pretendamazing

Trail Trek was today. I got out of the house a bit late because I was trying to bandage my knee and having some complications, but I eventually made it out. In the interest of time, I popped the front wheel off my bike and headed up to campus to the point where I was meeting the rest of my team.

We got over to Oak Lake Park and waited around for the event to start. Once it did, we were near the end of the massive group, but when it split off into the different groups (10mi left us and 25 kept going, with 50 and 100 having started at 7:00), we opted to take a little underpass and few past the rest of the 25 mile people. From there, we headed through a little bit of the area west of the Haymarket and downward until we were outside of Lincoln

Along the way, one of our teammates started lagging behind and eventually told me that he needed to take a break soon. I hurried up to catch up to the other two (I got up to just over 20mph until I wasn’t able to pass because I was blocked, but for the most part the ride was done at somewhere between 8 and 15mph) and told them. By the time I got to them, we were at the first water/fruit stopping point.

Once he caught up, we all stood around waiting for water (as they had run out and were waiting for more to be delivered). He dropped his helmet…then his water bottle…then his bike…then himself. After nearly passing out, he decided that pushing himself when he already has a cold limiting his ability to breathe he shouldn’t go on. We hung out until the water was delivered, complete with an SUV and a bike rack. They took him over there, hooked up his bike, and had him sit inside until they left. We grabbed some water and some fruit and headed out again.

From there, the rest of the ride was easy. Without someone who was (understandably) unable to maintain a decent pace, we were able to speed up a bit and make up for the unexpectedly long break. The wind must have picked up while we were there, because no matter what direction we had been going I felt at most a light breeze, but leaving from there and going back toward Lincoln we were battling the wind. It seemed to come and go from there onward.

With stops, it took us nearly the entire 3 hours to get from Oak Lake to Oak Lake. We started up north of campus, went south of town, headed back north to east campus, and then back to Oak Lake from there.

50mi next year? 100mi?

I ran to the store earlier to pick up a few items and noticed how beautiful it was outside, so after I got back I stopped for a few minutes to talk to a friend on GTalk and left, having told him I was going to go for a bike ride. “bbwhenever” was supposed to mean I’d be back after riding 6-8 miles and showering, maybe an hour.

The last few times I’ve ridden, my bike has made some creaking sound. It wasn’t quite a squeak, but I figured some WD-40 would fix it for me. Only one problem: I kept forgetting to spray it.

Lucky me, when I started out riding today, it wasn’t creaking! In retrospect, that should have told me something, but at the time it seemed like it had just worked itself out.

I get going, head up to 27th and Highway 2 and hop on Rock Island heading south. Things were going great. Beautiful weather, nice and sunny, a bit of a breeze going against me but overall awesome. Then I got down to Old Cheney.

After I crossed the street, I got a few feet past the sidewalk and suddenly my left foot lost track of the pedal. With this happening as I was pushing down on the left pedal, I had a lot of weight going down there and my balance was set off a bit. I started feeling like I might fall, so I turned to the right. I, uh, kind of turned too much.

The next thing I know, I’m on the ground.

I landed flat on my back, thankfully. My head hit the ground and then turned, which bent my glasses. I got up and noticed I didn’t have a pedal. I found it a few feet behind me, along with the crank (?) it was attached to. The crank had snapped off.

Obviously, I needed to get to a bike shop. I was going to just walk home, but I remembered that Trail Trek is in a few days. Thankfully, I was about a block away from Joyride.

I went in and asked if it could be repaired, and after the girl took it back to someone to look at it, I went into the bathroom. Halfway from the point I fell at to Joyride, I noticed that I had a bunch of blood on my leg and my knee was scratched. After I washed it off and went back out, I noticed that I was bleeding again. The girl went and grabbed some bandages for me (and put them on–it reminded her of being a camp counselor lol). It started again later (I believe her exact words were, “you’re leaking again”) too.

Eventually, they verified that they had replacement parts and put in an order for those two and an extended tune-up. I’ll go back tomorrow and pay for those and a new helmet.

The problem was that there was a bunch of water stored in there that weakened the structure. Apparently the creaking sound was an indication of the water. They recommended coming in yearly (or, of course, doing it myself yearly) and having it taken apart and cleaned. Gonna have to remember to do that.

After walking home, cleaning out the knee wound a bit and showering, I ran a couple of errands and then went to Shopko (on the Joyride girl’s recommendation) and set up an appointment for tomorrow morning to get an eye exam done and found a pair of frames that I like.

I even got into the chiropractor and got my back cracked and my neck worked on a bit. Hopefully with that, I’ll feel amazing tomorrow, get some new glasses ordered, get a fixed bike, and be ready to go for Trail Trek on Sunday.

While I wasn’t terribly far from the ground, was going slow (under 10mph), and landed on grass, I’m very glad I wear a helmet. Of course, hitting the ground in a helmet does not keep it from being sore, but the foam stuff is better than cement and probably better than the ground. Aside from a headache, my head is fine. I’ll continue wearing a helmet.

Testing <embed> for Erik.

Pafford finally got a bike! (That’s the miracle.) And, uh, I may have made him regret it.

@rossnelson kicked my ass & led me WAY farther than planned, but to his credit he hung out without bitching while I reswallowed my liver.

After he got the bike, he went to Monkey Wrench to get a lock then met me at Starbucks. We went to Noodles where we ran into the De Jabet family and hung out with them for a while. Stomach full of food to provide some more energy, I convinced Pafford that we should go riding around campus.

Little did he know, when I meant riding around campus, I would soon decide to literally go around campus. We rode past my building and then followed the edge of campus onto the new Antelope Valley trail and made our way back to downtown. We had to stop a few times for rest and water, and there were a few spots where we walked the bikes, but he was fine riding most of the way.

And how far was this, compared to the 0.8mi from his place to Starbucks? I figure he would have done maybe 2mi if I hadn’t been there. With the route I took him on, he did somewhere around 5mi on the first day he really rode a bike in 20-some years. I’m known to do this.

Surprise, still alive! Since failing, I’ve been quite busy and haven’t gotten around to writing anything.

Between April 25th and June 1st, I made 4 trips to Brookings. Two of those also involved Brookings to somewhere in Minnesota.

The first was a “family emergency” type thing and my sister’s graduation was the second. Those were simple drive-5-hours-stay-a-few-days-drive-5-hours trips to Brookings. While I’m certainly in Lincoln most of the year, I do make it to Brookings quite a few times a year, so the other two trips were what I was excited for.

The first was up to Minneapolis for my friend Travis’ birthday. I’m pretty sure that he’s my longest/oldest/whatever friend from Brookings. I made others after him, but I don’t ever talk to any of them. Since the days of 8th grade Social Studies (HTML!), Travis and I have kept in touch fairly well. Trigg (his girlfriend, who I’ve known since high school and been good friends with for 4-5 years) and I went from Brookings to Minneapolis and eventually back to Brookings. I also saw my business partners a few times while I was up there, which was nice.

The second was even better (sorry Travis/Trigg). There’s a group of us from college that are more family than friends. Unfortunately, we’re all spread out now and only small groups really see each other much. I rode with Jaime and Nic from Dell Rapids, SD to Rochester, MN. We got there to a party already in-progress, featuring all sorts of people that I see at most once or twice a year. The time spent on the way to/from and in Rochester was the first trip I can remember in recent past where I didn’t feel bad for not doing anything school/work related. It was amazing.

It was briefly mentioned on the way there and on Sunday while we were all sitting around, but on the way back they actually described it a bit. Jaime and Nic have asked me to shoot their wedding. I practiced on Lisa and Lukenbill’s wedding so I have some experience, and now I’ll be getting more! I found a list of the standard shots and sent it to them for additions/removals/changes and hope to get some additional gear by then. (The extra gear isn’t a strict requirement, as I could rent or borrow the important stuff and the rest is just nice to have on hand, but I want to eventually have it all anyway.) It shall be fun.

I didn’t really bike much in the last month because I was constantly gone and was just recuperating on the days I was back, so I’ve been slowly picking that up again. Angela and I went out biking yesterday and ended up at Scheel’s, where I convinced her that we should buy tennis rackets. We then biked to the court at my apartment complex and played for a while. Being something like 85°F and 85% humidity with no shade on the court and the floor being blacktop, we didn’t last a long time but we had fun. I always enjoyed tennis in P.E. in school, but I never had anyone to play with outside of school so I never looked into buying anything for it. Turns out low-end rackets are cheap. I got one plus a set of three practice balls for $24.

While Sarah’s graduation isn’t until Saturday, I had reason to come home today, so I did. It meant missing out on Startup Drinks, which I’ve been waiting for a month for (monthly event), but it means I don’t have to drive tomorrow and can sit and work all day in silence (I live next to a daycare thing in Lincoln—not quite silence heh.

I left Lincoln at 2:30 today. About 2 hours later, 40ish miles south of Sioux City, I realized (out of the blue) why it felt like I had forgotten something: my duffle bag is sitting on my bed.

I was many miles away from Nebraska with the only clothes being what I have on plus a hoodie, a jacket, and a baseball cap.

Thanks to the abyss (the area between Omaha and Sioux City where cell phone signals don’t exist), it took quite a few tries to call pafford, but I finally got ahold of him and got directions to a mall in Sioux City. $50 later, I had some shirts. I needed shirts anyway, so I bought more than needed and good ones.

While trying to get ahold of him, I discovered I don’t have an internal speaker. My phone things that I have headphones plugged in. While things like my MacBook Pro use a little switch to go between normal analog speakers/headphones and digital speakers, the Pre just has analog. When I got to Sioux Falls, I stopped to eat with a couple of friends and asked one (who has an electronics background) if he had any idea how I can fix it. He thinks there are three wires in it, one for the left channel, one for the right channel, and one for ground, and there’s a short somewhere that’s making it think I still have headphones in. I’ll be visiting Sprint when I get back to town—”yay.”

Before leaving SuFu and finishing my drive, I went and bought the rest of the clothes I need and some bathroom stuff. By the end of my shopping to “replace” that missing bag, I spent somewhere in the neighborhood of $200 (which is, of course, misleading since what I got is new and nicer than what was in it for a lot of the clothe). It’s not wasted since I need or will need in the nearish future all of the things I bought, but it would have been nice to not need to get them today.

This is all Brookings’ fault. Not mine. Not Palm’s. Brookings’.

The other night, there was an event at thé Cup that I biked to. It didn’t hit me until it was dark, but I didn’t want to take the trail back.

Why does Lincoln not invest in some lighting along the trails? I’ve ridden Rock Island home once and there large parts that are completely dark. Even as a guy of fairly considerable size, I’m kind of creeped out at the thought of riding on it at night. When I did it last, I couldn’t see oncoming bikers with lights on; runners, not a chance. Aside from creepy, it’s kind of dangerous when you can’t see people you’re potentially going to run into.

No need? Expensive? Something else? I’m not sure what their reasons are, but I’d love if I felt like I could take that trail (maybe others are better, but RI’s pretty popular, and huge) from campus/downtown/etc. home at night).

I failed.

Miserably.

I left home on Day 25 to go back to Brookings for a “family emergency” type deal before I got a chance to bike for the day. I was then gone until Day 29, when I had time to unload my car, unpack, shower, and head out. Got back at 3am the next day after helping students. Yesterday was the first day I had a real chance to go biking, but after only getting 4 hours of sleep I was too tired to go out, given that I’d already failed.

I went out today for the first time. I had intended to leave home at 10:30, meet theang where she hits the Rock Island trail, head to Noodles, and come home. Turns out, despite being exhausted from little sleep and either a cold or allergy-like problems, I had a lot of energy built up and convinced theang to keep going. I finally got home around 17:00. This, of course, angered Randall Flagg, who I told I couldn’t go for a multi-hour ride this weekend as I needed to work. Oops. I didn’t plan a multi-hour ride, it just happened. We did somewhere in the range of 15-20 miles. (We made a few stops and she’s just starting biking again for the first time in many, many years so we went at a slow, relaxed pace most of the ride.)

This month I have a couple of events where I’ll be leaving town and don’t want to haul my bike with me. Perhaps I can do 30 Days of Biking in June.

Update: hehe.

Today’s ride: part one (to Antelope Park), part two (back from Antelope Park), part three (to Antelope Park until I met up with Sarah), part four (Antelope Park to Lazlo’s), and part five (back from Haymarket, through Sarah’s neighborhood). Total: 17.7317mi.

I’m tired.

Green Wheels has ended so I’m no longer compelled to bike instead of drive places, but the Earth Day celebration stuff in Lincoln was today, I’m only a few miles from it by bike, and there was a tour of the newly opened Antelope Trail on the way to Green Meals. So I biked!

And biked. And biked. And biked some more.

17 miles isn’t a whole lot, but I’m running on about three and a half hours today, so I’m pretty much dead now that I’ve gotten home and showered. But it was fun, so it was worth it.

After taking pictures of Gene, Sarah, and the other people in The Loup River Band & Street Choir, I wandered around the event for a bit bored out of my mind until I heard someone call my name. Sarah had returned after taking gear back home and biking back. We wandered around a bit, picked up our Green Wheels t-shirts, and took surveys to get free reusable shopping bags. We then decided to both head home. She had some stuff to do, I didn’t want to carry my camera around with me any more.

Just as I was leaving, I grabbed my Driducks jacket (leaving the pants here) in case it sprinkled a bit. As I got to about a mile from the park, it started raining fairly heavily. Met Sarah (completely by chance) right at the point where our two paths both hit the park, then went looking to see where the bike ride was heading out from.

At 5:50, the 6:00 ride had already left.

We headed out on our own. Just after we started, the rain picked up a bit more. By the time we got to N, it was pretty much pouring. Sarah had two sets of rain gear so she dug out the pants (we both had jackets on already) and we covered our soaked shorts and jeans to try to keep them from getting any wetter. En route, we decided on Lazlo’s for food.

After we got there, we stripped off the rain gear on the street to avoid bringing in things that were covered in water but not soaking any in. Shoved them into a garbage bag and we were on our way to tasty, tasty food.

“Two?” “Yes.” As the guy took us to a booth, he started laughing at us. We were seated, ordered food, got food, ate. Me! Sarah!

When we left, our pants were still wet. Fortunately, though, the rain had stopped, woo! We headed to Sarah’s place and I continued on from there to the Rock Island Trail and home. Shower, map, blog.

I went to another one.

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