4/27/08

injured reserve

this is what you get when you step off the pony for a full weekend (at a fat tire fest, no less) and venture a trail with only running shoes and a camera, and not even one ounce of potential for speed:















sigh.
i dare and challenge all you mtb'ers out there to a 'get off your bike day'. seriously. get off your bike and go hike your favorite loop, and just see what you see, differently. it might surprise you.
jj

4/21/08

sunday deux

jeny be nimble
jeny be quick
jeny jump over the rocks and sticks.

jeny rolled high
jeny rolled low
jeny rolled with fire, in the land of no snow ;-)

sunday rocked. the still completely seized back and hips did not allow me to walk, lie down, or even sit comfortably. but ... sitting on the bike felt relatively nice... in fact, the compromise in freedom put me dead-center on the pony. while all things on this trail always have felt ride-able at speed (never really an issue), slower paced days tend to feel clumsy. not this sunday, tho. for some reason, i felt on four points in absolutely all situations.... i felt nimble.

the dreaded sand pit

cat and i rode sovereign from some stinky trail head by some camp spot. while this afforded us a lovely few extra sandy miles in both directions, full head-wind in both directions included ... it was truly a smelly place.

cat wasn't having any fun. and she wasn't talking at all
yeah. cat.

cat rollin' it, not having ANY fun at all


art
we stopped for a moment so i could get my head together and get some red ON


cat, continuing to not have any fun, and continuing to not have a single word to say at all ;-)


a view


LMAO!!! for those of you who know me
so ... i saw this bottle and had to buy it


cat, thinking: 'this sux; this isn't fun at all; why are we here?'

jeny, thinking: why did i give cat the camera?
cat stole my camera -- she was sick of me taking pix of her not having any fun at all
so i thought i'd post the only two pix of me from the whole weekend

jeny thinking: my shirt doesn't match my shorts. i wonder if anyone will notice
;-)
jeny also thinking: my chiropractor is going to kill me


mmm...view of the desert that is so particularly moab
the light was weird this day, as the wind was blowing HARD, and the sand was filling the sky with white light



cat, gettin' her roll on, not having any fun at all
(can't you tell by the expression on her face?)



the ride back to the car, in the headwind
my camera is now full of sand


ed and jeny
ed met me for dinner on my way back to his place in evergreen... lovely evening

It is suggested that "jumping over a candlestick" was a way of foretelling the future. If the candle stayed lit, good luck should follow, where as if it went out, bad luck would follow.

the fire still burns ...
jj

4/19/08

just another day ...

in moab ...

the ponies in frisco, winter wonderland ... ready to get dirty in the desert

cat and i decided it was high time for a girls weekend in moab. so i picked her up in frisco friday afternoon, and we rolled west!

big, wide sky today --- drenched in sunshine

since cat had never ridden porcupine, we decided that saturday would best be spent doing a porcupine loop. so we saddled up the ponies and rode up sand flats road from town, took a right at the usual 'drop-off' point fork in the road and continued climbing up to lps. unfortunately, i had a bit of a mysterious mishap ... and somehow completely sent my back into spasms while on the bike. i literally rolled off the bike and onto the ground ... lying on the ground, trying to be able to sit up ... stand up ... ride the bike. i didn't know what to do! i thought for certain it was OVER! thanks to cat and her awesome help, i managed back onto the pony, completed the climb (gingerly), hit lps, and had a spectacular day, albeit somewhat compromised.




a pic i snapped at the top


a better shot

as we were standing there -- cat being blown away with the view, a group of boys on heavy looking DH bikes rolled by and stopped to look at the little pink truth ;-) they asked if we wanted them to take a pic... just as we had stopped still, a gust of wind literally almost blew us backwards off the cliff we were standing on.... truly a funny moment;-)



cat ridin' the edge

i finally did it!!! i was far enough ahead to stop at a spot of opportunity, throw the bike in the bushes, and hide... waiting for my rider to rip around! i caught the shot JUST in time -- ONE TAKE!!! i think it turned out alright! the light was really quite difficult today... very washed out, so you know there are better colors here... but i liked the shot anyway!


la sals, valley, desert

lunch spot! the usual pix ;-)


cat looking leisurely at lunch!



cat rolling and talking to me at the same time

she didn't have ANY fun at all today ;-)



wood, desert, la sals

cat changed a flat ... i took pictures and watched everyone we just passed roll back by us ;-)



cat, moments before i got a flat!

look at me take pix of riders ;-) after my flat ... and the stupidly long time it took me to fix it, we lost our mojo train and dilly-dallied the rest of the way down...

sky shot

i loved the sky all day today. it was tremendously blue, and what clouds there were had such amazing texture. all day today the sky looked SO tremendously wide ... so big ... so vast.
jj

4/6/08

happiness is...

favorite singletrack on a sunny day
a familiar corner launching me into one of my favorite sections of single track, anywhere

taking a picture of something you've passed by 569 times this lifetime alone
the rock, sitting there



being able to express love in whatever means available
ed, telling me he loves me in his own special way

seeing the GOOD people out there
john, post dirt research

mmmmmm

do you see what i see?
ohhhhh-yeah. yes it's legal.

watching a looming storm linger over some other area
being in the sunshine, watching the forecast from afar



successfully missed rider-shots

ed and i actually worked on rider-shots today. he was a great teacher. and i still messed up. the whole notion of stopping and going and taking pix has now taken on a whole new goal. i have a TON to learn about the camera. i do love the leap-frog aspect of how ed and i can manage tons of rider-shots tho.... a whole new flow for us. i can tell, i'm going to be REALLY good at it ... at some point ;-)


watching your best-best roll through the sunshine
darling ;-)


endless rolly bliss through sunshine and shadows
ed, doing a fly-by


climbing
ed gunnin' it!

more climbing
go-honey-go

post ride satisfaction
a job well done

we started the weekend with a sun and wind-filled day of skiing with really, really good people (and their children). i never knew families could be so happy. and i never knew that children could rip quite like this. made me think of everything my father had ever done for us growing up, which was a LOT: skiing every weekend since the age of 5, dirt bikes, road bikes, wagons, a forrest and cliffs all of our own, trampoline, gymnastics, soccer...... how the heck did he do it?

needless to say, the legs were wasted at the start gate today, and ed and i had a lovely, LOVELY recovery ride through heaven......... again ;-)

jj