An attitude adjustment that I needed and that worked.
It was one of the best days every.
Best day on the bike maybe? From the amazing morning sunlight on the city as we drove in. To the team I rode with. To riding with nearly every other team on the road at some point or another. Having a group of 30+ riders all together. from catching up and riding with some just flat out amazing friends.
The hugs, the high fives, the smiles. The beers, the trails.
I'll get to writing it up (probably before I get to writing up Boston ride) more officially.
more completely, things are still super crazy and I have a few minutes, but not enough minutes.
But here's a few photos:
The team before the ride. Such a great crew pretty much smiling the whole day.
this is us after the ride, still smiling
The most epic of epic shots... the 'gram crop is one i'm pretty happy with... hangin with the Drifters+ Matt Roy posting it was amazing. High fived those guys and then Matt motioned me over to sit down once i had my beer. I mean just hanging out with everyone, but this shot was grammed and posted with a great suggestion. Not much difference from the raw to the gram, but the minor tweaks... anyway
Such an amazing ride, Thank you Scott. I haven't been to all of them but this had to be the best ever.
But maybe I need to loosen a bit of the constrains or the issue of having it not be sitting there looking at me saying "dude you are off on a tanget" and of course I always see it as failing to follow objective, aka just flat out failing.
That's me.
Despite measures of success or profeiciency always seem to fail, or feel like a failure. Like my spelling. Fuck it. Mis-spelled words bug you? I got piles of them.
scheduling
juggling calendars, timing, planning... multiple ones, lots of different users and limitations. Usually my strength.
but been taxed way more than usual lately.
to the point even simple scheduling with where to be when with the kids activities is completely breaking me.
can't function.
brain turns to foggy mush and I lose it.
trying to get to RdR with the PVD team is stupid complicated. Everyone has their own limitations, 'won't pick everyone up at their house no way, one stop' or this or that or fuckit i dunno
give up almost
frustrated, exhausted, overwhelmed at work with the complexity of everything.
anxious about the need to go to Thornwood but not having reliable transport. too far to ride... and get work done.
stressin about the talk next week. Should really be working on that now.
i'm not.
back at working the second job, it obviously is adding to the scheduling stress, both pride in building coupled with needing the extra income.
I dunno if i should write about the long ride, everytime i go back to think about it i get depressed. But then maybe it is just one of those things that needs to be put down in words and then move on from there.
Funny how little it takes to unhinge me lately, how i can go from feeling awesome to boom *hands in the air* f'it level
rode in so slowly today. sure didn't help that I put the heavy tires back on. got thinking abit. stupid fucking asshole cold headwind.
thought about some friends who have a show tonight... a short one middle of a set, but timing is of course not going to work out.
that thinking and the wind got me thinking about stuff and then I just started singing Amazing Grace. Just me and the wind on the path. In tune? I think so. I know the words, at least to the first verse, then i started improve.
I liked the flow, i changed the melody, I wrote the lyrics on the fly and I liked the song, I like the meaning of the words and the implications and how i wove them and looped them back a bit but never creating a chorus, just a steady stream of conciousness song. So I'm singing, and as I'm singing and making words and rhyming and creating a melody I'm also at the same time wishing I could remember the words, remember the melody, write it all down and record it.
But. I can't. I didn't. I have tried it in the past, and when I play the tape back the sound of my voice irks me, little comfort in hearing that I'm usually bang on the note, rarely out of tune but, i guess that was a long time ago.
The closest I got to writing the improve down was for one of the Lullabys I sing to the girls at night. It was actually in michigan, a lullaby I made up for my oldest. I sang it one night, then managed to remember it the next. And write it down.
Still now more than 10 years later I sing each of the girls (even though they are in the same room) their own lullaby. Each one gets a different melody, gets different words, similar phrases I suppose, sometimes the lullabys reflect some musical influence from the evening. Usually they are just what ever comes out of my head, a soft comforting melody, soothing words, for my precious girls.
But I sang as I pedaled. Thought about child hood musical influences like Gordon Bok, Hound Dog Taylor, all the poetry I read (and could never memorize), the quotes I'd find and share with someone... even growing up, I would make up lyrics and melodies and songs, like going to feed the chickens in the morning before school. My mother tells the story of sneaking out of the back door just as I went out the front so she could listen to whatever song I would make up walking down to the chicken coop.
The singing today, no just me...
It didn't help much, turned into blues with a lilting meldoy vaguely evocative of Amazing Grace...
Once I got through the morning meetings I cued up the Deltron 3030 station on pandora and yeah, listed to 'rap' or whatever pigeon hole you fit the Pandora algorithm based on that band's genere.
Very lyrical and complex cerebral lyrics for the most part. But then, it is rap, but more to me I guess it is poetry with a bit of a bass line.
Then just now song tangent thanks to to Carl
I should move onto writing something productive, positive, or whatever. Or not.
This ship's got some work do to, the steering linkage is bused and there's no feedback from the engine room, but the merciful winds and currents have kept us safe thus far. The one man crew is working on fixing. But man, he's one over worked, under appreciated and under paid dude. How long can one carry on like that. Who knows, but one set of lyrics I remember from this morning:
One foot down,
and another foot down
we keep moving along
The weekend comes, work and crazy schedule on Saturday, RdR2015 on sunday, back to insanity here on Monday, repeat until Christmas.
Read this, I take a few issues with it but mostly can let it stand as it is pretty close to correct.
That said: training isn't doing something once. Training is doing something with enough repetition that you show improvements. Not improving isn't training, that's just recreation, and there's nothing wrong with that.
But if you ARE training (doing specific workouts) or competeing at all, you shouldn't ignore the food side of things and the timing and impact of the food.
Best bottom line from the write up tailor what you eat so what you train is going to be most successful.
The doper enabler that has done more for the eat real food movement than anyone (Allen Lim) says much the same in his first book, and contiunes in he second.
Which I was reminded of when I read this just after the TP one.
That last one brought back up the Insulin issue.
If eat something that will spike your insulin, your body is generally going to store the calories w/o burning them. That's why a bowl of frosted flakes with a few teaspoons of sugar, skim milk and a glass of orange juice is going to be great fuel for a second but if you aren't immediately getting on an hour of HIIT or a CX race simulation most all of those calories are going to be converted to fat and stored. Not burned.
Implication for calorie counters: You'll be hungry way before you think you should because while your calorie count is where it should be (aka Cronoman and his powertap based caloric consumption) you will likely feel hungry and be 'underfueled.' If you have an extended fast and well exercised fat metabolism, and you have a fast before you subject your body to another big insulin spike, there's a good chance you'll burn off those stored fat calories...
Now if you are in glycogen deficit, and you're used to refilling glycogen then much of that pile of sugar you ate will go to the muscles instead of having the liver make it all into fat.
BUT first thing in the morning you will have the highest level of Glycogen (it gets stored overnight, aka why better to have your sugar at night than first thing in the morning).
It is simple. And complicated, and biggest issue is it messes with some people's habitual stuff.
But hey. Smoking was habitual for many people. Why stop smoking. It won't kill me for a while.
Why should I give up my morning breakfast of skim milk, grains(aka sugar) and uber processed chemically flavored premium orange juice?
-- yeah i'll write up the long ride sometime --
10 minutes between dealing with This grant after the sample sorting and trainings and user set up and NO LUNCH - I ate lunch but it was a hurried rushed thing. Links read between, or while waiting for late people.
So people who were late? Thanks. Your delay gave me a chance to read a little.
I won't say it on Facebook but I'll say it here. If you buy a shit ton of high end bikes but always take them to one shop to get them fixed, but never buy any of these fancy bikes from that shop... well... next time you're ready to dump a giant wad of cash on a bike. Buy one from that shop.
repairs are great, accessories and other stuff, they are nice too. But when you spend a couple grand on a bike, that's really actually pretty important for them to keep the doors open.
When you bring in your custom special bike for work they'll be less begrudging and grumpy behind your back if they know you've also picked up an Emonda, Boone or Superfly or Santa Cruz or something, kids bikes? yeah those are helpful but not really the same.
Like Glen said, shops don't like eating the crumbs if they don't get the cake too.
And to everyone walking in while they are going nuts right now (understaffed and overworked now that the weather has gotten nice) The mechanics in the shop didn't become mechanics to work on your shit for free. Esp when they are two weeks out on repairs for people who are willing to pay for it.
I should probably document it for myself. Not for anyone else because I guess while I was motivated to ride up there in order to support and be there for someone, relationships are two ways streets, but they are also more like double tracks in the woods. If they don't get used they get over grown. You can walk on track down yourself but you can't keep both paths open alone. But you can keep the path between clear alone.
The metaphor works for me as it allows me to imagine one of the many old two-tracks in the forest growing up. Watching them become dis-used and eventually dissapear. When there's no reason to keep traveling on it the barriers of stinging nettles and black berry brambles are a pretty good deterent to look elsewhere for places to walk.
But underlying the overgrowth and pioneer plants are those worn and packed tracks. Takes some effort but they can be recovered and put back into use. But that sort of thing takes two people.
And then there are relationships where the other side deliberately seeds barriers, knocks down a tree or two across the two tracks.
Moving through life is a curious thing. It must be way easier when you can legitimately think about what's best for you and ignore impacts of others. Oh don't worry, I know there's so many times I've been super selfish, thought only about myself, and pretty much every one of those times causes me some variable measure of greif and anquish when I reflect on it.
As much of an effort as I have made to keep writing and get things out of my head here, I've only been moderately successful, aka totally failing in past GeWilli superblogger's mind. But then that's okay. Things are insane and complicated and the demands everywhere are a challenge, sucking up time and energy. That or i'm just getting old and am un-inspired.
Definitely searching for a new muse I guess. Somewhat lost in many ways, not that a muse is a person in the flesh, they can be. Sometimes a dog, a pet, a simple park bench with a view. Maybe I need to go hang out on my favorite bench some more. It is probably soaking wet right now. Kind of miss eating lunch their with friends. Okay I'm not fooling anyone, i've never had friends, maybe a friend now and then will join me there. My mother, on visits, has joined me for lunch and we've eaten at that bench, usually getting something from East Side Pockets.
The other imaging facility across the hall that I'm not a part of has had a steady influx of workers. Guys either fixing the wall, installing stuff, moving stuff. Working together. Talking. With eachother. As I'm sitting here emailing, scheduling, trying to make sense of quotes and figure out what's next on the list of stuff that has to get done. As much as this gig is a part of me, it also kind of, for another part of me, unfulfilling/empty. Forunately bikeshop has gotten busy enough to ask me to come back and that's a nice social/but task oriented and productive kind of outlet. Keeps me balanced I guess, at least until it gets slow there, and CX picks up.
I should really get to the whole point of writing about the long ride, eh?
nice title - maybe inappropriate for such a short remark (at least it is starting off intenting to be short)
I don't run [much/enough] but this resonates... they [the demons] quiet in my head during intervals, or in races that go well. Races that I'm not doing well in tend to bring them back out in force. All day rides bring out a different set.
But maybe i don't ride to silence them.
I ride maybe to come to terms with them sometimes, to overthink and overthink and overthink. And less overthink and more meditate and process I guess.
Better work for overthinking is processing. It is appropriately descriptive, and less negatively saturated with stigma than overthinking is.
Processing thoughts, feelings, sometimes, and rarely to a positive end. But somethings do work well going through the neruon machine. I've gotten better and filtering stuff together, better at capturing good ideas that arise out of free form processing on the bike, on the commute.
I should really transition into writing about Last monday's ride to Boston and back. I should. But I also need to do taxes today (or at least start them). Anxeity riddled scary baggage associated with it. That said, I know, analytically that it is just sitting down with computer, a stack of numbers and punching it in, entering my credit card/bank info for refund/payment and getting it over. Simple, no? Deadline isn't until the 15th. Usually we have to get it done way early in Feb for financial aid applications, but well they moved those deadlines up to December. Thanks alot for that. Suddenly instead of the Feb deadlines I have April...
With luck the second book in the Hyperion series won't be ready to check out until the 15th (or when taxes are finished), why? because reading that is way more fun and distracting.
But it doesn't silence the demons. Doesn't deal with the anxiety. I know how to deal with it but even as distant and clinical as I can get, it doesn't actually make it easier to do.
I've also sat through my 3rd PhD defense talk in 10 days.
What is science? Stuff. What is effecitve science? Engaging an audience, captivating them and getting them to understand your stuff. Bonus points for keeping the attention of the experts in the field as well as those who don't have a clue.
Overthinking. Demons. Yup.
Does it get easier? No, not really. Because you find more and more people who are doing it all better than you. Doing what? Everything. And my brain can't function or focus on anything I do well enough to leverage it to happiness. Always focusing on failings. There has to be something redeeming about me or my life or some purpose besides just being miserable, right? Sometimes I find a glimmer of reasoning, but usually I don't.
That's why this panel (can be found in the link above) is the most difficult, real, aka woke up all my demons. So keep in mind, everytime an introvert/overthinker tries to offer advice, it is probably because the advice is coming from a good place, a place of wanting to help. Being frustrated or getting emotional and directing anger and frustrations at them for saying something kind of fucks them up. A lot. Keep in mind, if you find one of these people's comments difficult to deal with, imagine how self critical they are, imagine the constant internal dialog that none one else hears.
I guess the post wound up hitting the target and all the tangents.
Oh and I've tried running to escape them. It makes them louder. "How's the form? You look stupid running, keep your arms in line, why are you slowing down? think about the breathing? Why is it taking so long to get there? The bike is so much faster! WHY ARE YOU RUNNING? Oh man this is going to take months before it is going to be anywhere close to efficient? Is that really worth the time off the bike?"
maybe I'll start running anyway... I've started planking.
heddwch
G
PS (after ride home) need to make a correction, in addition to overthinking, i underthink too. super polarized. and then of course i overthink my underthink/immediate reactions and they become demons that follow me around too. Sometimes the underthink stuff is good, sometimes? not so much. but worse is the blackhole. Send email - no response. Should always expect responses i guess. I probably leave enough emails hanging w/o responding to deserve all the silence in return. Also. i'm still really tired from last week.
sure - just a review, of questionable epidemiological studies and experimental trials. But, like recent meta data, reviews are usually on the mark, up to date on scientific evidence and well cited.
Not much of an exception here.
Then again I tend to agree with the conclusions drawn.
Salt good (unless you have failing kidneys and then maybe not so much, but you've got bigger problems in that case)
Sugar bad
even cupcakes.
not real food. never ever. horrible little things. have some sugar with your sugar and other sugar. and let me load it with red dye that causes attention disorders and call it velvet. awesome. cupcakes are not real food.
yummy? yup, sure, if you find pancreatic crippling sweetness yummy.
The lack of turnout let me slip into a debate with someone on twitter who was 'curbing' group rides. Worthless no need why drive to them stupid serve no purpose Roadies are elitest d'bags only concerned with tubular deep section carbon wheels.
Yup. Then you got guys now who only race training races. "They know how to race" um no it is a training race and no one gives a shit. "Group riding is too sketchy" "road races/crits are too sketchy" "roadies are d'bags".
No I'm a CXr. Well first a bike mechanic. I never found my niche in the road scene. Dirtbag mt biker turned into Roadie by buying a Paramount and drafted onto the cycling team by Geo in college.
it came up that someone has been riding for half their life. Damn that's not much. If I go back to my first bike shit i've almost hit the four decade mark riding two wheels. and i'm only in my not quite mid 40s.
But then maybe they are only 20... percentages. I guess some people start late.
the group ride thing. It is different now.
Roadies all nod. It is code. Right? One of my friends commented, roadies always wave, but almost none of the hybrid riders acknowledge anyone. That's his observation.
Last night after the smackdown a there were three cyclists working on a flat change. One cranking a tiny min pump with a turtled bike. I said loud and clearly "NEED HELP?" and the hesitation made me stop.
More code eh? If a cyclists is on the side of the road, always ask if they need help. Yes, even if you are late. Or have no tools or anything. Maybe there is a chance you can provide assistance, or if nothing else just the simple offer is enough to turn their bad day into a good one. Never pass a rider on the side of the road, no matter what bike they are on, w/o offering. Worst case you can't do anything, but if they know that you tried and can't help it is still exponetially better to have stopped than to have ridden by.
This group of cyclists was effusive with thanks for just offering. They had watched countless cyclists ride past not even looking at them much less asking if help was needed. It wasn't. Or at least by the time i got my frame pump out and started switching it from soccer ball filling schrader valve to presta they realized the patch wasn't holding and the one with the flat was going to walk home and the other two were going to continue on.
Drives home two points to me. Always ask. Easiest way is the Ben Folsom Method "NEED HELP?" Simple, clear, unabiguous. The responses are equally clear. A NO is easy to interpret and you can keep going. Anything else and you f'n stop.
Back to smackdown.
I rolled up. It was awesome in the sun but the wind was brutal and cold. I was kind of hoping that no one would show and I could just ride back to the office, get my backpack and head home. But Andrew was there.
Only Andrew. Guess he's gonna keep me honest. He's also prep'n for Battenkill so this wed night thing is important but isn't his only thing and, as y'all know, he's a good 50# lighter than me and a former elite/varsity level lightweight crew dude. Aka #alllungs
Great, We've got big mr watts and the climber dude. Of course we went out. I assumed that Fox's comment about never riding his bike again were joking. But he didn't show like he usually did over on Broadway. Damnit. It really is just the two of us. "I'm gonna get my ass kicked." Bottom line? I did. He crushed me on Pine. We road Rocky Hill together, but I think that was more him sitting on my wheel. He dissapeared on the second pitch of Hillside. And gave a solid power dig in his big (way bigger than mine) big ring and 11/12 cog downhill into the wind. I may have put some pressure on over on Walker but man. It was a good ride. Great ride.
Not the fastest ever, not the slowest but it was great. Almost from the get go i could feel my right calf a bit edging on the cramp side - i knew by a few other signs that I was slightly dehydrated. Not optimal. But I survived. And even just the two of us we had a great smackdown ride.
Dissapointing turnout for a routine well advertised ride. Is it too hard? The beginners get dropped all the time, but hey, who knows. I'm going to keep doing it for a few reasons. One usually at least one or two of my friends shows up and riding with people you like is always something to relish. Second i know that even though I was destroyed by Andrew on the hills, it helps me. It pushes me beyond where I'd normally go with my commute and my riding.
There is value in the group ride.
Yes, a good group ride is more like a training race than a social tea party. And functionally can be better than a training race if the combinations are met just so.
I tired to take it easy riding in this morning to recover, It worked pretty well. But the ride home? Fuuuuuuck. First I was late so I had to push it. Second? BRUTAL F'N HEADWIND. It was a nice reminder that. nope, not recovered from yesterday.
Planning a Monday ride. Long Ride. Boston and back ride.
I miss the whole day in the saddle. Can't wait to be back. Looked for ride partners, got radio silence. Kind of like usual though.
There's a reason they've kept me in the basement w/o windows or social interactions in the IRL category for the last 20+ years. Reinforced by the lack of response. But hey, i'm used to it. finally figuring it out. Finally being okay with the guy left alone way off in isolation. I'm also sort of seeing part of a pattern with why i've wound up friends with socially awkward bullies. Wayne in first grade... it carries on - I only pick his name because I think last i heard he was not maybe the best roll model in South Kidsap county.
That bike racing woman who was a grad student then moved on said something about her two readers in her blog, and I definately think maybe she has more than two. Right now I'm wondering... shit maybe the 6 page views (as tracked by google) are two people clicking from three different devices/IPs. Would make sense.
This journey isn't straighforward. It isn't easy. But it is starting to make sense to me, and I'm more okay lately.
I'm also going to be talking at a fancy PRO meeting about nanoscape on may 1st. So that's pretty amazingly awesome too.
Life's a pretty f'n amazing journey. Even when it sucks it beats the alternative.
