An Active Weekend

Man I can't wait to go back to work tomorrow...

NOT.....

We were quite busy organizing, cleaning, shopping and bike riding though.

Lotus got her compost bins first thing Saturday morning. When she got back she made breakfast, then was out in the back yard building her new "machines" and tending to her children (all 30 or so of them, (don't tell the others, but I think her favorite is the zucchini)). While she was doing that I was doing bike maintenance. The mountain bikes where just crazy dirty. So I had to wash them, clean the chains and then re-lube the chains (it sounds easy, but it takes quite a while). While going over the bikes I noticed that Lotus's rear wheel was a bit wobbly (more on that later).

Oh ya, before that I put together our new patio table/fire pit (it rocks). I think I mentioned on someone else's blog that we got new patio furniture. It's a set from Target (love seat, 2 chairs, 2 ottomans and a table/fire pit). So after I put together the stuff, of course you have to clean it up. Target packed it very well and this thing is huge, so clean up took a while too (lots of cardboard to cut up, etc).

THEN we went for a bike ride (normal course, "Chilis, Rancho Paseo, Telegraph, Fwy, Olympic, Home") on the way home we stopped by Ralphs to get a few things for dinner (Lotus made sushi, which we ate on our new Patio.... I know....)

Dishes, then the Lost season finale on Tivo, then bed.

Day 2 (Sunday)

Woke up at 9:30am which I have not done in maybe a year. 9:30 is crazy late for me. I got up and my Hamstrings were just killing me. I think it was from bending a lot from working on the bikes. But I got dressed and we were on our way. First stop was Performance bikes on Bonita Road. They had a few things on sale that I wanted to look at (and bought all of), Gu 24pks, chain lube, and a bike stand (so my freaking hammys won't hurt as much). Then we went to Trek in Kearny Mesa to get Lotus bike worked on. One of the reasons I bought Trek bikes is that they will take care of anyting minor for free for the life of the bike. Their policy is adjustments, but they have done much more than that for me. The frames are also guaranteed for life, so the only thing I would ever pay for is worn out parts, etc.

So we took the bike in and I told them the rear wheel had a wobble and he said he would take a look at it right then and took it into the back. 5 minutes later we were walking out the front door with a bike that was as good as new!!! I of course still spent 40 bucks on other stuff though (degreaser, tire levers for the mtnt bikes, patch kit, tubes for the mntn bikes and a new bag for Lotus's bike) I had a coupon which Trek sends from time to time, plus their prices are good, so what's not to love. Now if they had shorter top tubes... But that's another story.

Then we went to Carls Jr for lunch, then to 1.5 Targets (the one next to Trek doesn't have a garden shop, so we did not go in) we still need an umbrella for our set. Then I went for a bike ride on Thunder (yes I named my road bike today, my mntn bike is now named lightning)(you would think my road bike would be lightning since it is actually faster, but no, for some reason it is Thunder, just feels right to me and that's all that really matters since it's my bike (and if you don't like it you can just get your goonie-goo-goo ass out of my house)).

So todays ride was pretty good, I did 31 miles and cranked my 2,500th mile on Thunder. I also got to try 2 new flavors of Gu, since I bought a variety pack of them at Performance Bike earlier today. The Strawberry Banana was ok, I just wish it actually had caffeine, but I did not care for the Tri berry. Something about it just did not taste appealing to me.

I also came back down Telegraph from the Target shopping center for the first time in about a year. Since they have been working on the fwy they closed the bike lanes under the fwy, so it was not safe to go that way. Well I have not been missing much. The road is vary bumpy (like the rest of telegraph until you get to Hunte Pkwy). I'm glad they are going to be resurfacing it this month, that should make it smoother in the future (although with Chula Vista you never know) my street was awesome when they first built it, then the resurfaced it and it is worse than before (less smooth and lots of grooves and rough spots).

Took a shower, then mowed the front lawn, aerated it and worked in the garage organizing a bit. Thank goodness Lotus mowed the back yard while I was riding, I don't know that I had the energy left to do that too.

Typed up this massively long and rambling post and now it's off to bed...

Fuel???

Here are a few pics from our trip to Chicago/Milwaukee.

This is a picture from Lou Malnati's, which is supposed to be one of the best places in Chicago to get a real Chicago Deep Dish Pizza.


We had quite the trip getting to Lou's. They are only open until 11pm and we got there at about 10:15pm. Normally, that is no problem, but the pizza takes 30 minutes to cook, so we were up against the clock. When we arrived in Chicago it was kind of tense, becuase we forgot our TomTom, so I was not sure how to get there. Luckily Hertz gaveaway my car to someone else (initally tense), but they upgraded me to another car and that car had a GPS device in it (and much nicer), otherwise we may not have made it.

The Pizza was just ok. I did not think it was much better (or worse) than a pizza you would get at Uno's. I know Uno's is a derivative of the first real Chicago deep dish, but I guess I thought once you went national, you would lose some of that origial quality and character. So we wanted an authentic Chicago Deep dish, from Chi town. Oh well.

These are pictures from Moody's Pub in Chicago. Lotus looked on a few Chicago blogs and a few of them said this place made a mean burger. The indoor part was very dark, the outside patio was pretty cool.


The weather was very nice that day. About 72 degrees and a nice breeze. It was just a beautiful day for a burger. And this was a good burger. It was called a Moody Blue burger (of course). Lotus had a regular cheese burger and the rings were pretty good too. But if you go, stick with the Moody Bleu, it's a keeper.


We barely made our flight home that day though. There was a lot of traffic in Chicago that day becuase it was so nice out. We flew Southwest and walked straight on the plane since it was already boarding. Luckily we checked in on line the night before, so we were still in group A. Oh that would have sucked if we would have got there 5 minutes later, we would have ended up in the last group and probably would have each been sitting in between 2 other people.

Shiny New Bikes

Here are pics of our shiny new bikes. It kind of freaked me out how shiny the rear cogs actually WERE.

They are still pretty clean looking, but not so shiny anymore.