Sunday, August 24, 2008
After over five years of dating with no ring in sight, Jillian still hadn't issued me an ultimatum. I figured that means she's the girl for me.
So this last weekend I went down to Charlottesville to see Jillian. As an added bonus, David was also traveling through town on his way to New York. Although he is known for his marathon 18 hour solo non-stop drives from Florida to New York, he was glad to have an opportunity to stop and cause some mischief.
Since both David and I are known for patting ourselves on the back for our navigational skills (in fact, after meeting David, the first question he'll ask you is often, "Which way did you go to get here?"), we met at a rest stop on I-66. After a lengthy discussion as to why there were eight foot long concrete sidewalk strips in the parking lot, but no actual side walk, we got back on the road and drove to Charlottesville convoy style. Once there I gave him the nickel tour, which consisted of the trip to Lucky 7's to buy some food and drink. That night, Jillian and I even gave him a little gift for his "boat" - his brand new Dodge Charger
On Saturday, after continuing our Rock Band world tour, we ventured out to the downtown mall. At Java Java, Dave got an annoying phone call from Nick, who was in California working on this huge project. To complete our afternoon we watched some local coed hockey, hit up the Salvation army thrift store (Dave had a tv show theme party to attend later), and bugged Jillian's roommate Anna. Sadly, Anna couldn't come out to dinner with us, since her Mother was coming to town.
Around six we went out to Dinner at Sal's, which was delicious. Jillian got fried Ravioli, which definitely gave me second thoughts. After we'd finished eating, and were sitting around waiting for our check, Dave got a call from Nick again, this time needing some data off a spreadsheet on Dave's computer. So I gave Dave my keys (and I don't loan my car out, ever), and he was off with a promise that he'd come back and pick us up.
Now that we had so much time to kill we decided to take a little walk. After stopping to watch more hockey, Dave gave us a call to let us know that the only place he knew how to get to was Lucky 7's, where we'd stopped the other night. As we made our way there, Jillian saw the big statue of Stonewall Jackson that sits in Court Square and had to take some pictures. After those, while stopping at a bench, she found some Trivial Pursuit cards on the ground.
The first vacation we ever took together was a frisbee trip to Tybee Island, Georgia. At night, after the games were over, we'd take a walk along the beach. One night we found a bunch of Trivial Pursuit cards on the ground, and we used these cards as conversation starters. They've kind of become one of our things.
So as Jillian was asking me the questions on the cards, she suddenly noticed that the third question on the second card didn't have an answer. So she immediately read that question, "Will you marry me?" and found me on one knee holding a ring.
She said yes, and Dave come out of the bushes, explaining that Nick wasn't actually in California working on this project. Jillian eventually noticed that all of the questions on the card actually related to us (causing me to learn lots of trivia). We celebrated by going home and hanging up curtains.
Anna regretted not coming to dinner.
| posted at: 05:30 |
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Saturday, August 16, 2008
Yesterday I was walking into Safeway, and I had to cross over one of the little wood-chipped areas that has one tree at the end of the parking lot. It was only three feet across, but I had to step in the wood chips to avoid looking like an idiot jumping over it or taking awkward steps. Whatever. We've all walked through those hundreds of times. Except this time when I stepped down I felt an awful pain. Much like the time then I jumped off a dumpster and landed on a nail.
I kicked my sandal off immediately, and noticed there was blood on the bottom of my foot. I looked at the sandal and found a single wood chip, maybe an inch long and an 1/8 inch wide, had punctured the sandal and come to rest in my foot. I limped, purchased my milk, and had a terrible time working the clutch on the way home.
I'm still limping a little today, but I should be alright by Monday.
In unrelated news, Jillian and I decided not to do the Blue Ridge Extreme ride, settling instead on a much more low key ride in mid October. We're hoping that with the later time, a Pino might be available at Mt Airy bikes.
| posted at: 11:30 |
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Monday, August 11, 2008
A few weeks ago I was looking for a tandem recumbent to rent so that Jillian and I could try one to see if this whole idea is actually feasible. When Mt Airy Bikes came up, the first tandem listed on their page was the Hase Pino. One of concerns with the tandem recumbent was big hills. A couple I spoke to at a ride in Harrisburg said they commonly went 3mph the whole way up the hill. I hoped that with a hybrid, whomever was in the back would be able to stand up and put in some power when we needed it. There were other advantages as well. I thought it would be much easier to talk to each other, and the two different kinds of seats could provide a lot of relief to sore behinds on a long ride.
Since Jillian was in town Saturday, we went out to Mt Airy and gave the Pino a test ride. For starters, I was very impressed with Mt Airy Bikes. The staff we talked to was friendly, knowledgeable, and had a real passion for riding. There was a parking lot full of bikes, as well as a building the size of a three car garage with bikes hanging and sitting in every conceivable spot. I'm not actually sure how all the bikes outside went in at night. I strongly recommend it for anyone who wants any bike at all, used or new. They even have these things for rent.
Getting on the Pino was an adventure. The captain sits in the back, with full control over steering, gears, and brakes. The person in the front is just along for the ride. I started in the back, and we had a very rough first start. We swerved all over the place, and it was probably only through sheer luck that we didn't hit any cars on our way out. After a quarter mile or so I got the hang of steering, Jillian was able to adjust to riding while sitting down, and things got a lot better.
Once we started shifting, Jillian pointed out that I had to stop shifting without warning her. I hadn't even thought about that. It would be really weird to all of a sudden need to pedal a lot harder because the gear changed when you weren't ready. Starting, stopping, turning - everything required complete, clear, concise communication. Something that will certainly be very important in our relationship
Around the half way point, Jillian and I tried switching places on a long almost flat stretch of road. This was an adventure. The first two or three starts she tried to start it like a regular bike. Normally, you lean the bike a little bit so you can almost straddle the seat, push off, and go. With this bike, when you lean, the added weight makes the whole bike fall right over. Ultimately, Jillian wasn't able to start the bike as the captain. It wasn't until later that we realized we were in way too high of a gear.
Once we had that figured out, we tried again at the top of a little hill. This time things went much smoother. For me, this part of the ride highlighted one of my major goals of this trip. While I'm sitting in the front, I have no control at all. I can't turn the bike. I can't stop it. I can't shift down right before a hill. Since I'm sitting, I didn't even feel like I could lean my weight at all and prevent the bike from tipping over. I had to have total and complete faith and trust that Jillian would take care of it. I just had to let go. It was very different for me, and will definitely make me grow.
On the way back to the shop, I tried standing up to pedal. That was a disaster. The handlebars swayed back and forth and the bike got very unsteady. If I'm going to stand, I need to remember not to sway the bike back and forth like I normally do when climbing.
When we got back to the bike shop, I finally felt comfortable riding the bike. Not ready to take it screaming down a big hill, but ready to ride it twenty or thirty miles in a stretch, so long as there were no big hills. It had a lot in common with driving stick for the first few weeks. You just try to avoid ever needing to start on a hill. We'll definitely need a lot of practice riding it, so we're going to need to get it in time to do a bunch of charity rides before summer.
Unfortunately, this isn't an inexpensive bike. A new one costs around 3100 euros, plus costs for the kick stand and fenders. The guy at the shop thought he could get us one for around $4600. We did see a lot of other advantages that might justify the price. Having the rear rider in a traditional position provides much better visibility. The recumbent seat means that if one of us is injured, they can slack off for the day and rest. There is definitively easier communication. Perhaps most importantly, the two different seats makes it easier on your rear end.
In two weeks there's a ride outside of Charlottesville that we're considering doing. The course is intense. You climb nearly 3500 feet over the last six miles, without any breaks. Tomorrow I'm going to get in touch with the bike shop and see if they're willing to rent the Pino to us so we can really see if this will work. They do normally rent bikes, and are even willing to apply between 50 and 100% of the rental price toward the purchase price, but I feel like the Hase is different from other rides.
We are definitely going to need some help in order to get this bike, but I think both Jillian and I agree it would be totally worth it, and probably help us grow as a couple for years to come.
| posted at: 20:20 |
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