This is the funniest shizzat I've read in a long time

http://whyihatemyhusband.blogspot.com/

Another "Relaxing" Weekend

So apparently I'm trying to live the life of about 2.5 people. 1. Family Man 2. Avid Athlete 2.5 Everything else. Last weekend was to be spent doing the following: Palm Springs with the family, Camp and pre-ride the race course with my ODC teamates in Idyllwild, Attend my company swimming party , Attend a company picnic for my wife's work. Yes, about 600 miles of driving in one weekend.

So it began with Thursday night drive to palm springs, where we had a late check-in at the time-share. Friday was spent by the pool/waterslide relaxing (as much as you can with an over-active 3 year old)and dinner at the Cheesecake Factory. On Saturday, we hit the Cabazon outlets and headed straight to Yorba Linda for my work party gig. This is not a water park, it is Harold's back yard...

http://lousarcade.com/emptythepool1.jpg saul & I try to empty the pool w/ double cannonball, notice Kaleo trying to get out of the way!!!
http://lousarcade.com/emptythepool2.jpg Kids at play on the waterfall
http://lousarcade.com/emptythepool3.jpg Slide, cave, wading pool above. I want...

From That Saturday afternoon, I drove back up to Idyllwild/Mountain Center to Hurkey Creek Park. Setup my tent, rode five miles, ate dinner, rode a ten mile night lap, sleep, got up at 6 a.m. (Sunday) and rode the ten mile morning lap.

Hurkey Creek went like this:
http://lousarcade.com/hurkey1.jpg
http://lousarcade.com/hurkey2.jpg
http://lousarcade.com/hurkey3.jpg
http://lousarcade.com/hurkey4.jpg
http://lousarcade.com/hurkey5.jpg

At about 10 a.m. I drove back down the hill back home, jumped in the shower and went to the wife's company picnic in Fountain Valley. Small shopping at REI and supergo afterwards, some unpacking and the weekend was finally done.

I've got some work to do on my riding at altitude so I've got to get a bunch more miles in for the next 3 weeks.

Old Camp, well almost...

prologue: Last night I took my 3 year old hiking up Santiago. When at the trail head there were a bunch of ambulances and firetrucks. By the time we got our gear ready and on the trail, the trucks were gone. Skip ahead about 3 miles about an hour later and a rider was coming down with another bike strapped to his back. "Where's the owner of that bike?" I asked. "Oh he was airlifted off in a helicopter and I'm on the way to meet him at the hospital".

Tonight's ride was supposed to be a loop around whiting, then santiago truck trail then down the luge for 13 miles. We ended up changing the trip on the fly and decided to go all the way up the truck trail to old camp. I am a really slow starter, I felt I was pacing back behind Maureen and Cisco tonight, but about 6 miles in, I started feeling stronger and led the rest of the way. It got dark at about 8p.m. switch on the Niterider HID's and we were good to go. We got up to the flat above old camp (1/2 a mile short) and decided to turn around for some good downhill. Back down the luge and the tally was 16.5 miles total. I already know Cisco is fast, but I'm afraid come 24 hours of Adrenalin next month Maureen's going to post faster times than me!!! Lightweight riders have such an advantage over us clydesdales. Anyways, I felt better about my conditioning tonight. Least of all no one got hurt, or ran into any mechanical problems.

We're meeting at the race course this weekend up in Idyllwild to get a few laps in with a bunch of other folks that ride in the group. camping should be a hoot.

lots of excercise, no lost weight...

I don't get it. The harder I work out the more weight I'm gaining. Yeah yeah, someone told me to knock off the protein. 3 days of hard riding, 3 lbs gained, some attributed to gatorade water retention. I need to get to my racing weight in 4 weeks and it seems impossible. My eating habits are the same. I'll see where I am a week from now...

Not much else going on, I got to surf san-o state beach over the weekend with some camping. It was a good relaxing time. I'm finally back to where I was as far as catching waves go, I like it when things come to me like second nature, never skipped a beat during my long lay-off.

Next Week: I'm going to try and ride at least twice this week. Busy week at work with a release going in and the I'm off to Palm Springs for some more R and R.

Quiet Weekends and Board Sports don't mix.

So, I'm planning on an almost perfectly quiet weekend of TV and rest. When oldest nephew calls up on Friday and says "Let's go surfing tomorrow!". I say to myself, "ah, why not??" So we decide to meet at 7a.m. at the usual spot at Bolsa Chica. Check the surf report and great, 1-3 feet, nice and easy, but red tide and jellyfish out. I thought to myself, it should be easy on my arms...

It's been about two months since my last time in the water and seriously about one year before that... and I'm wondering how foreign a surfboard is going to feel under my feet. So I'm excited and nervous to go that I only got 2 or 3 hours of sleep the night before the alarm went of at 6:00 a.m. The anxiety I felt while tossing and turning is like drinking 2 cups of coffee 1 hour before you're desperately trying to get some decent sleep. The insomnia compounds itself by the worry about whether or not you're going to be able to fall asleep or get enough sleep or fall asleep or feel tired in the morning or being rested toss and turn more fleeting thoughts...will I get enough rest, can I fall asleep, toss and turn some more... you get the picture.

Wake up, drive, in the water by 7a.m. Caught some decent waves, lungs worked great - arms got a bit tired early on and felt like jelly, but I worked through it. I ended up being in the water 2 hours catching what I wanted when I wanted and felt so comfortable that I was able to walk the board up and back with a bit of confidence. I also got my two youngest nephews up and standing on my 10 footer so it was a rush for them as well as me. It ended up being a big family affair with 3 uncles and 6 cousins showing up. I finished up with a fat breakfast at woody's, a 2 hour nap and some housecleaning that night.

Okay, so to add to my "quiet" weekend, my brother in law calls up in the evening and says, let's take the kids to the wild animal park tomorrow - Sunday. They also said they wanted to check out Etnies skateboard park afterwards. I said what the heck, I haven't skated in 5 years so why not?!?

The animal park was so just okay so I won't get into that other than I fell asleep on the tram tour and that captive Gorilla's live a good life. We were back by 5p.m.

The skateboard park was much more fun that evening. I picked up some new pads and broke out the old Tony Hawk Birdhouse stick. Busted out with my two youngest nephews who skated quite well for their age, but hey need to learn a few things including the ability to not get run over by the bigger kids. I was able to carve a few good lines and never really slammed myself into the hard concrete which was positive.

Now I'm seriously thinking of skating a bit more, but perhaps when the park is empty so I can try some bigger moves without crashing and looking like an a$$ in front of a bunch of kids... Finished up the evening with BBQ.

Afterthought: Boy I really miss surfing and skating, two things I've spent a lot of time doing - Skateboarding as a teen, and surfing all the time in my 20's. I'm going to dedicate some time doing those things a bit more although I'll never reach that same level of performance with skating. Kid's today are just insane (and according today's lingo "pull off some sick moves") and my body (at my age and weight) just can't take that level of abuse anymore.

Anyways that was my quiet weekend.

Training Ride

So we're prepping for the next 24 hours of Adrenalin and our night ride went like this:

It was a tough and demanding ride on both Cisco and me. We weren't fresh. The problem was we rode hard the night before and I had a bit of cramping in my left calf so I was fighting that all evening. Cisco is really fast so I think I went a lot harder trying to keep up.

Cisco was riding fast until he wrecked in the dark on that steep loose section just before the luge. He got some bad cuts, a sprained thumb and a bruised ego. Light broke pretty good, too I'll have to re-engineer the mounting on that, time to go with hose clamps I guess...

I went down on the luge twice. The first crash, my bike ended partway down a cliff, I was able to step off without going with the bike. The second, I slammed pretty hard when my front wheel went down a rut hole, crossed up and I ended up over the bars then landed on my side and head. It happened so fast that there was nothing I could do. See a hole, next thing I knew I was on my head.

Anyways we were going a bit harder and faster than we should have. But we had fun. Definitely an advanced ride and we covered about 14 miles.

This ride can be started earlier like at 6:00 and still finish in the dark. It's getting darker earlier. I'm going to take a break and not ride til at least Sunday probably. Back to back rides - my legs just don't do that well.

Nephew called and wants to go surfing on Saturday morning, it'll be a good break from the lower body work out.

DEVO rocked it !!!

House of Blues Anaheim at Downtown Disney. Sold out show. No opening band.

Doors opened at 8pm. We got inside by about 8:30. Standing room only. Had to have been 1200+ folks inside. Ventilation sucked, and very cozy. Hot and stuffy and after an hour+ of waiting, (start time was at 9:30p.m) peeps got a bit impatient. they got started at about 9:50.
The show started with an opening video staring General Boy with "a message". was great!!!

I won't go into the play list (spoiler), but they surprised me with a few songs I haven't heard them play in other concerts. No new material - just a few from Duty Now, FoC, Nutra and of course AWNM. There might have been one from ONID, but it's late now and my brain is as fried as my voice. I overheard that Freeze was the drummer this night, I was on the side
and drummer out of view so I couldn't see who it was.

Everyone there had a great time despite the hot stuffy conditions. Mark's voice sounds as good as ever. Hate to say it but the spud boys are aging gracefully so get to see them as soon as you can.

I met some great kids that flew from Calgary down to Anaheim specifically for this concert, and we were able to get a pic with Gerry before the show.

http://www.lousarcade.com/devo1.jpg

wrapped up another b-ball season

what another ending to a miserable season. 5w -5L It has been hard to keep a consistent roster of 7 committed players. We should have gone to the playoffs this season, but there were those 2 games that we "shoulda" won. I think this is my last season for now, the youngsters in the league are better-stronger-faster. And I've lost about 3/4 of step at my age and weight.

I'm going to concentrate on mtn bike races this fall and get some night riding in. This week. Pringles rule.

The kid is amazing

So I'm getting Kaleo hooked on stuff that I dig, this time it's trail running and trekking. I took him to whiting ranch for a 3 mile up and back last week and he just had a blast. He enjoys the up and down terrain, which is surprising. What keeps him motivated to run up the ups, is that he knows that there will be a fast descent going down. While running down, he ate dirt a few times going too fast, but he's got the hang and knows how to avoid the dreaded poison oak when I ask him to. He especially enjoys the creek crossings and the rock hopping.

http://lousarcade.com/kaleo/kaleotrail1.jpg
http://lousarcade.com/kaleo/kaleotrail2.jpg

24 hours of adrenalin coming up, I guess that's why I've sub-consciously been riding a heck of a lot more than normal. I got on a team with ODC and hopefully we can fill the roster. There's about another 7 weeks to train.

DEVO this week at the HOB, I'm taking half the day off to have a nice dinner with the Mrs. and to have a great time there. Should be a blast.