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Archive for August, 2009

Donna and I had someone come over who is versed in Volkswagens to give us their impression of the bug we just bought. Before we go and start making plans for it’s revival we wanted to know if it’s even worth saving.

Happily he thought the car was a decent purchase. Josh listened attentively to the blistering power of the 40hp engine (I think it was speaking to him in a foreign language). He said it sounded pretty good and only needed a couple of minor adjustments.

All in all the car is easily repairable and most of the work will be cosmetic. The carburetor needs to be adjusted since it has a tendency to shut off after 10-15 minutes. Could be the choke, could be overheating. A little more research is needed for that one, but at least this thing isn’t going to be a bottomless pit of money.

I took some more pictures of what the car looks like. If you want to check them out you can see them here:

This is what happens when you don’t know the route and just follow the person in front of you.

So I get to the appointed place at the appointed time and head off with the pack on the bike ride. Everything is going along just fine until the rain comes – which only took about 10 minutes. The rain itself wasn’t that bad, but I could really do without the tire spray to the face trick. Clearly drafting and rain don’t mix. I suppose it will cool you down, but I don’t think it’s a good look.

I was a little afraid the rain was going to make the roads slick which would cause me to embarrass myself yet again by falling off my bike in front of a large crowd. Luckily I managed to avoid this.

However, since I am not familiar with the route I follow the person in front of me. Where they go I follow. When we got to the fork in the road, I kept following my chosen leader. And my chosen leader is determined by the person who gives off the air of authority and seems to know where they’re going. Or by the person who has the flashiest bike jersey, whichever seems more appropriate at the time.

Using my method, I quickly found myself on a path that didn’t look familiar. I pedaled along figuring they just changed the route slightly to keep things interesting. I should have realized when there were just 12 of us left that I had splintered off with some renegade faction that wanted to go further. Or this group had selected me as the sacrifice and they were taking me out to the middle of nowhere where I would be placed into a burlap sack and left for dead.

How far did they want to go? I wasn’t sure, but I knew they drove to the shop so ultimately they had to go back to their cars. Since forging my own path would have only lead to tears and a spot on the 6 o’clock news, I kept up.

It really wasn’t bad. They belted out 40 miles and kept up quite nicely. I’m not entirely sure if they knew who I was, but they didn’t seem to mind me tagging along, so that’s good.

We finished the ride right at 2 hours and 10 minutes, which included a few stops to rest up. That actually put me at a pretty good pace for the day. At that pace I was in line to go 65 miles at pretty close to 3 hours.

All’s well that ends well and I ended up in the parking lot back at the bike shop where we started.

I really have to learn this route.

To my credit I did come home and mow the law right after, so that’s the equivalent of going the extra distance to make it a 65 mile day.

I really wanted to get out and go on the road this morning, but I got too late of a start so I contented myself with riding the trainer. I watched the new Fast and Furious movie (which was horrible by the way) while I did a quick 20 miles.

And then just to show how Uber Powerful I am, I went out and mowed the lawn. I figured if I was already hot and sweaty I might as well go all in and get all the manual labor out of the way.