Auld Lang Syne by Robert Burns

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And auld lang syne?

Chorus:
For auld lang syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet
For auld lang syne!

We twa hae run about the braes,
And pu’d the gowans fine,
But we’ve wander’d mony a weary fit
Sin auld lang syne.

We twa hae paidl’t in the burn
Frae morning sun till dine,
But seas between us braid hae roar’d
Sin auld lang syne.

And there’s a hand, my trusty fiere,
And gie’s a hand o’ thine,
And we’ll tak a right guid willie-waught
For auld lang syne!

And surely ye’ll be your pint’ stowp,
And surely I’ll be mine,
And we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet
For auld lang syne!

Update

I am going to keep it short because there’s probably something better I could be doing with my vacation and because nobody reads the blog during the holidays anyway.

The drive in on Wednesday was easy.  No sweat.  We were in by 3:30.  Thursday, known in some circles as Chrismas, was arsome.  The girls had a blast.  Despite the fact that it rained pretty much all day, I managed to get out for a quick ride with Kelly’s dad.  Not quick enough as we got caught in a torrential rain/wind storm!  Yes, first ride on the new bike and it rains.  At least now, I don’t have to worry about it.

Friday we did a family ride in some massive wind.  Everyone was complaining about the cold, but it just wasn’t.  It was windy, I’ll give ‘em that.

Saturday I hit up Kelly’s dad’s club ride before we drove up to the mountains.  Yeah, somehow I went to LA for Christmas and ended up in the snow.  As you can imagine, I’m not totally stoked about it, but it’s all good fun.  The girls are having a blast and the family is all together, so it’s good… Really psyched to go back to the beach on Monday or Tuesday though.  There’s a good 3 feet on the ground up here, which surprised me.  It’s about 50 degrees today, so I gotta think some of it will start to melt. 

Anyway, back to it.  Happy New Year, though I’m sure I’ll update again before then.

Inventory Day

Yeah, no more selling for 2008, so it is a day to practice counting instead.  Talk about a way to make a long day longer.  The rest of the crew is doing the same for half day tomorrow, and I opted to take a vacation day, so I got that going for me.

I am definitely curious how we are going to fit everything in the wagon for the big drive to Long Beach tomorrow.  We are taking Etta, which means we are taking a dog box, which means half our trunk space is already gone.  And then there’s the gifts….whatever, we’ll figure it out.   I am just psyched to get outta here.

In an odd twist, there’s not that much snow here at work (West Jordan), but by my house there’s easily over a foot on the ground.  Usually, it works out the opposite.  I’ll admit the snow does put you in the Christmas spirit, but it’s not so fun for commuting. 

Anyway, back to it.  Merry Christmas, and Channukah, and Kwanzaa if I don’t get around to posting again in the next two days.  Oh yeah, and Festivus.  How could I forget?

Ready to Get the Funk Outta Here

Yeah, two days ’til yellow line fever!  I am ready to get some place warmer.  I-15, here I come.  Oh wait, I just got off I-15 and will commute on it another 3X between now and the trip.  Whatever, you get the point!  Stoked!!

Rode my new Canyon Bicycles-Sienna Dev’t team issue hot rod over the weekend.  Rollers make it hard to determine, but since it’s the same bike I had for TofU, I’ll go ahead and call it the sweetness. 

On that note, I have ridden rollers every day for over a week now.  I rode outside one of those days, but needed the rollers to warm back up.  What can I say?  At work it’s just easier to hop on the rollers rather than spending half my lunch putting on the layers necessary to combat nature’s fury.  The volume has not been much, but clearly the new team program is breathing some life into this tired body.

Otherwise, the weekend was pretty lax.  Mostly hanging out with the girls including a sweet snowplay session, and a (very) little Christmas shopping.  Sleevie came over for dinner last night.  He showed us some new variations on Scrabble (and you thought you knew everything there is to know about Scrabble!), and  is making the epic journey to visit the Dingmans in Bozoman today.

As referenced in the comments on the post below this one, Billy Demon(g) won the Nordic Combined World Cup over the weekend.  So yeah, he’s kind of a big deal.  For those out of the area, Billy rides bikes to keep fitness and was a Cat. 5 last year, and a 1 this year.  He’s also the guy that got to ride double with Chris Horner at Cascade last summer.  I am proud to say I know this guy!  Congrats again, man!

Here’s a picture I stole off his webpage to prove that I sometimes get to hang out with him, at least during races:

 

Do I look fat in that picture?

Another Day, Another Traffic Jam

11 months after the Teal Jetta commited suicide in the same spot, the situation was the exact same on my commute today.  No worries, full freeway speed until Point of the Mountain, then the wind was howling out of the canyons sending snow across the freeway and turning it into a skating rink.  Luckily, someone else had already crashed when I got there and traffic was backed way up and creeping through.

We are slammed trying to end the month and the year in style over here. 

Really, really, really looking forward to Xmas vacay.

Update: We are getting hammered and the way home is looking far worse than the drive in!  Glad the Jeep is back from the dead.

The Death Cold

Yeah, it is freezing.  Actually, well below freezing.  I realize that Jared is probably laughing as he told me it was a balmy -12 F at his pad the other morning, but to me this is as cold as it ever needs to get.  And it’s gonna get colder.  For my out of state friends, we’re looking at a high around 20 this weekend.  The nice part about all this is that it makes me appreciate our upcoming CA trip even more.  Leaving one week from today.

I have actually been riding rollers at lunch.  Yeah, surfing dry, the dev’t team must be doing something for my motivation.  Still, I am pretty cracked on that plan, so I think I’ll take on the icy tundra for lunch today. 

At least, the resorts finally got some snow, which while not terribly important to me at the moment, makes everyone else in Utah happy.  And if everyone’s happy, that’s gotta rub off, right?

In other news, my ex-teammate from way back when Hilton Clarke signed with the Fuji ProTour team.  I’ve probably not always been his biggest fan, but  it’s good he gets a shot at the highest level.

Anyway, better get crackin’.

“Daddy’s Special Friend”

Yeah, so my buddy Brian was around for the weekend.  Haley immediately latched onto the idea of him being my “special friend”.  Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Anyway, we didn’t do anything super thrilling what with the 30 degree drop in temps and all.  We checked out Bridal Veils falls and did a wee bit of Xmas shopping, but mostly it was just hanging out and catching up.

I neglected my bicycles for the entire weekend, which is fairly rare.

Big ups to all the crushers at ‘cross natz.  Ali G- 2nd in master’s, Krieger- 4th in master’s, Kris Walker- WINNER!  Congrats to everyone on putting it all out there whether you accomplished your goals or not.  Now you can put your feet up.  Seriously, put your feet up and don’t touch your bike until the road season starts.  What?  Road season starts now?  Good point.

Reunited and it feels so good

One of my bestest friends ever is flying in tonight.  Brian was a member of the infamous Signet Bank Junior Cycling Team back in the day.  He is couch surfing with us for the weekend before joining some friends in Park City to ski next week.  I will put my personal feelings on hold, and hope that the predicted storms materialize in the form of some deep pow in the near future for his sake.  I guess it’s good for the “snow pack” or whatever too.

Also…

If this does not get you in the Christmas spirit, nothing will:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqtQwqy4bBw

Seriously, click through.  Safe for work, as long as your work is okay with eurotrash.

Oh yeah, and everyone at cross natz- get it done!

The Red Tights Dilemma, More Intervention Follow-Up

So, one of our reps got me this awesome set of tights last winter.  Fully lined, bibs, nice chamois- the kind of shiz you see in the catalogs for like $400.  One problem, they’re red.  I look like a cross between these two:

and

I look huge in these things- Like a giant red target for redneck trucks.  As if I don’t already have a complex about my child bearing hips.

Anyway, I brought these tights in for today’s lunch ride, so if you’re around West Jordan, look out for the red-assed baboon!

In other news, pez has a sweet interview with Chad Gerlach:

http://pezcyclingnews.com/?pg=fullstory&id=6550&status=True&catname=Latest%20News

I know you are probably thinking I have a man-crush (not to be confused with a  bro-mance) on this guy by now, but I just find the story fascinating and can’t wait to see what happens.   I will say that when I arrived on the scene (as on the scene as I got), he had a horrid reputation, which he pretty much alludes to in the interview above.  Good luck to him and his whole Amore e Vita/McDonald’s team this coming year.  It will be interesting to see where the fit in the domestic and international scene.  On that note, the quote of the day:

“MAC-Donald’s- I wish I rode for that team” 

- Henk Vogels to J-Rad Nelson like 10 years ago in a hotel elevator in Killington or somewhere.

What else?  We have our non-mandatory mandatory Christmas holiday party tonight.  This is a bit of drag for me (there I go “licking a gift horse” again) as Kelly can’t attend due to the commute, not having a baby sitter, etc.  So, instead of my normal 12 hours away from home, it’s 18 hours today.

On the plus side, the Jeeper Creeper is back in business and running better than I can ever remember.  I suppose a new engine, clutch, and most of the belts and hoses will do that!

Yard Sale

I have some of the 2008 Park City Jeep-Goble Knee Clinic kit that I need to sell:

Small Jerseys at $50

Large jerseys at $50

Large Big Shorts at $50

Large Long Sleeve at $60

Large Skinsuit at $60

Medium Arm Warmers- $15

All top notch Louis Garneau stuff.  Full zip jerseys in our distinctive orange design by the king of kit- Elder Sleevie Designs.  New, in bags, with tags.

If you don’t know, it looks like this:

Seriously, that is the only photo I have.  I swear it was not just an excuse to show off the guns again! 

FWIW, this fire sale is not going in my pocket, but to pay off a team debt.

I’ll have a bunch more stuff to sell for my own pocket some time, but probably not ’til after the holidays.

Holler at me if you want any of this turbo _ ryan at hotmail dot com