My friends are stateside from Qatar, so I had a chance to catch up with them this weekend while they visited family in Fredericksburg.
Saturday, John wanted to ride the Willow City Loop. He said something about missing the hills when he's in the Middle East. I was happy to oblige, although I don't miss hills at all. Pete, Glenn and Dustin joined in to share the pain. Thanks for driving, Glenn.
The loop was only 55 miles long, but it had lots of climbing. LOTS of climbing. And sun and wind just made it that much more magical. I will admit, the ride was pretty awesome, and the views were spectacular.
I think John was sandbagging us (pun intended) most of the day. He rode near the back of our group until we were about 15 miles from town, then he left us in the dust (pun also intended).
Lunch followed at Hondo's where I had the most obscenely large hamburger ever.
Stopped off to grab some peaches on the way back to Austin. Perfect timing - ripe and juicy.
Sunday, I spent the day at the Llano River catching up. Hot sun, cold beer, and chicken enchiladas. Nice. Not so nice was running out of gas in Castell with no gas station within 20 miles. Luckily, our host for the day had a near full 5 gallon gas can that she was kind enough to loan me.
Coming home with a big bouquet of basil was an added bonus. I have them in water to root. Hopefully, these will make it longer than my last 2 attempts.
If you've ridden with me recently, you may have noticed the fancy carbon rear wheel I'm sporting. After my first ride, I thought the decals on the rim clashed a bit with the minimalist carbon/titanium color scheme. Luckily, the decals peeled off easily by hand (as opposed to Seven decals that need scraping and a good dose of Goof-Off to remove).
A side benefit from the nude carbon look is the substantial weight savings I realized. Yes, that's one whole gram. Keep in mind, that's just for the rear wheel. Imagine the savings for BOTH front and rear wheels. Purely a guess, but I'm thinking it's somewhere in the neighborhood of 2 grams.
Now, there's been much discussion over the years regarding the effects of lighter weight wheels. If you study the equations (and more equations), many say that it's pretty negligible, and perhaps only a benefit when accelerating from a standing stop (like climbing a steep hill). Who really has the time to study these equations. I prefer to live in a fantasy land where my one gram weight savings means the difference between making it up Mount Bonnell or not.
Btw, Inception is showing in IMAX over at the Bob Bullock Museum. Need to find some time to get over there. I'm not sure how you can spin a whole city like that. The equations must be complicated.
Part of my job at work is to test the software we write that creates ePubs. Recently, I was reviewing some NY Times publications that we built. While scanning to see if everything looked ok, I came across this op-ed column by Camille Paglia regarding middle class sex (for those of you not registered with NYT, here's a PDF version). I found it amusing - much more so than the first book of hers that I read back in 1992. That book was polarizing drivel meant to shock. She's seems to have mellowed and matured a bit over the years. Thankfully.
I'm taking a couple of days off from work, so I went for a run this morning. A trio of songs accompanied me.
Robert Smith looks a lot like the Heath Ledger Joker in the last video. Oooh, scary...
Pete and I rode out to Elgin last Sunday. It was a nice day for a ride - not too humid and a little overcast. Around Decker Lake we rode in a coned off lane. Didn't think too much about it at the time, but on the way home we realized it was a protected lane for a local triathlon - the Couples Tri, I believe. Regardless, it was nicer to be riding with other cyclist than with cars zipping by.
Since I was already sweaty, after the ride I decided to repair the cracks in the concrete skirting around the house. The cracks are the result of leveling my house a few months back - when they raised the front of my house 2 inches.
Unfortunately, a 60 lb bag of mortar was the smallest I could find at Home Depot. A bit of a waste, since I only needed 15 lbs or so. It's not my best job, but it certainly looks better than before.
I left work early Wednesday, so I could meet up with a delivery person at the house. They had a batch of fresh baked cookies for me - courtesy of my new employer. A welcome wagon gift, I suppose.
While I was home working from the rear office. I hear this loud crack, followed by lots of flying sparks and a generous amount of smoke. Startled me for a minute. Steeling my nerves, I ventured outside to find a large hackberry branch had fallen on my utility lines. The riser from my electrical box had been torn off, and my electric meter had burned up. Lots of fun.
The electric company was quick to send someone over to assess the damage. They cut off the power and told me to contact an electrician. Cindy was nice to supply me with a referral, but he couldn't stop by until Thursday noon. I spent Wednesday night at Alamo Drafthouse and The Karate Kid. It gave the house time to cool down.
The electrician and his crew spent 7 hours repairing the damage Thursday, but they finished too late to call the city inspector over. So I spent Thursday night at Eric and Gaby's. Thanks for the chili.
Finally, today, the power came back on about 1:00. Have power but no cable or internet. How am I going to keep up with the tour? I may have to go old school and do something not 'connected.' Oh, the horror... the horror...
I'm glad to see someone around here likes fennel. I took these picture over the weekend. The plant was stripped bare this morning. That's ok - I hate fennel. The only reason I have it is because a friend thought it was dill.
Btw, Ron came into town for a brief visit Saturday. We saw Knight and Day and had a chance to run around Town Lake. He thought the weather was great. I thought it was miserably humid. The movie was entertaining, however.
