How I've spent my winter break...

Soooo it's been a while since my last post. Not to worry though, I been doin' shit. In fact, I can think of a couple of milestones that I've achieved in this short respite. For instance, up until about 10min ago, I hadn't washed my hair since sometime Thursday morning. You might ask, why would one do such a thing? It's called nostalgia, bitches. Remember when you were a kid and you'd go days (sometimes even weeks) without showering or washing your hair? So why not relive the glory days? Growing up across the street from a country club, I often went a week at a time with nothing more than a daily chlorine cleanse. Now mind you, my most recent foray into greasy hair had one important difference from my childhood--I showered but just didn't wash my hair. And by "wash" I'm implying that my hair did get wet, but no shampoo was applied...I repeat, no shampoo was applied. I caved this evening after I looked in the mirror and realized I looked emo.

During this hiatis from classes, I've also had time to bump up my training hours to a more reasonable amount. Again, it has been nostalgic as it has been quite some time since I had put in more than 9 hours of cycling in a week. The past two weeks, I consistently breeched the 11 hour barrier in spite of the shit-tay weather in central and northwest Indiana. Today, the Sunday NUVO ritual of riding down to Wilbur and back continued. Last week, not wanting to prematurely blow my load on what was supposed to be a dry run, I drove down to Southwestway Park and caught up with the guys for a 2.5 hour spin. Something was different this morning...I felt spritely so I posted up outside of my apartment at 7:40am and waited for the guys to roll on by. To my surprise, Hubbell was the only soul brave enough to venture out in the dense fog and 45 degree temperature. So we cruised through downtown and over to the Mooresville area to meet up with the rest. At the park, five others awaited our imminent arrival. After a few how's-your-mother's, we spun toward yonder hills with a steady headwind out of the southwest. Along the way, the other guys punished me on the climbs as they are already in decent shape. Upon reaching our turn-around point in Wilbur, we took a double-take on a sign at the local quick-e-mart. I kid you not, it read: "Porn and crack 95% off: Beat the meat" (or something similar to that). To my dissappointment, I found neither one of those items in the store, so I had to settle for a Snickers bar with almonds. Having checked the weather prior to the start, I knew that the temperatures were supposed to start dropping sometime in the afternoon. Furthermore, the forecast called for the wind to redirect itself out of the northwest. For once, the forecast was actually correct. However, instead of happening at 1pm, the weather decided to begin a couple of hours early. As we traversed from one meth-lab town to another on our way back to the Windy Apple, the temperature dropped to the 30's, the drizzle shifted to a light rain, and the wind's origin shifted from the southwest to the northwest. Despite these obstacles, our group of seven made good time on the way back to Southwestway Park. After going our separate ways, Hubbell and I were left by our lonesomes for the hour-long trek back to the near northside of Indy. I don't think we spoke more than five sentences to each other during the remainder of our ride. Our fingers went painfully numb, the headwind slowed our pace to a crawl at times, and Hubbell even cursed at a squirrel at some point around Delaware and 16th. Finally, I arrived at my abode after 4.25 hours of ride time--my longest ride since the Tour of Ohio in June. All in all, a great ride...not quite epic status but nearly there.

Well, I hope that wet your whistles. Maybe I'll write another one of these things soon.