Aaand - it's Spring!

Finally, warmth and dryness combined to create irresistable riding weather, so I emerged, purulent, blinking, and spandexy, into the sun (that's the big bright thing in the sky that we don't see much of between November and April), and lumped my way though about 20 miles. I'm still doing flab-related penance, though, so I did the ride on my Dad's Trek hybrid. It's a bit better to road-ride on than a slick-tired mountain bike, but Ruby's going to feel amazing in another 6 pounds.

Since I haven't put up anything since early January, and my horde of readers (can my parents be considered a horde?) are undoubtedly clamoring to know what I've been up to, a bit of a summary: I did not set butt to saddle at all in the last half of January or at all in February. In March, I put that hybrid on the trainer in the garage and rode while watching movies a few times.

In February, I did do the Park Tool School at Velo City Cycles in Holland. It was great fun and a perfect opportunity to drop a few dead presidents on bike tools. My favorite tool is, hands down, this. Anytime you can make a wrench look like a burger turner, it's gold, baby. It even came in a leather pouch. Anyway, any bike that comes with arm's reach is now gleefully adjusted, and possibly disassembled. My mountain bike now sports new shifters and brake levers, and on the two-minute test ride that I did after completing the fun, they even worked right! I also finagled up a bike workstand out of galvanized steel pipe and a pipe clamp, which was an immensely satisfying way to spend $30.

The planning for the Death Valley ride is in the works, now, with our first group ride being on the 23rd of this month. We have some 60 riders this year, most goiing to DV with a few going to Asheville and a few to the new ride in Montana. Last year we had 26 riders, between Death Valley and Asheville. Yay us!

Note to self: start fund-raising before hurricane season...