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.

I have a problem

I wasn't sure if I wanted to call this, "I have a problem", or "Traffic Jam". We currently have 6 bikes in our garage for 2 people...

One I was borrowing from my brother, so only 5 are actually ours.

Lotus and I have discovered Mountain Biking. I did not think I was going to really like it, but I do. I always thought I was a die hard "roadie", but there is something to this off road stuff.

We recently got new Mountain Bikes, since the ones we were using are about 10 years old and really rusty. The front brakes on the one I was using lock up from time to time, and that can be a bit harrowing when you are going down hill really fast. I either need to fix them up a bit in case Sailor Moon and Junglicious want to use them, or just give them to Goodwill (I guess I should still fix the brakes before I give them to them too).

Our new bikes are pretty cool. I'll post about them later. We both got the same model, with the same paint scheme, so we will be the cutest.... gag....

I Hate Bees

Sorry to be hating on you bees, but ya'll are just ticking me off.

Here is a recap of my last ride.

Rode 10 miles, minding my own business, passing the old jogger guy with the big Gilligan hat, then BAM!!! a bee flys INTO my helmet. I pull over quickly, take off my helmet and as I am shaking it, the bee falls out to the ground. I should go back and look at my heart rate on my Garmin, I bet it was real high.

I take a deep breath, put my helmet back on, click in and I'm off to enjoy the rest of my ride.

About 5 miles later, almost exactly where I got stung the week before, ANOTHER F...ing bee flys into my F...ing helmet. Now I'm pissed. Give me a F...ing break, what did I ever do to you.

I'm pissed..., so I just turn around and decide to head home, then another F...ing bee flys into my chest and bounces off of me as soon as I started to head back.

Did I mention I now really hate bees.

At least I'm not allergic

I was riding on Saturday and I was stung by a bee out near the lake. This is the second time I've been stung while cycling. The first wasn't bad at all, the bee stung me on the top of my left quad. I pulled over real quick, pulled it out, felt like everything was ok and continued on.

This most recent attack was much worse. I was out on Otay Lakes road about about a mile east of where the road splits to go to the dam. There is not a curb or real shoulder there, so I can't just stop right away, it takes a gradual slowing, or you will crash.

The bee was still attached to the stinger when I stopped and he did not seem to want to give it up. I think I flicked at him three times before he fell off. I then pulled out the stinger and everything seemed like it would be fine. But this one seemed to hurt more. I did not know why at the time, I just knew it hurt more.

When I got home I looked at the area and it was already a bit red and puffy. Since the bee was in longer, I'm guessig he was pumping the venom a bit longer than the first time. Then I read that you are supposed to scrape away at the stinger from the side (not pull it out, like I did). If you pull at it, you are likely to actually push more of the venom in the wound.

Well the puffyness is gone now, but there is still a big red mark (it looks like a bruise now). Hopefully it will clear it by the weekend.

Did I mention the bee looked real mean too???

They are finally gone Part 1

This month has really sucked since we got back from NYC. I have not put in so many hours in quite a long time. I have only really had Sundays off this month, and when I say off, that just means I got to work at home instead of in the stores.

This week was really tough, in that about 5 people who are above me in my company were out here doing stuff, so that adds a lot of stress to my daily grind and a lot of extra hours.

They are all gone now, but most of them are coming back in two weeks, so hopefully after that, it will all be good. I'm going to try to get in at least 2 rides a week to get my weight back down to where it was before they got here.

When they are here, there are always larger lunches and dinners eaten by all, thus a need to get my weight back to where it was, before they got here.

New York

We ate soo much in New York. Luckily we walked a ton too, so the damage will not be that great. Unfortuneatly I have people in town for work, so I won't get to ride until this weekend :(

I never thought I would hear Lotus say this, but on the last day she said, "please don't make me eat anymore..."

Then we went and had 4 desserts that day (coconut pyramid in the morning, Eileens cheesecake followed by gelato (laboratorio de gelato) in the afternoon (since they were only about 6 blocks apart)(we were in the neighborhood) and then red velvet cake after dinner).

I think we covered at least 30 miles total on foot for the 5 days. I had my garmin with me, but I kept forgetting to turn it on and off during the day, so most of my readings were really askew. If I did not turn it off before we went in the subway, once we emerged it had a fit trying to plot our course and I don't think the tall buildings helped much either.

I have not even tried to use the plotting software for the garmin yet. Maybe by next weekend. Hopefully I can plot a day, map it and import it here as an image. That would be cool.