Independence Day!

Wednesday night was pretty chill. We went out to eat with Jess’ parents at the Gritty. Great burger, below average curds. We got home and I packed up for my duathlon. Yep I was going to do a 4th of July Duathlon. Except for that running crap, it was going to be a road and then mountain bike ride. Tuesday night it poured. I almost scrapped everything but decided if I didn’t ride early I wasn’t riding at all. It came as no surprise that no one else showed up. I started down Blue Mound at 45+ when it was wet which was kind of fun! The ride was awesome! 4 big climbs. More deer than cars, lots of wild life, beavers, birds and some sort of muskrat looking thing, 1 mile of gravel. The final climb up Blue Mound isn’t getting any less steep or shorter but it was manageable. Did just over 30 miles in just under 2 hours and it was beautiful. As I was riding back into the park the sign said the MTB trails were closed. And no one showed up for that either, except for Garett who was scoping out for the 12hour race. It was ok, I got home and watched the movie Flight Plan which was entertaining.

Got readied up and headed to Kyle and Tracy’s for some BBQ action. It was a small get together (7 of us) but was a lot of fun. Their new puppy (Dari) is so cute, I can’t get enough and rattled off one photo after another. Kyle made the best burger I've ever had not at a restaurant which is a pretty high compliment. I won a game of Beans (as did Tracy.) Got home early enough to go to bed at a normal hour. Wow, Wednesday holidays suck!

Today was the Gun Show. I've only been training for two weeks but things came back to me pretty quick. I was a player in the 1st and 3 stages and even scored me a 3rd place finish behind a couple powerhouses on Seminole. It felt good to be able to play a bit. Of course I wanted to get some hills in tonight so I did my local hilly route. I thought I'd get more elevation but I guess the climbs are more the 100 foot type and not the 200 foot type. Still Sun Valley, Observatory and Paoli road were killers in the heat. Got home, ate some leftover pizza and a protein shake and then took the dogs to the park. Now I am back home and not much to report.

Heading north this weekend…should be fun!

4th of July!

When asked if he wanted to ride bikes tomorrow morning, this is what my friend Shiroma responded with: "Jill had mentioned trying to do the Tuesday night triangle of death (half priced mug-o-ritas at pedro’s, $1 sloppy joes & $1 pabst at big ten, and free bacon & $1 pabst at wando’s). If I do that, there’s probably not going to be early riding, but if I can withstand the peer pressure then I’ll be there." That was Shiroma and not the Riz. I expect to not see Shiroma tomorrow.

Can't wait to go to Colorado...all of these photos are from one trail, although it's kinda far away so I might not get to do...

Madness!

Do as many things as possible. Call it my weekend. Friday wasn’t too bad at work. Work has gotten a lot better lately which has been good. We went on the brat ride at lunch. Unfortunately some guy who was visiting and works for Hayes shifted his derailleur into his wheel, breaking his wheel, derailleur and hanger. Fortunately for him I was the same size so I gave up my bike and began the hike back. Another guy on the ride called a coworker and had her pick me up at the nearest intersection so a ½ mile hike and a car ride later I was back at work. I missed out on a brat but my boss got an extra sandwich so she gave it to me and the company president thanked me for my effort. Listened to the Brewers blow it big time against the Cubs. Then met up with a couple other couples from work for some Dottys. Dottys reigns supreme! We then went to a wine tasting (I again had coffee and a cookie). By popular demand we had to bust out some Beans…and I actually won a game and Kyle took the second game. Stayed up a little later than I wanted but such is life.

Saturday morning I decided to skip basketball and do some training on the bike. Unfortunately my body misses basketball and made sure I was well awake at 6am. Guh! I chilled out until meeting the Wolf at 8am. We rode 41 miles. Actual words out of my mouth: we could go south here and add some miles and do the Observatory climb. What’s wrong with me? It went pretty well and we even randomly saw Waisbrot out and forced him to do it with us. He wanted to do no more though; apparently hill workouts on the road aren’t great the day before mountain bike races. Got home and chilled for a bit before having to get ready to head out. We got on the road a bit late and hit the Qdoba (thanks Riz for the coupon!) I tried the shredded beef because the steak looked crappy and it was a good choice! We then hit a couple places on the way and went to find a Brewers Pro Shop. We though of a mall that would have it, no dice, so we went to Miller Park and they had everything we could want. Jess got a JJ Hardy T-Shirt. We then headed into Summerfest. If you go, the one thing you need to do? Go to Saz’s, order the Leinies Cheese Curds. Don’t go combo plate, order the curds. Then eat them. Then smile! We had other food items including a funnel cake. I even changed a tire!If only I was 10 an under, I would've bested that time by .11 seconds. We then headed in to watch the Fray and some band called OK Go. I am not a big Fray fan but I enjoy their music. This concert rocked. OK Go ended up being super cool. The Fray? Spectacular! Although I only know 3 of their songs well enough, every song they played was enjoyable. Oh yeah, and they did this crazy bluegrass version of Hips Don’t Lie which is one of the Top 5 concert moments ever. We headed south to Chicago after Summerfest and getting to our hotel at like 12:15. It was pretty funny getting there as everyone around was hammered as there must’ve been a couple weddings there that night. We had the biggest hotel room I’ve ever seen and it was awesome. Thank you Radisson.

Sunday we woke up and headed towards Wrigley Field. Of course breakfast was at Dunkin Donuts. For the first time in my life I had an overcooked donut. And it was actually good, it almost melted in my mouth. Of course if I knew both of mine were overcooked I would’ve ordered one of something else but all was good. We stopped at a Target to get some game snacks and then found the best parking spot ever (3 blocks from Wrigley with an easy out.) Oh wait, on the way to the stadium we drove around it. And this taxi stops in front of us and Jess is like, look it’s Derrick Turnbow (jokingly) and I said I think it is. Well she wasn’t sure it was him until out of the next taxi pops Ryan Braun. Jess jumps out of the car with my camera to get a photo. Only problem was the camera was stuck on movie mode. Guh! So we have a movie of them crossing the street. Anyways, we walk around the park for a while, looking for cheap hot dogs. I settled for a carne asada taco from some local taco joint, and a 7-11 slurpee! Then we got in line to wait for bobbleheads. We ran into Dean and Beth and we all waited in line together. We got Michael Barrett bobbles! We then got to stand near the dug out. We could yell at players and get them to wave and I took some photos. Couldn’t get close enough to get free stuff though. The seats we had were primo on the first base side, maybe 40 rows up and about at the pitchers mound. Hot! The game itself went super fast and the Brewers decided to suck. Oh well! We then headed out to Dave and Busters. But not before we met a 7-week old boxer by our car! Awesome! We had a good out and were able to get to Dave & Busters in about 45 minutes. Unfortunately, Dean and Beth had a bad out and then they got rear-ended on the Interstate. Guh! We probably had to wait an extra hour but fortunately they weren’t hurt and Beth’s car was pretty much unscathed. We got to eat and play games. I rocked the flaming finger (shut up, it’s a video game of skill) but then Dean proved it was easy and did it too. It was fun! I made Jess drive home and we made it back after dark. Guh!

We then received an e-mail saying our friends (Kyle and Tracy) had picked up a boxer! It’s so cute! What a complete weekend!