We Could be Heroes Forever and Ever

Now that it's late October in our fair city, it's time to play a game. When I see someone wearing a cape, I have to guess whether they are dressing up for Halloween, or whether they are a theater major*.  The woman above is definitely a theater major, since she isn't wearing anything else that looks like a costume.

At the beginning of October, I saw a guy wearing a cape that didn't seem to be either. He was riding a skate board, without wearing a shirt on a cold day, with a cape that looked almost like an animal hide and carrying a large stick, as if it were a staff (sadly, I was on my bike, so I didn't get a photo of him). You might think that it was a costume, but other people have witnessed him in this get-up on other days, so I think that's just who he is - a man living his "Clan of the Cave Bear" superhero fantasy on wheels.

*If you were a theater major, you know what I mean...

He Was Lookin' For a Soul to Steal. He Was in a Bind, 'Cause He Was Way Behind, And He Was Willin' to Make a Deal

Well, it's almost November, so I better do my "Travel Through Books" post for September.

I read six books in September. Not a whole lot, but we were busy most weekends, so I didn't have as much time, and my constant migraine for the month of September didn't help with the reading list either. Anyway, the few books I did read did help me with my "Calgon take me away" moments.

1.) As far as I'm concerned there's no better way to start your monthly reading list than with Jane Austen. the first book I read last month was "Mansfield Park". I found it very entertaining.

2.) The second book trip I went on for September was "Universal Harvester" by John Darnielle (the guy from the Mountain Goats band). It was a great premise. It took place in Nevada, Iowa in the 90's. A guy in his early twenties works at a video store, and videos start getting returned that have some brutal homemade movie scenes spliced in them. I wasn't super excited where the book went from there, but I did like the way it started.

3.) The third novel I read was "Manhattan Beach", by Jennifer Egan. I really liked it. It took me to New York City during World War Two and the main character was one of the first women divers to work on ships during that time. It was fun and glitzy and the Irish mob was involved. What more do you need for escapism?

 4.) The Fourth book trip I took was to Indiana and Kentucky from post WWII to the present. "Hillbilly Elegy" by J. D. Vance was an interesting look at that culture. I didn't always agree with his take on things, but it was still an interesting trip.

5.) The fifth adventure I took was to our future planet, in the South America region. Octavia Butler's "Adulthood Rites" was the second book in the Lilith trilogy. I liked this novel way better than the first book in the series. It looks at the question of whether humans are irredeemable, or whether we will make the same mistakes we originally made to ruin our planet. It's a good question.

6.) The last book vacation I went on was to Moscow in the late 1930's (?), and to the Middle East during the time of Jesus' crucifixion. the novel didn't get out of the Soviet Union for many years after it was written. It makes fun of the Soviet government and the devil comes to Russia to create havoc. It gives an entirely new meaning to "The devil went down to Georgia".

I had some strange trips in September, but it was just gearing me up for my scary, freakish, murderous books that I read in October.

Arkansas, Land of Opportunity. Arkansas, Oh, What You Do to Me.

Okay. So, remember how I said we went to Fayetteville to race a couple of weeks ago? Well, it just happened to be the first time I've ever been to not only Fayetteville, but to the whole state of Arkansas before.

I haven't really spent any time in the South, and so I have all of these stereotypes in my head from TV and movies about how Southerners are racist and misogynistic, and from watching "Deliverance" in particular, they might terrorize and rape Northerners, but worst of all, I heard that people dress up a lot more to just do simple things, like go out to eat or get a drink at a bar. Really, though, how frightening is that?

Well, I'm happy to report, we didn't encounter any of those stereotypes when we were down in Arkansas.

One of the things I like about going to different towns to race cyclocross, is checking out a new city and finding out the best places to eat and drink and look at art and get tea and whatever other things to do in a new town.

I checked things out ahead of time, and decided on Friday night we would get good seafood at the Power House, that used to be an old power station building back in the day. I also wanted to go to Maxine's Tap Room, not just because it has the same name as my grandma and my niece, but because it was rated one of the best cocktail bars in the country by Esquire magazine. It was such a cute place and all of the bartenders were super sweet and attentive, even to us old people. Also, because I can't really drink alcohol when I have a migraine, they had what they called temperance cocktails. I got a non-alcoholic drink made with mashed strawberries and some kind of lemon lime soda (?). It was amazing.

I loved the cool sculptures around town.

I read about the old post office close to campus, and we wandered over on Saturday afternoon after we got done watching the pros race.

The little walkway around the post office was so pretty.

Even the utility boxes were gussied up.

We walked around the whole downtown area and checked out the murals.

There was an area that was kind of like a mall, that had a bunch of different peace sculptures.

After our little walk, we went into eat at a place called Cheers at the OPO (old post office). It was really cool inside. We sat at the bar and had really good food. We got fried artichoke hearts as an appetizer and they were so damn good.

On Sunday we raced in the rain and mud and had some time to kill before the we went back to watch the pro women race, so we went to Torchy's Tacos for lunch. We went to the Torchy's in Austin when we were there in 2015, and we loved the food. So, we went back for more in Fayetteville. It was just as delicious as ever.

So, my take on Fayetteville and Arkansas? I give it an enthusiastic two thumbs up. The food and drinks were great, the art around the downtown area was plentiful, and the people were so nice and friendly. Most importantly, we didn't really have to dress up to eat or drink anywhere. We'll be back!

Not Much, How 'bout You?

Hello, yeah, well, it's been a while. After I said I was doing all of that finger/eye/leg crossing to keep the migraines at bay, it just didn't work.

A couple of weeks ago, I signed up to race in Arkansas, and got a migraine the very next day. Damn it.

I took some migraine meds and raced the next day anyway. So, in between and during my migraine battles, I did three races in the last couple of weeks. Here are some reports about them all:

We went to Fayetteville to race and I was worried the course would be too technical and too difficult for me since I haven't trained since sometime in July and I was weak from the lovely combo of the still there migraine and migraine meds. So, I was just fine with the course being easier to ride.

Saturday was beautiful in Fayetteville. It was warm and dry and the course was really fast. There was only one other woman in my category, so I knew I was going to get second anyway. Since I haven't raced since the end of August, I felt rusty at first. I just tried to stay steady. The other woman in my category was super fast and she took off at the start and I never saw her again. I did pass one of the women in the category higher than mine, but I think she may have been having troubles with her bike.

Earlier that month I asked the person in charge of such things within the Iowa Bicycle Racing Association if I could cat down - which means to go down to an easier category since my stupid health problems were preventing me from going very fast anymore. If I ever start feeling better on a regular basis and I can race better, I'll try to cat right back up, but for now, I basically demoted myself and I am just fine with that.

Mostly it means it's not quite so disheartening to race against people who are so much better than me that they take off and ride so fast, that I don't ever see them in the race, unless they lap me. Hopefully, now there will be people that I can actually be close to and see during my race. I guess we'll see if or how that works.

Anyway, I felt okay during the race. I wasn't afraid to ride anything, and I only crashed once when the muddy section we rode down hid a slippery root underneath my tire and I went down in that lovely mud.

Luckily, it usually doesn't hurt anything to crash in the mud at slower speeds, but it does make for some bad-ass photos.

So, basically. I got a participation prize, but I look at it like this: It's hard to get up off of the couch and go to a different town where you don't know anyone and there are very few women my age still trying to race, and obviously, there were only two women in my category of any age who made the effort to go out and play on their bikes. So, I'll take that participation prize and be glad for it.

The next day was a horse of a different color...And that color was brown. It rained six inches in Faytteville from Saturday night to Sunday night. My migraine was manageable during my Saturday race, but got way worse after I was done racing, so I took another migraine pill on Saturday. It seems like the more often I take meds, the more weakened I become.

I was the only woman in my category who showed up on that rainy Sunday, so if I could finish the race, I would win. That seems simple enough, right? Well, all that slippery mud and the little lakes to ride through made that a little less likely.

John raced right before me and while I was at the starting line, he came up and told me to run more of the course than he did. It would be faster. Usually, it's a badge of honor for people to ride their bikes, more than they run them during a cyclocross race, but with those conditions, it wasn't necessarily faster.

When we took off, I went out too hard, it was really difficult to try and plow through the mud and tall wet grass and it took a lot out of me.

I had to slow way down, and let a couple of people pass me so I wouldn't blow up and have to quit. Once I got a better pace and figured out that I needed to listen to John and run more of the course than I had at the beginning, I started to pass a lot of those people back.

I was the only person in my category, but they put all of the different women's categories together and added most of the junior racers too, so I tried to compete against any of those people who were near me. I passed four or five people before they pulled us off the course...And I finished, so I won.

I felt like I deserved my participation trophy (or free tires in this case) even more on that day. Anyone who rode in that muck and mess was a winner, as far as I'm concerned.

Thanks to Burne Sippy for the Twisted CX photos.

My third race this month happened last weekend in Cedar Falls, Iowa. It was great to see a lot of women I hadn't been able to hang out with all season, even if I'm still in no shape to compete against them.

As always in cyclocross, the weather was a consideration. this time it was cold. I hadn't raced in cold temps since Nationals in December, and it seems like I forget from year to year, what I need to wear in what temperatures. I just brought everything I could think of and it worked for the most part.

I did pretty well with my clothing choices, and my feet were really the only part of me that felt cold during my race.

Luckily for me, Twisted CX has a master's women category, but it's only 35+, so some of the women are still 20 years younger than me, but at least it's something...

There were seven women in my race. I knew I wasn't in any kind of shape to be competitive, but the only way I can get better is to keep trying to race. Of course, I had another migraine on Friday, so I took more meds. That's 3 days in that past week for taking meds, for those who are keeping score. Ugh! One of these days I'll do a race where I haven't had chronic migraines and have to take meds that make me exhausted, but who knows when that will be.

Anywhooo, I did my thing and I was in fourth for most of the race in my category. There was a woman right behind me and I noticed that she ran the sandy section, and I got a little time when I rode it, so I kept trying to ride it, and the 2nd to last lap, I lost momentum and had to get off my bike and run the rest of the sand. I have no idea how, because I wasn't even on my bike, but I tripped and basically did a face plant in the sand, giving the woman behind me a fine opportunity to pass me.

I tried to catch her the rest of the race, and I also tried to ride the sand again on the last lap, where I lost momentum again and got even further behind her. Sigh.

I ended up finishing fifth in my category, which was just fine.

These days I'm just thrilled when I feel well enough to race. Even when I don't get a participation prize, just being able to show up and, well, participate feels like winning this year.

Made of Wet Boots and Rain and Shiny Black Ravens on Chimney Smoke Lanes.

Well, kids. It's October already and I haven't really written a ton on the blog lately.

I am a Summer person. It makes me nervous when it starts getting cooler outside and darker earlier. I do like Halloween, though. So, I'll have that to get excited about.

I had a stupid migraine for pretty much all of September. I'd take meds and it would go away for 24 hours and come right back the minute the meds wore off.

It got me down, and I was so dizzy and in pain from the migraine, that I couldn't even run or ride my bike much, which is normally how I deal with being down. I'm happy to say that I did just go an entire week without having a migraine or taking meds. Woo hoo! I had a very light one the last couple of days, but nothing like it was last month. I'll keep my fingers and my eyes and my legs crossed that things stay that way.

Since I was having trouble getting excited about things through the fog of my brain pain, I bought myself a pretty bike.

I know it's stupid. John keeps telling me that a new bike won't make me faster, and I was raised to know that consumerism doesn't help anything, but I wanted a pretty bike, dammit! A few years ago, I said I wouldn't buy anything (except our house) that I had to borrow money for. I could actually afford this, and I got it and I'm riding it and it's fun and pretty and I'm not at all faster, but that wasn't the point. The point is that I wanted something to get excited about, and not having a migraine and then having a new bike is doing that for me. As always, I'll take what I can get...

Two weeks ago we went to Madison, Wisconsin for a bike race, and it was really fun.

Saturday was John's 55th birthday. His favorite way to celebrate anything is to race his bike. He had three full days of bike racing, plus hanging out with friends and my family (sorry John) and watching the pros race their bikes. He said it was a great birthday weekend for him.

 The next day was Stinky's 26th birthday. Holy cow! But my kids are getting older. It's a damn good thing that I'm not.

We celebrated her birthday the next day with dinner and drinks and cheesecake and free beignets. It was a lovely evening,

John caught a cold, so we decided not to go to Des Moines and race last weekend. Instead we did a slow gravel ride to our friends rescue farm where they had a lovely party and I got to meet their Vietnamese pot bellied piglets. They were so adorable.

So, now we're back up to speed. It's October, and it's been raining too much, but I'm hoping my migraines are calming down and even though I'm not in great shape, I want to try and "race" again. We'll see how that goes...

And for all the rest of you? I hope you love Fall and that you aren't in any pain and that you have a million things to be excited about.

Summer Reading, Had Me a Blast.

Well, kids. It's almost October, so I better get crackin' on my August books post.

In August I took six book trips, and I went to some fantastic places.

1.) My first jaunt was to Turkey and Syria via Elliot Ackerman's "Dark at the Crossing". It was a very sad book. It was also the first novel I've read about what's been going on in Syria the last few years.

2.) My second trip was a non-fiction book by Mary Karr called "The Liar's Club" about her childhood in a very dysfunctional family. It was a trip back to the 60's and early 70's in Texas and Colorado. It was very well written as well.

3.) My third adventure involved trolls and changelings in modern day NYC. I really liked this novel a lot. It was "The Changeling" by Victor Lavalle.

4.) My fourth book has been getting tons of hype this Summer. "Where the Crawdads Sings" by Delia Owens was a perfect Summer read. It takes place in North Carolina and is about a girl who was basically abandoned by her family members when she was very young and how that has shaped her as an adult. If you want a very escapist, read, this is your novel.

5.) I traveled to a part of England in "Elmet", by Fiona Mozley. This book was in keeping with my theme during August of brutal allegory/fantasy texts. The world in this novel felt dreamlike and then later turned into a nightmare.

6.) What a way to end my month in book travel. My sixth book was "The Fellowship of the Ring" by J. R. R. Tolkien. I don't think I ever read the trilogy when I was a kid, and I wanted to wait a while after having watched the movies to dig into it, but man, what a voyage. My daughter tells me the other ones get more boring, however. I just loved the novel and it was another perfect Summer read.

Now that the sun light seems to be getting weaker and setting earlier, it will be interesting to see how my book travel changes.

And the Soles of Your Shoes Are All Worn Down

I've been trying to write this post for the last couple of weeks, but our internet at home is spotty, and we've been busy at work. So, I'm not updating this post again, or I'll never publish this thing: 

Okay. So, I've been having migraines on and off now for three weeks and it's hard to make my brain work well enough to write anything ground breaking, or all that interesting. I'm taking the next two days off for the Trek World Cup Cyclocross race. I probably won't be able to race at all, since I'm so weak and dizzy from stupid migraines. John will race all three days and we'll be in Madison for almost four days.

Last Thursday I had my third year post breast cancer mammogram. I went in the morning and had my mammogram and then met with the oncologist nurse practitioner who told me that my preliminary report was clean. Yea me!

Oh, old lady health issues, I'm a little annoyed with you all. Speaking of old lady health issues, I've been reading this very long, but very informative article about the link between Alzheimer's and menopause here: https://medium.com/neurotrack/menopause-and-alzheimers-1c455f29fe16. Of course, Alzheimer's doesn't seem to run in my family...Or maybe it does, but everyone in my family tends to smoke so much that they die of cancer or strokes or heart attacks, and they don't live long enough to find out if it runs in our family or not.

Anyway, this woman proposes that there is a strong link to menopause and Alzheimer's in women. Basically, they think women start getting Alzheimer's right when they hit menopause. Great. The woman says you can keep this from happening by avoiding, alcohol, sugar, caffeine, processed food, and stress. Excuse me, but how are we supposed to deal with our stress when we have to avoid alcohol, sugar, caffeine, and processed food?

Soooo, I'm working hard to eat better, even though perimenopause makes me crave sugar and stresses me out, making that way more of a challenge than it should be. I suppose the good thing about getting Alzheimer's with my menopause, will be forgetting what perimenopause felt like. Hot flashes? What are those? Migraines? I can't really recall that pain. Crying for no reason? When did that happen? Gaining weight by just looking at food? Haven't I always weighed this much? Maybe I shouldn't work so hard at eating better and avoiding alcohol after all...

Let Me Drown in Your Laughter. Let Me Die in Your Arms

Last night I had a dream that John Denver was still alive and looked like he did in the 70's and he wanted to meet me after his (well attended concert - which should have clued me in that it was a dream).

Anyway, the dream seemed to go on for hours and hours and all it was, was me wanting to meet John Denver for a date after his show, but blowing him off for my husband and being conflicted and then having John Denver give me another chance to meet him, and then me flaking on him, and so on and so on, and right when it seemed that I would finally leave my spouse to be with John Denver, I woke up and felt awful about choosing him over my husband. Where the hell did THAT dream come from?

All I can say, is that if I had that dream when I was 10 years old, it would have been a lot shorter. I would have left any husband I had to be with John Denver without a drop of guilt. I guess maybe I have matured a little now that I'm in my 50's.

Also, I'm blaming my now 7 day migraine for all of this. Who knows what weird doors all that pain has opened up in my brain. I might totally revert back to my mid-seventies self and start wearing smock tops and earth shoes, and listening to Olivia Newton-John and watching "The Waltons". It's a slippery slope.

I Used to Get Mad at My School (No, I Can't Complain). The Teachers Who Taught Me Weren't Cool (No, I Can't Complain).

 Time for a recycled post:


 When I was in 4th grade, I was desperately trying to get diagnosed with a learning disability. Both my brother and my sister supposedly had one and they got to see Mrs. Sanchez. She was a big proponent of positive reinforcement, so my siblings were constantly coming home with super balls, candy and best of all, stories about their lunches at McDonald's. Back in 1974, you were still allowed to use food as a reward. My plan was to get diagnosed, have my class in Mrs. Sanchez's room and then be so good that I used up her entire budget on McDonald's lunches every week. The school indulged me a couple of times, but the third time I asked to take the test that should have led me down my Mccheeseburger path, I was denied.

I don't remember specifics, but I think the principal sounded like this; "Listen kid. You don't have a learning disability and you're not gonna get one by taking the tests over and over. So, scram." Actually, it was the seventies and we lived in Mesa so I'm sure he spoke less like Nick the bartender from It's A Wonderful Life and more like a progressive Mormon worried about my self-esteem.

What I lacked in a learning disability, I made up for in a speech impediment. I had a lisp up until that year. Lisps are adorable until you reach that awkward age and unless you're moving to Barcelona, you want to try to lose it and fast. Which meant I had to meet with a speech therapist. Unfortunately, she was no Mrs. Sanchez. She was so boring, I don't even remember her name. I sat in her room and recited, "Sammy snake, Sammy snake, Sammy snake..." into a tape recorder.

I know I can't make it through a post without mentioning my short attention span, so I figured I'd bring it up again. Sitting down for very long is difficult for me as an adult, but as a nine year old, it was torture. Finally, one day my teacher went out and left me to my recitation so she could smoke a ciggie in the hallway and chat with some of the other teachers. I continued on and she told me she would listen to it later. Halfway through, I belched very loudly into the microphone. I felt so rebellious. But instead of listening to the tape later, my speech therapist came back early and decided to go over it with me. I couldn't look at her as the tape rolled on. "Sammy snake. Sammy snake. Sammy snake. Bwaaap! Sammy snake..." My teacher was sufficently horrified.

"Chur-LEE-ta!" I was so busted. I didn't even laugh uncomfortably like I normally do in awkward situations.

"I'm sorry, but it was soooo boring." She wasn't sympathetic. She was, in fact, very annoyed for the duration of our classes together. I once heard her relating the incident to another teacher when they were standing outside the door. The other teacher said,

"I guess there's one in every bunch..."

The good news is, that I lost my lisp that year. Maybe the therapist had a plan all along. Her strategy was to bore the lisp right out of me. And now I don't even have to consciously think to put my tongue behind my teeth when I say Sammy snake. Which is good, because you know how often I'm always talking about Sammy snake.

Moonlight and Love Songs Never Out of Date

Archie is scandalized by my reading choice.

I'm going to go ahead and interrupt the vacation posts, with a traveling by books in July one. Especially since it's almost September now.

In July I only read five books. Since I was able to travel in real life, I figure I was okay with such a low number.

1.) The first book I read in July was "Valley of the Dolls", by Jacqueline Susann. It was written in 1966, and at that time I believe it was very sensational and considered debauched, but now it's pretty tame. It was fun to go back to that time, but sad that the women felt like they had to over medicate themselves to deal with their relationships with men. I'm sure there are plenty of women who still feel that way even now. Sigh.

2.) The Second book trip I took was "Where the Red Fern Grows", by Wilson Rawls. I first read this book in third or fourth grade and the author came to our school to read from it. It took me to The Ozarks in the 1920's. It was a great adventure story and I'm always a sucker for an animal saga. It was perfect Summer reading.

3.) I read "Modern Lovers" by Emma Straub. It takes place in New York City and deals with parents who were in a band back in the day that was considered pretty cool, but now they have their own children in high school and how they have to pass that torch, while still dealing with their younger adult selve's issues. I really liked it and the writing was excellent. A nice two-for-one book trip.

4.) I read Christopher Moore's "Noir" when we were on vacation, so I didn't have tons of time to take that trip within our trip, but it was so crazy and fun. It takes place in San Francisco right after World War II. It reads like an old detective novel, but it has aliens in it too. I thought it was a hoot.

5.) The last book I read was "Where'd You Go, Bernadette", by Maria Semple. I have heard the movie isn't that great, but I was very entertained by the book, which takes place in Seattle and everyone is rich and there is a lot of talk of architecture, and the main character is at first, not very likable.

All the books I read in July were a lot of fun. Of course, they can't beat our actual vacation, but I haven't seen much in this world that could.

You Realize That Life Goes Fast. It's Hard to Make the Good Things Last.

On Monday we reluctantly left our resort and Zion and headed toward Bryce Canyon.

It was Coadster's last day with us. Since we weren't sure she was coming on the trip with us when I booked everything, the last two stops could only house two people, so Coadster was going to head back to Iowa after lunch. It was so great to have her with us. She helped so much with driving and she was a great sport to hang out with a couple of old people and put up with our geriatric antics.

We went to the visitor's center to see what would be a good hike to see cool stuff in a few hours. They suggested the Navajo Loop. So, we did that.

It was really cool. I'm so glad that Coadster got over her fear of heights from when she was a child, because this would have done her in.

Luckily, the trails were wide and not hard to walk on.

We loved the little archways to walk through too.

We were also going to try and hike Queen's Garden, but Coadster had a long drive ahead of her, so we bailed on that and hopefully, Coadster will have a chance to come back and do it later.

We agreed that Navajo Trail was a great hike to do if that's all you had time for.

Sadly, it came time to say goodbye to our Coadster. We were so sad to see her go, but we were very glad that we had that time with her in such perfect conditions. I always say this, but try to make the fun experiences happen whenever you can, you never know what can change in your life, and you'd hate to say, "I should have done that..." I hope that even when I'm (hopefully old) at the end of my time here on earth, I will have these images and memories to look back on and still be in wonder of it.

I really did like Bryce Canyon. It was beautiful and the Hoo Doo's were so cool to behold.

After Coadster left, John and I decided to check out the trails through the park.

Bryce was the only park that we saw that had an actual bike path through it.

Because there was a shuttle and there wasn't much car traffic, we even rode off the bike path up to Inspiration Point.

Once we got there, I felt very inspired. What incredible views.

We took the path through Dixie National Forest and just to the border of Bryce Canyon city and then turned around.

Since it was getting late, we decided to save the bike path past Bryce Canyon City as far as it would go for the next day.

In the evening we got pizza at the Bryce Canyon Inn, and it was delicious. Strangely enough for a Mormon state, the local beer we had in Utah was great too.

We were going to try and stay up and watch a movie in our AirBnB that night, but we watched a half hour series and both crashed. All of this hiking and biking can really wear an old person out.