Some Quick Updates

Yep – just some quick ones.

1) Something interesting is happening.  I can’t talk about details yet, but I’ll let you all know when I know the final details – probably Wednesday afternoon.

2) As you probably know, Chris is back and out of the hospital.  He’s staying with us for a while, while he recovers.  We’re pumping calories into him at an astronomical rate.  Hopefully we can have him good and fat soon.

3) I’ve signed up on sparkpeople.com  It’s a fitness and nutrition tracking site.  I’m trying to sort of diet = 1850 calories or less per day.  So far it’s going pretty good. 

4) In that regard I’ve recently put a post up on my fitness blog – runfatboyrun.wordpress.com  I’m planning to add to it more regularly again.

5) I’m writing this on my laptop with no internet connection.  If all goes well this should publish when I get to an internet connection later in the day.  What fascinating modern times we live in.

6) Going to Kamloops soon.  Have an appointment with a specialist about my back disease.  I’m hoping for some sort of miracle drug that takes away my pain and lets me sleep full nights again.  That would be cool. 

7) Spore is pretty cool.  I’ve been playing offline only in  my “liberated” version.  Now that EA/Maxis has said that they’ll be changing the copy protection to allow five activations and are putting in place a tool to “de-authorize” activated computers (much like iTunes) I’ll consider buying it if I don’t get it for my birthday.

8) Which is coming up soon!  I’m getting oldish.

9) Dylan is officially a 6mo.  That’s pretty cool.  She’s loving real people food – although she only gets to gum bread and rice crackers and stuff to death.  The occasional bit of rice cereal.  Y’know – baby stuff.

10) People are coming over tonight.  It’s officially a wedding planning exercise, garnished with a fresh beef roast and veggies.  I think Scott is planning to add a topping of Rock Band Fun after we get the work part done.  Since Ivy pooped in the potty it’s also going to be her potty pooping party we’ve been promising her since we started this whole potty training affair.  And what an affair it’s been!\

11) Ivy pooped in the potty!!!!!  YAY! Word! Dude! Party Time! Excellent! (guitar solo) Sweeeeeeeet!

12) I rode my bike to work today.  Chilly.  I had to scrape frost off the seat, put on a scarf, and wear ski-doo gloves.  It was pretty cold, but once you get to 100km/h at least your helmet unfogs!  Awesome!  I’m guessing this will be one of my last commutes this year on the bike, and prolly one of the last times I get to ride before I have to winterize the little baby and put it away for the winter.  Sad me.

Toy Run

Motorcycle Toy Run (Benefits Salvation Army I think?)

I’m going to try to do two of these this year.

The first is Quesnel’s.  Sunday September 7th.  Starts at Sylvia’s Cafe and finishes at the Quesnel Museum.

The second is Prince George.  Sunday September 28th.  Need more details.

This is mostly just a reminder to myself, but if anyone is intersted in riding with me, just drop me a line.

These should be fun.  I’ll be trying to get together with Greg and Kate in PG for the PG one.  Maybe they’ll come down for this one.  My motorcycle instructor, Ian, whom I rode the Poker Ride with is planning on doing both as well – and has offered to caravan up to PG with me that sunday.

Planting, Cleaning, Building, Oil-Changing

Well, I went for a ride with Greg and Kate today.  We hopped on the bikes and followed Greg’s parents out the the Yorston Farm and had Cinnamon Buns.  They have an event called Cinnamon Sunday each Sunday in May.  Buns are 1$ each and really, really yummy.  We took some curvy roads home. (Yorston Farm, incidentally, is where we went to the super awesome corn maze last year, and will be going again this fall.)

When I got home I changed my oil and filter in my bike.  Nice clean oil now, will be dirty in a day or two.  The curvy roads were fun, and Greg brought the extra pieces for my left fairing, so I can hopefully tighten up my dash and whatnot.  Sweetness.

Tom, Chris, Scott, Sam and I worked on putting together Ivy’s new swing set!  She loves it, it has one baby swing in the middle, two big kid swings, a slide and a teeter-totter.  The whole thing was enjoyed by all of the kids, because Mel brought her little ones, Ally and James over as well!  Super awesome sunny Sunday. (And it was Sun-Day as well, nice and warm at about 22*C)

Then we had some yummy barbecued pork chops, courtesy of Samantha.  Salad too – the first and only thing I ate today other than a cinnamon bun.  It was super to sit outside with the family and enjoy some dinner.

After dinner Samantha and I cleaned the barbecue, CLR and Scotch-Pads baby!  We scrubbed and hosed and sprayed and cursed and cleaned and rinsed and …. whew!  The BBQ should be nice and clean for next thing we cook on it – maybe ceder plank salmon tomorrow night.

I also managed to get our three herb pots planted, the three pepper plants and the extra herbs in the herb garden in the back.  I’m hoping my garlic chives and leeks do well back there too – the rubarb is still scrawny, it hasn’t put down good roots yet.  Maybe I should find some good food safe fertilizer to drop down back there.  We have parsley and something else new – can’t even remember what I planted.

Then, to finish off the night Chris, Sam and I put some Mario Kart Wii on and raced ourselves silly.  I have to get my sorry, sunburned butt to work in the morning, so I’m about to crash now.  See y’all later!

PS.

Welcome to summer time!

Allowed to Ride!

Born to be wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiild!

I passed my Motorcycle Skills Test today.  That means I have had the supervisor and skill restrictions removed from my licence.  I can now legally exceed 60 km/h and drive without a supervisor.

I have my drivers test on Thursday at 10:15am.  I need to get some practice in before then – I’m hoping this head cold pulls a vanishing act.

I’m still hoping to take a motorcycle course sometime soon.  This can get me commuting though.  Props to all those who gave me a hand with practice time etc. when I needed it!

Circular Logic. Argh!

I’m getting there. I’ve got my bike. It’s pretty. I love being on it, and want to be on it more.

To do so I need an instructor, over age 25 and holding a valid motorcycle liscence (class 6). This is hard to come by. I have several contacts at work, but they’re not able to go out every day, in fact, I haven’t been able to yet.

I so badly want to get out and ride, just to get to a parking lot and practice what I’ll have to do for my MST, (motorcycle skills test), which if (when) I pass it I’ll be able to ride and practice on my own.

I can’t do my test until May 12, and still need to line someone up to go with me. But before I can pass it I need to practice. Lots. If only I lived in a parking lot still. Or rather, in a building that had a parking lot.

Conceivably I could push my bike to a parking lot to practice, I wouldn’t be on the road without an instructor. ;)

I also priced out 3M Black Reflective Tape. $9/sq. foot. I want to put some invisible except under bright direct light on my bike, and maybe pants and jacket. 2 feet would probably do. You can go here to see some comparisons of what it looks like under normal light, and direct light like a camera flash or headlight pass.

Anyway, just venting a little bit of frustration.

New Motorcycle!

I got my bike!  After years of working towards getting a bike Sam helped me get one.  I’ll be using it for day to day transportation to and from work, as well as a little bit of extra solo riding.

I need to get my MST (motorcycle skills test) done so that my liscence will have the 60km/h speed limit and supervisor restrictions removed so that I can commute on it until I do my road test and get my full Class 6 designation.

Until then, a couple of pics.  We’ll start with a pretty girl on a motorcycle, cause that’s pretty cool, then some pics of me on my bike in my gear. (Minus my awesome Alter-Ego armoured pants that I didn’t want to pull on just for a pic.)

*I added more tag so as not to blow up someone’s RSS reader.