Saturday, February 6, 2010

Too Busy!

Seems like it has been weeks since I was on the bike, but it has actually only been a few days.  One of my rides last weekend my sensor for my cadence/speed when into my spokes without warning and made the most horrible "sproing" noise as it went flying.  It broke the mounting for it, so I am looking at an expensive replacement, oh the fun of cycling.  Riding with just my heart rate and no cadence/speed info reminds my of training in the 80's before the Avocet computer, where everything was just based on how you felt and then measuring your route on a map or in a car and noting what time it was when you left and when you returned.  Kind of a liberating experience, but very dis-satisfying for my inner geek.

My youngest Andrew had pinewood derby today with his cub scout pack.  As with most kids starting in cub scouts, I had to do a lot of the more dangerous work on the car, but trying to make sure that Andrew had a hand in just about every step.  The car set a new speed record for the track a scaled 227.3 mph, one fast hunk of wood.  I just hope that he doesn't expect to win every year, but it was sure nice to see how happy he was getting a trophy for the first time.  Wish I could have witnessed it first hand, but today was our church vestry retreat, so I was in planning meetings all day.  I think we have a great group on our vestry and we made some good goals for the next year.  It is tough with a church that is re-growing after a rather large exodus of parishioners, but I think we are all here some a reason and hopefully we can make a difference in our community.

I have some trips coming up for work, both Denver and West Palm Beach.  I love geotechnical engineering, and these are great events to catch up with friends from across the states and the world, but they are exhausting, but they always act as a catalyst to new ideas, and get me energized about work.  I have papers that I have contributed to that we are trying to wrap up for several international conferences, one in Chile and another in London.  Doubt that I will be able to attend either, but it is always good to be published.  I think my next international trip will be for either the Tour de France or the Giro, sometime in the next two or three years.  Andrew will be 9 or 10 at the time, so hopefully he will get a lot out of the trips, not just the cycling, but the culture and history.

We this has been a rambling journey through my scatterbrain thoughts, maybe I can get some real cycling insight on my next post, the season is really getting going now and even our season here in NorCal is already in full swing.  I will be forced off of the bike for a couple of weeks starting right after my latest trips, I have surgery scheduled on my collarbone, finally!  I think UC Davis really got things wrong after my accident, they said I only had a "simple" fracture and that I didn't need to go to an orthopedist to follow up, just my gp.  They never sent the x-rays to my gp either, and then when my gp had me take x-rays to see how things were healing we find out that I have lots of bone fragments and they aren't even touching.  Now 5 months after my accident and after trying a ultrasonic bone stimulator to try and get things back together, it is now down to getting surgery to get things put back together.  They are going to try and use cadaver or synthetic bone for the bone grafts so that they hopefully won't need to use bone from my hip, but either way I just want it to stop hurting.  I am scared to ride a lot of times because I don't trust drivers to see me or even if they see me to not hit me.  It makes riding a rather tense time if I am on "public" roads and not bicycle trails.  I haven't been able to train consistently or do any basic weight training since my shoulder hurts and it hasn't healed at all.  Well, cheers and here's to getting past all of this!

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