A Day of Malaise

Saturday was rather, as my student's like to say, "boring"...My wife is pulling the super hard-core crazy weekend night shifts at the Surgical INTENSIVE care unit @ SMDC all weekend...Plus all the neighborhood is out using sophisticated sonar and radar systems to harrass small fish at their lake mega-cabins, so it was just me and Sophie, and Scout [Scout, the cat, is my newest dependent-a six week old w/ a tough start to life but has now just hit the BIG TIME, in that it looks to be a permanent resident here, so it goes, life is just one big game of poker]...So training was hard to come by...If I had really wanted it bad, I could have made time to ride the tortureous trainer after I got the off-spring to bed, and while I usually am able to motivate [I did a lot of those late night torture-sessions last winter], I did not have the fight in me last night.

Kudos to my friends Sarah Kylander-Johnson and Kyia Malenkovich for doing outstanding work at the UCI Professional MTB race held at Maplelag on Saturday. Sarah took third behind two very talented big-time pros and Kyia got fifth!!! The pro men also raced on Saturday, and the mere mortals race today...

We are experiencing a big time drought up here in the Northland complete with a big forest fire in the BWCA area...But don't worry cuz itz like Bob Dylan sez--A Hard Rain is gonna fall...

Surreal Singing w/ Squirrelly Sadistic Serpents: 83 minutes on the torture machine on Sunday...Total for the WEEK:994 minutes or 16.6 hours...Got two big races coming up next weekend...therefore I plan to take it easy, especially on Thursday and Friday...Saturday itz the Cable Classic which is a true Classic; last year they had a couple of free kegs of Summit Northern Porter after the race, can't get anymore classic than that, plus itz an outstanding course that always attracts a big field, [Last year, I used Chris White's brand new Top-of-the-Line Trek Carbon bike, which retails for something like $5000+ [absurd!]--so I was scared the whole race that I was gonna crash it and mark it up or worse, so this year I am pumped to ride the steel, full on retro-indestructable Gunnar. Then on Sunday, itz Erik's Spring Opener[The first race of the MNSCS], which had always been held at Buck Hill near Lakeville up until last year's race which was held at a new course near Inver Grove Heights. Itz a very fast, but tight and twitchy, curvy, wild ride...last year I rode it on a Specialized demo-bike that I borrowed from Ski Hut, it was one of those full-on suspension jobs with lots of dials, settings, etc..., which was a little too much bike for this Luddite [I felt like I was pedaling a couch]...In any event, these are two outstanding, top-notch races...I am getting pumped!!!