Back in the Paceline

After a dreary and rainy Saturday, I was really looking forward to getting back on the bike today. The forecast was calling for clear skies, nice temperatures, and a stiff wind. The cold front that had brought all the rain would be in control, and that always means beautiful crisp winter weather around here.

I have to admit, though, that it was not without some trepidation that I loaded the bike into the car early Sunday morning. It was the end of November and the month had not been kind to me, training-wise. I'm sure I missed nearly two solid weeks of riding this month, and if I had any question about whether or not it mattered, I had only to grab a handful of the flab accumulating around my waist. So the bottom line was that I didn't really know if this long ride in the country would turn out to have been overly optimistic. Only one way to find out, though.....

Over at Starbucks, I poured four packets of turbinado sugar into my cup of hot Thanksgiving Blend just as Mignon walked in the door. Some of the other guys had said they might stop by on the way to the ride, but as it turned out we were the only ones, so we headed off to the northshore just after 7:00. She seemed a little worried that she might be getting in over her head on this ride, but I was pretty sure she'd do fine.

Despite a rather strong wind, today's winter training ride attracted fourteen riders, a few of whom were determined to make it a small-chainring day. A few others, though, had other ideas. It wasn't too long before the pace started to creep up and it became clear that we would have a fairly fast ride. Fortunately, everyone was happy to regroup at the intersections, so I guess the various training plans weren't too badly disturbed. As for myself, I was pleasantly surprised that I felt pretty good throughout. The last half of the 65+ mile ride featured a number of fast sections where the group split, but I don't think the gaps ever got to be more than a couple of minutes and nobody ended up riding alone. I arrived back at the car feeling quite satisfied, and I think that if someone had suggested doing another twenty miles I probably would have tagged along. It likely would have been a mistake, of course.

Tomorrow it's back to work. Last week sure did go by fast!

Vacation Over - Re-entry in Progress

Almost a full week off the bike, eating at restaurants, and spending obscene amounts of money at the "happiest place on earth." Last Sunday, with the car fully loaded yet without a bike, we headed east on I-10 in the general direction of Disney World. The Wife's long-awaited vacation to never-never land was underway. I had checked around a bit to see if riding would be feasible, but what I learned convinced me that I'd best just write off the whole week and try to make the best of it. The next six days would be the longest uninjured stretch of non-exercise I've had in a long time. Well, unless you count endless hours of walking and standing.

We started out slow, hitting Epcot around mid-day on Monday. Of all the Disney parks, Epcot is definitely my favorite. One of the first things I saw when we got off of the ferry from the hotel was a neat little display down by the water with an old bike. I'm probably one of the few people who actually noticed it. Later on, I would be surprised by the number of authentic old bikes used as props at Animal Kingdom. Some were a bit out of context, but most people wouldn't know. The crowds are a bit thinner, the attractions a bit more sophisticated, and practically every "country" is selling wine and/or beer by the glass. That certainly helps smooth out the whole experience.

It had been a long time since we'd visited Mickey Land, although not all that much had changed. The Epcot fireworks were even better than I remembered, and since The Daughter's roommate was in a wheelchair with a broken foot (she got spiked playing rugby, broke some bones in her foot, and then ran a marathon the next weekend before getting it x-rayed), we often got to avoid waiting in line. The Daughter had mapped out the plan for the four days we'd be there. You have to have a plan, you know. For the most part, it worked out pretty well. We hit all of the big rides and shows without spending too much time standing in line, and the weather was quite cooperative the whole time. As for me, well, there's just way too much "retail" and predatory pricing going on there for my own comfort. The rest of the crew, however, spent hours searching for just the right sweat-shirt or whatever. This is something I will never understand. I walk through these shops, look around, realize there is nothing there that I need, and leave to look for the next wine bar.

Diner in "Germany" was pretty much fun. The test track ride at Epcot was good, as was one of the big roller-coaster rides at discovery island (or somewhere around there), and the stunt car show at Hollywood Studios was pretty impressive. It's pretty much all a blur now, though. And there's just no getting around how spectacular the castle is at Magic Kingdom at night when it's all lit up for the holidays. All-in-all it was a nice change of pace that was probably worth the two days of driving. If I had been able to ride for a couple of hours each morning, it would have been perfect. As it was, however, I probably gained five pounds last week that will take me until March to lose - if I'm lucky. For the truly curious, there are photos.

So tomorrow I will attempt to re-enter reality by way of the deep end, in this case a long group ride in the country. I'm not expecting it to be easy. I am also scheming to start doing a little bit of work in the gym in the evenings after work. Maybe a couple of rounds on the weight machines to work on my pathetically weak core, and perhaps a spin class or two.

We can hope.

In the meantime, I have a lot of stuff to catch up on. The LAMBRA meeting is this weekend and I still have to arrange for some food and stuff, plus I need to work out an agenda so that it doesn't turn into a big pointless gripe session. There are always those who want to add more classes and categories to the points series. Some want to require promoters to offer a long list of separate races. It would be nice. It would be especially nice if those people would actually promote races themselves. Yeah, I'm a dreamer.....

A Slow One

It was cold and windy this morning, and I was rather unenthusiastic about riding when the 5:50 am alarm sounded, but I had to ride. It will be a week before I can ride again. I was thinking about bringing the bike along on this trip to Disneyworld, but everything I've heard tells me it would just be an exercise in futility (or suicide). So the bike will stay at home and I'll have to improvise with the "health club" at the Disney hotel where we'll be staying. Crap.

So getting back to this morning, I guess it was that cold and wind that kept the pace so slow. Eventually a few of us rolled off the front at the blazing speed of 21 mph. I kept looking behind me, but the lazy group just kept getting farther and farther behind. By the time we got rolling again on Hayne Blvd., Diego was on the front, where he stayed for the next few miles towing our little group. I was expecting the group to come blasting past at any moment, but I guesst they were all feeling kind of lazy today.

What? Friday Already?

It has not been a very good week riding-wise. As usual, I'm having a difficult time adjusting to the colder morning temperatures, especially since they always coincide with the late-fall motivational void I feel this time of year. On top of that, work has put a little kink in my plans the last couple of days, which is to say I've been out to eat too much and out to ride too little. I did make it out Wednesday and Thursday, and both rides were good, but I feel heavy and sluggish and generally lazy when I'm stuffed into the knee-warmers and thick jerseys and shoe-covers.

I woke up this morning and started doing the math, trying to convince myself I could get in a ride and still make the morning meeting. I admit, it was a half-hearted effort. Had it been April, I probably would have come to a different conclusion, but on this day in November, with the temperature in the 40s and the wind blowing the trees around, my Boolean logic quickly yielded only a predictable "false."

My timing today was such that if I'd ridden I would have had to rush in order to make my meeting, but since I didn't ride , I was left with an extra 45 minutes or so, which, despite some nagging guilt, was happily spent at the local Starbucks checking email. I was surprised that the temperature hardly rose at all during the day, thanks to a cold front that came through in the early morning. At mid-afternoon on a sunny day it's still only 54F, which is pretty chilly by my standards, and we might even dip into the 30s here in town tonight. Maybe I'll have to break down and try to light the pilot light on the furnace tonight! At least it's warmer than it is Up in Alaska where Jill has just self-published a book on her exploits (Ghost Trails). I got my copy yesterday. If you enjoy reading about someone's experiences doing things generally considered to be absolutely crazy, this book's for you.

Deer Season

12:49 a.m. and I'm walking back from the kitchen in the dark after making a late-night refrigerator raid.

The cellphone beeps with a text message. It's from The Daughter.
Somewhere between Minneapolis and Iowa City.
"hit a deer...car looks bad. awesome. still 2.5 hours to get home."

Sheesh! Luckily the car didn't end up in the ditch or upside-down. As an added bonus, it was still driveable. She stops at the next service station and does some duct tape work to secure a loose piece of plastic on the fender. Both of the Jeep Liberty's headlights survived and the deer didn't come through the windshield, but the side marker light is MIA, as is part of the fender, and the passenger door and sill are smashed. The little Min-Pin's doggie seat restraint did its job, though, and no airbags deployed. Not too bad of an outcome as deer collisions go. Much of the interstate up there in deer country was apparently awash in deer blood last night, and they later straddled another victim that was in the middle of the interstate. Good thing that Jeep has a lot of ground clearance. So the plan for her to drive in to NOLA this weekend for a little vacation to Disneyworld got amended at the cost of a couple of round-trip plane tickets. And I didn't get much sleep.

It was still pretty chilly this morning. I went out dressed warmly with the plan to ride really easy. My back was still hurting and my quads were sore from the weekend rides, so a rest day was definitely in order. Up on the levee there was only John, and once we got rolling I told him I was going to drop back into his draft to give my legs some recovery time. He was trying to make up for some lost riding time and so I sat on his wheel as he pulled me all the way out to Williams Blvd. at 20-21 mph. By then I was warmed up a little bit and since we came back a little more slowly we rode mostly side-by-side. I have a feeling my legs will still be feeling Sunday's ride on Tuesday, though.

Winter Ride Complications

I had been looking forward to this morning's ride. The forecast was for cold and crisp weather with clear skies and a moderate wind. Basically, it was the very definition of a winter training ride. The email list, however, had been oddly silent this week, except for a lone note from Jason announcing the meeting location and time. Saturday evening, before rushing off to a rather nice party by one of the Tulane psychiatrists, I'd sent out an email letting people know that if they wanted a ride, I'd be at the usual Starbucks at 7 am. Early the next morning I filled my bag with winter riding stuff and headed off for a hot coffee, arriving with enough time for a few minutes in one of the cushy chairs. By 7:00, nobody else had arrived, so I fired up the old Volvo and pointed her north on the Causeway. With the temperature in the upper 30s, I looked down the long bridge as the sun came over my right shoulder, set the cruise control on 65 mph, and thought, "here I go again." Indeed, it's been a whole bunch of years that I've been doing these winter rides in the country, and every year I wonder if this will be my last. I mean, it would be so easy to skip these rides and sink into the winter doldrums, only to suddenly realize, some time around late January, that I'm hopelessly out of shape.

So anyway, we had either nine or twelve riders today (I think I miscounted somewhere along the line), as we rode slowly into the chilly wind. Luckily, by the time we started at 8:00, it was already warming up, so the cold was never a problem. What was a problem, however, was my back. I'm not sure what I did yesterday to deserve it, but I'd obviously pulled something in my back, as the ride went on it only got worse. Even so, it was never all that bad -- more of an annoyance really. When we turned off of Tung Road onto Lee Road, I was glad to find that the road had been completely repaved with nice smooth asphalt. None of that damed chip-seal crap - this was genuine black asphalt. Even better, it looked like they had added a foot or so to each lane. I was really enjoying the silky-smooth ride over the watchtower hill and the long descent to the River at Enon. Then the ride started to get kind of complicated. There were the usual "nature breaks" and resulting slowdowns and re-groupings, and then there was a flat tire, and then when things started getting faster the group kind of came apart. When we tried to regroup at Plainview there seemed to be a lot of confusion about how many riders we were missing. Eventually we continued on with, as best I can determine, everyone we started with. After a rather brisk ride back into Enon, we stopped at the store for a minute to refill water bottles and regroup, and at that point we realized someone was missing. So Keith rode backwards on the course looking for the missing rider and about the same time most of the rest of the group continued on toward the watchtower hill. I don't think they realized that Keith was going the other way. Three of us lagged behind, looking frequently over our shoulders to see if Keith was in sight yet. Well, that "looking over the shoulder" thing didn't work out so well for one of the newer riders. He dropped a wheel over the edge of the road and went down pretty hard. He was at the back of our trio at the time and all I heard was the loud "smack" of a helmet hitting the pavement. I immediately thought, "that doesn't sound good." On the plus side, by the time I'd gotten back to him he was already back on his feet and looking relatively uninjured. Jason straightened out his brake lever and we continued on our way, but a minute later he said, "I think I might have broken my collarbone." We suggested he turn back to Enon and wait for us to come back with a car, but he said he was OK. So we continued on.

The main group was by then many minutes up the road, and we were beginning to be worried that we still couldn't see Keith or the missing rider. Then a motorcycle came up alongside us and slowed down for a chat with Jason. He said there was a rider back there who was looking for us. So Jason turned back to look for Keith who was missing because he had turned back to look for the other guy, and we continued on to the next intersection to wait, meeting up with Steve who by then was wondering where we were and had turned back to look for us while we were were waiting for Jason who was looking for Keith who had been looking for the missing guy.

Finally Keith and Jason rode up, having never located the missing rider (who apparently had told one of the guys in the lead group that he would just ride in at his own pace). It was all very complicated. I think Keith later said that the missing rider had somehow appeared back at the parking lot ahead of us, so perhaps he got a ride. With all the complications, it turned out to be a fairly easy ride, speed-wise, although personally I was definitely hurting. If the collarbone turns out to be broken, that'll make eight, I think, for the year. Weird. Definitely weird.

Winter Winds

In what would prove to be the theme for this weekend, Saturday's Giro Ride was a little unusual. A cold front had come through the night before, bringing with it a big drop in temperature and a nasty north wind. As I prepared to ride out to the lakefront I bounced around the house looking for the winter riding gear that I'd so happly stashed away so many months earlier. The result, of course, was that I was running a bit late. That wouldn't have been too bad, except that I was riding straight into a chilly north wind. Somehow, I arrived at Lakeshore Drive in time, and turned west to meet the group that I knew should be coming along in a few minutes. So I rode, and rode, and rounded a curve to find Lakeshore drive awash in slippery mud and water. I rode a bit more and glanced at my watch. Damn! The group must have taken the alternate route, bypassing the lakefront. I cautiously turned around in the slick mud, now splattered all over the bike, and soon saw Brent and another rider coming my way. I turned them around and we headed east along the lake hoping to catch the group somewhere up the road. As we came around the curve at Harrison Ave., we saw them just ahead. For reasons unknown, they had turned back onto Lakeshore Drive. Considering the wind and unfamiliar cold air, I was expecting the ride to be pretty civilized. Once again, I was wrong. Shorly after we hit Hayne Blvd., the pressure was on and it didn't let up until we'd reached the turnaround over half an hour later. As usual, we had a nice paceline going for a while on Chef Highway, but, also as usual, it started to disintegrate as riders burned out and drifted back to the safety of the pack. Also, as usual, the return trip was a lot slower. These guys never seem to learn to pace themselves! The wind was absolutely brutal all day, and there were a couple of gusts as I crossed the Seabrook Bridge that I seriously thought would blow me right off the bike. At least I had a nice tailwind on the way home!

Didn't Feel Right

I must be going through a "feeling lousy" phase. It's funny the way you'll feel up one day and down the next with no particularly good explanation for either. Today was one of those days when I just didn't feel "right."

Yesterday started out kind of normally enough, but the stage had already been set for a break from routine. The forecast had been calling for a 70% chance of rain, and when I checked the radar before heading out I could see a line of storms approaching slowly from the west. They were all a good 100 miles away, so I was pretty sure we'd make it through the training ride with dry feet (we did), but the remainder of the day was not looking too good. I wouldn't have been too concerned, except that I had a meeting downtown at 11:00, and as best I could tell that was about when the rain would arrive. Rather than ride to the office and then take off an hour later in the rain for downtown, I decided to do my morning email chores at home where I would be closer to the meeting location. The whole time, though, I was dreading the thought of having to ride down to the LSU Health Sciences Center in a pouring rainstorm and then having to endure what promised to be a long meeting with wet feet, looking like something the cat had dragged in. I even considered skipping the meeting altogether, but I had a feeling it would be an important one that I really shouldn't miss. So I watched the radar carefully and then left a little bit early to be sure I made it there before the rain. The meeting, as I had expected, lasted until nearly 2:30 and had it's share of fireworks, and as I walked out of the conference room I anxiously looked for a window in order to check on the weather. Surprise! Although it had obviously rained a bit during the meeting, it was no longer raining, so I happily made the ride back uptown to the office, pleased that I had successfully eluded the rain three times in one day. Ahhh, but the rain gods were not finished with me yet. I was halfway home that evening when the rain started, but it was too little too late and for once I snubbed my nose at the rain gods.

So after feeling pretty good all day yesterday, I inexplicably fell asleep around 9 pm that night. It was a sign. When I awoke, the first thing I thought was "damn, my left knee feels sore." Sore knees are not normal for me -- ever. To make matters worse, I felt tired and achy, and there was a little voice in my head telling me to skip the long Thursday ride. Of course I ignored it.

Luckily, the ride this morning was smooth and steady and although something still felt vaguely wrong, I can't say I felt particularly bad. My knee continued to feel a little heavy, and my feet never quite warmed up despite the moderate temperature, but by the end I was glad I'd ridden. So who knows? Maybe I'm fighting off a little bug or something. It's been said that life is like a box of chocolates. Sometimes if feels a lot more like a roller coaster ride -- immediately after eating a box of chocolates -- all with squishy centers.

Training Groove

"I'm overdressed," I thought to myself. I was barely a mile from home and although I felt quite comfortable at the time, I knew that in an hour I'd be hot. That happens a lot this time of year when 55 degrees can feel cool one day and balmy the next. Better to be overdressed and on the bike than hiding under the covers waiting for Spring, though. I hadn't been paying attention to the weather forecasts, but if I had I'd have known that they were predicting highs in the upper 70s all the way until Friday when the next little cool front is supposed to arrive. Even then I don't think we'll see anything you could really call "cold" for at least a week.

So jumping into the long levee ride this morning was fairly painless, although I sure felt like I'd been off the bike for more than a week. I probably should have done more work on the way out, but once when I dropped back I ended up behind Rob who was riding his PowerCranks and letting people get back in ahead of him. I convinced myself that it would be good to ease myself back into the training groove by staying in the draft for a while. It was a lie, of course, but it's easy to rationalize about those sorts of things in November. Way down at the turnaround the group broke out in a chorus of "Happy Birthday" for Big Richard. With a little bit of a headwind on the way back my effort level gradually increased from "blatant wheelsucking" to "not sucking too badly," and so by the end I was starting to feel like I was back in the groove.

I've got a to-do list right now that's about a mile long. You know, the kind of list that's so overwhelming that it elicits occupational paralysis. Where to start? I figured I'd go in order of priority, so naturally a blog update went up to the top of the list. Oh, at the conference I got a discount card for 53x11 coffee (one of USAC's Affinity Partners), so on a whim I decided to order a couple of bags. I like their attitude. You should check out their video. My gourmet coffee review will follow once the post office delivers, although I may have to wait a few days until it gets really cold because coffee really doesn't taste right to me until winter. My choices? The Chain Breaker and The Big Ring. Gotta love it.

That Guy at the Airport

Sunday at the USAC conference was the day of the chip. There was a presentation by AMB (who just bought Champion Chip) and another by Winning Time. I liked Winning Time's presentation better. They seemed a little more approachable for some reason, and their presentation got right down to business, homing in on the main issues for bike race chip timing. AMB started out with a bunch of chest-pounding about how they were so big and how they were the choice of NASCAR, and then justified the price of the system and its $100 chips by pointing out that bikes are expensive. No kidding? Apparently my own bike racing expenditures fall far short of the norm. Somehow their pitch didn't ring true to me, although I have little doubt that their system will reliably capture chip codes and times as needed, especially if you buy the extra $3,000 worth of software that they forgot to mention. It would be great if LAMBRA could buy one of these systems, where the starting price is in the $7,000 neighborhood (not counting the chips), but the idea of forcing our promoters to use the system, training people to use it properly, and of course passing the cost along to the riders in the form of higher entry fees (and chip purchases or rentals) still seems a little harsh for the smallish races we have around here. Having someone start up a business doing chip timing for bike races would eliminate the initial cost, but I'm having a hard time seeing how it would break even considering the number of races and riders we have in LAMBRA. Anyway, it was interesting and I came away convinced that in a few years these timing systems will be the norm in cycling. Which one? I dunno. What will they cost? I dunno. Will the chip that works for LAMBRA races work for Florida races? I dunno (but I doubt it). Gotta admit, though, the gee-whiz factor is pretty high. Maybe in a year.

So by 4:30 I was back in the air heading for a long layover at Dallas-Ft. Worth airport. As we flew southeast I looked back at the sun setting behind the Rockies after a fine weekend of clean air and blue skies. Good weather even by Colorado standards. The flight, though, was packed and uncomfortable, and by the time I hit Dallas that Rocky Mountain High was fading fast. I found a TGI Fridays, got a seat in front, and ordered a big glass of Sam Adams and had a relaxed but lonely dinner. You know that guy you always see sitting by himself at the airport restaurant? He was I. On the plus side, the flight to New Orleans was on time.

Monday it was back to the old routine, although I was a little bit surprised to find the levee so deserted. I had gotten out there a few minutes late and was hoping I'd run into some of the regulars. I didn't. Just as well, I guess, since I wasn't in the mood to go hard anyway. Maybe tomorrow.

USAC @ USOC in COS

Friday morning found me in the PJs Coffee shop at the Moisant Stock Yard (MSY), otherwise known as the Louis Armstrong International Airport waiting for my flight out to Colorado Springs (COS) for the USA Cycling (USAC) Local Associations conference. After an uneventful flight I walked out the front door of the airport to the waiting bus from the Olympic Training Center (OTC). I really lucked out this year on the accommodations. It turns out there were a few high-class athlete suites available in the "athlete center" building, and since I had turned in my paperwork early I got assigned one. Last year I had been in one of the unrenovated old dorms with a bathroom down the hall, so this was really a step up. Friday night we were treated to an open bar and dinner at a local golf club. Having unrestricted access to both wine and food, together with the bug decrease in physical activity I've endured since last week, left me feeling like a stuffed turkey.

Saturday started off with another "all you can eat" breakfast, followed by a day of presentations on insurance matters, rule change proposals, new website content, etc. I was glad to see some of the new things that will be on the website beginning in December. In fact, they have already rolled out the new "My USA Cycling" design and layout, which I think is a nice improvement. They will also be rolling out some interesting things next year, including online one-day licenses and a completely redesigned ranking system. Finally, this one will be based on the calendar year and it will use a points system that is additive rather than the incomprehensible one they used to have that is subtractive. They also have a new "Encyclingpedia" section with general information on it. It isn't live yet, but you can sneak a peek at it if you happen to know the URL. The entire USAC office will be moving to a new Colorado Springs location in early January, so that will be a lot of work for the staff, I think. They will be taking over a strip mall that they've re-designed. The interesting thing is that right in the middle of this building is a bar that will be staying for the next couple of years.

So the 2009 masters nationals will be June 28 - July 4 in Louisville, followed by elite/junior nationals July 7-11 at a location that they weren't free to announce yet.

I just returned from a dinner at the USOC Visitor Center hosted by AMB, the chip-timing folks. It looks like they will be a new USOC "Affinity Partner" which basically means that we might be able to get a discount. Even so, I'm pretty skeptical about the feasibility of using chip timing for any of the regular events because we don't have the turnout we would need. Florida requires AMB chip timing for their points series. Not coincidentally, the president of the Florida Local Association is also running a business doing chip timing with the AMB system. Anyway, I think the price of the chips, currently $100 each, is going to have to come down rather dramatically before it will make sense for the smaller local associations like LAMBRA.

Tomorrow I'll have to head back to the airport after lunch. I am definitely starting to feel a little dragged out after a full week of conferences, wine, food, and inactivity. Hopefully I will be able to find some time to put all of this new information to good use. It looks like we'll have our LAMBRA meeting the first week of December, assuming I can find suitable space and get everything ready in time. It won't help that I'll be taking the week of Thanksgiving off for a trip to Disneyworld, though.

Four Days in 2008

It seemed, this morning, like it had been infinitely longer than four days since I'd ridden, and if it had been cold and dark I seriously doubt I'd have been able to get myself out to the morning training ride. I had arrived back home around 10:30 pm, and after three extremely sleep-deprived days I somehow stayed up until midnight last night getting reorganized. My low-budget travel arrangements had made for a long trip, and that, combined with the nonstop conference activities were really starting to catch up with me. Even so, the last four days were pretty good. I learned some stuff, caught up with some old friends, made a few new ones, got a badly needed dose of enthusiasm. Some of these people at the research universities are truly awesome - what you'd call "unsung heroes." Every time I go to this meeting it really energizes me.

Election day was pretty memorable this year, but I still found myself with a couple of regrets. The conference always has a big party on Tuesday night - one to which I always look forward for some reason. So by 7 pm we were poised at the door ready to rush in and grab a primo table next to the dance floor, and once again our years of experience served us well. The NCURA band started up at 8:00 as usual, but one thing was distinctly different this year. There was an "election return" room set up nearby and everyone kept running back and forth from the dance floor to the television once the returns started coming in. Earlier that morning James Carville had told us that the networks didn't want to call the race early, but that if at any point we heard the words "Georgia is too close to call" we would know it was really over. Sure enough, I was standing there in front of the TV and heard them say those exact words!

My first regret that night, however, was that I was signed up for Hospitality Suite duty starting at 11:00, so I didn't get to be down at the party all the way to the end at midnight. The last hour is always the best. Always. Of course, with all the excitement about the election the hospitality suite was pretty busy too and when the bar shut down at midnight a few of us migrated to another region's suite where they had "extended hours." By 1:30 or so they were about ready to close up shop and I walked out onto the street with one of my colleagues from Florida (one of the few still standing)where we stood for a while seriously considering making a run down to Georgetown. Unfortunately, sensible heads prevailed and we figured we'd probably end up trying to find out way back home at 4 am in an even more inebriated state, which would make it really hard to get up in time for the "NIH Update" at 8:30 am. What were we thinking???? So my second big regret, especially after I saw the morning news reports and video of the crowds out in the streets of D.C. and in front of the White House, was that we hadn't thrown caution to the wind that time. So anyway, Tuesday was memorable, to say the least, and when I woke up Wednesday morning to go back to the conference I thought to myself, "Damn, if I was going to feel this bad in the morning anyway, I should have just stayed out all night." I sat through the long NIH Update and NSF update sessions, which were really quite good even in my severely dehydrated state, and shortly after noon started on the long trip back to New Orleans and the local reality. For some reason I was trying to save Tulane money on this trip and had booked my flight out of Baltimore, so that meant a walk down to Dupont Circle, a Metro ride to Union Station, lunch by myself, and a half-hour ride on the MARC commuter train to the airport. Even so, I arrived nearly three hours before my flight time and then discovered that my flight had already been delayed another hour. Luckily I had enough time to make my connection in Atlanta and got back home about on schedule. Oh, and those pictures above? Guess which two were still going strong by the end of the evening.

Soooo, this morning the weather was great once again and we had a good long levee ride. It was so nice to be able to ride out there without lights! Tomorrow morning I'll be heading up to COS for the USAC Local Associations Conference, which should be interesting. Lots of stuff I need to get done in the next week or so, however, and of course it will be another three days off the bike. I think I'll just call this a "detraining period."

Up in D.C.

You know, every year I come up here to this conference with at least a little hope of getting in some exercise, but some years it just doesn't happen. This is looking like it will be one of those years. Sunday night was the welcome dinner, followed by a long visit to our regional hospitality suite. I stayed until around midnight catching up with all the people who I only see once or twice a year and then made the three block walk back to the little hotel I'm at. One thing I like about DC is all of the cyclists I see. Granted, there is somewhat of an overabundance of wannabe bike messengers mixed in with the real bike messengers, but even so, there are lots of regular people riding regular bikes to and from work too.


By 6:30 am I was already rushing to get dressed for a very full Monday that didn't end until the wee hours of Tuesday. The highlight, really, was the morning's Keynote Address by Steve Squyres of Cornell who was, and still is, the Principal Investigator for the Mars Rover Mission. It was really awesome to hear his inside stories about the mission and to feel his abundant enthusiasm wash over the room. The day was filled with technical sessions that only research administrators could appreciate with titles like "A-21, Allowability Criteria and Section J," and "Incommons, Federated ID, Internet 2, LDAP, Shibboleth, Kerberos, X.506 - What are They?" By 6 pm I was meeting my dinner group where our table spend more on wine than food. I then reported to our hospitality suite again, where I had volunteer duty until midnight. Things were a bit more lively than they had been on Sunday, and when we closed things down around midnight I followed some of the other survivors down to another Region's hospitality suite. That one was still going at 1:30 am or so when, having lost count of the number of glasses of wine I'd had, I decided I had better get some sleep if I expected to repeat this process today.

This morning started out with a really funny Plenary Session by James Carville and Mary Matalin (amazing we got them to do this on election day), who have moved to New Orleans and actually admitted it a few times. If their political pundit gig ever goes south, they can always jump right into stand-up comedy! I finally got a little break this afternoon so I can catch up on email and catch my breath before the annual party tonight. The weather is warmer than I expected, but it's been drizzling all day. I was thinking about going out for a long walk, but it doesn't seem worth getting wet so I'll probably pass.

Spooks and Saints

Ever since that first post-Katrina Halloween when a bunch of the neighbors got together on a front porch and spent the night drinking wine and hoping to see a trick-or-treater (none ever materialized), it has been kind of a tradition to have a Halloween night porch party. And so we had our annual little "open porch" Halloween party again this year. Unlike 2005, this year we saw lots of costumed children running about from house to house where there were generally ample supplies of candy for the kids and Cabernet for the parents. Things finally wound down around 11 pm, and when I got up to ride out to the Giro Ride this morning my head was still a little foggy from all the wine.

It was warmer today, but riding out to the lakefront at 6:30 still felt rather chilly thanks to the little patches of fog along the way. I was riding a little faster than usual thanks to a somewhat late start, but I was easily on schedule to make my rendezvous at the Bayou St. John bridge. Just after I crossed Robert E. Lee Blvd., though, I heard a loud "crack." I thought at first that I had hit something in the road, but quickly realized that one of the spokes on my front wheel had snapped. I was quite surprised, and stopped for a moment to wedge the broken spoke into the rest of them so it wouldn't be flapping around scratching up the fork. I was thinking how odd it is for me to break a front spoke, but then I realized what had happened. It was that spoke that had gotten bent in the crash that took out my collarbone back in May. So anyway, I bailed on the Giro and made my way back home early.

We ended up walking down to Riccobono's for breakfast (one of the sister in laws and her daughter had come in the day before and spend the night at our house). Then, since it was All Saints Day, we decided to go cemetery touring. The plan was to track down the family tombs in St. Louis #1, St. Louis #2, St. Louis #3, and Metairie Cemetery. We end up skipping #3, but found the other three, and also spent hours walking through the cities of the dead looking at all of the old inscriptions. In St. Louis #2 there were a few tombs that were broken open, and inside you could see the remains of their more recent occupants. It was a little creepy sometimes. Over in St. Louis #1, which is closest to the French Quarter and a prime tourist attraction, we saw the reputed tomb of Marie Laveau which was covered with X marks, the traditional inscription of those asking for favors from the deceased Voodoo queen, along with all manner of trinkets, coins and offerings left on the ground. There were a number of people out painting their family's old tombs. Right behind Marie Laveau's popular tomb there was a well-dressed mother and daughter checking out their own family tomb. The woman was telling her child how unhappy her grandmother was about the justaposition and that they always had to check to make sure nobody had scratched Xs onto their tomb by mistake. It turned out to be a pretty long day. Tomorrow I'll be up at 4:30 to catch a 6 am flight to D.C. for a conference. Guess I'd better go iron some shirts.....