Dec 11 2008
Rocky Mountain High
With a long lag here on posts, there’s a short bullet list of stuff that went on. I’ll try to get to them in detail in time, but here’s a taste:
- Raccoon attack. A raccoon squeezed it’s way through our coop fencing 3:30 Saturday morning and took out Cheddar, arguably my favorite of the 5. It was going after Sunny when the racket woke us up. We chased them off. It came back Sunday morning at 6, this time with a friend. All the chickens were up by then making noise and we ran out there fast. Regrettably, I was unable to take out any of the raccoons. For those of you who have run around your yard naked at 6 am chasing raccoons with a pitchfork, you know how frustrating it can be. Really.
- Sausage Fest (aka any beer festival in Portland on a Friday or Saturday). Seriously. If you’re a woman who is in the market for a single male who likes beer, and you can throw around a few key terms like ‘balance’, ‘oakiness’, or even ‘diacetyl’, you should run, not walk, to the next beer festival. You’ll have your pick of the litter. Good God, there were like 5 women in the whole place compared to the 500 men. I stopped by there Friday after work and finished up my taster tickets from the day before. Note to self – never ever go on Friday.
- USGP. The result may have not been all that great, but I finished more uplifted and optimistic about next year than I have the previous races. With my cold having firmly settled in my chest and nose, this race could have easily been held on the top of South Sister as far as my respiratory system goes. Lets put it this way, I was breathing heavy from the 20 yard ride between the staging area and the start chute during call-ups. More details later.
- Latrine! redux. Yes, another holiday season accident statistic. This time with a saw and a very stubborn christmas tree trunk. I hit a knot with the saw and it jumped over to my left thumb. You know, there’s that split second after you cut yourself very badly where you can see how deep and how big the cut it. It’s the ‘oh shit, that’s fucked up’ moment. Then the blood rushes in. I should have went and gotten stitches.
- Amtrak. Who said rail is dead? I tried getting tickets up to the UConn – Gonzaga game in a few weekends but all the trains were sold out. Now I have to drive to Seattle which I’m not terribly excited about.
- Beer. Still waiting on the Kolsch to finish fermenting. It’s been about 10 days. I need to test it tonight.
I’ll try to get back to a few of these later. Work and home have been busy during the holidays.
Sounds like we need to get you a pellet gun! Make you up a coon skin hat…
Jeff, I was *this* close to heading out to Joe’s Sunday morning & picking up a bb gun. But we’ve got kids in the house and there are times when my life feels like a ‘Rescue 911′ episode.
I hate raccoons.
Since you already have some animals, sounds like you need an outside dog?! I am just glad you write about all this stuff, I feel better knowing that my life is not all that different from everyone elses.
Now that racing is over, it has been a wierd feeling week. Have not been on the bike at all, that is strange in it’s self. Body needed a break… Wife and kids needed a break.
J