Apple Pie and Tomatoes

Frank was eating an apple pie today at work after lunch. When I saw him eating it I said, "Hey, that looks good."

"You want one?" He asked.

I raised my eyebrows.

"Here, follow me."

"Where'd you get it?"

"McDonald's"

Whatever. It looked good so I followed him and ate the apple pie. It was better than it looked. See, he had bought the apple pie probably thinking he would want it, but then after lunch and one pie, likely realized it was too much. So I took it.

I sat in the ops room, put up my feet, and enjoyed my newly found apple pie. To say it was good is an understatement. Taking a page from the "be here now" book I savored it, enjoyed it fully. When I was done I sat there and announced, "That was a damn good apple pie."

It was true.

Those of you out there thinking I'll never hit the 170s with this behavior, I only have this to say: Eat shit. It was damn fine apple pie, sublime almost. Not sure if it qualifies in the Twin Peaks realm of good cherry pie, but it was good. Overall I think McDonald's makes shit food but this was on the mark.

More poop:

FatCat

"Well, FatBastard, I laughed again and I'm sorry it was at your daughter's expense but the turtle sighting got me. Funny stuff. 24 hours tho... I'd be grunting too. Oooofa."

Not sure I have much more in the Poop Story department right now. When she did finally get it out 24 hours later it was a doozy. She filled the diaper real well, then proceeded to drop 2 more floaters when we put her in the tub. She's got a green light in her head to shit in the tub right now which is a little messy sometimes. She just squats away and all of the sudden there's a floater, total Fat Bastard style.

She's really a gem, I have to say. Life is different, no doubt. Life changes for the better. It used to be that the highs were higher and lows were lower with Julia in our world, and to some extent that's still true. Nothing makes me as happy as some moments with her. And when she's sick it's just the worst thing in the world. But the big thing now is that the highs far outnumber the lows, when a long time ago it used to be a lot more evenly matched.

I saw someone with a baby on the train last week and remembered back to when Julia was that small, so helpless and and in need of support. It's not like she can wash her own clothes now but life is different for her. She runs and talks and keeps herself occupied. Certainly when she proclaims "eye" and jams her finger in your eye you realize that just a wee bit of the helpless innocence is gone. It's not a bad thing. It just is. I can understand why people get wistful and have more kids though.

Parenthood is a steady stream of emotions, roller coaster-type stuff. All sort of goods and bads and it makes life better and more interesting. Someone really ought to come up with a pill that will allow you to relive all of those emotions and you could wear it around your neck in the event that you were caught by Russian spies. Then you could pop that pill and relive the insane amount of ups and downs in the last 18 months before you perished from the Earth. The emotional bender from that experience would surely kill you, leaving you laughing, crying, crapping your pants, with an erection and a heart attack that would work much more efficiently than cyanide. Your secrets would be safe from those pesky Reds for sure. WOLVERINES!!!

Where do I get this stuff? I don't know. Maybe the apple pie greased my mental wheels today but it all seems to make sense. I'm eating cherry tomatoes on the train home right now. It's not all apple pie but let me say that these are damn good too. And like I said to Walter earlier, I admit it, I like Luna bars. Does that make me gay?

I still have a bike, or 5 of them actually. I do ride them here and there, even though my mentors Maurice and Chris tell me I need to back off. Last night it was 40 minutes. Short, to the point. Who needs structure? I'm going to lolly-gag until after vacation, at the least. Then we'll see. So for now you get poop, apple pie, and dissertations about reality and your place in it.

Oh, and tomatoes.

There must be some pithy saying about not getting the yin without a yang. I don't know what the one-line quote is but I do know that there's some truth about opposites and balance As Perry said, there ain't no wrong now, ain't no right - there's only pleasure and pain. Or streamlining it, the highs and lows of parenthood. Or bringing it more down to Earth, apple pie and tomatoes.

The Poop Chronicles

I don't really feel like writing a blog entry today so I'll start off with that statement and go from there. For the second night in a row I was able to not eat in the middle of the night. I did a little reading on it and it seems this is a fairly common "problem". I put it in quotes because I wonder if it's not just fat Americans being fat.

Basically the premise is that people wake up and eat to compensate for something they're deficient in. Maybe water, vitamins, salt, or simply calories. Nat and I contend that we eat a salty diet but most days I crave salt at some point. Now I'm not talking an inclination towards salty foods. I'm talking about a desire to drink pickle juice or ketchup. I'm not joking. Sometimes it's that strong.

As a result I've been a little more free with the salt shaker and I make sure I drink water when I eat salty food. If I'm having salt shortages I'm probably having water absorption issues as well. In addition, the last 2 nights I have taken my multi-vitamin before bed and not in the morning. Both nights I have not woken up starving. I've also started keeping a sleep log/chart. I write down what time I go to bed, what time I wake up, and for how long. I also keep track of how many calories I eat.

It's funny how a simple piece of paper can force your hand. On this piece of paper I have a time written down. Last night it was 1:20. If I woke up before 1:20 I wasn't allowed to eat anything. After that, fine. So I woke up at 11:50 and went to take a leak and went back to bed. I woke up again at 1:20 exactly and took a leak and decided to go back to bed. Funny how that works.

Here's the takeaway: the mind is a wildly complex place. There are all sorts of buttons there to push and it can take you a lifetime trying to figure out what those buttons do, where they area, and in what combinations they work.

Here's the alternate takeaway: I'm absolutely insane in my desire to drop more pounds.

Hey I'm not delusional. I know I sound nuts. At least I haven't started weighing my food. Yet. The practical application is that I sleep more soundly which is pretty important. There's the added bonus of potential weight loss but the reality is that I'm not sleeping well enough, which is much more detrimental to my bike performance than 5 extra pounds.

Uh-oh, I said the word bike. FatCat may have just tuned out. From yesterday.

FatCat

"Ok, I don't know Walter, or this dude who decided to poo in the oven or his wife and I guess since I don't know any of them I don't feel either good or bad for any of them either. I'm indifferent... kinda like watching NYC 6:00 news on Channel 4 and not registering that another person was shot in Astoria or there was a 7 car pile up on the Cross Bronx Expressway... it just doesn't affect my world. That said, something about this blog entry has me laughing my head off. Maybe it's just all this poo talk and its general outlandishness. I think this reaction is entrirely valid too. I watch Dirty Jobs religiously so that's somewhat of an explanation. Mike Rowe rules! Ok, then you started talking about biking again... sorry I checked out there. I was too interested in the poo story and I'm tired."

Well I have plenty of shit notes. You know, if you eat a healthy diet of fruits and veggies you sure crap like a healthy donkey. Another one is that my friend's sister in high school convinced her boyfriend that girls didn't shit. Finally, as I was dressing my daughter after her bath the other day I started tickling her and she started laughing and then grunting and I saw a turtle head poke out. I slapped that diaper on right quick. She didn't finish that particular job until 24 hours later.

Get in my belly!

The Oven of Doom

So I got this from Walter about the oven.

Walter

"So its a floor standing oven/range, oven on the bottom. He lowers the door, I guess thinking he is putting the seat down if he was actually in the shitter, and drops a deuce right on the window. He also has his weiner between his legs and he is pissing while he is shitting. So while the brownies are baking right on the door, his golden love is flowing into the ovens seams and grates, and also onto the floor.

"They live in a ranch house and from where he was in the living room, the first left is the kitchen, the second is the shit house. The oven is exactly where the toilet is, had he been in the right room. Good thing he didnt make it to the third left, the one year old would of had a rude awakening.

"Nicole was talking to Heather today, she has gone through with all the paperwork and told him yesterday about whats on its way. The sheriffs department will likely serve him this week.

"Being the asshole that I am, we went to Lowes to get stain for our window mouldings and they have all the floor model appliances for sale, I called Heather to tell her of the great deals, I even told her I checked for shit stains and they were all clear."

Incredible really. I still have to believe that deep down he knew what he was doing. Maybe not at first. But figure he had to squat instead of just sitting on it. And he must have had to pull the door down. So I could see him mistakenly going to the wrong room but then saying "fuck it" once he got in there. Given this guy's overall track record it's within the realm of possibility.

Regardless of this ridiculous scenario, I'm glad she went through with the paperwork. And it's good to hear you're supporting her with phone calls like that from Lowe's.

Some more comments that I haven't followed up on.

George

"This post was fucking hilarious! Not to sat that Julia being sick and having Rosiola is/was hilarious dude...that just plain sucks...been there...done that! Ah yes...the sleepless nights...the incessant screaming! Good times...yea, good times. LOL. The Faltwy Towers reference was just icing on the Giant Bicycle cake Norm...very funny. On another note...I'm having a lot of fun reading of your dealings with sponsors...and the like! It is a lot of work on the administrative side of racing...eh!? Well, if you need some help..I'm just a phone call away. I hope Julia is better soon, and you and Nat get some sleep... Later man."

It's all good now. Turns out that on top of the Rosiola she had her upper eye teeth come in, which just makes sleeping harder. She's literally been teething for 9 straight months now. We've been trying to get her into a routine which is a fucking joke. The routine is that we do a routine, then she stays up an hour past the intended sleep time. Great.

I did send you an email that I never heard back from. Do you still check that hometownu.com address?

Steve

"i will be on mtbnj hiatus starting tomorrow afternoon, so it should be a bit slower after that - stop whining, bitch."

Yeah not much slower on this end. This weekend was more relaxing than usual which was nice. I go on vacation next Friday so I'll get 6 days away, more or less. I'm sure work will shit the bed while I'm gone because that's the way it goes.

Steve

"welcome back. TBH, I kind of like this blog better than the other one"

Thanks. I do too. The other was a one-hit wonder. I may do some details for team discussion but nothing like the 7 Weeks, which I'm glad is done.

Walter

"again, same boat as shaggz. Great season recap, great plans for the next year, hope all works out, including the random vomiting"

You guys and your boats. My top priority right now is ending my awful habit of waking up in the middle of the night and eating. Last night was my first successful night doing it. I'm hoping to be able to hold that more or less through the end of next week when we go on vacation. Then use that as the final 6 nights to cement that into place. Harder to wake up and eat when you're in a hotel room or boat cabin.

On biking, it's sloth city. Having a tough time finding motivation which is expected. It was a long year and I'm enjoying my time right now. You would think that translates to mountain biking for fun but the process of getting ready makes it less likely right now. And waking up in the dark on a weekend isn't on top of my list of things to do.

After vacation things get back in motion. Tentative plans right now are to bike out to my parents in PA on Thanksgiving day. Probably in the 50 mile realm I would imagine. Probably cold too.

Terren also had a comment but I'll save that for a post later this week.