racing starts in two weeks and i feel like i've started to fill in the gaps in riding. got some long road rides in this weekend to backfill the training i didn't do earlier this year. saturday would've been a great day for a mountain bike ride, but i had other plans (work on the basement) and figured i'd get a mountain bike ride in on sunday. that was not to be the case, as we woke up to rain that didn't stop until mid-afternoon.

the corner cabinet for the basement is built and just needs to be finished and then installed. the basement is really starting to come together. a week ago it was a couple of sheets of 3/4" ply and a few feet of maple 1x2 & 1x3, now it actually looks like a real built-in cabinet -- and hasn't fallen apart yet. still need to figure out the countertop... looks like it might require purchasing a biscuit jointer & a router. is there a 12-step program for power tool addiction? i'll post pictures soon, i keep meaning to take some of the progress.

i did get to take a trip down to paradiso on saturday night, where i had 2 rather nice double IPAs... brooklyn blast and southern tier unearthly. the unearthly was nice (solid malty body, nice bitterness, good hop taste) but the brooklyn blast was the more interesting of the two. paler and lighter bodied that most double IPAs and i'm pretty sure it used british hops for the finishing instead of the typical pacific northwest varieties. it actually tastes like a beer i've wanted to make: a british double IPA (a british re-take on an americanized british beer?) and coming from garrett oliver i'm not surprised. it's a brooklyn brewmaster's reserve beer, so i wouldn't expect to see it anywhere but on tap at "good beer bars". that said, last year's brooklyner-schneider hopfen-weiss (last year's best beer of the year) is now available bottled. i saw it on thursday at whole foods and picked some up for the summer.