Meatloaf and beans

This was my dinner last night - smoked meatloaf from Pete and purple hull beans from my garden. Both were excellent:


Speaking of garden, I've given up on trying to organize mine. Time to watch Darwinism at work. At this rate, my entire backyard will be a pumpkin patch by late October:

HHH 2011

This Saturday (yesterday) was the 30th annual Hotter 'N Hell Hundred bike ride in Wichita Falls, TX. This 2011 edition was indeed hotter than hell - what with it being the hottest ride on record with a high of 109 degrees.

Btw, I saw riders with number tags as high as 13,400 - so this year might have been a record year for number of riders also.

Unfortunately, Pete and Glenn didn't make it this year. Jeremy, however, did drive in from Plano and joined Jill and me in our room at the lovely La Quinta Inn (obligatory bad hotel room picture):


Expecting a hot ride this year, the organizers offered an optional 6:15AM start time for those riding the hundred mile route. This sounded good to Jeremy, as did starting from the actual starting line near downtown. Of course, this meant him getting up at 4:45AM, so he could join his friends at the start. As for me, I opted to start from La Quinta again this year and avoid the madness of the mass start. This allowed me to leave our room at 6:30 and still join in near the front of the pact:

I heard a yell from Jeremy somewhere in the pack around mile 20, but I didn't actually see him until I stopped at mile 40:


My next stop was at mile 50, where I eyed a sausage kraut with my name on it:


Up to this point, I'd been riding around 20 mph, but that started to fall off quickly as the day got hotter and as I headed towards Hell's Gate (around mile 60). Due to the heat, Hell's Gate was closed an hour early this year, but I was lucky (or not so lucky, depending on your point of view) enough to make the time cut-off:


Somewhere around mile 85, I found the only pond left in the area with water in it. Here's a picture of it, the barbed wire fence that protected it, and my commuter bike I rode this year (the fenders rattled non-stop on the chip-seal road):


Next up was the outlaw 98th mile beer stop. Glenn and I found this last year - it's a lawnmower repair shop that throws the biggest free party every year about 2 miles from the official HHH finish line. Like last year, as soon as I walked in, someone handed me a cold beer and directed me towards the sausage and beans:



I managed to cross the finish line around 2:00. I was pretty happy with my time, especially since I hadn't been on my bike since Betsy and I rode many months ago:


Jeremy had a run of bad luck with a couple of flat tires and a call from his boss at work to troubleshoot a software upgrade problem, so he rolled in after me. Afterward, we retreated to El Chico for very average Mexican food and giant margaritas:


As in years past, we took in a movie after dinner. This year: Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Nice escapist fun - and they hinted at how the next movie will start out.

Sunday, we stopped by Sweetie Pie's Ribeyes for a steak on our way back to Austin:


In previous years, we (Pete, Glenn, and I) would stop at Sweetie Pie's on our way to Wichita Falls, but this year we (really just me) were running late, so we stopped at a Cracker Barrel outside Fort Worth for dinner. I'm not sure why people eat there - I ordered the chicken and dumplings, and it was just horrible (Hoover's has nothing to worry about).

Anyway, that's it until next year.

And one to grow on, part 2

Thanks to my family and friends for the birthday wishes. The fact that I could talk a couple dozen of you to come out on a school night to help me celebrate at the Black Star Co-op really means a lot to me.







And thanks to Denise for taking these photos:






Btw, I managed to locate a basil plant in my back bed yesterday:


I'm still amazed how fast everything is growing:

And one to grow on

I made a trip to Houston this weekend to celebrate my birthday with my family. But before I get to that, I wanted to share another garden update.

The back garden has gone wild. I'm having a hard time locating my basil plants, but I know they're in there somewhere:


The purple hull beans are coming in nicely. I'll start picking them when the bees and wasps let me:


The pumpkin vines are flowering with these really cool yellow blossoms:


Friday night, Jill surprised me by cooking dinner for me while simultaneously cleaning out my fridge of misfit vegetables. Her creation of fried tofu with sauteed mushrooms, celery, onions, and bell peppers was excellent. She also made a nice tomato salad to go with it:



My birthday trip started at Benihana's for lunch Saturday. It was just the siblings, plus Ron and Joe (my brother-in-law):


Later that night, my parents took us out for Peking duck and a lot more Chinese food:



Afterward, we went home for cake and eggs (gotta have the lucky eggs):




I think my fortune sums up my weekend nicely:

Garden update

My backyard garden is thriving. It's a bit of a jungle out there. I really need to take some time to separate out the plants to reduce crowding. But for now, I'm just happy that the plants are happy. The soaker hoses have proven to be a huge time saver - I turn on the water when I take my morning shower, and off when I'm finished showering.

Btw, you may have noticed that I added 6 or 7 updates to my blog this morning. I back-dated them, so they'd be in chronological order (just realized you can do this with Blogger). I thought the individual posts would be easier to read than one giant post that aggregated the past couple of weeks.

Picnic

The thing I miss the most about living in Travis Heights is Stacy Park (technically, 2 things, as there are 2 parks - Big Stacy Park and Little Stacy Park). I just like the shaded green belt, the creek that runs along it, and the 2 pools that anchor the park.

Anyway, Jill and I wanted to have a picnic Sunday, so I chose Stacy Park for our destination. We waited until 7:PM to start, and with the clouds above, the weather was actually pretty pleasant. We had a nice spread of food. Jill, being the vegan, made fried chicken. Me, being the carnivore, made a vegan potato salad.

And we wore white, which is the proper attire for a Sunday picnic.

Monkey Nest

I've been wanting to try Red Rabbit's vegan donuts for some time now. They serve them at Monkey Nest (a new coffee shop on Burnet), so we decided to check the place out Saturday. The maple glazed with candied walnuts was our favorite, but the lemon sugar and the coffee glazed were also good.

Bowling

Went on a mid-week outing to the Dart Bowl. Jill hadn't bowled in 22 years (since she was 17), so an adventure was guaranteed. She's a bit competitive, so me besting her in all three games wasn't great (in all fairness, I did bowl a lot in my previous life). But she did have fun. Here, we're showing our game faces.