Tuesday

I had hoped to get back here yesterday, but the Mt. Rose ride got the better of me.  While my pal Pete made the climb without ever having to go down to the third chain-ring, I was there from the get-go.  Really no surprise in either of those results.  @bcbison can ride anywhere, and up any hill.  Any future on Mt. Rose for me will be only from the lake side.

The concept that I would have "thinkin'" time while on the road yesterday was a total pipe-dream.  There were a precious few times where there were lulls in the traffic, but for most of the ride, the roar of vehicles coming from behind was a constant reminder to maintain my line. My appraisal of the relationship between cyclists and vehicular traffic on Mt. Rose is that drivers acknowledge a rider's right to be there, but there's not a lot of slowing down.  And the biker needs to keep it steady.  Its not a place for the faint of heart.

It was sad to see 4 head back to The Big Apple yesterday.  (And I was about 300 yards too slow to be at a place on the ride where 2 could have pulled off for a final hug on their drive down to RNO.  My bad.)  With all the wedding-related festivities while she was here, we really didn't get a lot of pure FFF before she had to go home.  She's back to the salt mines tomorrow, and fully engaged with the apartment-hunting task as well.  Good luck, Kiddo!

Although I am not watching the Olympics, the TV here seems to be tuned to NBC most of the time so there's lots of access to the events being broadcast.  Is it real or is it Memorex?  Whatever.  Anyway, 1.1 suggested that there be a limit on the number of political ads allowed per hour.  Not a bad idea.  Why not impose a full embargo on all political ads for, say, the month of August?  Give the public a break.  If that proposal were floated to the voters, I'd take the Over that at least 70% of the electorate would fully agree to a holiday from the mud-slinging.

The road construction in the Tahoe area is impressive this year.  I'm theorizing that good ol' Harry Reid has found a way to bring stimulus money to his state to brace-up a lack-luster economy.  When Pete and I were coming down from the summit yesterday (he had had time to ride down to Incline and get the car before I got to the top), we saw a 6-man crew standing by, all in supervisory mode, as a bob-cat dozer was moving a small pile of gravel.  One of the standing guys had a long-handled shovel in one hand.  I figured that that was visual evidence of a project that was definitely shovel-ready.

We did have the NASCAR race on here Sunday when the 48 just ran away from the field.  When they brought NASCAR to Indianapolis 15 or so years ago, it was a big deal.  Now, they can't sell that many tickets.  Personally, I think that these big tracks don't offer that much excitement to stock car fans.  I mean, its two and a half miles around, and the cars get pretty strung out.  Without a little bump-n-running goin' on, the racing is as boring as the tape-delayed Olympics.

And they (the Olympics) have open-seating problems too.  I thought that the Olympics were sold out?  Again, if I were interested, I might research the problem, but that's not happening.

@srh4 and I are enjoying a few hours of Five Minutes Peace today(with 1.02) while the others are at Sand Harbor for the day.  Its good therapy after the stresses of  #07282012 and yesterday's Mt. Rose adventure.

Maybe an update later.

BCOT