Tyler's back!

A beautiful day in Little Rock!

We got a call last night from Tyler and he was in KS. We thought he was staying there for the night but he drove through and stopped about 4am at some truck stop for breakfast and about 6:30 he was coming down our street. It's good to have him back. He'll be job searching and apartment searching. A college graduate! Still great! I'm going to put him to work producing a really knock out promo for my summer tour. Hay, that's what he majored in so it's the least he can do for his dad! HA!

I was supposed to be at Gator's by 6 last night for a night light ride down by the river but I got there about 10 after and I could see the group leaving the parking lot. Try as I may to get my gear on and pedal like a madman to catch them, just didn't happen plus they took a turn so I missed them all together. I rode 15 miles in the dark, well with my headlights on. I saw deer, armadillo and a raccoon couple. At one time there was a loud crashing in the brush just beside me. Someone said this morning it was Bigfoot heading back to the mothership! As loud as it was, I almost believe it.

Today is beautiful outside as I finish my Backyard Burger chicken sandwich for lunch. Days like this make it hard to stay insdie and work but I got to pay some bills and support my daughter's mall habit! HA!

So many people

Got up and went to church. Sean met us there and then came home with us for lunch. He and Emily are completely nuts over each other. He's a good guy and we enjoy having him around.
We had a good time at lunch because Terri made his favorites and I blamed him for not getting fried okra, he laughed an said but you're getting upgraded mashed potatoes.

I went out to ride some distance since it rained yesterday and I didn't get to go out. I rode with the club and then rode quite a while afterwards solo. I kept the speed up around 18 and that was witht ehsouth wind blowing. With the club we keep it in the 18-20 mph zone but you get to tuck in behind friends which makes it a lot easier. I also did some hill work in preparation for the ride I'm leading in a few weeks called the Triple Bypass. Not the big one by the same name in Colorado. I would love to go out there and ride it one day. I ended up riding with a fellow Carve rider and talking about the upcoming camp. He said that he can train all year just to try and ride Donnie or Hunters wheel. Those guys are superhuman on their bikes. There were so many folks on the bike paths today that at times you couldn't get any speed. Still a good day that ended with 52 miles under my belt.

One of the riders in the club is one of my Tuesday/Thursday bunch "Fast Girls and Slow Guys" club. Jenn is married to Chris and they both are great folks. Anyway Jenn works just about a block or two away from my office so we are going to ride a few days a week at lunch.. There are others around that ride lunch as well and I'm hoping to get some ACH folks to ride. It would be get to have a lunch crowd.

Tyler is leaving denver behind tomorrow around noon. I wonder how he really feels about that? I hope he has a good safe trip back.

From 1 to 3

Emily and Her friend Melissa in Denver for Ty's graduation.






Terri wanted me to paint Em old bedroom since she moved into Ty's old bedroom. Her room was some shade of Disney screaming rah-rah blue that young teens would have. Now her new bedroom is a relaxing color with a few AR Razorback stuff here and there. She says she's going to UA Fayetteville so she's getting a head start I guess. Anyway, Terri and I discussed the color for the new "guest/office/study/junk/spinning" room. She wanted it a shade darker than the rest of the house so her and Emily ran down to National Homecenter (Sean works there) and got paint. 3 cans of paint! I was to paint the guest room, plus the kitchen about the chair rail the same color as the rest of the house and below the chair rail is going to be maroon or as it says on the can "Berry Cobbler". Yep, the Cobb's paint their rooms cobbler!

I left the office early because I had not gotten a chance to ride this week and they were saying 80% chance of rain on Saturday so I got home and out the door. I rode every street in about a 5 neighborhood area and got in 17 miles of hills. That's all we have in this part of central Arkansas. Well, it's makes for a good cyclist.

I got up this morning fully expecting it to be raining and it wasn't! I could go ride but when I stood out on the deck while Sadie did her business i could feel the mist. No thanks on the ride. I would rather ride in the rain than the mist because it's like black ice. You don't know you are about to hit the wet spot until it's too late. Bust your tail!

We got some photos back from Denver so I'll post them. There are some good ones from Ty's graduation and one of me at Invesco Field (Go Broncs!)

Just another Monday

Just a basic day of sorting through electronic applications. I did manage to get over to the fitness center at lunch and work on the core stuff. I'm keeping the same program as I used last year before my state loop ride. I was 5 days of fitness center at lunch and riding afterwards but I talked to one of the trainers today and we discussed for now try fitness center 3 days a week and ride as often as possible.

Just got a call from Terri and Tyler has officially pulled out from Denver and is on his way to Arkansas. Will stop in Salina, KS for the night and drive on in tomorrow. Wonder how he feels leaving Denver? I'm thinking sad to leave but happy to be coming back?

Cloudy afternoon on top of the hospital...


I went to spin class a couple of days ago and when Rance said tighten the tension I really put the screws to it and the class did a lot of climbing. My legs are toast! I didn't go to the fitness center today but will head out for a recovery ride here shortly. Got to get those legs back in shape.

The weekend is threatening a wash out. Last Sunday it rained all day so not riding. My miles are starting to suffer for a year that started out so good. Sort of whinning today huh?

Today was Chris Taylor's last day as the manager of the Fitness Center. He is headed to bentonville to work for Shelter insurance. He's a good guy.

I'm going to lead a ride in a couple of weeks that will go over 3 mountains! Stay tuned.

Rainy Sunday workouts and Denver

Woke to lightening and thunder about 5:30 this morning and rolled back over. I have to admit, the rain is nice. Been raining steady all day. We went to church and another guy, Greg Clark from Tulsa, OK was speaking as a try-out for our new pastor position. I really liked this guy.

We're in the 3rd quarter of the Broncos vs Steelers and I'm hoping for a Bronco miracle here! I'm not much of a football crazy like so many of my buds but Denver I really like. Maybe because I've actually been to the stadium last month.

Speaking of Denver, Tyler let us know yesterday that he is returning home! It's one of those happy/sad sort of deals. He loves Denver but I think there is a little girl living in North Little Rock that he loves too. He'll be moving back in a couple of weeks. He has been looking at different video jobs around and has some good leads already. I'm not too worried about him finding something. One of the nice things about him moving back is that Terri will stop worrying all the time. She'll take care of him no doubt! HA! Mom's do that. Mine still does. HA!

I went to the hospital fitness center this afternoon and was surprised to see a crowd. I pulled out the fitness schedule Rance had me on last spring and loaded it into a Excel spreadsheet so I could add several extra columns to track weight and diet. I'm going back to my 5 days a week in the center as core strengthening and as the days began to get longer I'll either ride my bike 9.7 miles to work or ride after work. Since my bike tour is a month earlier this year, I've got to get on the stick. I really need to be out there riding 6 days a week like I was to get some of the extra weight off. By the way, I woke up some lazy muscles that had been in hibernation. I could feel the love!

It was fun the other day when I plotted the route for the summer tour. I remembered certain places and can't wait to return! I'm really hoping I can get a Hampton Inn sponsorship for the 5 nights I'm in towns with Hampton's. I've just not had a bad experience with them whether it's business or pleasure.

I did get a good ride in yesterday. Started midafternoon and rode til sundown for 42 miles. About 5:30 I was towards the end of the ride when I rounded the corner and noticed a lot of cars coming through the gate by the river. Most were trucks. Then it dawned on me, George Strait was playing Alltel Arena to a sold out crowd. Guess it was tailgate party time. I made it to the turn around and then got to buzz back to the car with tailwind! That's the best way to end a ride.... zoom zoom!

Coming back around to what's important

It's been an interesting day for me. It started with a change in what I eat for breakfast. This morning it was granola, a banana and a small glass of chocolate milk. I felt better this morning than I have in weeks and I really didn't sleep that well (woke about 3 times during the night). But something just felt different.

Work was sort of crazy with quoting salaries and some system problem uncovered. A little stress there.

There was a lunch for all the employees that are part of the Travel to Wellness fitness program. The food was great and catered from Capers. Then we had a speaker for UAMS Center on Aging. Dr David as he is known. It's funny because a lot of people try and not say his last name which is Lipschit (sp?). He was one of the best speakers and he was funny and very real. He made us to glad to be alive and gave you hope for turning old. He told us that weight is not the most important thing but being happy and loving. I think that sort of stopped everyone in their tracks. He was telling us different things about being old and that if a person is overweight a little or chunky but they have a wonderful life of happiness and love then they are far better than the ones that are on every diet and trying to look Hollywood ruining realtionships, etc. I walked out feeling great!

Then I get home and hug my wife and daughter. We have dinner and they go to run an errand and Em asked me if I had ever heard of Lynard Skynard. I just laughed. Kids! Anyway she had downloaded Simple Man and loves that song. She asked if I liked any other of his songs. Again, I laughed and told her that "he" was a "group". They left and I was alone to list to some of the songs she had downloaded. She had a great collection of all sorts of songs. Then I saw a few I dared myself to listen to. Butterfly Kisses, Beautiful, I don't want to miss a thing, Here to worship. I listened to Beautiful first and got teary eyed. It's the song my neice Linsey walked down the isle to marry Joe. And she was Beautiful. Emily was in that wedding as one of the maids and she was beautiful as well. During the song it dawned on me that someday she would be walking down that isle. Someday a long way off but someday. I picture my beautiful daughter walking with me holding her arm, dressed in white carrying flowers is just overwhelming. The next song was Butterfly Kisses. That one is special too because of the words and every dad is lying if he says he can keep I dry eye and think of his daughter(s) during that song. It's too powerful. It was also a song played just a year ago this week at my friend Geoff Hartmann's celebration of life (funeral). He left a wife and 2 daughters. I'm certain that he is waiting for them on a cloud somewhere with butterfly kisses. One of the other songs "Here to worship" by Sonic Flood just took me to my knees. I realized that things have gotten sort of off balance lately. I've slipped in places and haven't been the dad/husband/leader I should be.

Isn't it strange that all these piece came together today? Is it wonderful how God works?
Today was just Beautiful...............

You're gonna do what again?

I had a meeting with our Foundation department the other day and Fred, the VP, and I had a discussion about the money raised. I said, really, ten thousand dollars is not a lot in the grand scheme of things. But Fred disagreed and said, "George do you realize you saved a life by doing your ride last summer?" The money I raised paid for the helicopter to go get a child. When he said that everything stopped for a moment. I knew right then that I would be riding again this summer.

The first plan was to ride from Canada to the hospital but things just weren't looking good for that. I read a couple of journals and saw the problems folks had along the way. I looked at maps and there were places that bikes couldn't go. So I'll do a repeat of last year. I had fun and I won't have the nervousness I had last year because I've done the route. I'll go a little slower this time and take more photos. I'm also going to ride from Saturday, June 3rd to Friday, June 16th.
I meet with the marketing team on Feb 2nd. Then I'll start parting everything together. Honestly, I can't wait!!!

Windy...

It was a windy and cool afternoon of riding with the Arkansas Bicycle Club. I rode with Will and Chris part of the way back and I told Will it's always a good day if I can keep up with him. He laughed. Good guy, fast rider. Got 36.7 mles in today with an average of 17.34 mph. Not to shabby with a wind blowing.

Terri is much better today. Her eye is looking good. She stayed in from church services today and when em and I got home she had started lunch. I ate baked pork chops and she made a new dish the Paula Dern (?) made on TV yesterday that I thought looked good. Terri has her cook book and made the dish. It was great! I ate more of it when I came in from riding.

Tomorrow is the MLK holiday for many. We don't get this holiday at the hospital but a lot of folks take a long lunch break and go down the block to where the parade comes through and celebrate. MLK seemed like a good man and I wish he was still around.

Weekends are for ridin'

I got up late (7am). Well that's late for me. Made breakfast and coffee and sat on the sofa and just started the day off slow. It was cold outside and I didn't do my best last week with the club ride and I was thinking to myself. Why not wait and ride in the afternoon warmth? So I did. I got a great 52.7 miler down this afternoon and could ahve kept going but the sun went down behind the hill and boy did it get col fast! It was 70 at the beginning of my ride and 48 about 2 and half hours later. I saw Lee and Connie out riding their sweet Cannondales and they were coming as I was going so I did what any competitive cyclist would do. I went on up to the rest stop but just slowed and rode in a couple of parking lot circles whle drinking sweet tea out of one of my water bottles then off I go. I really didn't think I would catch them but about 3.5 miles down the rode I did and rode with them back to their car. I was nice. The plan tomorrow is to go to church and hear to guy that's trying out for the preaching spot and then be under the 430 bridge at 1 to ride with the club. Rance said he might come out and ride with us. I really need him to be out there so I can smoke his can! HA!

Terri had the old in her eye return with vengance! It's nasty. All oooozzzy. I had to beg her to slow down a bit and rest so the eye will heal. The pain was so bad that we had to call the doctors exchange but they couldn't really do anything else unless she went to the ER.

She was feeling a little better to we went over to Kroger and did the grocery shopping.

Now Sean, Emily's boyfriend has a headache. Emily had it earlier theis week and I had to pick her up from school and she eve stayed home he next day. Hope he didn't get that.

I did finally get he rest of the Christmas stuff put back up in the attic this morning and all arranged. It felt good to see the garage clean again.

Terri talked to Tyler and he is working at Boston Market but not at 42 Productions. So it has bummed him out somewhat. He is looking at jobs closer to home now.

The rain came!

We finally got some rain and everyone is happy! It's early in the morning and Sadie is acting like a wild animal! Oh man, she's crazy. I tried to get her to go out but she wouldn't because she has only seen rain 1 time I think so she finally goes out and it's like someone pouring Red Bull in her. She keeps running to the door so I keep letting her out and she goes out and runs around and runs back in (I leave the door cracked so she can get back in). Then I have to wipe up the paw prints.

I went out and rode the Monday Night Light ride along the river. It's a lot of fun because all the animals come out. You just have to watch for them because sometimes they lay down on the bike path or poop on it. Both are bad! We saw a few deer. We went up Ft Roots drive to the top which I hadn't done at night before. I felt really good climbing the hill for the first time in a while. As we climbed I noticed the lights of the city. Wow what a view! I hought the daytime view was great, you should see it at night! We all made it back safe and promised to be back out there next Monday. Sure beats a spin class!

Linsey sent out ther "How many people are going to the family Florida vacation?" email yesterday. I'm excited!

Weekend!

Thought you'd get a kick out of this! Yes, it's a squirrel that got run over by a bike. I don't know who the lucky rider was but the photo was posted on the bike journal were I log my miles. Yes, the little rodent broke the folk of the bike. Wonder if insurance pays for something like that?

Oh well, been a nice day. Met the guys of Carve at 8:30 for a 42 mile ride in the country. I have to remember to take more gel packets and use them. Gel packs are food in gel form. Most are like a spon full of cake icing. Good stuff. Today was the first "real" ride I've had since early December and boy did I pay for it. It was 36 when we started and once we got away from the city there was nothing to block the wind and it was windy. When i finally got to the front of the group to pull it was straight on headwind and tough. After I did my pull then I was going to drop to the back of the line and blow my nose but when I slowed down I didn't have the strength to get back with the group. There were some behind me and some in front so I fought the wind solo for a few miles until we turned and got the the stop/break point. That was nice because I was able to have a gel and water and it made me feel 100% better. Then as we were heading back I got cramps off and on in BOTH legs. I'd never had that better. I was tough!

I have my meeting with Foundation on Wednesday so we'll have some yes or no touring news when I blog Wednesday afternoon or night. Stay tuned!

We've had a couple of families that left Sylvan Hills church for other places. I suspect there will be more before they hire a peacher. We are trying to hang in there until the dust settles but with this Sunday being the "Budget Sunday" I think several families will be visiting other places. We might, not sure though. Sad to see this happening to a wonderful family but growth is hard and you have to go where you feel you are needed and fed.

Have a great weekend and watch for squirrels!

Almost Friday!

Even though it has been a short week, I'm still glad tomorrow is Friday! I don't have a heavy afternon schedule so it should be nice. Maybe I can sneak out early for a ride. I've been in the email loop with several gys I normally ride with and sounds like the Saturday morning ride is on. It's gonna be a chilly one but this group is a lot of fun so cold want damped the spirits.

Tyler seems to have settled back into Denver life quickly. We just had a call from Shalyn and she's going to stop by with a gift. I don't know what the gift is or what's it's for but she's a sweetheart for doing that.

Sean and Emily are out running around as teenagers do.

Terri is getting better but still is fighting the leftovers of the cold we've both had. I'm still coughing and fighting sinus and this is going on week 3. UGH!

So Texas beat USC last night in the Rose Bowl. That was an upset. USC beat Ark with one of the worse defeats in hog history. I'm not a Texas fan at all but was still glad they beat USC.

I have my Foundation meeting next week to discuss whether I'll ride this sumer as a fundraiser or not. I'm asking them to do the soliciting this year since that's what they do. I think if they will back me then I'll ride, if not then I'll do something else. I'm still going to Destin in July, that's 146 days away!

Back to the routine of life...

We seem to look forward to the holidays so much but somewhere during it all we begin to long for the routine we had before the holidays. Today it seems most folks got back to the routine. Sure, it's a short week but traffic was back to full force. The couple of times I was in our lobby it seemed quite which surprised me. Something tells me in a few days it will pick up.

Tyler returned to Denver yesterday but not witout a few tears from everyone. Hard to believe that he has graduated from college and is now starting his professional life. He'll do good out there.

I requested to come in a coupld of hours early on Tuesday and Thursday so I could have more daylight time to train on my bike. The off season has really taken it toll. I did ride yesterday and felt good even with the wind blasting me in the face. But the ride back was so fun because it was effortless with tailwind! I remember last winter that I would start at Alltel Arena and ride north into the wind as the first 7.5 miles then I got to turn around and had wind pushing e all the way back to the car for the return. I saw a few folks yesterday that were new riders and had made the mistake of riding with the wind only to turn around and realize they then had to ride against the wind to get back to their cars. I remember as a newbie rider how I did that a few times and it's so hard to ride back. You are completly drained when you finish.

I had lunch with my marathon running bud, Gary, and he had run this morning sarting at 5:30. Said he never saw daylight and he ran for an hour. It will soon be getting daylight longer little by little.

It's 2006!

We ate out last night at Krazy Hibachi over in Lakewod Village. It was fun and good. The kids went to their different parties and Terri and I made a quick stop to Books a Million then home. Still fighting colds. We managed to stay up til midnight then I went to bed. Emily came home soon after I went to bed.

I went to work at the fitness center which was a waste of time because no one came to work out. A few employees came by to pick up their employee Christmas gifts but other than that, I walked around, cleaned, stocked, read and watched TV. Boring!

Tyler heads back to Dener tomorrow afternoon and I'll get a ride in sometime tomorrow.

Everything goes back to routine on Tuesday the 3rd. School starts back, etc.

I'm still working on my 106 things to do in 2006. I'll post them later.

Happy New Year!