Catching Up About The Trike

I kind of forgot about this, so here's a brief recap to get to where I am today.

• Had a Dr. Appointment in December, he tells me I need to exercise, and the got the trike lust burning again.
• Got the tax return done in February, let's go trike shopping. Settled on two models, the Catrike 559 and the AZUB T-Tris.
• February 24th - Make a 2 hour drive to go see the trikes in person and make sure they're what I want. They weren't, decided on an ICE Adventure HD instead. Came home and emailed ICE the same day.
• March 18th - Trike frame arrived in Columbus, make the hour and a half drive to pick it up.
• All parts ordered and arrived during April
• April 18th - Finally all the parts are put on and the trike is whole. I love it.

I still only have around 50 miles, but I'm completely satisfied and don't plan on changing anything anytime soon.

Trying to relearn like it's the first time does not make one a virgin.

I have picked up some really bad habits over the course of my disc golf career. Some my own fault, some what I was told by others. After watching a ton of videos and reading more than I should have, I decided that I could relearn since I've taken enough time off.

I feel a bit like that hooker that found God. Righting wrongs is possible, but will be a process...

I finally got a chance to get out and throw some in a wide open area. I had my son with me in his stroller, he loves watching me do driving drills. I think he thinks it's funny to see dada spin around and flail his arms. By the time I finally pushed the stroller down a path, through stones, down a ravine, across long unkempt grass, I was starting to feel rushed due to the sun starting to go down. I didn't even do any practice throws to warm up, just hastily set up my phone in the cupholder. Remember I said my son, I'll call him Jack (some call him single serve or packet since he's a little CreemCheese serving,) likes seeing me do drills. Well, he knew what was coming and started kicking. Didn't even get the first drive on video. Reset, pack the phone in a little tighter. throw 4 more times in a mix of old style and trying to stand still working in thrown from a pec produced power pocket. Say that 5 times fast, go on..I can wait...

Okay, now that you tried that and failed, I'll continue rambling. The discs were white, green, blue, orange, and red, shouldn't be hard to spot right? That unkempt field grass thinks differently. I spend a good 10 minutes and only find two. Can't push the stroller though long grass and uneven ground, so I try carrying Jack and looking at the same time. Quickly obvious that won't work, I let him stand beside me, that's when the hayride starts coming toward me. I pick him up because I don't know which way he'll start walking or where the hay ride tractor is heading; as if that's not distracting enough, my lovely wife decides it's time to go to break. What does she do at break? Text me, so now I'm losing light, holding my son, looking for discs, watching the tractor, and texting my wife. Another half hour passes and I finally find all the discs.

I do some editing on the videos, post them to be critqued, and find out I am doing more wrong than right.

The rebirth of CreemCheese

This post is about 3 weeks overdue, but oh well. Shoot the messenger if you have to.

There was a time when I thought he was dead. Thought the world would be a better place because of it. Unfortunately for everyone, that was not the case and the great CreemCheese is alive again.

A buddy who is involved in the Resistance movement through Ingress was creating new portals that happened to be at one of the local disc golf courses. I made mention to him that the sport used to pretty much rule my life at one point in time. He had never seen it played, but thought it could be great fun, proposed playing a round. I say great, the sooner the better. I should have known it wasn't going to be as simple as one round.

This was the first round I had played in close to two years, and have played less than 10 times since I had to stop due to medical reasons roughly 6 years ago. We agree on Firestine Park as it's in town and a short walk in case I can't handle it. I start off showing him the basics to which he catches on fairly quick. The first few holes were bad on my part. Hole 3 is where I started to get the feel for it again. Hole 4 is where I start thinking I can throw again. Hole 5 is the roller hole for me. I don't know why, but I love watching discs roll. I start feel something in my head coming loose. We get to hole 6, I throw a gentle little hyzer with a G5i Demon, then click. There's no good way of describing it, but I felt instantly drawn back into the sport and knew that the persona of CreemCheese was going to be alive again. We finish out the round and each put one or 2 in the creek; his due to inexperience, mine due to trying to show off and thinking I can flex anything like I used to.

I got home and thought I would be okay, but before I even went to bed that night, I found myself cruising disc golf sites and forums. Signed in as CreemCheese.

More Riding Woo-Hoo! Part 2 of 2

This is part 2 of the More Riding saga. Part 1 was before this, it was about yesterday, Part 2 being now, is about today. Sorry for the redundancy, but I felt it was necessary, since I repeated myself yesterday, thought there would be need for recalling that today.

I've been getting bored with the normal route, so I wanted to change it up today. Rather than riding east like normal, it would either be north or south. Not sure which way to go, I asked the wife, and she said it's up to me. So I say I thought about riding toward Arlington, but don't know the best way. After about 5 minutes, that felt like 30, of playing on her laptop trying to figure out the route. I got tired of waiting on Google Maps to load. It's time to ride.

Start heading down the road, my normal way out of the neighborhood is blocked by utility trucks, and I'm afraid it's going to be one of those days. Take the next road, everything is going good, legs are working, no wind, not to warm. Am I becoming an outdoors type? Cruise by the university, dodging golf carts. I think they have one for each person on staff, 2 started and ended in the same spot, but both only had 1 person. Now I know why my wife's tuition is so high. I get through the cart slalom and look in my mirror making sure no more are coming up behind me, that's when I see another cyclist. I slide toward the curb, thinking he'll pass. Nope, he slows down and follows me for the next mile, finally I start going ludicrously slow, so he either passes or walks his bike. The biggest +1 for trikes, no need to balance. I'm back to thinking it's going to be one of those days again, but I'm outside and have my trike grin on.

Still not knowing which route I should take, I end up on a fairly busy 2 lane road. At least it has a wide shoulder, so no worries. Ride by Cooper Tire, get a few smiles, push on under 68/15 underpass. Lots of traffic, but still getting plenty of room. Not being familiar with the side streets here, I just stay on the main road. Finally, I see some H's painted on the road. Now I know where I'm going, just follow the Hancock Horizontal Hundred route. Keep pushing on, the sun's starting to bake me. Thinking this did not seem nearly this long when finishing the route last year, but it was dark and no traffic. Aha! there's the turn off. Now I start wondering why I didn't just stick to town. Sure, it's not the same route, and hardly any stops out this way, but I'm getting tired of seeing corn. Start to slow down a bit, just from boredom and not paying attention to what I'm doing.

Hear a big deep bark, look over and see a large yellow lab trotting toward me. Pay him not attention, pick up the pace a bit, figuring he'll stay in his area. Well, he did, but I didn't see the little Jack Russel/Chihuahua looking thing about 3" from my tire. Why's it always the little ones? Before I think about what to do I let out a loud "'Ey!!" and he jumped, and turned tail. Hmm...he must be afraid of angry Canadiens. Another half mile down the road, I see "DOG AHEAD" painted on the road from last year's HHH. Oh crap, now what. Stay alert, keep moving, nothing. More uneventful miles, and I'm starting to get tired, also hear a bit of brake rub. Stop in the shade, put on some sunblock. Start pedaling back north, where I came from, no noise. Feeling a bit rejuvenated from my sunblock break, I turn back south. There's the noise again, must be a sign. Start heading north to go back home, an older gent on a motor scooter gives a huge wave, then a thumbs up with a bit of fist pump thrown in for good measure.

Keep following the H's to get back home, they take me through the side streets I'm not very familiar with, straight to an overpass. Nope, not happening. Take the last road before the overpass, and back onto the main road. Wow, that was a lot easier than I thought it would have been. Ride by Cooper again, only person out this time gave me a rather nasty scowl. I grinned and kept riding. Maybe wearing a helmet on 3 wheels with a flag sticking out of the seat gave him the impression I need a helmet all of the time. The brake noise has been intermittent the whole time, but now that I'm back on familiar roads, I realize that if I lean just right it goes away. Note to self, gotta bend that back.

Thanks for reading about my 17 miles.

Soundtrack: Rage Against the Machine, Metallica, Stryck-9, Nirvana, Weird Al Yankovic, Radiohead, Slipknot, MurderDolls, Dishwala, random punk bands from a compilation I bought years ago.

More Riding Woo-Hoo! 1 of 2

Well, I had good intentions, but forgot to put anything on about yesterday's ride :( So I'm doing this as a 2 parter, part 1 being yesterday's, part 2 being today. No I didn't need to add that in there, but sometimes I'm redundant and repeat myself about what I just said, once in a while.

I started off thinking it would be another ~5 mile ride. On the approach of the usual turn around, my legs felt fine, and my wife said not to rush. So I pushed on a little farther, deciding to ride by the cigar shop that was the normal stop last year. The way between the park and the cigar shop is a bunch of residential streets with stop signs every block, or about every 3 houses. The view at each intersection is clear, so it's normal to just look a few times each direction on the approach and keep pedaling. Not saying it's right, but I have passed a few cops and they never said anything about it. Whenever I see a car, I do slow down to at least see what they are going to do. This time, I saw a truck, he paused and kept coming at me, so I just powered right through, knowing it was clear. This is when I catch sight of the driver waving his finger at me, reminding me of the scene from Jurassic Park "Uh uh uh, you didn't say the magic word" I think, okay, I was in the wrong, no big deal. I keep watching in my mirror as he rolled through the next intersection without even tapping the brakes. I <3 hypocrites.

Feeling better still, than when I left, I thought it would be fun to play stalker and see if I can find where one of my old friends just moved to. Thinking I was somewhat close, I started going down some different side streets, not knowing where I was going, I ended up just doing a loop right back to where I was when I started the stalk. D'OH! It's obvious that I was wrong, so I start heading back home. Not wanting to take the same old path, I got adventurous. Elected to go down the busiest road in town. "Eek, that's a lot of traffic," time to play on the sidewalk for a while. Being that this is a slight down hill, I start going for it, end up in my 2nd highest gear before I realize how bumpy the sidewalk is. After getting air time like the bunny hills on Magnum at Cedar Point, I get brave, venture on to the road. My top speed being only about a third of what traffic is doing, this was pretty nerve racking, but almost everyone got over into the next lane, giving me plenty of room. Another +1 for trikes looking like wheelchairs.

All is going well, then red light, no big deal, I'll just dive on to the, oh crap, no sidewalk here. Oh well, make people go around. Yay! sidewalk. Hand signal, cut to the right on to the sidewalk. NO! BRAKES PLEASE WORK! Evidently some people don't know what hand signals mean, nor where to stop when leaving a parking lot. I just about ended up on someone's hood. It's time to go to residential streets again. I've had too much excitement. Get to the residential area, think a drink sounds nice, look down, no water bottle. Hmm, that was there before the bunny hilled sidewalk. Keep pedaling toward home, when I find the street I was originally looking for that my friend had moved to. Take the right and if I wasn't sitting down, I would have kicked myself. It's uphill, so I have to try keeping momentum. Make note of the park, knowing that there's a geocache there. Keep going, find the house, decide he's probably not awake. Turn around, yay, down hill time. See the park again, think about going to hunt for the cache, and find somebody golfing in the park along the railroad tracks. Guess he couldn't afford greens fees this week. Keep pedaling for home, nothing too remarkable.

Thanks for reading about my 10 miles. 

Soundtrack, as best as I can remember: Motley Crue, Rage Against the Machine, Green Day, The Offspring, Weird Al Yankovic, The Verve.