February

Lots to catch up on... where to begin? First, I need to be better about taking some pictures. A picture is worth a thousand words, right?

We'll just dive in here with whatever comes to mind first. At the encouragement of a few people, I'd like to entertain any questions about food and health you may have. Anything from 'what is gluten?' to 'how does cholesterol effect your health?' and anything else you can come up with.  No question is too simple or complex. How food can be your medicine or your poison. We all might agree Doritos aren't good for you, but have you asked why? Or what is canola oil?  Maybe you eat whatever you want and never gain a pound, or you gain 5 pounds just looking at a donut. Curious why? Send me an email or post a question in the comments section.

Onto adventures of late: more riding and disc golfing as always. Went up to Northern VA to a trail called Fountainhead which was a lot of fun. A lot more hills than in Richmond, that's for sure. Visited Andrew and Janna for the Superbowl and hung out with fun folks up in MD. I finished up a book called Deep Survival, suggested to me by Chad, which was a great read. And I started reading Unbroken which was suggested to me by two people in the same day, and I can see why. It's excellent! And I have to put a plug for The Flinch, which is a super short, interesting, make-you-think, free book from Amazon.

This past weekend was action packed. While riding at Fountainhead last weekend, I came off a 'skinny' which is usually a narrow piece of wood a little ways up off the ground, which broke a relatively easily replaceable part on my bike. So on Friday I ran errands, picked up that part, fixed the bike, stopped by the yarn store to get some more hat making supplies, and took the dog out for some disc golf.

Saturday was awesome. After a reminder about when and where from Karen, I decided to get out and help maintain some of the trails I use for biking/hiking. I spent a couple hours in the morning hacking vines and digging and packing dirt for some new sections of trail. The afternoon consisted of attending a Buddhist lecture, making foam rollers out of PVC, and having the "Triple Nut Encrusted Opakapaka w/amaretto lobster cream sauce" for dinner at Tarrant's. Amazing! Great company and lots of learning.

Sunday was another cold day, but three of us went down to Pocahontas state park in my bike transporting machine, aka the Subaru, for a good ride on some different trails. We grabbed some lunch on the way home, and after dropping everyone off, I changed and grabbed Maddog for some more disc golf. It was in the low 40's I think at that point in the afternoon, and while I was tired and a little cold from riding, Maddog was full of energy and looked like he could've run around all day.

After using my new foam roller for a little bit to loosen up the legs from riding, I got a shower and a snack and went to Commercial Taphouse for some live music and hanging out with friends. Again, great company and I was happy to get out and take advantage of the under-appreciated Sunday night for more fun.

Here's a couple pictures just for those visual people among us.

The first is of Madison, and in the big tree behind him, is a good sized hawk. I couldn't tell what kind, but I told Madison to come closer to me.

There's a closer, but really grainy picture of the hawk.

This is the moon coming up over the Art Museum by my place. It just looked really pretty and felt a little surreal in its veil of wispy clouds along with the other lights.