is it still february?

scardaville at whitegrass

the last few weeks have been an bit of a blur, but i am still here... i had a couple of weekends in philly, then a ski trip last weekend (that was moved from january), and this past weekend i took a whirlwind trip to england to go to my cousin tom's wedding...

tom & zoe

somehow in the midst of all of this, i've been managing to keep my training mostly on track, mostly thanks to early morning trainer rides... i'll fill in more details from the last couple of weeks later, but for now i'll leave you with a look at the english channel and the village of cawsands in cornwall...

cawsands, cornwall

snow...

another good philly group ride on sunday morning before the snow started falling... 3 hours heading north out of the city into regions unknown, at least to me. the pace seemed a little easier this week, maybe beacuse a couple of the really fast guys got off the front, or maybe my legs just had more in them. baked some french bread (loaves and baguettes) that had a pretty good reception from the hardy few that braved the (rather disappointing to that point) snow to come over saturday night. moist and dense inside, but i think the crust was a little too thick on the bottom.

sunday morning there was snow to be shoveled and a recovery ride that was moved inside to the trainer. in the afternoon we walked across town to watch the phildelphia theatre company's production of 'after ashley' and then finished off the day with an omakase dinner at morimoto.

omakase is a tasting menu designed to highlight morimoto's cuisine. the meal is tailored to your tastes (and allergies if needed) and well worth the experience. everything in the meal -- each of the 7 courses individually, the meal as a whole -- works together perfectly and was one of the best meals that i've ever had. after every course we were waiting in anticipation for what our server would bring out next.

as we were eating, i did a little sake tasting of my own, trying morimoto's junmai, junmai ginjo, and junmai daiginjo sakes. there was a definate continuum of flavor among the 3 grades of sake, with the lowest (junmai) having a warm and full flavor, and the highest (junmai daiginjo) having a more subtle and drier flavor.

busy week...

busy week... monday we had the city bikes team meeting at my house. 20 or so mountain bikers crammed into a little room, drinking, eating, trying on jerseys, and discussing (very loudly at times) what's going on with the team this year...

tuesday i rode down to pizzeria paradiso in georgetown to hang out at their newly renamed basement bar (bieria paradiso) and sample some malty beverages with the TNS crew... steve has a good writeup of the night over on wrench in the gears. between my own beers and sips of others peoples i managed to add a 1/2 dozen entries to my new beer journal: brasserie dupont saison dupont, van housebrouck kesteal biere du chateau gouden tripel, unibroue maudite, clipper city small craft warning uber pils (handpumped), fullers esb, and a dogfish 60 minute IPA plus rougue shakespeare stout black and tan.

wednesday i finally got out on a mountain bike for the first time this year for a quick sping around fairland with jason and wayne after work. it's been a couple of years since i've ridden there and i was really impressed with the trails. nothing really technical, but nice rolling singletrack. it's only 20 minutes from work, so i'll probably be out there more often as the year goes on and the days get longer. spent the rest of the evening scanning pictures from new york and working on a couple of projects for MORE.

hope the snow holds off long enough this weekend to get a good ride in on saturday morning.

two bridges, three views

has anyone got olympic fever?

since almost everyone else has forgotten about them this year i thought i'd post a little reminder that the winter olympics start this friday... i'm a big winter olympics fan, but it sort of snuck up on me this year.

in spite of Bode Miller getting more attention for what he's saying instead of his results (inconsistent) recently the men's ski team look have better chances than ever to medal... alpine skiing kick's off with the men's downhill on saturday.

if only 'cross was an olympic sport we might get to see some on tv.

chinese new year

a good hard 3 hour group ride on saturday morning in philly with a bunch of riders from guys, bike addict, and a lot of other teams that i don't know and then an easy 2 hours on sunday to recover.

sunday afternoon, as we were walking around philly, near chinatown, we heard some firecrackers and soon realized that it was a chinese new year celebration. we stopped and watched for a while as the lion dancers moved from business to business scaring away evil spirits and bringing good luck in return for a small donation (in this case to the chinese youth organization that was performing the dances).

seconds...

it's funny how hard it is to really get a grasp on the length of a second... in normal life they pass so quickly, flowing away behind us, gone in the blink of an eye... but on the trainer, at the end of a set of intervals, they seem drag on and on, slowing and stretching out in front of you.

DC For the Curling Gold...

Guam and Puerto Rico send teams to the Olympics... Why not DC?

dc olympic team website
washingtonpost.com article