No Blunt for me.....

...the party was awesome. She was Totally and Completely surprised and we all had a wonderful time. My wife maybe too good of a time. We had to make a couple of "pitstops" on the way home; I felt bad for her. But her buddies bought her a few shots and she obliged. And then paid the price.

So I didn't make to Springfield for the Blunt Park race. I haven't even looked at the MRC site to see how the boys fared....I'm still bummed, but it's a long season.

CX, BABY!!!

So the quandary of quandaries.....

First 'cross season of the year is Sunday. And it's in Springfield--I grew up there. And it's at Blunt Park--my high school is right next door. Sure thing right?

Well, my beautiful wife recently turned 40 a couple weeks ago, and we're going to dinner with some friends to celebrate. She's likely going to tip back more than a couple; and dealing with 3 rambunctious little kids with a hangover isn't fun.

So I have expressed my wishes to get to the Blunt. I haven't pre-reg'd though. It will be a gametime decision early on Sunday.

OOOOOOOOOOOOh, I really want to go.

24HOGG to CX

Will post photos when we get them from the event, but Ca$h Money Thugs did alright--8th in sport and 20th overall. The Ditch Diggers WON the beginner class going away. We are in for next year, this thing was a fun event, and one pretty much tailor made for a hard tail (Gewilli turned some laps on a CX bike and had some fun with it, so I'll try that next year as well). Nothing broken per se other than my shoes getting destroyed (fingers crossed that Lake will either repair or replace these, cuz with CX season coming up, duct tape can only do so much!)

Now on to the real season. I am hopeful as hell to be able to get to the opener at Blunt Park in the 'field this Sunday. Dinner for my wife's 40th with friends on Saturday so I need to be good. But if she goes for the gusto and needs some respite from screamin' kids in the morning, it's not exactly fair to bail at dawn for a race. As I said, fingers crossed. If I cannot make this one, there's plenty else out there.

Need to get going on road intervals though. Haven't done much and I need to tune the top end if I want to earn some upgrade points this year......CCC need some help planning that!!!

Are we in Seattle???

Sixth straight day of RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIINNNN!!!

We're running out of ways to keep the kids occupied--got half way up the trail to Arethusa Falls and the sky just opened up...Ryan got friggin' soaked in the baby backpack (doesn't make us bad parents, does it???).

24HOGG is going to be an absolute muddy slogfest. I am going to take the cages off as I'm figuring this is going to turn into a 'cross race. Any technical climb isn't going to be rideable....

Brad, have a new one for your next review: Gritty McDuffs Vacationland Summer

The First Camping Trip!

We took the kids on their first camping trip and it was a pretty big hit. Despite the fact that Ryan (just turned 1) had a tough first night sleeping in a tent, everything else turned out great. We stayed at Lafayette Campground at the base of Canon Mountain. I love the area, possibly my favorite hike of all time is there (the Little Haystack to Lincoln to Lafayette summit hop), not to mention two stout ice climbs (one I've done-Mt. Flume, one-the Black Dike...someday). For the first real hike for the children we opted to take them to Lonesome Lake which is on the way to the summit of Canon. Meghan (the 7 year old) flew up the hill. Caitlin (only 4) managed to hike on her own (no carrying at all) to the lake and Ryan snored on my back a good way up. Cait was pretty beat so I ended up carrying her back down (with Ryan still on my back....Dad was a bit beat himself when we got back to camp).

On day two, we took them over to the Basin and hiked up to some falls--though we were in the rain, everyone had a good time and the woods provided good cover. Ryan crashed on my back again (all of our kids love the "baby backpack").

Here's some photos....the next trip is being planned!!! Probably an easy beach trip to Welfleet!