Happy Halloween

Or in the world of Specialized, have a very Special Halloween. Our dog “Ike” might be well described as ‘special’ or even as a ‘hound from hell’ as the picture may suggest. No, we didn’t go visit some haunted structure or photo shop in the background, that really is our back yard.

The weather has been cold damp dark and blustery. The winds knocked over our small bush last week. What is really scary though is the overwhelming success of the Wisconsin Bike Feds Summit and corresponding Gala. Obviously due to my promotigating it through this most powerful of mediums; any blog written by me. Really scary stuff. Not sure how this threat to the bicycle cause in Iowa County turned out.

Dream Bikes on Third Street is no nightmare. I stopped by today to drop off some old rims that may find reuse and old tires and tubes that they will recycle with efficiency. If there is any good use for old rubber they know about it. A worthy cause.

Misao made me get a hair cut today. She said I get angry easily when my hair gets long. Perhaps some wild haired Teutonic spirits looking to connect in pursuit of some vicarious conquest against perceived enemies resembling those long dead. But I think she just wants me to look proper and upstanding for tomorrow. A friend of ours scored us some tickets for “The Band Perry” Friday evening in Madison. My wife’s very first concert ever. We can afford to go, making up Friday’s sales tonight, as nothing Halloween related goes on after the 31st. That’s when those Saints come marching in. It will be a wild and crazy tonight.

The $41 question for good causes such as Dream Bikes (see Charity Jackpot page in sidebar): What two concerts did I attend in High School? Yes, we will keep it the same as my last post as getting tickets and making time for “The Band Perry” has consumed our souls this week.

Better Dig Two

A Chance of Snow

Snow in October? That was the promise anyway. It snowed in Sheboygan and Madison today according to my Facebook friends. And snow can mean only one thing. Cyclo-Cross is here; AKA Psycho-Cross. La Crosse is holding a cyclo-cross event on November 2nd.

Of course with the chance of snow I had to go for a ride but unfortunately the snow never arrived. The photo is of Palermo’s from Three Bridges Park. The panoramic nature makes the river look as if it is bending. The sign asks people not to wander off the path and trample the newly planted native species. last time a road by several people who looked like volunteers were working hard at the planting.

The trail also gives great access to one of Milwaukee’s landmarks; The Domes. Entry is free  to Milwaukee county residence on Mondays before noon.

Of course Friday is The 2013 Wisconsin Bike Summit if you have yet to find your second part time job and have the time. It is topped off by the Saris Gala.

I realized on my ride that the Three Bridges Park will also enhance the views for the now rising tribal casino’s new hotel. It is there behind the bridges.

The geese were out in force to poop up the path.

Now for the big event, the $40 question with not only the Doubler being in affect (see jackpot page) but also the Bonus Question is now activated for a chance to transform $40 into $120. My wife and I are contemplating attending one of The Band Perry concerts in Wisconsin over the next several months. I went to two concerts when I was in High School. Which two performances did I see?

Hint: They could both be labeled iconic. …or not depending on your tastes.

Pizza, Pizza, Pizza

Everyone loves pizza. It is something you can order delivered at home for a football game, while you’re riding on Ray’s fantastical indoor MTB courses or even at the next Metro Mountain Bikers meeting which will be in November on Sunday; MTB movies to follow and a hot grill outdoors. It is election time for the club.

Palermo’s is a famous, or rather infamous frozen pizza producer in our valley. They have a public café at their production facility that serves beer which is so very important to many of the MTB affliction. I am not sure if the Fall Social Ride tomorrow will visit there, but places you have never been before (on a social ride) were promised last meeting. All are welcome. I rode out to Palermo’s yesterday and took a glide over the Three Bridges Park trail, connected to the Hank Aaron Trail. It is right behind Palermo’s. When I got there I found the battery in my camera was dead.

But we need pictures. Here’s an early Happy Halloween.

It is a nice ride,as is the Canal Street corridor. If a clear and convenient bike path can connect 6th street to the Lakefront it will be a convenient and enjoyable ride. You could actually ride from Lake Michigan almost all the way to Madison with little worry of automobile traffic. Though from this November until 2017 the trail will be closed from 94th Place to 116th Street while the freeway interchange is being reconstructed.

Sometimes we make pizza from scratch. Palermo’s sells frozen crust at their cafe. You can buy pizza dough fairly cheap at Trader Joe’s or other places. The traditional yeast based pizza dough can be a long somewhat tedious process to produce but there are several recipes for no yeast pizza dough (I think that is what Trader Joe’s sells) that take only a few minutes to prepare. You can find the recipes on the Internet and they are almost all identical. We were watching America’s Test Kitchen one Saturday and their no yeast pizza dough had one difference over all the others. You know they test and retest and then test again to find the very best recipes. They added 2 tablespoons of corn starch to the typical recipe. And I am no fan of big corn. I wouldn’t tell you that if I didn’t trust that it makes a difference.

My wife and I had to make a trip yesterday and without reservations I let her drive. Though when I told her to stop I had to repeat myself five times before she stopped. She also claims she stops completely at stop signs. So we were planning to try this no yeast dough pizza. You need to roll it out on parchment paper so you can slide it onto a preheated stone or pan (it bakes with the paper). So for several days I asked, “Did you buy the parchment paper?”

Over and over she confirmed to me that we had parchment paper. So she was mixing up the dough. I, always looking to help, asked “Where is the parchment paper?” I opened the drawer she directed me to and asked again, “Where?”

“This is wax paper.” I told my wife. Wax paper is much easier to remove from the bottom of a baked pizza after it is cold, like refrigerator cold. Pizza toppings are more common and inexpensive these days at the grocer.

I did not make it to the 2013 Wigwam MTB Challenge but here is a wondrous picture from 2011.

The $38 question (see Charity Jackpot page): You all know that I have invested myself as a writer. (I will be providing my e-books for free in the near future) Who gave me my first typewriter and what is the make and model?

Happy Birthday

I want wish Happy Birthday to my other dad.

I hope you had wonderful 40th B day.

 

 

I love you -Ike-

 

October; Strange Days

Is it October already? The colors seemed to start changing on queue. This will be some month. October 3rd is Ray’s Indoor Bike Park sneak peak; free for all IMBA members from 6-10pm. October 8th will be the Metro Mountain Biker’s monthly meeting at ‘Collectivo’ formerly Alterra at 68th and Wells. They found it important to mention to club members that they serve beer at this location. Maybe I will have a tea. The 12th is Metro’s Fall Social Ride also featuring beer. October 25th is the Wisconsin Bike Summit in Madison. I suspect beer will be involved.

The WORS season ends this October 6th.

REI will be hosting a run/walk this coming weekend at Lapham Peal State Park to raise money for improvements. I mentioned some events this last weekend and heard on the news of many more that same weekend. Lots of fundraising going on around here for good causes. I regret that our schedule is so irregular that we find it hard to contribute. REI will also be hosting a Surviving a Zombie Apocalypse seminar on the 22nd, a topic near and dear, like global warming.

My brother the Catholic Priest is developing a pilgrimage route in Wisconsin. He will start his own pilgrimage over the route this October 13th.

Ike suffered a bee sting a while back. Here he is sitting in the refrigerator. He looked worse and worse over the following day (the Internet said after 24hrs he should be fine, not true) but 25mg of Benadryl immediately made him a happy camper; problem solved.

October hit me like a brick. Found myself scattered this morning but regrouped. Having several jobs going last month I had to push to complete some semblance of my writing goals. I worked late last night to finish another edit of my second book. I found the work in such bad shape I thought, You’re never going to be a writer Phil. (I call myself Phil but prefer you all call me Phillip) Then I said to myself, “No man. You’re good.” I pulled out some past versions of the work in print-out and digital form and compared them with what I was working on; the latest digital version. Is sabotage the right word? Maybe, if I could imagine why or how someone would want to mess up my work, but it is difficult to imagine. Something messed it up good in many and various subtle ways.

I hope to make it to Ray’s this Thursday. It is my bowling night but I pre-bowled so I can attend a lecture at SARUP. Then I will run out afterwards if time allows. California was passing up Wisconsin in number of visits to my blog until I started giving Ray’s some free promotion. They have made their indoor park better than ever this year making many fantastic changes. Their season pass is good for twelve months now. So if you get one late this season it will still be good early next season. They also hold several stand alone events throughout the summer.

I always get immediate hits from California when I post on any of my blogs. It is always a new hit, not a previous visitor and did I mention it comes as soon as I post anything. Its been that way for years.

Last question stands. $36

What’s a Man To Do?

Two previously mentioned events deserve to be repeated; a reminder to those who may not have any plans yet for today (I write in the early AM). One is the Energy for Life Walkathon today right here in Milwaukee at Greenfield Park. The other is the Fall Color Festival, a family oriented MTB event, In the Southern Kettles at the John Muir trail head. Both take advantage of Wisconsin’s wonderful natural environment.

Harvesting is something that should come natural to all men. Partaking of the fruits of their labor and God’s good earth. The peaches were slow to ripen this year due to the unusual fluctuations in the weather this Summer. I picked all the ripe fruit and anything of significant size since it all seemed to be falling, ready or not. It appears the fruit will all drop the last week of September even if it is still green. Much was chomped upon by some creature, most likely of feathered nature but whose true identity has yet to be revealed. We had more rot than usual this year. But everyone  we have given fruit to loves the peaches. They can’t stop talking about how wonderful they are. Ours is a Resilient Peach Tree and this is the northern edge of its growing zone. It is in a protected area and we are near the lake. It gets something less than full sunlight as the surrounding houses shade it for some hours a day, though not much more than the trees along the street would.

But what’s a man to do? I do a good days work, hard to come by, and do what any man would do when stopping by a supermarket. I was looking to buy some bacon, if the price is right, and pick up some non-alcoholic beer.

So I am walking up to a local grocery and some lady approaches me and says, “Excuse me sir. I don’t know if you know this but you almost caused an accident back at the intersection.”

So what does a man do? “No.” I answered, “I didn’t.”

She went on to explain that how stopping after a left turn arrow went from yellow to red that I almost caused two cars, one hers, to hit me from behind.

I explained that I had to stop (I was not going fast either) and if anyone hit me from behind it would be their fault; they would be liable. After the fact I wish I had told her that she would also have gotten a ticket for un-attentive driving if she had hit me. And that’s the truth!

She said, “The light was not red it was gold.” …Gold? That told me everything I needed to know. Those must have been some powerful psychedelic mind altering illicit drugs she took in her formative years. Who calls a yellow light gold? Must be of the same liberal stock as those East-siders that drift into the lane to their right before they make a left turn.

I continued to try to explain why she was wrong. She just wouldn’t shut up. Finally she called me a derogatory term that I cannot mention here and stormed off. Some choice unmentionable terms I had not used in many years came to my mind also though I refrained from their use. But two words encapsulate any and all such terms could possibly come to mind; ‘woman driver’. There is power in being concise.

And when I say ‘woman driver’ I am not being figurative despite her looks. That would suggest that she could possibly be a man. On the other hand they changed the definition of literal to also mean figurative in the latest edition of “The Oxford English Dictionary”. So to say that she was literally a ‘woman driver’ would still not preclude her from being a man. Bringing us to the real problem with the world today. Men not being men (and I’m not talking non-alcoholic beer) and women not being women. Could it all trace back to when woman started driving?

And this is why you keep coming back.. Yes, I try to keep you informed of upcoming events. In some cases I lapse in that responsibility. I missed  mentioning the Ore to Shore Mountain Bike Epic. I have discovered a new race, after it was over, in the news feed in my side bar; The Red Earth Classic in the upper peninsula. But it is the cutting edge truth and common sense that was all too common in days gone by.

Another photo from the Coffee Bean Classic.

Now, for the $34 question. Back in High School my brother and I were going to go in together to buy a classic muscle car but the guy left town thinking it was a day later than it was before we could pick it up. What was the make, model, price and how much did we put down, which of our younger brothers redeemed the receipt for our deposit and was it days, weeks, months or years later? Check  the rules on the jackpot page.

Fall Colors

It will be a while before the fall colors blanket our beautiful countryside, but Autumn begins this weekend and the reds and yellows are covering our peach tree in the form of fruit. We may have it all picked this weekend though it is still a bit green. It was a strange year weather wise and the fruits vary greatly in size. We’ll see how they taste.

I have been away from writing all together for a few weeks. I had the opportunity to help some friends with projects of theirs. It has kept me busy. This time of year also appears to be a two month window in which I do 90% of major renovations on our own home. I failed to mention the Bike Fed/IMBA Day at The Rock two weeks past. Maybe they would have had a larger turnout if I had mentioned it on my blog. I am just too popular. Until we can rid ourselves of our weekend jobs I don’t see any opportunity to support weekend bicycle events and competitions.

Speaking of the Wisconsin Bicycle Federation, a fine cause, I doubt they had anything to do with posting this signage.

Tomorrow, very short notice, is the grand opening of the Pleasant Valley bike trails. They look quite inviting for the whole family and not too far out of the way for the Milwaukee area. 10:00am – 2:00pm in Cedarburg.

With plenty of time to plan a wonderful Saturday don’t forget about the Fall Color Festival in our wonderful Kettle Moraine on Saturday the 28th. Plenty of fun and activities (and prizes) for the whole family. On the same day is another event and very worthy of participation. It is the Energy for Life Walkathon for the United Mitochondrial Disease Foundation, right here in Milwaukee at Greenfield Park.

On a darker note, the Odd Tuesday Rides are over. The Wednesday Night Races, also finished for the season, were a success with a total of 159 different competitors over twelve weeks. They averaged about 50 racers a week. Nearly half were in the over 40 category, and they were not all in the greatest of shape. Of course their were some true athletes competing but don’t be shy in taking the plunge. There will be plenty of beginners to commiserate with if you are overweight and out of shape. Metro Mountain Bikers have invested nearly 800 volunteer hours as of the Beginning of September in trail care and building. There will be many more before the end of the year. WORS Alterra attendance was down by 10% from the 1012 season.

Yes, the economy is hitting everyone hard which is why you are all waiting for the now $32 question (see rules on Charity Jackpot page). The question; How old was my wife and how old was I when we first met?