Relaxed

Eric gave me a day at the spa for my birthday. I scheduled it for Monday and ejoyed a very relaxing and pampered day. It was so nice that I've been relaxed all week and been able to handle some stressful situations without freaking out. Like on Wed. when Eric's alarm didn't go off and he missed his 4:00 am airport shuttle. We got him pulled together and made it to the shuttle stop in Albany on time so I treated myself to a Dutch Bros mexican hot chocolate on the way home. I also felt relaxed enough this week to deal with situations with our car mechanic and the bank that I have been putting off for weeks. All in all it has been a very productive week and I would reccommend a spa day, or at the very least a nice pedicure, for all.

Roboman

Eric visited the doctor on Thursday and now has a new and improved brace. It still goes above his elbow and makes him look a little bit like a robot but it is much lighter and easier to get clothes over. This one will be on until June 14 when we he gets the pins in his wrist removed. I got to see his naked arm with the stitches. They shaved a lot of arm hair and I'm guessing it will be pretty annoying when it starts growing back in. Some good news is that he can ride his bike indoors on the trainer now. Bad news is that he is probably not going to be able to do any racing or sponsored rides this summer.

I had dinner with the new Chief of the Forest Service, Gail Kimbell, last Friday. She was in town to accept a distinguished alumni award from the college and my department was sponsoring her visit. As we have no female faculty, my department head invited me and another female PhD student to go along with four male professors, Gail and her husband to Iovino’s. I had some delicious butternut squash ravioli and really enjoyed talking with Gail. She has a great sense of humor and joked about being the first to store hair barrettes in Gifford Pinchot’s desk. I was disappointed that she didn’t have a security detail with her. I was imagining walking around down-town Corvallis with her and being surrounded by men in dark sun-glasses and ear-pieces. When I am Chief I will take security everywhere with me, they just look cool.

Biker Dude


My brother Tim and his friend rode their motorcycles up from Salt Lake City and stopped by for a visit. They are heading out to the coast today and are planning on riding Highway 101 down to San Fransisco. Luckily we had some great weather and they shouldn't get rained on. He looks a little scary with the big beard but I think he looks like a younger version of my dad (complete with red beard!). Thanks for stopping by bro!

Eric the new lefty
It has been a crazy few weeks for us and to add to the excitement Eric had surgery on his wrist last week. He tore ligaments in January playing basketball and has been living with pain for a while. The surgery involved pinning one ligament back in place and using other wrist tissue to fix another ligament. He goes back to the doctor on Thursday and will hopefully get a smaller brace. Then in 6 weeks he will be back in surgery to remove the pins. No more bicycle for a while. And no more basketball ever! OK, maybe "horse" is still allowed. He is back teaching class this week and today is actually out on an all day field lab. Hopefully he can keep his arm elevated and his meds don't make him too loopy!

My heart is hurting this week for two friends and a family member who are going through sad and difficult experiences. CH, KG, and HB - I love you and wish I could be with each of you to give you hugs and love. This is truly a sad week.

Ode to my Pac-Man lunchbox

Actually I am not very creative and grammar was never my forte (read: engineer) so I won't subject you to any poetry. But isn't my lunchbox great? My advisor poked fun at it today but I think it is pretty cool.

Eric really likes it when I have a loose utensil rattling around in it and he can hear me coming 2 blocks away.

More water

It is raining today so I might as well write a little more about water... A friend sent an email out this morning with a news release on bottled water. You can read it here if you are interested. A point that stood out to me was that bottled water is regulated by the FDA - a federal agency - so bottled water collected and sold in the same state does not have to meet the FDA requirements.

A little poking around at our local EPA and water treatment plant made me realize that our home faucet filter, which uses a carbon filter, does little. It does remove the clorine smell and taste but our water treatment plant uses an active carbon filter towards the end of the treatment process and this does all and more than the dinky faucet filter in terms of contaminants. Our city sends out a water newsletter every once in a while and I looked over the last one but there was no mention of pharmaceuticals. I'm going to try the EPA water quality hotline tomorrow: 1-800-426-4791.

I've been a reluctant blogger; I know I've got nothing on E and can't hope to match her wittiness. As you've seen in her posts below, this last month has been a bit nuts for us. First, I spent a few days in DC, came home for the weekend before flying out for a few days in South Carolina (which included a crazy descent into a small airport where we had to pull out at the last minute before circling around for another shot because the wind was bouncing us around something fierce). Then E spent a week in Seattle, then in Texas (she got me a personalized law badge from the Alamo), then on Oregon's north coast. Now its Spring Break in town (meaning campus is dead--its great!). Classes start up on Monday, I'm teaching on Monday and Wednesday and have an all-day field lab on Tuesdays.

Now for the real reason I'm posting. A while back (read 2-3 years ago) I was driving in town when I came across a road bike in a pile of free stuff on the side of the road. It was dark, so I carried the bike into the headlights and saw it was an old Raleigh--the frame seemed to be in decent shape, it was missing a crank but otherwise was pretty well complete. I threw it in the back of the truck and brought it home for a project bike as black and white images of the Tour de France danced in my head. I figured I'd buy an old wool jersey and be cruising around town in style in no time. Well, a few years passed and the bike just sat buried in our garage. This winter I finally pulled it out and started the restoration process. I decided to build it up as a fixed gear (single speed no freewheel, kind of like your old BMX just without the mag wheels).

I figured this would be a fairly easy process--sand it down, throw on some paint, get some new cranks, convert the old wheels, put on a saddle, and voila. It turned out to be quite more involved than I anticipated. I learned that older bikes weren't build with any standardization across the industry, meaning seat posts, wheels, cranks, etc were all sized according to the manufacturer. Even after some standardization came into the industry Raleigh held out...doing their own thing and making all their own parts (which are largely unavailable today). Well, I won't bore you (more than I already have) but I managed to get the necessary parts from a local shop and other cyclists here in Oregon and just last Saturday took my restored bike on its first ride (a mile or so). So, was it worth the wait? I think so. Now I have a new mistress (as E refers to my bikes) to steal my time. Now I just need an old leather helmet and wool jersey, stay tuned for more fixed gear adventures.