The Fat Adventures Begin Again!

There has been a classic fall cooling trend here around the inland northwest, which has peaked my motivation meter to ride a bike again. Since it's been kind of rainy out there's not much in my mind that can be completed outside beyond bike riding...the chores around home can eternally wait for another day and the crisp morning temperatures have me itching to get the Fatbacks out for more Fat Adventures...so it began.



There is something to be said about riding in a misty on-off rain with temps in the 40's...most people would not find comfort or pleasure in this, but I'm different. The forest is once a again breathing a sight of relief from the season of fire potential. The roads and trails are dust free and the forest floor is no longer a volatile, crispy fire tender waiting for some idiot to light it up. The forest feels happy, the trees are waving, rain is gently pattering all around, everything is quiet except for the sound of a breeze through the pines.



I spent a few days climbing around the mountains in my back yard, never seeing another being, enjoying the peace and soul reviving solitude all around me. Yes, this is my mental therapy.



I put some serious miles on the Fatback which also entailed many thousands of feet of climbing and descending. I did not even notice that I am out of shape, the bike just kept going forward.

Pathetic!

Yep that's the way my summer riding season has been - Pathetic! It's the end of summer and the only way I know is that the mountain flora is rather dead...



I just feel that I lost the entire summer to work at "work" and work on our place. I love where I live, but loathe the work it has taken to bring this place up to "my standards" which is, by my own fault, rather lofty in the perfectionism realm. There is actually a lot of factors involved here that have kept my cycling to once or twice a week, if that.





I've become so pathetic about my cycling that the last time someone asked me how many bikes I owned that I could not remember completely until I was on my way home some time later - Pathetic!

I then read an article on vanity which, in combination with the aforementioned issues of memory loss regarding my bikes and lack of riding, made me a tad bit disgruntled (well actually I was in a raging disgruntled state to say the least). So in my highly disgruntled state I started selling off all my bikes and bike related parts (which it seems I have accumulated so much that I did not even know half of what I had in my shop)...Cyclocross bikes down to one and the last one is for sale, mountain bikes down to one, everything else is still on the chopping block including my Volagi, the only thing spared were the Fatbacks. You could say that I'm getting back down to the basics.

People who found out what I was doing thought I was insane. Personally I'm starting to feel better about having less to maintain and deal with or to decide what to ride for the day. I'm not totally off my rocker since I do have a plan that involves simplifying my bike life and it has already been set into action...



Unfortunately I'm in no shape for cyclocross this year and I'm not happy about missing these ultra fun competitions, but I feel that I would be wasting money and time in a futile effort to compete once again. I'm happy about just riding up in my "back yard" mountain park once or twice a week exploring new areas and finding new loops to ride. I have my own network of trails and roads to ride up there...it keeps me sane.



I also hinted in my last post (yes, it was long ago) that there were changes in the wind for me and those changes are chugging right along at a snail's pace. The changes involve relocating to a new area for new adventures in exploration of the local mountainous backwoods...hopefully better schools for my kids, smaller town living, SNOW, green grass all summer, Mount Idaho in the back yard...hmmm.



If everything goes right, this coming year I will be moving to Idaho. I was born there so I guess my destiny is to die there...but then again one never really knows their end destiny. Man that Lynskey is a sweet riding bike...WHOOOHOOO!!!!