It's been brought to my attention that I've yet again lapsed on updates. Quick synopis of recent happenings: we took the kids to Carlsbad for a quick vacation to see the caverns and to meet up with my parents, Jody traveled more, bike rides were made, Rowan started back to school (1st grade now), and I finally got the garage organized and have gotten back into woodworking.

Currently we're into the full onset of autumn. We got an ever slight dusting of snow the other day with a decent chance of some tonight. Loveland has already opened up, of course it's rock board conditions right now, but it's looking like this year's early season will be better than last. I've been procrastinating on picking up my season pass but it's about time to get it.

Yet again I have to make excuses for not getting to my backlog of photos. Too bad I'm too snobbish to just use a point and shoot as it really is unbelievably easier than requiring the whole digital darkroom approach. As we get into our cold weather "shut in" days it'll give me something to do at least.

As Life Without Jody continues, not only am I expected to feed the kids and occasionally rinse them off with a garden hose, but today I have to take Rowan (and of course Fáelán) to Chuck E. Cheese for a friend of Rowan's birthday party.  I don't know exactly what I did in my prior life to warrant this fate, but I suspect I might have been a Hun.

I just hope that when Jody comes home to find me still curled up on the floor, rocking myself and tunelessly humming while the kids are running around chasing the emaciated dog around while wielding steak knives that she at least has the decency to feel guilty.

Alright, alright, yes I haven't updated in a while.  I've really got to get on the backlog of photos.  I have a bunch from when we took the kids to a historical amusement park and from the local water park.  No new ride photos though, I've been buckling down and doing conditioning work before I set back out on one of the real trails here.  Hopefully this time won't be as humbling.

Jody is off in New Orleans this week for "work".  So yet again, I'm at home playing Mr. Mom while she's out drinking and carousing in the Big Easy.  If you want to donate to my abused husband fund, feel free to.  My paypal account is under liquidmantis[crazyAtSymbolHere]gmail.com.  I suppose I should add contact info to the web site for general purposes, eh?  How else are any of my thousands of viewers going to give me any feedback or witty commentary?

We're now days from May yet it's 40ºF and snowing.  This is actually a nice boon as I haven't been able to really do anything outside recently.  Rather than my usual barefootedness I spent this winter in wool-lined house shoes or insulated shoes when out so my foot muscles have atrophied.  Then I wisely jumped back into my old conditioning routine now that spring is bringing about the sloughing off of my winter hibernation lethargy and I was working out barefooted, managing to get another stress fracture in my foot.  It's mild and I've been a lot better about staying off it than I was last time so hopefully it'll only set me back a few weeks (It's been two weeks now and it's feeling a lot better).  This next winter I definitely need to be better about keeping my training motivation up when the mercury start trying to hide in the bulb.

That's it for now; I just wanted to knock the dust off.  I'm still lagging on the photo processing but hopefully I'll get some new stuff added in the next few days.

I took advantage of some late season powder and got in a good ride yesterday. It was unbelievable how good it felt to get out. I've been stuck inside with really no energy due to this flu and chest congestion for just over two weeks and we had company prior to that so it's been almost a month since my last snowboard session.  Loveland was ready for me too, giving the best conditions I've seen out there this season. They've cut down on the amount of grooming they're doing and the late season traffic is really light. Amazing powder and packed powder everywhere making for smooth, quiet rides.

Here's the Google Map chronicling the ride:

Loveland 4.08.08

And the Google Earth version, which handles photos stacked at the same location:

Loveland 4.08.08 Google Earth file

There's some wonkiness with the GPS log unfortunately. I apparently accidently paused the GPS so I missed some runs and caused a weird teleport line when the GPS resumed. I'm too lazy right now to manually split the tracklog to get rid of it. Feel free to ask for a refund.

Hopefully I'll get another ride or two this season before they close. If not, this was certainly a great ride to close out the season and transition to mountain biking season.

As usual, here's the Google Map page:

Golden, CO - 4.04.2008

And here is the Google Earth version, now even complete with speed, heart rate, and elevation 3D overlays.

Golden, CO - 4.04.2008 - Google Earth file