Weekly Beatdown

It's getting cooler outside. This morning's commute was really comfortable. On the way over to the shop, I ran into two other cyclists. One was just riding over to the shop like me, but the other was a commuter, I guess also like me. I've been seeing more and more commuters lately. Maybe I've started a trend.

The ride itself was not so great. I've been digging being able to hang in with the A group, but they start late, ride long and it's almost dark when they're done. I was relegated to B1. I've described B1's crazy riding before, but what I have not mentioned how often you get chastised for doing completely reasonable things. I've mentioned instances of it before, but I didn't realize it was so chronic until today. It would take a complex animation to explain what I got yelled at for, but it involved me sustaining the paceline while the rider ahead of me jumped off the front and another rider came around on the left. "We don't need anybody riding up the middle!"

Rob got yelled at for bridging up to pull down a solo break, pulling around on the left to go for his own break and riding too close to the right hand column in a paceline, too close being less than 5 feet. We both got yelled at for pulling up on the left of a column of riders who got dropped from a break and wouldn't rotate, then pulling over to pull them back up into it. Apparently we were "rotating in the wrong direction."

Strange indictments aside, we kept a good pace and got back in good time so that part worked out.

Bull Mountain, Buford Hatchery and Alpharetta Greenway

Today was a busy, busy day. Busy.

I met the Chattahooche Trail Horse Association folks at Jake Mountain at 9AM for a work party. I'm bad with names, so I only remember Debbie Crowe, who I met before at the Bull/Jake Assessment, JK because we talked for a while before everybody else got there and Humberto because his name is so awesome, but there were 7 CTHA folks in total. Very cool folks, very friendly. They turned out to be a pleasure to work with.

JK has a chainsaw certification, so he took off to cut out a bunch of downed trees. The rest of us headed up to Jones Creek Ridge. It had rained all night, and it was super wet in the parking lot, but it dried up really quickly and the trails themselves turned out to be totally dry. Two folks went up to do some weedeating. The rest of us started down the trail to deberm some sections and cut nicks into the flat spots. On me and Eddie's walk-through, we'd walked out on Jones Creek. There are two hills out there that we said "These will take a lot of work." That's where we started.

I've weedwhacked, cleared water bars, built bridges, flagged corridor, rerouted, cut new trail, rerouted old trail, nicked, debermed and God knows what else in the past, but only on tight little two foot wide trails. Jones Creek is about 6 feet wide and required a lot more labor. I've also swung the heck out of a Pulaski, but never used a McCleod before. Humberto is a sculptor with that thing. My initial efforts were not ineffective, but after watching how it's really done, I got a lot more efficient with it. I love that tool.

Our first nick, a big, tough one...



Some folks came by on horseback while we were working. Friends of the CTHA folks.



A little while later, Wes and Rob came riding up. Of all the people that could have passed by, it was two guys I know. Wes was even wearing an old BOR jersey. "What's up Muse? It's about time you fixed this trail!" Hahaha. I chatted with them for a while, Debbie talked to them for a while, and they were on their way. I was jealous, I kind of wanted to be riding with them.

We cut more and more nicks...



And debermed a bunch of trail. By and large, Jones isn't worn in too deeply below grade, an inch or less in most places, but it's a wide trail. Removing just that inch is still a lot of dirt, and deberming it for real will require a dingo or a ditch witch of some kind. One of the CTHA guys is actually certified to run a ditch-witch in the National Forest. He's the guy that cleaned up Jake and part of Moss Branch. There's a pro-trail builder coming through this fall to work on a bunch of the trails too. Everything in yellow...



The cyclists I know who are interested in doing work out there have been reticent to do so for two main reasons. "Those trails won't even be there next year." Well, got a point there, nobody wants to work on trails that will end up closed, rerouted or dingo'd and nobody knows what trails will hang around. I only just saw this map last week. I doubt many have seen it. In theory though, after the reroutes the trails should be really nice, maybe there will be some interest then. And the other reason... "The horses will just tear it back up." Well, on the steeper trails, yeah. Again, after the reroutes that shouldn't be an issue. If the reroutes are done, and the trails are nice, and stay nice, that will say a lot. Hopefully it will change some minds. In the mean time, there are trails that aren't getting bulldozed, and when I get a chance, I'll be working on them.

Somebody's been out there tearing down the plastic blazes. They tried hard to get these off.



We found one just lying in the woods near where it had been torn off. Whoever's doing it isn't keeping them, just tearing them down. Woohoo!

CTHA is great. They even fed us.



We ate where the old game check station was. In the past week they removed the last remains of it, tilled up the ground and laid down straw.

I've got energy for days, but just like running, it's easy for me to overdrive muscles that aren't trained up for it. I used a lot of those muscles today and I'm tired in places I'm not usually tired in. I hope I'm not sore tomorrow, but if I am, I'll still feel good about it.


Back at home, there was still time to get in some fishing before the pond at the Buford Hatchery closed. I've become convinced that sausage is the best thing to fish with there. Murky water, good scent, and there are big catfish there. I wanted to catch one.

Kathryn's got a cold, so the walk to the pond felt like forever to her. It didn't help she was carrying a camping chair.

How I missed these last week is beyond me. Wild grapes!



They tasted woody, with lots of seeds, but the aftertaste was really nice.

I put a big chunk of sausage on a fairly large hook and on my first cast hooked a huge catfish, in seconds. Or I would have hooked it, except that Kathryn immediately needed me to put a hook on her line. So while she was holding my rod, she caught a huge catfish. Almost. She had a lot of trouble with my reel, but even after she figured that out, the fish pulled the knot loose as she lifted it out of the water. We saw it. It was huge. The one that got away always is.

The girls were hauling them in left and right. Pretty nice catches too.





I caught a panfish about that size too, trying to catch another big catfish.

A kid of maybe 10 and his family were fishing next to us and I offered them some of our bait. The kid had an older baitcasting reel without a magnetic brake and was impressively proficient with it. I'm not sure I could cast with it, but he really knew what he was doing.

Kathryn redeemed herself after letting that first one go.



This one too, eventually pulled the knot out, right after I took that picture. I retied it with a different knot. We'll see how that works out.

I'm going to try fishing with either barbless or circle hooks though. The barbed ones are rough on the smaller panfish and the catfish are so tough and meaty, they get torn up pretty badly too. I hate to see it.

I never caught my big catfish, but given Kathryn's results, I feel pretty validated about my approach. Maybe next time.


Yesterday, we upgraded the girls' bikes. Iz has gears now and Sophie's riding Iz's old bike.



We hit the proving ground yesterday. Today Iz was itching to ride again. Sophie had already had "too much outdoor time." She stayed home. Me and Iz hit the Greenway. She was a little hesitant at first, but before long she was comfortable and confident, railing turns and pedaling downhill.



Water break.



She did really well on the mountain bike trail too.



For a while, at least. Realizing she could ride over larger roots, she took some questionable lines and eventually ended up crashing. Once just tipping over and falling on the end of her handlebar. Her instinct was to reach down and put her hands on the ground, which just drove the bar into her stomach. That must have hurt. She shook it off, but the next one was harder to shake. Arguably not as bad of a crash, but it had more of an emotional impact. Like the first time, she just got stalled out and tipped over, but that time her shirt got torn. She recently had to give up a bunch of shirts that don't fit her any more, so pretty much every one she still has, she loves. Between that and the wedgie she kept getting, we decided she needs some real cycling gear.

A few minutes later she was fine, riding and starting to get her confidence back. She's pretty well figured out her gears too, at least on the pavement. She figured out how to use them to climb on her own. She's figuring out a lot on her own these days. Growing up.

Weekly Beatdown and Mulberry Gap

I felt super good on the commute today. Good enough to jump in with the A group, which for some reason, took it really easy. We barely averaged 20 mph. There were some attacks, but we rolled lazily up Elmo and even more lazily over Sawnee. It was a nice ride, but not without it's own penalty. The A group rolls out last, does a longer route, and with the added slowness, got back too late to ride home. I had to call Kathryn to pick me up. She was more than happy though, rather than have me ride home on those roads, in the dark.

I sat on the curb and waited. Upon sitting, a bunch of good teenage skateboarding memories found their way to the surface... sitting on a curb, tired and thirsty, at the end of the day, in cool weather, with the sky not quite dark, hearing the sound of distant traffic, and the street lights just came on.

This may not be your idea of solitude and beauty, but it's definitely one of mine:



In real life, the street lights didn't pop so hard.

Post ride, and post shower, I headed up to Mulberry Gap. I'd been watching the last riders on the tracker, and expected to be able to pick them up from the border, but they beat my prediction by over an hour. Rob picked up Karlos himself and Mulberry had already sent a car to get Jeff and Ruth. But, still, I wanted to see them off, and uncover the mystery of Ruth's super-spotty Spot reception. I drove up, rolled through the property, but all the lights were off, so I parked out front, set the alarm in my phone for an hour and dozed off. Just as I woke up, Ginny had driven down to see who the heck was parked out front of their property. I think she was happy to find it was just me. Andrew arrived 10 minutes later with Ruth and Jeff.



Jeff came in last and still crushed my finish time. EVERY finisher beat my time. Hard core. Ruth's Spot barely worked the entire time. It showed her in Ellijay for half the time, then started working well, briefly, then updated once again, and that was it. She wasn't in the car when Matt told us about needing to use Energizer Lithium Ultimates, so my theory was that it had inferior batteries in it, possibly alkalines. We opened it up and took a look. It says "Lithium Batteries Only" on the inside, and she had, in fact, put lithium batteries in it. However, they were Energizer Advanced Lithium's, not Energizer Ultimate Lithium's and apparently the tree canopy of North Georgia requires the ultimate in lithium battery technology. Mere "advanced" technology doesn't cut through. Glad we solved that mystery. Good to know for next year.

I didn't keep them up for too long, just long enough to say hi, figure out that mystery and talk a little about the ride. On the drive back home, before I got out of the woods, I saw some unidentifiable animal cross the road in front of me. It bounded, kind of like a deer, but it had shorter legs than a deer for it's length and was the only size of a large dog. I couldn't get close enough to tell what it was before it was gone. Could have been anything. The rest of the drive was uneventful. Yay, the TNGA's in the bag. All that's left is publishing the official times.

Buford Fish Hatchery, Rocky Mountain Recreation Area and TNGA

Sunday and Monday just ran together. We all slept in Sunday morning, hit the late service and then hit the pond. Lanier's got ten million little bream or some kind of bream-like fish. That's all I know how to catch there. The little pond at the Buford Hatchery has catfish and allegedly bass. The weather was great and the fish were biting all day.

I tried a rig that put the hook about a foot off the bottom. The plastic grasshopper didn't work, but I got several strong hits on a real worm. I think the water is so murky there, you've got to use bait with a good scent. Nothing can see the grasshopper. My hits didn't pan out though. I tried a smaller hook and started catching.

Kathryn and the girls were catching too.





Hey, I caught a catfish.



Actually, I caught 3. I caught my share of catfish when I was a kid, but I also watched my grandfather get his hands ripped to shreds by their serrated spines, so I always took them off the hook by putting them on the ground, holding them down with my foot, getting the hook out and then kicking them into the water. Saturday I tried my grandfather's technique of sliding his hand up the body from behind the spines and holding them out with his thumb, hand and first finger. It worked enough to get the hook out, but while throwing the fish back in, I got cut up just like I saw him get cut, and the mild poison felt like a bee sting. The next time I just let the fish hang by its lower lip. A loose wrist kept it's spines away from me, even when it thrashed about. Much better.

That's all we did. A cool, lazy day.

On the way to dinner I caught sight of the Blue Ridge to the north and thought of the riders out there hauling themselves across it.



The tracker showed Eddie, Matt and Brad, already west of Dalton. If they kept moving, they could get to the border by 2AM or so. I would meet them.

Me and Iz headed west. Sophie declined. We got to Rome in a record hour and a half. It's a quick trip when there's no traffic. When we got there, we checked the tracker on my phone. Nobody had moved. They were asleep. Even moving, they wouldn't be at the border for at least 8 or 10 hours. We could sleep too.

We'd brought our sleeping bags, but there was no 3G or even Edge at the trailheads. We could have parked in a church lot or something, but if Iz had to go to the bathroom, it wouldn't be good. We opted for a hotel room. At 8AM we checked the tracker again. The riders were moving, but were at least 6 hours out.

While scouting and riding the route, I'd seen a sign on Hwy 100 for the Rocky Mountain Recreation Area and always wanted to check it out. The sign just points east, so I followed it, expecting the area to be nearby, but it was like 10 miles away. Suddenly I recognized it. We passed it getting a ride home from our TNGA adventure. I've even seen it on the maps. Somebody turned Rocky Mountain into a pumped storage reservoir, like Raccoon Mountain, maybe even before Raccoon Mountain, and converted the land around it into a recreation area.

Me and Iz found a trail and hiked it. We weren't quite prepared though. No technical clothing. No camelbacks. Jeans, T-shirts, Iz was wearing boots. Empty soda bottles, filled with water. Iz carried a bag of Doritos.

The trail was flat and easy, but very scenic.







We ate a few elderberries.



The trail eventually led across a dam a the east end of the lake...



...and we had to walk on the road for a while. Iz found a large, awesome feather.



Turkey?

The Spillway was cool.



I don't totally understand the water flow out there. It looks like the northern lakes drain into the middle lakes when they're high enough, then water is pumped up to the top of the mountain from them when there's surplus energy, and let flow back down when they need to generate more electricity. Maybe.

We had a tough time finding the trail again. A friendly park ranger pointed us in the right direction. It went up over a hill, then back down along the lake. We passed several people fishing, and I saw my first Paw Paw tree...



...with it's weird fruit. I didn't try it.

Our little adventure over, we headed back to Rome to check the tracker. About halfway there, I got a voicemail from Russell. Eddie was like 20 miles out. Woohoo!

We headed to the border and waited a little over an hour.

And then...



Woohoo!

A few hours later, Matt arrived, but declined to finish. He and Brad had been travelling together for over half the route. They'd gotten separated coming down off of High Point. I'm not sure exactly how. He explained it, but I didn't understand. 20 minutes later Brad showed up, met Matt at the gas station and they rode in together.



Matt chucked an empty gatorade bottle at Brad's front wheel at the last second to try to take him out! Or something like that. Maybe Matt pushed him and it fell out of his pack. Whatever it was, it was dirty! Hahaha.

We piled in the truck and Matt was literally asleep in seconds. He has that gift. I wish I had that gift. At Los Portales, we mowed through a metric ton of food. Iz didn't like her hamburger, but hey, that's what you get when you order a hamburger at a mexican joint. She should have had some of my Camarones a la Diabla.

The guys were moving slowly. I remember that from my ride. Stiff muscles and joints, and lots of chafing. Once you sit, you don't want to get up.



At length, we dropped Brad at a hotel. Matt Fusco was coming in later and Matt's girlfriend would pick the two of them up. I pulled his bike down off my rack, and man, his bike was heavy. His front wheel felt heavier than my bike. His gear was heavy! Brad is just an ox. Strong as hell. Inhumanly strong.

Back on the road, Mulberry bound, Matt crashed out again. Zzzzz. My truck hit 300K on the way.



It must be built Ford tough or something. Does Dodge have a slogan like that? If they do, I can't come up with it. Good job Dodge.

My mom called me: "Your dad's fine but..." Man, I hate when it starts like that. Apparently he got stung by a hundred bees. Just riding along, noticed a downed tree, stopped, "Hmm, how do I get around... Bees!" Benadryl, ice packs and a ton of water to drink. I talked to him today, he took off work, but he's feeling ok. They were supposed to send me a photo, but I don't have a photo yet. Send me a photo!

At Mulberry, everybody was up, buzzing around. Charley Rome was still there and we hung out for a while. He's riding the local trails today.

Before long, Karlos showed up, riding super fast up the super steep hill leading up to the Barn. We were watching his light come up the hill and doubting that it could even be one of the riders. "Who is that?" "Karlos!" "Karlos?"



Yep, Karlos. His stamina is amazing. I think a lot of these guys just don't need much sleep. They just ride and don't need to sleep. Were they born that way? Did they train that up? Both? Something to work on for sure.

Mission accomplished, me and Iz rolled home. She was out after 5 minutes. I remember driving, but no details of the drive. My bed felt good.

TNGA Start and Rabun Bald

TNGA time. Yes, it's that time. After work, the girls and I rolled up to Mulberry Gap. I met Karlos and Rob Roberts on the way into the barn, and everybody else almost immediately after walking in. Diane and Ginny fed us spaghetti and I had a Dr. Pepper with an old-school logo on it, prompting "That's the wrong Dr. Pepper" from Sophie.

Sophie immediately began exploring her world, taking photos of everything.



There were 4 or 5 dogs running around, Kathryn is allergic, the girls are dog-starved and they couldn't get enough dog time. While they ran around and played, I attended to some logistics, talked to the riders, talked to some folks just up there for the weekend, talked to some folks doing the Drama Queen ride the next day, talked to Rick Moon of NWGA Sorba, who was going to do most of the shuttling and generally ran around loading up bikes and talking to everybody.

The girls were getting sleepy, so we checked into our bunkhouse. Then, as soon as they got in bed, Sophie had to pee. The closest bathroom is up the hill a bit, so they had to get re-dressed and walk back up there. Mulberry Gap is IN the woods, so it's pretty dark. I needed to get back to the barn, so post-urination, I let them walk back by themselves, which included navigation down a pitch-black road and around a switchback and finding the proper cabin. I lurked in the shadows, keeping an eye on them the whole time, but as far as they knew, they were on their own. They got it though, and they were confident, even in the dark. Intro to night-nav.

Matthew Lee hit a ton of traffic and showed up around 11. He'd forgotten to bring his lefty rack adapter so we had to just take his wheels off and put his bike in the back of my truck. Around midnight we were all set and I hit the sack.

The girls were already sacked out, with the lights on. I guess it was too scary with the lights off.



We slept fast. At 3:45 it was wake-up time.

The girls and I ran around, making sure everyone was up, which involved a little more pseudo-night-nav back up to the barn. Again, they were pretty confident walking through the woods in the dark. Good stuff. At breakfast, I met several of the riders that had hit the hay before I got there, including Charley Rome from my home town of Baton Rouge, woohoo! These guys and girls are all characters, I'm privileged to have them riding this thing, if only just to meet them.



Rick was driving the riders over in his Cadillac Limo.



Now that's a sight. A Cadillac Limo pulling a trailer full of bikes. The girls and I ferried 3 riders over in my truck.

We left about 10 minutes late, and as awesome as it was, the limo was a little slow on the highway. Loaded down, it couldn't hold 55 along much of the route. We made a coffee and bathroom stop at McDonalds in Hiawasse, and also discovered, en route, that the rental Spots required Energizer Lithium Ultimate batteries. No other batteries would do. We didn't have enough, so we made another run through Wal Mart in Clayton, which, of course, had only one lane open, and the cashier was chatting up the customer before me "...so did he ever find out if the one she's carrying now is his?..."

We arrived at the start at 7:50. I'd planned to start everyone at 8, but I held the start long enough for everybody to get ready. I knew several riders were planning on riding to Helen that day and then picking up lights though, and I didn't want anyone descending the Hickory Nut in the dark, without lights, so I tried not to hold it for long.

Johnny and Norma were there to heckle everybody and it was cool to see them. We all agreed though, that while it felt odd to be at the start of a big ride like that, but not be kitted up and ride-focused, none of us felt that "darn, I wish I was riding" feeling that we usually have when we volunteer at an event.

The field...



It was cool to see everybody's set-up. Different bikes, different gear, different strategies. One common theme - 29'ers. I think only two riders had 26 inch wheels. Only one was on a singlespeed.

At 8:15 we had a brief meeting and at 8:24 (by my watch) they rolled out.

Joe Polk of MTBCast talked to Johnny, Norma and I. "What aspects of the ride are people underestimating?" We all agreed: navigation, the amount of climbing and the Pinhoti singletrack out past Dalton, which looks easy on the elevation profile, but is probably the toughest part, being late in the ride and all. We may be eating our words though. Since then, most of the riders have exceeded my expectations, some by a lot, some by an almost absurd amount. If they can hold out, we're the ones guilty of underestimation, of them.

With everybody out riding and nothing left to do, Johnny and Norma went for a run on the Chattooga River Trail. Me and the girls headed back to Clayton for some Waffle House. The kids had slept in the car, but not me. I was nodding off at the table. My eggs were good though, and bacon... yum, bacon. Recharged, we turned around and headed up Hale Ridge Road to the Rabun Bald Trail.

I usually carry a camelback for these things, but yesterday I'd brought my REI pack and a bladder. A bladder, with a hole in it. No duct tape, no patches, but I rigged up this!



It was all water-cooler, glug-glug-glug action, but it worked.

We climbed and climbed. For the most part, the trail runs directly up a bumpy ridge. We kept track of our location by counting the bumps as we climbed over them.



I can't get trail assessment off my mind. It looks like Turner Creek wasn't the only trail ravaged by this year's bad weather. Look at all that silt:



Fortunately that's a rolling dip. This poor water bar's had it:



Everybody knows what I think about water bars, so I won't go into it.

Iz loved these mushrooms and required that I title the photo: "Iz Says That's a Lot of Mushrooms"...



The trail had one switchback and a short sidehill, so it was easy to tell where we were when we were on those sections.



The last kick to the top goes directly up a steep, steep ridge, forever. You can't see anything but trees and brush, so there's no way to tell how far from the top you are, or at least I couldn't.

Iz found this cool snake skin.



The trail got pretty rough in places. More trail assessment... Basically, it's too steep. The shear strength of the soil is too low to withstand than the force applied by feet, struggling to climb or arresting themselves on the descent. Feet loosen the soil. Water washes it downhill. See, it can happen on a hiking trail.



But I digress. The foliage began to change and we suspected we were near the top. There was a little clear spot with a fantastic view.



The kids were digging it.



But the trail kept going up, so we went up. Then, suddenly, we heard people, and saw this...



There's a tower up there! I'd just heard it was "cool on Rabun Bald" but I didn't know why. I guess this is why.

The views were amazing.



The girls were impressed because the platform on the tower was bigger than their bedroom, but they weren't totally convinced that the climb was worth it.



We stayed there for probably an hour and talked to a bunch of folks. Amazingly, one couple lived in New Orleans, had grown up in Baton Rouge, the guy worked at Capitol Schwinn on Jones Creek Road and we knew some of the same people. It's a small, small world.

The descent was faster than the climb, but not materially less strenuous. My legs were burning. If you don't want to slip, you have to move a certain speed, which is tough to sustain. The girls impressed me with their ability to keep up. My legs are actually still a little sore right now from it.

On the way down, Johnny Garner called me. Don Meredith had dropped after climbing for 10 miles on a singlespeed and ultimately deciding that he needed to refactor his approach. Johnny'd found him at the start after his run and gave him a ride to his house in South Carolina. Just another reason that Johnny and Norma are saints. Another reason.

I also got a call from Shey Linder. He was at Moccasin Creek State Park with a torn hamstring. Kari was coming to pick him up. My heart sunk. Shey is a great guy. An inspiring guy. This was his second try. He was back, his game was down and I was really pulling for him. Did he push too hard or was it just bad luck? No way to tell with a pull, sometimes they just happen. Next year brother. Stay strong.

The girls and I ate dinner at Mama G's in Clayton. Again, I was nodding off at the table. Iz was too though, so I didn't feel so bad. A few of the TNGA riders had done some last-minute gear analysis and left some stuff in my truck prior to the start. We drove back to Mulberry Gap and dropped the gear there. The drive over was challenging to say the least.

When I was in college, during the summer, I'd work in New Orleans during the day, drive to Baton Rouge after work to practice with the band I was in, visit Kathryn for a few hours, then drive back to New Orleans, more tired than a person should be and still drive. One especially bad evening, I hallucinated multiple times, once believing that I saw a 747 landing ahead of me, perpendicular to the road. It turned out just to be an overpass, but that was the last straw. No more tired driving. Ever. Ever.

On the drive to Mulberry, I hit that "I won't drive tireder than this" point a few different times and had to stop and walk around. We got there though, ate and recharged again. The girls played with the dogs. I hung out with the remaining Drama Queen riders for a bit, then checked the tracker. Eddie and Matt were both past Helen and still moving. Brad Key was on their tail. John Hightower and Trey Woodall weren't terribly far behind. Virtually everyone was past me, Johnny and Norma's stopping point. Yes. That's what I'm talking about!

Apparently the Spot's don't work as well in the Appalachians though. Out west, there's almost always a clear view of the sky. Not here. Too many trees. The newer units were sending updates every 20 or 30 minutes. The older units were sending them every few hours. For most of the day, several folks were showing up like they were at the start. But, then, while we were watching, suddenly they all moved to the right spots. Since then, they've been sporadic too. Ruth Cunningham's unit still says she's in Ellijay, but we checked it at the start and it was set up correctly then. The units have to be cycled each day, so hopefully it'll start working soon.

We hung out and watched the Spot's move across the state for an hour or so. Ginny offered me and the girls cots. I was totally down for that, but they really wanted to see their mom. They crawled into the back of the truck, got in their sleeping bags, buckled in and sort-of camped out in the truck. An hour later we took off. When we got home, Sophie didn't realize we were home and didn't understand why I wanted her to get out of the truck.

It goes without saying that we slept in today.

East Bank Park

Sophie and I went fishing again this evening while Iz was at gymnastics. Her rod fell all apart last time so she had to use Isabel's. I tried a rig with the weight at the end of the line, the hook about 2 feet up and a plastic lure, whatever that rig's called. I thought it was a Carolina Rig, but apparently not, or maybe it is, I'm sure somebody knows. I got several solid hits, but nothing took the hook. Sophie got nothing. Little bream weren't even nibbling. It was like somebody hit the off switch on the fish. We both got snagged more than usual. That was kind of interesting. Ahh, better luck next time.

Weekly Beatdown

I slept through my alarm twice this morning. I've never been as sleepy, while still actually awake, as this morning. I got plenty of sleep, what the heck? I figured I'd get on the bike and wake right up, but nope. Even a boston creme donut and mexican sugar Coke at Dutch Monkey didn't help. I finally woke up after lunch, but I was sleepy again on the ride over to the shop. That ride did kind of wake me up, but not enough to feel good. I rolled out with B1 but they were really moving and I waited on top of Sawnee for B2. B2 turned out to be pretty tough too though. Apparently lots of B1 riders had the same idea and pushed the pace, blew through the rest stops and put down a 21 mph pace. By comparison, B1 usually averages about 20 mph. I hung in and took my pulls, but I'm congested and I just couldn't breathe. Shallow breaths. When I'd force myself to breathe deeply, it felt like diminishing returns. I didn't feel like I was even able work very hard, but I was apparently strong and fast and probably could have hung with B1, but man, why can't I be strong, fast, and feel good like I did this past weekend. Maybe I just need sleep. Lets find out.