HAPPY HALLOWEEN

blog-o-mania

OYE - I have decided to maintain a second blog on my account here at blogger. WHAT was I thinking? My second blog is my accountability tool for keeping me on track with my training that I will start at the new year. Right now I'm just figuring out what all I need to do to train for a Duathlon! So, if you are curious head over to ciclodu for what MIGHT be entertaining and informative posts on my DU training.

We'll see how long this lasts....

critters

I don't think that you have lived until you run over a not so large furry animal while riding your bike! A couple of years ago I had decided to try running over a young raccoon. Check out my post from then. I don't recommend running over raccoons while riding a bike.

Fast forward to yesterday morning. Tom was in the first few miles of his 20 mile commute into work yesterday and as he approached 99th Street on Lakeshore Avenue he spotted a critter in the road...he didn't have the time to swerve to miss it so he simply unweighted the rear of the bike and not really bunny hopped over the RACCOON. Which, like the one I hit, survived. He was able to stay upright, which was not an option during my encounter.

When you spot a critter on the road/trail there sometimes is not enough time to decide how to handle the fast approaching situation. I opted for flying over my handlebars...not good bike handling skills. Tom at least kind of skimmed over the raccoon. Either way, critters and bikes do not mix.

I think we'll start the "I HIT A RACCOON CLUB" now.

October Cycling

My cycling season is starting to wind down and I'll soon be out on the trainer on cold mornings or not as cold evenings.

During the Fall and Winter months the weekends are the times to get out and ride. Yesterday we met our new cycling friend Adam (and new Felida regular) over at the church for an "easy" 35-40 mile ride. The route, once we made it downtown, was the first few miles of the RACC and then to I-205 Bridge to Marine Drive and back via Interstate Bridge. As usual we stopped at Starbucks and enjoyed a treat before heading back to Felida.

It was really fun getting together with someone other than just the two of us. During our ride Adam mentioned that we should get a church cycling group together to do regular weekend rides. I'm all for that and have set up a "group" on My Cycling Log. We'll see how things work out over the next few months leading up to the 2009 cycling season.

At the other end of the 205 Bridge

Tom & Adam

Adam and his bright green bike!

A-mazeing Graze Corn Maze at Sauvie Island Farms

On Friday evening Tom & I joined Mark & Robin and kids on a trip to the corn maze at Sauvie Island Farms.

Tom and I have never gone to a corn maze before so this was a new adventure, let alone a maze at night! There were a lot of people there...who knew it would be so popular. I think the fact that it wasn't raining made it more alluring for people to go and play.

We paid our fee, got glow sticks and a teeny-tiny map. Besides the glow sticks we had no flashlights, Robin used her i-Touch to illuminate the map - which we had started using once we all realized that we were pretty much going around in circles. It is very disorienting in the dark, but made for a fun time! After at least an hour of walking up and down paths we made it out again.

Me peeking behind Andrew & Tom's Self Portrait...

Playing around on the path....

Caramel Apple Snack at the end...

FC JERSEY

The boys at Twin Six have done it again and came out with another great Fat Cyclist Jersey...Tom is modeling version #4 of this jersey...tres chic...also, the socks are Cancer Sucks by Sock Guys.

7 day weather

Probably my next favorite thing to do besides riding my bike is constantly checking the weather. It must be an obsessive thing because all I usually think about is when I can ride.

So this is the forecast for this week according to KOIN 6 News...there seem to be enough dry days for me to bike commute this week. Not today though - Monday is ALWAYS my day off and I also have a dental appointment - BOOOOO. I have another appointment Wednesday, but tomorrow, Thursday & Friday will work out fine. Clouds are not that bad after all.

The movement of vehicles thru an area or along a route...

This book came for me at work yesterday...

Since we live a cool 15-20 minutes from my work, I really don't experience what can pass as TRAFFIC on a daily basis. Especially since I spent the majority of the summer bike commuting...my bike view of traffic is a lot different. Overall, driving is not my favorite activity, I just see it as a necessary means to get someplace in the least amount of time, if at all possible.

Commuting by bike is so great because I will generally take a least driven route to get past the mess at the I-5 and I-205 @ 134th Street interchange. With the opening of the new bridge over Salmon Creek my route doesn't even pass thru the I-5/I-205 area anymore. During my bike travels I have discovered that motorists are not necessarily happy drivers or that good either or too cautious. There have been too many instances of people speeding up to get past me just to jam on the brakes to make a turn somewhere OR others that drive very slowly behind me until I get past where they want to go or the driver behind them becomes very impatient. Both practices that I hate equally. Just drive your car - that's all I can say. Yes, cars move faster depending on the driver so please people, just drive as you were taught in Driver's Education. What is it that makes people drive so differently, while seemingly "obeying" the same traffic laws? In my world, a red light equals STOP...not "oop, I can still make it since it was yellow when I saw it 5 blocks back..."

Anyway, when driving thru Salmon Creek and all the lights between the two interstates can get hairy at times and from point to point the distance between the onramp to I-5 and the offramp from I-205 is less than half a mile and there are 6 traffic lights from point to point which gives opportunity for motorists to make all sorts of interesting moves while driving. The big green signes over the intersections give plenty of warning if you don't really know where you are going.

Okay, so I am a little driving nazi, I really do not enjoy driving that much. I tend to plan my route ahead of time, leave WAY before I need to and try to enjoy the trip, but really, who enjoys driving? Two out of three isn't bad I guess.

How did I find this book? In a very unlikely place actually, Bicycling magazine! The new Editor in Chief included this in her letter as a recommended read for anyone who rides a bike. I am still working my way thru the Prologue, but I am already enjoying what I read. Should be interesting!

Harvest Century

Yesterday Tom and I rode our last organized ride of the year, the Harvest Century. With 3 routes to choose from we decided that we would repeat the 75 mile route that we originally rode 2 years ago. All routes start/end at Champoeg Park.

I had some concerns before the ride day was here, mostly just issues with whether or not I would do okay and if Tom would be feeling well enough as he has had a cold for the past week. We both have slacked off in our riding in the last few weeks also, so that was not helping my confidence for the day.

Also, there are portions of this ride that I was really not looking forward to, going to and from the Canby Ferry (steep on both sides and have to walk) one really big hill not long after our second rest stop and riding along 219 which doesn't really have that wide of shoulders, and what is there is not that great and full of junk and we have to cross over for a left turn on a hill....ugh. I did a lot of praying on this ride!

All went well and this has got to be the best that I have felt in a long time, I felt completely refreshed coming thru Newberg and heading back to Champoeg Park where we (I) enjoyed a little something to eat and some live music.

I am sad that this is the last ride of the season, but I am looking forward to riding to work as much as possible thru the fall and maybe even some in the winter too. Next cycling season will be here in no time at all!

Here is the ferry going back to the other side

This is heading up the hill from the ferry

The last rest stop before heading into Newberg....just 15 miles to go!

OOPS! Tom got a flat...

Looking for a signal.

Yet another self portrait.

cuisson française

This last Spring our church had a family movie night and picked the movie Ratatouille. For fun we thought of having a ratatouille tasting. Of course Tom signed up and took a recipe, but really I did most of the work (shopping, prep, etc.) Also, I searched for another recipe to see how close the one that was handed out was. I settled on a "Tyler's Ultimate Ratatouille". Also, I usually will try out a recipe if I have some sort of idea what it should look like so I have an frame of reference - there was a photo along with the Tyler's Ultimate recipe. I got to cooking and did exactly as the recipe directed and thought it turned out pretty good. However, once I brought it to the church, I wasn't so sure that it was actually done correctly - booo.

Fortunately for me, one of the Barista's at our local Starbucks is from France and I had an opportunity to ask him what the heck it was supposed to look like. Turns out it is a side dish that of veggies that are cooked down, but not so much that they are MUSHY (or mooshy), so the veggies are soft, but still hold their shape. So with this bit of information I surmised that I had done it correctly, just wasn't sure on the taste of it - how would I know what it is supposed to taste like? For me it tasted okay, but then it was my first try at it. Also, he asked me why I didn't bring him some...YIKES! Bringing a dish to a person who is from the country of origin for scrutiny...scary!

Last week I had a hankering for ratatouille and decided that I would make some for us and then share some with Stephane. Monday night rolled around and I went to the store to see if he was working and he was so I presented my ratatouille offering and he took a whiff and noted that it smelled right. SCORE! That was enough for me to last a couple of days. As the week went on, I had not seen him and was starting to wonder if I might have made him sick or something...hehe.

This morning I got the final report from him and he said it was "Very good." That is high praise coming from a frenchman and a proper one at that! We visited for a couple of minutes after the rush was over and he said that the fact that the veggies were not so soft that they fell apart made it good. I'm pretty excited about that - I really like to cook food as close to the original recipe as possible and I guess it worked well this time.

I like ratatouille and all, but it is a involved process with cooking each of the veggies separately first and then adding in everything at the end - it doesn't fit into my lets get this food going mentality, but then neither do several other dishes that I have tried out

I think I'm almost ready for my cooking show!

MRI Pics

I was lamenting that I didn't know how to get the images off the disk to post some photos. Then it hit me - DUH - take photos of the MRI images on the computer monitor. Honestly, there are days when I wonder HOW I make it thru the day.

This shows where the tumor was removed from.

What a cool shot of my BRAIN!

Check out my eyeballs - they are HUGE!

Brain Movie

Life goes on...

It seems like such a long time since this photo was taken, but it was 4 1/2 years ago...so really, not that long ago. Long enough that the stress and anxiety of the possibility of a recurrence fades more to the back of my mind. Up until April of this year I was having MRI's every 3 months, but in April I made my mind up to make a change and have my schedule switched to every 6 months - the best decision EVER! I don't think about the actual MRI much before the appointment and even less after. So I think I'm finally accepting that things are good.

Today was my follow-up with my oncologist and all is well, blood counts, MRI results - perfect! It was a good visit, fairly short - about an hour - and I left with a disk of my latest MRI and no orders for a blood draw at my next appointment. There have been some staff changes and I have more confidence that the scheduling of my future appointments will be low-stress.

This has been a good day indeed.

TWIN SIX JERSEY'S ROCK!

I got my new jersey from Twin Six this week and I wore it yesterday...it is soooo cool! I feel like I'm going FAST when I wear this -

Cycling is GOOD

When I ride a lot of times I just kind of focus on getting to where I am going without any injury to me or my bike. After work yesterday I was feeling pretty relaxed and was thinking about all sorts of stuff besides keeping out of harms way.

The one thing that came to mind is how much I enjoy being out on my bike. When I ride I can gauge where my condition is on any given day, have I ridden too hard, I'm tired, I feel strong etc. Yesterday I was feeling particularly good, so I was flying along enjoying a great ride without too much effort, but with just enough to know that I was working hard enough. Basically, I knew that I was getting a good workout - as I had a couple of hills to do, nothing terribly out of control of course.

As I was thinking about how much fun I was having I thought about something of the things that I have heard people say about their rides - how they "punished" themselves on a ride and they rode so hard or the ride was so hard. It struck me as interesting because all of my cycling buddies at Performance just rave about all the rides that they go on and that is what I am used to. Is it me or am I stuck in between two different realms of cycling? I LOVE riding, it is the one thing that I can do that brings me happiness and a sense of well being. My bike is my escape - from my day and whatever else might be bogging me down.

Who wants to look like this?

When you could look like this...

What also keeps me riding is the fact that I can. Not my ability, but that I am allowed to. When I was first diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor I was instructed not to drive while I was on the dilantin. Of course, silly me asked about riding my bike and the doctor looked at me and said that I probably shouldn't ride my bike either - that would have lasted at least 6 months, until I was off the medication. I can understand a little, she didn't want anything to happen to me in the event that I had another seizure, but it seemed a little extreme. So, that was the WRONG answer and I immediately started trying to strike up a deal that would still allow me to ride my not even really broken in road bike and she relented, realizing that I would not let go of the issue. She agreed that I could still ride if I had someone with me. Well, that worked out and one of the guys from the station came out several times a week and rode with me...which was so great because it really made a difference in my attitude while going thru all the stuff that I had to do while starting up my cancer treatments. Even though I never rode very far on those rides, it was enough to keep me happy and in good spirits.

Since those days, nearly 5 years ago I am convinced that no one will ever truly understand the joys of cycling until there is the potential for it to be taken away for a period of time. If I had my riding privileges taken away that would have been punishment or torture or whatever else someone might describe a ride...

Riding is my passion and NO ONE is going to take away that passion.

medical type people

Over the past 4 years I have visited my fair share of doctors, oncologists, neurosurgeons, family doctor, allergy doctor, dermatologist blah blah blah...out of all the offices that I visit I have to say that the people in the MRI department at Rebound are the best. Bert in particular - He has been a part of several of my MRIs over the last couple of years and he really is quite pleasant. Since they don't get many people that need contrast injected but maybe 2 or 3 times a week his skills in finding a vein and actually hitting it are slim. He's always apologetic as my tears are running down the my face because of the anxiety and pain from the poke in the hand....the most painful place I have ever had contrast injected. Mr Bert, he's okay...I always look forward to seeing him and having my scans done with assistance from Kenda.

Post MRI and ready to go home...

Lawrence Welk

This morning it was brought to my attention that the song "One Toke Over the Line" was performed on the LAWRENCE WELK show! Amazing to think that they would sing such a song on a family show oh so long ago...