Ooops

Mom brain strikes again: After mountain biking today, I gleefully loaded the bike into the new truck and drove off. About a half a mile later, it occurred to me that I didn't remember putting the front wheel in... Sure enough, I had left it leaned against the rear tire of the truck, where it was so well camoflauged that I didn't notice it. Argh.

I'm hoping I get off with just having to replace the badly bent skewer, though I fear Chad will come home and exclaim in horror: "You mangled the [insert obscure expensive bike part name here]!" The truck, of course, was unscathed by the puny mountain bike wheel.

Yes, I made more butter, too. Adding a spoonful of sour cream and letting the mix fester on the counter overnight did marvelous things to the flavor!

Counterpoint on new vehicle

I have to point out, that this was not a case of "guy wants macho 4x4, talks girls into it" -- rather, Anna found the truck, and she and Nimue convinced me that it would be a fun and unconventional choice. In particular, for Anna it would be distinctively not a "soccer-mom-mobile" (as so often seen around our chunk of suburbia.) In Nimue's case, the "cute-mobile" beat out the "horky giganto" 4runner we were also considering.

Further, lest my eco-concious friends put me on the pillory, I must mention that we put considerably less than 10k miles on a car annually (while collectively racking up considerably more miles than that on our bikes.) The huge majority of our car miles are spent heading off on various adventures, often on bad or borderline impassable roads. Nearly all the city driving that we might do, is done on our bikes. Thus, fuel economy ended up ranking fairly low in our list of new-car requirements; adventure capabilities and durability rated higher.

Interestingly, the new Toyota is shorter than the Subaru (discovered when parking in our driveway for the first time!)

Can you tell what just happened?

2000 Subaru Outback

2010 Toyota FJ Cruiser Trail Edition

Dirt, ho!

Fun Run

Nimue decided she wanted to do the Cherry Chase Fun Run this year -- she ran the entire two mile course in 22 minutes with no stops. Yay, Nim! Chad greeted us at the end on his way out on a bike ride.


We may be insane, but are also signed up to do a females-only 9k out at Palo Alto Baylands in November. It turns out that taking Nimue running after dinner is a good way to work out the crazo "I've just been fed" energy, plus she likes the undivided Ma attention. I set the bike computer to beep every two minutes, at which point we have to think of a word that will either (a) make the other person laugh or (b) expand the small one's vocabulary. Nim's idea. Weird kid. Weird Ma, too.

Fleeing the sinking ship

I tore out a big allergenic Scotch broom bush yesterday; Chad cracked up at the larval exodus that occurred after I stuffed the detritus in the yard waste bin. Reminds me of the time when my brother at age 4 decided to throw away the loosely covered container of caterpillars he had taken in to preschool for show-and-tell in the kitchen garbage can, to be discovered several hours later.

You can't hide in an Eichler

One of the great things about living in at Eichler is that one doesn't have to look hard to locate one's family members, even when they are up on the roof. Chad is accumulating great house chore karma by replacing the roof sealant around the atrium by himself.

Determined

Neither darkness or bedtime stops the creation of art.

Culinary Mountain Biking

Silly Experiment of the Week:

 

Put Cream in Bottle on Mountain Bike. Go Have Fun.

 

Wash Dirt off Bottle. Observe lack of Solidity inside with Sadness.

 

Shake Exactly Twice; Feel Thud in Bottle. Wahoo -- Butter!

 

Rinse and Drain; Eat on Toast. Yum.

Next time: Use good cream from the Milk Pail. Perhaps fester on the counter overnight for flavor development before churning.