Saturday December 27, 2008

 

I weighed in at 157 pounds on December 26—my emergency weight. This is the number that should trigger an alarm when I step on my scale. I haven’t yet decided what the sound for that alarm should be, but I’m getting closer to making a decision. Right now I’m trying to decide between a comical response of “Ugh, get off me tank ass!” from my scale or perhaps a quick tune from Blues Traveler—not because I’m a big fan of their music; but to remind me that John Popper is about 3 rider-specific backstage buffets away from being permanently pasted to a Rascal scooter.

 

I cannot wail on the harmonica as Mr. Popper does, but I am still ambulatory; so I have options. My option today was a ride on rollers. It’s time to start working off the extra me. I hope I don’t sweat away any good parts.

 

Today’s plan for the rollers: get up early, try to retain sanity, watch a Top Gear playlist on youtube. I succeeded in two of those, and as I am wearing a Napoleon costume and slipping a hand inside my shirt, you can guess which two goals I achieved.

 

 

Sunday December 28, 2008

 

The good news today is that my weight is slowly going down. I’ve not really altered my diet too much. I’ve just curbed my eating to an amount just under the preposterous quantities I’d been consuming in the past few days leading up to Christmas. There is a Costco-sized bucket (which I think works out to about 5 pounds—I’m not kidding) of Dutch Butter Cookies in the cupboard that is softly calling my name out, but I will do my best to resist its siren call.

 

To help stave off mental decline today, I downloaded “The Tudors” and “Mad Men” on itunes for my rollers ride. The Mad Men episode was excellent, as usual, and The Tudors helped me learn a lot about the English crown. Most notably, that if you are king, you get to boink pretty much whoever you want. Who knew? I wonder if Prince Charles is aware of this?

 

I dismounted the rollers and I can now bask in the sense of self satisfaction that comes with stringing together two days of getting up early and completing roller rides before anyone in the house awakes. This feeling of accomplishment will probably last about 22 hours. 

 

 

Monday December 29, 2008 153

 

Today I will eschew the roller cave that I’ve been building out of old electronics and bits of wire and cable and I will step outside to ride my bike on actual roads. It’s going to be hard to part with my 1999 vintage media basement empire, but any opportunity to ride in the real world at this time of year has to be taken. I will miss my expanding roller cave, but there will be plenty of time for the cave as the winter wears on.

 

Our childhood pet was a labrador and golden retriever mix named Star. She had a single white mark on her forehead that had a smeary resemblance to a five pointed star, so the white fuzz mark between her eyes became her namesake. She was a very sweet dog and was a great companion to my brothers and I, which made it all the much harder to understand why she tried to escape from us every chance she got. Any time we would go to answer our front door, she would slink at our heels, hoping that the gate keeper at the door would not be paying attention to her so she could bolt forward and hit the screen door with her head, swinging it open enough for her to slip through the crack she’d made and wiggle through like a salmon desperately swimming upstream to spawn.

 

Whenever she was lucky enough to gain her freedom, we knew she was out for the night. Star had been fixed, so she wasn’t out on the prowl for romance (or maybe she liked to cuddle, who knows?). She instead roamed far, dug in garbage cans, and rolled in any sort of disgusting muck she could find. She would come back in the morning, covered in filth, tired, and in a mood that would suggest she had some sort of dog hangover. These forays into the night would sate her thirst for adventure for about a week or two, and then she’d be back at our heels again, trying desperately to get out the door. 

 

Why am I telling you about our free-roaming family dog? Because I was able to nudge my snout through the door today and roam free—searching for muck to roll in.

 

 

Tuesday, December 30, 2008

 

Today was another warm-ish day outside, so I took advantage and hit the road to do an uphill 20/10 interval. It went well and it goes to show that exercising outdoors always raises the wattage numbers. It felt good to ride a familiar route after being inside for so long. Funny how being cooped up will make you again long to ride a route that, three months ago, was the cycling equivalent of being forced to walk to grade school while holding your little brother’s hand.

 

 

Wednesday December 31, 2008

I got up later than I hoped to today and instead of doing a full 90 minutes like I had planned, I only did the duration of an episode of Mad Men. Am I watching TV to be able to ride or rising to be able to watch TV? Does it matter? It seems the enthusiasm I had for my roller cave lasted about a day or so. I will be forced to find some other way to enliven my indoor training, as it looks like there won’t be any outdoor ventures any time soon.