Weekend rewind

Shooting back to the weekend here since there were some bright spots of note. Friday night we took off to Kansas City to visit some friends. With Bone Bender having been moved to April 18th, we had all ready scheduled to go down and stay so we just kept our plans. Luckily the construction on I-35 in downtown KC wasn't nearly as bad as expected and we still made it to our friends place on time even though we left over an hour later than we anticipated. From there it was a quick turn around to a killer BBQ joint called Oklahoma Joes. Great food and cheap for the amount of food you get. We met up with a few old friends that are holdovers from my car racing/playing days and had a great time catching up on things. Back to our friend's house after that where we put Corley down for bed and then killed some time with a few drinks and playing a couple games before hitting the sack.

Saturday had us up at a relatively tame hour and off to breakfast to join up with another couple friends that couldn't meet for dinner. Chatting and catching up ensued as usual. On leaving the restaurant we got a great compliment. The friends that we stayed overnight with made the observation that we'd done a pretty good job of raising Corley in regards to her speech, manners, and general disposition when paired up against the other 2 kids in her age range that had been present at the meals. Made Miranda and I pretty proud.

After we bid our friends adieu, we headed off to Union Station in downtown KC. We hit the Science City which is similar to our own Science Center, but personally, I thought this was way cooler. They had a larger variety of activities and just cooler things in general for the kids to try their hands at. Corley had a ball checking out the various attractions.

After Science City, we finished wandering around Union Station and headed over to Crown Center which is connected by skywalk to do some shopping and grab some lunch. While at Crown Center, there were definitely a few things of interest. There was an OZ display going on celebrating some anniversary of the movie release. It was crawling with people, but we managed to wiggle our way through. Corley thought the trees were pretty interesting.

There also happened to be an anime convention going on at one of the connected hotels. There was every type of costume you could imagine and what appeared to be an overload of scantily clad underage tweener girls and a number of older-creepy guys. You make the call, but I think one group probably attracts the other. I didn't have the stones to straight up stop and shoot some of the costumes, but I'm sure you can imagine.

The afternoon was really nice when we headed out so we opted to walk outside through a couple park areas on our way back to the car.

A few short hours later and we were back at home grabbing some much needed rest from the beginning of the weekend.

I got up early Sunday to join a few roadies for a "zone 2" ride out towards Van Meter. Apparently Zone 2 is code for kill it as long as you can and then back it down a bit from there. As we hit the hills out towards Grand on UTE rd, I thought seriously the coffee and bar I'd had for breakfast would be making it's second appearance of the morning. Luckily we swept through a housing area to take a look at Tony Nichols latest project house and I got my wits back about me. After that it was mostly a game of sitting in and watch Tony show off. The highlight of which was him passing us uphill while pedalling with 1 leg, showoff.

After almost 2 hours in "zone 2" it was time for something a bit more relaxing as I met up with the gravellers for a jaunt out on the Booneville loop. The pace was much more mellow as we rolled out and having been properly warmed up all ready, I hit the hills with a little more gusto than the rest and got to Booneville with enough time to make a quick pit stop at Waveland West.

MMM, warmth, gravel, and sun. How could you not be smiling?!
I parted company at this point needing to head back in time for Miranda to get to work. I cranked up the wick a bit and managed to add a full MPH to my average by the time I got back to the truck. 60 miles and a shade over 3 hours of riding for the morning. I was one happy camper.

Not one to waste a gorgeous afternoon, I took Corley out to the park for the first time this year. It took me forever to find the park entrance since I'd only ridden to it before, but eventually we made our way in and she played for close to an hour before we packed it in. A great way to cap off the weekend.

Leg breaker weekend

Ahh, the weekend. The time for rest, relaxation, and breaking legs? That was the recipe for Saturday morning. Only an endurance pace ride for Pete, Lou, Pig, and a couple other boys in black but that meant I was in for some hurt. I haven't had nearly enough time on the bike lately, but signed on anyway. Damn boys, I know you like to go early, but a 5:45 start time from the west side means a 4:30 wake up call for me. I rolled my bleary eyed ass out of bed and got everything ready to roll. I was greeted by a foggy and humid morning rolling in.

The original call was for 80 miles on the Winterset loop, but I was only planning to hang as long as I could and then limp it back home on empty. We actually rolled out a bit of a different route heading the reverse of how I typically ride it. We rolled through Orilla, down to Norwalk, and then through Martensdale. I hung pretty well into Martensdale and then it was discussed to shorten the ride to St Mary's and back. Somewhere around this point Lou made the comment that at the front of the pace line we should be drilling it since we were able to recover in the draft. I laughed out loud at that one considering my heart rate was averaging 170-175 in the draft and 180+ up front. We hit the first big roller south of Martensdale and I popped half way up running the heart rate to 190. I'd been pushing hard enough long enough that I didn't push on through and fell off the back quickly. I hit one more roller headed south and turned for home figuring they'd catch me somewhere around the edge of town.

As I turned I checked my average speed and made a mental note to try to stay on the gas and keep my pace up. I rolled in through town and headed back to the parking lot. It was a zoo with everyone loading up for the spectacle that is Ragbrai. Luckily I had enough forethought to park at the far end of the lot so I was out of the way enough to get out easily. Micah showed back up about 10 minutes after I got there and let me know the others stopped for coffee downtown. I headed out to go meet them. As we headed out from coffee, Lou offered up the second half of his cup since he was still on 2 wheels and I was headed home. Not one to let a good cup go to waste, I took it home. Damn! I'm not sure what his order was, but I was like a squirrel on crack when I got home!!

The rest of the weekend was pretty nice as well. We got a little family time in along with some house cleaning for the afternoon and then dropped little one off at Grandma's. We hit a nice dinner at Latin King before we headed out in search of some commercial property. We're seriously thinking of opening a storefront for our lingerie business. Things are starting to move for us locally with our product getting put out in a few locations, so it's time to think about doing some of our own sales.

We headed down to the science center after that to catch Dark Night in IMAX. The movie kicked some serious ass, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend seeing it in IMAX. There's just too much sensory input and while it can be processed, it isn't the same as being able to catch it all on a regular screen. Definitely check out the movie either way.

I actually slept in a bit this morning since Corley spent the night with grandma. I hit work for a few hours and tried to get some stuff done. I wasn't alone in my Sunday slave labor. I picked up Corley after her nap and decided we'd go do some playing this afternoon. Squirrel apparently still has his text ring tone shut off and I didn't hear back from them so we headed out on our own. I hooked the trailer up to the Bianchi for the first time. We rolled to the grocery store to pick up a few frosty adult refreshments and some treats for later as well. After dinner, we took another short ride up to the park.



Corley LOVES to swing. She'll tell you that's what she wants to do if you ever give her an option to go do something. We swung and did the slides for a while and headed back to the house. I took a little bit of a detour to get some hills in dragging the trailer. Talk about a leg breaker! Nothing like dragging an extra 40 pounds up a hill with you.



It was a good thing I took that long way home. My first real freegan find while riding. There was a nice shiny Craftsman wrench with a ratchet box end. Sweet! Another block to home and it was time to wind the weekend down. Hopefully this week will bring some sanity back to work. I'm headed to the job site on Tuesday and while things don't seem too over the top right this second, I'll be holding my breath until I head home on Tuesday night. I might try to sneak in a ride up there with one of the owner's reps who happens to be a triathlete.

Good times

The weekend is a bit hazy, but overall was pretty decent. Saturday morning we were up relatively early and headed off to the zoo to catch one more show with the elephants before they left town. We picked up a friend's daughter and took her as well. The girls had an awesome time watching the elephants put on their show. We had a few sprinkles that threatened to get us wet, but luckily they were just a threat only. We buzzed through a few more exhibits and then it was time to head out for lunches and such.

I headed off to work after swining by the house for quick bite of lunch. I'm still pegging out miles on the new scooter. As of this morning I'm around 200 in just a shade over a week. I spent a 5 hour chunk prepping a single question set for the job I'm working on. Apparently the designer and architect don't ever talk to each other and I'm about the only one checking to see if items all work together which definitely isn't part of my job. So, after that was done, I couldn't really make any headway and it was time to head home.

After Corley's bed time we kicked back and watched part of a horror flick called "The Eye". I only watched part of it as I was due to get up early for a nice long ride with some friends. I rousted myself out of bed and was just a minute or two past our designated 7 AM start time when I reached their house. Hmm, that's odd, usually they're ready and waiting for me. So, I knocked and knocked again. Finally, I tapped on the glass in the door. Finally a bleary eyed buddy opens the door and regrets to inform me that an email was fired off after midnight last night that they weren't rolling with me this morning. Damn! I headed back out on the road and as the sun was warming my back I stopped to ponder.

Yup, I bailed on the ride. I really wanted to go, but something was nagging me to stay back and do other things. I'm not sure if I just thought going out on the ride by myself was being too selfish or if I just didn't want to be out on my own. In any case, I headed home, peeled out of the spandex, and made arrangements to help some friends out with a new swingset they were building. I spent the morning and a couple hours in the afternoon on that project helping with the heavyweight portions of the work. I had to head out early so Miranda could go to work.

Coley got up from her nap and had been begging to go swing all day. How could I resist? We loaded up and hit Ewing park for some good dirty fun. We swung, we slid, we shuffled our feet in the gravel, and had a great time.



We rounded out the night playing in the cool AC before hitting bed. Couldn't have asked for a much better Sunday.