A Ripper in Honor of "The Dude"

This is Andre. The story I am about to tell you was all his fault. The night started off innocent enough. A little music, chips, salsa, hummus, pizza, beer, and of course Caucasians (aka White Russians, "The Dude's" favorite beverage for those not in the privvy). From a few drinks to bowling (we used designated drivers) at Leasure Lanes.

The young man you see in the background was our ringer. He brought his own ball and shoes. While he hasn't bowled much lately he was still putting up scores in the 160-170 range. Me, well let's just say I agree with "the dude". By nights end though I had managed one game over 100. I was too busy pretending I was in a mix of "The Big Lebowski" and "Kingpin". Probably the two best bowling movies ever. After every roll I would make some sort of celebrative motion. Much like the one Staci is making up top. Now if only I had some hair that I could comb over.

Still zipped up in our hoodies but...

We are a bit cozier in this ice box now. Our new storm door is finally installed. Yes, it took a week to fit it, stain it, varnish it, and then finally install it. It looks pretty nice though. Being a pipefitter I know how to do many things construction related but doors, not really. I enlisted the help of Staci's moms better half. He crushed it. I mostly just watched as he fit the door and notched little coves for the hinges. The sucker is pretty air tight. No more drafty front door. We never were ones that did the before and after photos so all we have is an after. Oh well.

Yesterday, I went out for a ride in the 20-30mph wind. Talk about some resistance training. Boy howdy! I road directly into the wind for the first 23-24 miles. Basically, I road RT.23 to 441 (with some other roads to break up the straight shot). This took about 1 hour and 20 minutes. Horrible. What is that, like 15-16mph average? When I turned south on 441 the pace went super high. The last 21-22 miles of my ride took 50 minutes. It felt like I was a pro just humming along on a flat stage in the Tour de France. All said and done, not a bad day on the bike.

In team news...Our uniform designs are done. We are submitting our templates to Champion Systems and by late January they should be in our hands. They have a thing on their website that lets you dress up a guy in their clothes. It's a good chuckle. Click on the title of this entry to check it out.

Cool as a Cucumber

In our efforts to have a smaller carbon footprint, we, at this household, for the past few years have been setting the thermostat at 63 degrees. You may say, "That's a bit chilly." I will tell you this, you are right but, think of the positives. Our house which is 100+ years old is inefficient so, we reduce our heat bills. Also, we get to snuggle with our family and furry friends. Even when they are mad at us. See pictures as proof.

Today, we get a new storm door. The old aluminium one will be given away via letting on the sidewalk or to our neighbor Butch. No picture of him will even be placed on this blog. I'm pretty sure he would kill me. Seriously. Butch scraps metal, which the price is up so he may get $2 for the door. I say way to go Butch. The new door will be a wooden one. It should look nice. Staci's mom and step-dad are coming down to install it. Well, her mom is really coming for the good times. Normally, I would help with such a project but, no one would switch days with me at work. Yet another reason why work is for suckers!

Skellington and Serendipity are mortal enemies but with the 63 degree mandate they've quickly become close "friends". Skelly is the one that is just a head. Dippy is the one using him as a bed. T and Staci are the ones with grumpy faces. They have been wearing these grumpy faces for a few days. In their defense, I've had one on too.

Well, another set of business cards came in the mail. These were from Chad. Thanks.

Not so Fairhill

Shawn and myself made the trek to Fairhill today. It was wonderful 'cross weather with temps in the mid 50's and a nice stiff wind. A little chilly actually. When the gun went off we pedaled like mad men. Unfortunately for me, I appeared to be going backwards. I've never really been a strong starter but this was backwards fast and I never really got into a rhythm. The two of us raced the whole race pretty close to each other. Shawn having mechanical issues. His chain dropped twice and he went down and broke his left shifter/brake lever. Me, I just had dead legs. It wasn't until the 4th lap that I finally felt "fast" but by then it was far too late. On the 5th lap though, the legs were dead again. I haven't been training much this 'cross season, about 45 minutes on the trainer each week. I've been relying on what I built up all spring/summer. This week though I did put about 6 hours in because I didn't want to lose what I worked for all summer. Maybe it was too much. Maybe it was the stiff wind that seemed to always be a head wind. All I know is that we didn't even bother to see where we finished. That's bad.