Running Errands

The main branch library downtown.

I feel like I'm getting a cold today, I'm all stuffed up and my throat hurts, not a way to spend the first day of my 25th year. :) I do have a funny story to tell about my new cell phone. I wanted to put Saskatoon Police number on my speed dial, in case I get almost run over or encounter someone who is aggressive I can phone the police fast. So I set the number so that when I press #2 it will dial the police. All was well until I attempted to find out if the speed dial actually worked, I ended up calling the police and I couldn't get the phone to shut off as the officer on the other line was saying, "Hello." I finally just shut it and that hung it up, sometimes I'm such a technical klutz. Even though I'm getting a cold I went for a ride, but I only managed to go 12.2kms. I had to bring a video back to Roger's Video and then I headed downtown to the library to bring back some magazines I had. On the way home I went to the UPS Store to check my mail box, I rent a mail box there because in the past four years I've moved 4 times :) and when you get packages COD there they pay the shipping charges for you, it's a pretty good deal. Well must go, ride safe and have fun!

I'm older now..... :(

I took this photo yesterday, today I changed it to black and white in Photoshop, just a photo of the sidewalk on Spadina Cres.

I'm a little older today, 25 to be exact, I'm not bitter, but that is half way to 30, I'm going to have to start acting my age soon. :) Well now that I will probably be staying here I'm making more serious plans for the Paris Brest Paris in 2007. I mentioned the PBP in my profile and I guess that I should talk about it a bit for those who don't know what it is. The Paris Brest Paris is an ultra long distance endurance ride. It was first run in 1891 and is the oldest cycling event in the world that is still run. The ride starts in Paris, France, riders then cycle 600kms west to the small costal town of Brest, France, in Brest they turn around and ride 600kms back to Paris. Overall the ride is 1200kms and must be completed in under 90hours. The PBP is currently a randonneuring event, therefore to qualify for it riders must complete a series of brevets (randonneuring events) in the same year as the PBP. Brevets are generally held in the each province (for Canada) and consist of rides that range in distances from 100kms to 1200kms each. Obviously I will need to get into shape for this, that's okay though, my doctor told me that I have to lose weight anyway. :) I'm planning on some long rides this season and a lot of riding in generally, so hopefully it will help, I may do some brevets this year too. I didn't go riding today, just really felt lathargic today for some reason. I will be riding tomorrow though, so check in then for more. Ride safe and have fun.

Loving the winter weather!

People skating on an outdoor rink along Spadina Cres.

The front entrance.

The Delta Bessborough, from the street side.

An old doubledecker bus now converted into a concession stand. Obviously it is only open in the summer. :)

Vimy Memorial bandstand, you've seen it before in my photo's, but I thought this was a unique angle on it.

There is a couple of people making a really nice ice sculpture at the base of the Victoria Bridge, it is supposed to be part of Saskatoon's centennial celebrations. I'll take more photos when it is complete.

So I took a photo of the SMART car that I was talking about in a previous post, I think I like the black color the best. :) 70mpg is pretty nice too.

I wasn't lazy today and I did go riding, just not very far, I only managed ride 8.5kms, mostly because I left close to supper and wanted to get home in time to eat. I've decided that I should make a list of winter riding tips, I've come a long way since I started riding in the fall and I thought it would be nice to share some of my experiences I've had along the way.

TIP #1

Use studded tires.
On a diamond frame bike this isn't as big of deal, but recumbents have different balance points so I think that it is more important to have studded tires. While it is really easy to get some old tires and screw in metal screws all over, it is probably better to get actually studded tires because they will last several times longer and they offer more grip on ice.

TIP #2
Dress warm.
This one is pretty obvious, but it is often the biggest problem with winter riding, people don't dress warm enough because they think that they will warm up after riding. My rule is to dress warm enough that you can stand still for about five minutes and not get too cold. If you aren't dressed warm enough and you get a flat or something you will freeze.


TIP #3
Use lights
The majority of my winter riding time is after dark, this is also when the majority of cycling accidents occur. I'm sure everyone has witnessed the cyclist dressed all in black riding at night without lights, I hope they have a donor card! Personally I think that the more lights you have the better. I see a lot of cyclist ride at night with just a red blinking light at the back, this is better then no light, but not by much. A really bight front-facing white light should always on your bike after dark, that way cars that are facing you will not cut you off as they are turning or possibly run you over because you can't be seen. A rear-facing red light is good, it should be blinking fast so that it attracts attention, mine flashes really fast from side to side, much like lights on an emergency vehicle.

TIP #4
Keep the extremities warm.
Keep your hands and toes warm, they are almost always the first things to get cold. Good wool socks rated to -40C are what I use, I still get cold toes but only after a hour or so of riding in -25C (the -40C rating is standing still with no windchill.) Heated socks would also work good. I use gloves because I like to be able to operate my camera and adjust things on my bike, I have gloves made of a fleecy material and insulated with Thinsulate. Some people find that mitts protect your hands better then gloves, it's really a personal choice.

TIP #5
Don't ride to hard.
This one is a hard one to follow some days, we've all been in the position where we want to get a good hard ride in, when it's cold out, take it easy. First of all, you have to allow the muscles to warm up, so don't ride really hard for about 30mins, after they are warmed up I ride at about 80% of my normal pace in the summer. The cold is hard on your muscles and riding hard only increases the chances of an injury, so take it easy.

TIP #6
Have fun!
In order to keep motivated for winter riding you have to keep it fun. Ride a different route or your same route, but this time backwards. Relax and enjoy the scenery instead of racing around. Go around with a camera and take photos of winter scenery to enjoy in the middle of summer! :) Most of all ride safe and have fun!

Yah! New toys for me!!:)

Riding back from Leo's place on Friday night, for some reason it was very light out.

I didn't get to post this last night so here it is today. I got some new parts for my bike yesterday, I finally managed to find some tandem shifter cables so that I can re-cable it in the spring. Also I bought some replacement bearings for my RaceFace X-type crankset (see photo above) I believe I 've talked about these cranks before, the whole system is pretty bullet proof, but since it is something new I want to make sure I have spare parts for it. Next I got myself a really nice Giro helmet (also see photo above) to replace my other Giro that had cracked down the middle. Friday night Tina and I went to a potluck at my friend Leo's place for the Saskatoon Cycle Club. The potluck was small but very nice, I rode my bike there and Tina came in the car after she was finished work. Today was an off-day for me, we had friends from out of town come so I didn't go riding. Tina and I went to look at cell phones this morning for my birthday and she got me a Virgin Mobile phone, it's nice because you can buy cards so I don't have to pay every month. I just have to figure out how to use it. :) I will probably be riding again on Sunday night or maybe Monday (my B-day!), so check back in soon, ride safe and have fun.

Number 90!

Well this is post number 90, quite a milestone. It's hard to believe that I've written in this blog for 90 days now. I hope that all my regular readers enjoy coming back to see my photo's and read about my bike, riding and just anything in general. If this is your first time here bookmark it and check back again, the writing might be boring for some people, but at least the photo's keep it interesting to look at (I hope) :) I really can't say too much today, I'm taking a day off and being lazy tonight, after supper I just didn't feel like going for a ride today, I think that I ate too much maybe. I think that if all goes well I will get out tomorrow for a ride, on Friday's I get off early from work so I will actually get to go riding in the daytime. The days are starting to get longer now, the sun doesn't set to just before 6:00 now, it's getting to be spring soon I guess. Well with all the nice weather the snow is melting away pretty good, so by the time I get my ski boots back from being stretched there will probably be no snow! :) Anyway until tomorrow, ride safe and have fun!!

It's summer out! ...........Well not really, but almost

I wasn't really going to take any photos tonight, but I couldn't resist this photo of Nutana Collegiate, it looks really tall because I was really close up.

It was really nice out today, +4C and a nice warm breeze. I went for a ride at around 9:00 tonight and it had only cooled down to 3C. I did 10.5kms and it was one of my best rides this winter, there was a nice chinook wind blowing and even though I didn't dress very warm I was still sweating pretty good when I got home. The warm weather has melted most of the snow and ice off the roads so it is actually quite pleasent, I don't have to keep looking out for icy patches. Earlier in the evening Tina and I went around looking at carlots, I'm not looking for something but Tina might buy a Pontiac Grand Am in a few months. Saskatoon is opening a Smart Car dealership soon, they had a convertible model out in front so I went to look at it since it is the first time I've seen one up close. It is a pretty well built car for $24,000, heated leather seats, diesel, all wheel drive, small but nice, I really liked it. I kind of wonder why they haven't brought the four door model to Canada yet, I think it would be a better seller then the small two door model. I did like that fact that it had tons of space in the front to stretch out, but behind the seats there isn't much room. If you haven't seen one yet, head over to the site and check it out. Until tomorrow, ride safe and have fun!

Waiting for WARM weather.

The one photo I took on today's ride, I was trying to get a bit of a workout so I didn't take too many photos.

I couldn't resist another sunset photo, so here you go!

Well I went for a ride at 9:00pm tonight, it was quit nice out, -5C. I was really wishing for some warm weather to come so I could put my slick tires back on the Burley and get some speed out of it. I did do 11.5kms tonight and I managed to make it back around 10:00pm. I'm trying to lose some weight and get in a little better shape for this spring when I start riding in groups again. Anyway ride safe and have fun!

Everyday has a Sunset.......

I took these all in Diefenbaker Park, at around 5:35pm this afternoon as the sun was setting. It was really windy today so the guy flying the kite was having fun.

We got a lovely Chinook wind today and it got up to +3C, everything was melting, I was loving it! I decided not to wait and I went out riding right after work. I managed to get in 15.75kms, I started by heading up to Diefenbaker Park in hopes of getting there before the sun set so I could get some nice photo's for everyone. I actually thought that the photo's I took were going to be pretty bad because it wasn't the nicest sunset I've seen by far, but when I uploaded them to the computer the sunset actually looks pretty nice, I'm pretty happy with them. I managed to get home with out completely covering my bike and self with mud, at that time it wasn't too bad because it had started to cool off and the mushy spots had firmed up a bit. It's supposed to be nice tomorrow too, so check back for more then. Ride safe and have fun.

What a Ride!!

On the way home. Look how blue that sky is.

If you look at the LCD on my computer in this photo, you can see how great an LCD display works in cold weather. :)

I rode up to a park in Lawson Heights and took this from one of the park benches.

It is supposed to be nice tomorrow, today the sun is peeking throught and the clouds are starting to go away. It is also starting to get warmer, it was -13C on the beginning of my ride and by the end it had warmed up to -9C.

I had a great ride today, I actually went out while it was still light out :) Anyways I managed to get in a little over 20kms of riding. When I left at around 2:00PM it was around -13C out, on the way home at around 4:00PM my toes were starting to get frozen, but it was also warming up so when I stopped to take some photo's my feet started to feel warm again. If anyone has any thoughts on how I can keep my camera from getting condensation on it when I bring it inside, please leave some comments and let me know. I may have to go back to my other camera soon because the Pentax seems to like fogging up. I've thought about getting some sort of battery powered heater thing to put in the bag and keep it warm. I wanted to talk about putting a bike computer on your 'bent, it appears to be something that a lot of people are wondering about. Most 'bents have a long distance from the front or rear wheel to the handlebars, most cable computers don't have a long enough cable and wireless ones tend to not work to well over such a long distance. I heard about something that I decided to try and it works good, so I thought that I would share it. I use a Cateye Tomo computer on my Burley with a short wire on it, obviously there is no way that it would ever reach the handle bars from the front wheel that is a long way upfront. My solution was to go to the dollar store and get some speaker wire, it only cost a dollar and it useful for so many things. Next I took the wire on the computer and cut it in half, I cut a piece of speaker wire that would fit inbetween the front wheel and the handlebars. I stripped all the wires and spliced the speaker wire to the wires on my computer, then I wrapped it all up really good with electricians tape and mounted it one the bike. My computer has been like this since last fall and it is working fine still, I've never had a problem picking up the signal from the front wheel either. While some computer manufacterers offer long wire kits for their computers, I think that this is a cheaper alternative to ordering a long wire kit. It's supposed to be really nice tomorrow, so I hope that I will be able to get out, check back for more tomorrow. Ride safe and have fun!

It's 1:05AM, but I'm still doing this :)

My "Hot Paws" gloves, this is the second set I've bought, I burnt a hole in the first set with the exhaust on my car :( They were only $9.99 at Canadian Tire and the warmest gloves I've ever worn, these are my "good" pair now.

I took this photo by Market Mall, there are many apartments like this in that area, and I thought the colors were interesting.

This is a little sample of what it was like out riding tonight, not very nice.

Just a quick snapshot out of our apartment window.

I was just being stupid and took a photo of tonight's supper being made, Italian Extra Hot sausages...YUMMY!

A funny cartoon that I got off of www.bentrideronline.com

Well it is pretty late, but I promised I'd post something tonight. Today I went on a quest to find some new cross-country skiing boots, I went to my usual spot but was totally out of luck finding anything in my size. I then went to a place that sells new equipment and they had new boots that would fit the bindings on my skis, and they were really nice, but also $90 :( So I decided to take my boots to a shoe repair place to see if they could be stretched a little. Because I have skis for feet the lady had to send the shoes away and I won't get them back until Thursday, I guess it beats spending $90 on a new pair of shoes that I would hardly use. I don't really go skiing a lot, but it's nice to have a backup activity when the weather gets really nasty out. Tonight I decided to summon up some motivation and actually go on a bike ride, it was hard because it was around -18 Celsius out there. I did manage to get in 6.5kms riding around my area here, which has been grace with the presence of the rarely-seen City of Saskatoon snowplows. I rode all around by Market Mall and then back to my apartment, nice quiet streets. I tried to take more photo's but the auto-focus on the camera didn't like the cold weather too much, it was working, but it kept locking on to different things and it was really slow, I finally decided just to put it back in the bag and keep riding. Hopefully I will get out tomorrow as tonight's ride really lifted my spirits and I need that in the middle of winter. Check back in tomorrow, I promise to have something of interest to someone on here :) Until then, ride safe, and always have fun!

I'm still here!

Just a short note to say I'm still here. I've been sick with the flu for the last few days and as such I haven't updated the blog. I will hopefully be putting something on here tonight, so check back then :)

Ride safe and have fun..

Heading home from Nordegg, Alberta

Your's truly, driving the van.

Mom and Dad's Storage space in Rocky Mountain House.

Tina in the back of the van, you can see how big it was now that it is empty.

Mom and Dad's new place in Nordegg.

Sunday we left around 3:00 from Rocky Mountain House after unloading the rest of truck at Mom and Dad's storage unit there. We headed out towards Red Deer, I decided to go through Sylvan Lake and Red Deer again so that we could see them in the daytime. Sylvan Lake was very nice, but I imagine that it would be crazy in the summer time because there was even a lot of people there now with the lake frozen over. We got into Red Deer and of course I had to make a wrong turn :( so we were lost again. I kept going on this road until it came to a new subdivision instead of the highway, so I stopped the van at a convenience store and asked for directions. Finally we got back on the highway out of Red Deer but we had wasted about an hour and it was already getting dark. Next stop was Hanna, Alberta to fuel up and get supper at the truck stop, after that we headed towards Kindersley, SK. We stopped in Kindersley for a few minutes to surprise our friends Kristin and Chris, then we continued to Saskatoon. By the time I had the truck fueled back up and ready to go back to Budget it was 1:00am, we were very tired to say the least. As for the rest of the week so far, Monday I really did nothing as I was feeling sick. Today I was feeling very lazy too, but I went to Canadian Tire and got some new wax for my cross-country skis. Then I went skiing for a bit tonight in Kinsman Park downtown. They have probably 2 kms of nice groomed track in the park and it weaves around all over the place, it was very pleasant except for the fact that my ski boots are too small and really squeezed my toes. I will have to go to the sports exchange place and see if I can score myself a set of bigger boots, maybe some waxless skis too, as I hate waxing my skis all the time, even if it works better. If I go skiing tomorrow I will bring my camera along and take some photo's in the park. Until then, ride safe and have fun...

Heading out to Nordegg, Alberta

Nordegg Lodge, Dad will be the maintenance guy here.

The Budget van, it was a big one, Mom reserved a 5 ton, it took me a while to get used to driving such a big vehicle, but I eventually got the hand of it.

The Budget van fully loaded up and ready to go, we had a power tailgate which was nice for loading the heavy things.

Well, I went to Budget on Friday afternoon and picked up Mom and Dad's rental van. Tina and I then drove it to my parent's place. We loaded it up on Friday night, it turns out that Mom had rented a really BIG van so we only filled it halfway to the roof, which was still a lot of stuff to bring :) Dad had a lathe and assorted tools to go with it that he sold the day before they left, that's why Mom rented the big truck, she thought we would need it for the lathe to fit in. Since it was very late when we went to bed, we didn't get started until around 10am on Saturday. The drive to Nordegg was pretty uneventful except for some fog from Loreburn to Hanna, Alberta, we had to backtrack from Hanna (home of rock band Nickleback) to a truck stop to meet my parents and fill the van up, apparently I thought the truck stop was right in Hanna (it wasn't) so there was some confusion there. Then Tina and I took a wrong turn in Red Deer and ended up on a two lane road heading to Edmonton (whoops!), so we turned the van around and took another wrong turn (whoops again!) we ended up taking the scenic route to Nordegg which took us through Sylvan Lake (which was very nice) and we arrived in Nordegg around 10:30, we unloaded and got to bed around 2:00pm I think, long day. Check in tomorrow and I'll go over the return trip to Saskatoon in the van (nicknamed "Budgie"). Ride safe and have fun..

I'm lazy tonight

Well, no pictures tonight, and no ride either. After supper Tina and I decided to watch a movie, by the time the movie was over it was really too late to go for a ride because I have to get up at 5:30 tomorrow for work. I'm going to pick the moving van up after work tomorrow and then when Tina is done work we will take the van to Mom and Dad's place. I have a couple of things for people to look at tonight. If anyone would like a free online issue of Recumbent Cyclist News, click HERE. Also something that really interested me, ICE trikes from UK has just released information on their 2006 model recumbent trikes. They are really interesting because all the new models are designed to foldup like the Greenspeed GT3, GT5 and X5. Also the ICE trikes have rear suspension, which would definitely be a bonus on a trike. The folding aspect definitely appealed to me, because anyone that has read my blog since the beginning knows that I really like the Greenspeed GT3, mostly because it can be folded. The main reason I never got a trike in the first place was the lack of room. However the Greenspeed is very pricey, the ICE trikes are pretty pricey too, but not as bad as Greenspeed. Anyone who is interested, check them out HERE. I will be unable to post until Sunday night, so check back then for a look at our weekend :) Until then, ride safe and have fun!

80th POST!!!!!!

Victoria Bridge

A train heading to the Potash mine.

"Combine World" in Elstow, trust me they have a lot of combines! :)

Allan Potash Mine, I had an interview here today for a job in April.

I managed to get in 10.8kms tonight, it's gotten colder tonight especially with the north wind, it is supposed to get colder towards the end of the week. Well I went for a job interview today at the Potash mine in Allan, which is a half hour east of Saskatoon. I think the interview went really well so hopefully something will come of it. On another front, I did here some good news from my prospective job in Alberta, so we'll have to see what wins out. Nice position to be in I guess :) We got a little snow yesterday and it made the roads a little slippery tonight, I did slid around but I didn't go down. I will have to be careful out there I guess. Tina and I will be helping Mom and Dad move out to Alberta on the weekend, we will be driving the moving van, and my camera will be right along for the ride. Our first big road trip since I started this blog, so make sure to prepare for the onslaught of photo's on Sunday and Monday night :) Ride safe and have fun until tomorrow.

Some Photos

Another church on Spadina Cres. :)

A church on Spadina Cres.

The Spadina Freehouse on (you guess it!) Spadina Cres.

Skaters on the ice rink by the Delta Bessborough.



Well I was lazy today, so I decided to take the car and head to the library, I brought my camera and tripod along so that I could take some photos downtown. At our downtown main library they have about 30 books on cycling and bikes, I've read them all at least once. :) They do have at least 300 some books on photography, so I've started to dig into them now. I went downtown and tried to take some photos, however it started to snow right away, so I had to cut it short so that my camera wouldn't get wet. Some of the above photos are a bit grainy and blurry, I took most of them by handholding the camera on 1600ISO setting, mostly because I was trying to keep the camera out of the snow. I should be riding tomorrow if I can get the motivation up. :) So check back tomorrow, ride safe and have fun until then.............

Finally got my camera!

Now that I have a flash I don't have to always rely on natural light for night time photos.

The construction crane is still working hard, the condo complex is climbing like crazy.

The Meewasin Trail along the river bank downtown.

My old 2MB HP camera which up till recently I've used to take the photo's for my blog.

My new camera, Pentax *ist DL, I took this with my old camera.

It was beautiful tonight, very warm and little wind, so I had to go for a ride. I managed to get in 19.5 kms, I went riding downtown and then headed north to Lawson Heights area. I may have mentioned before that the camera I was using was a loaner until I got a replacement because the flash failed to work on the first camera I bought. I finally got the replacement today, it also seems to take better photo's then the other camera, this could be a result of the other camera having the software problems. I have had another change in career plans, I won't even bother to mention it here because it seems that every time I tell someone about my career plans they seem to change, so we'll leave it at that. I can't believe that it is January 9th and I'm still riding regularly, I'm in very good shape for this time of year and I can go into spring with the speed and physical shape that I usually have in the fall, hopefully I will get in a lot of training done in the spring and summer this year. Well, check back soon, ride safe and have fun.................

Sorry to disappoint :)

Well I didn't go riding today even though it was quite nice today. We went to my parents place instead for the afternoon, I didn't manage to take any photo's today either. :) Well hopefully I will be able to take some photo's and go for a ride tomorrow. Check back then, ride safe and have fun.

Just riding around...............

Canadian Light Source synchrotron

Saskatchewan Research Council Building

Hydophonics labs at the University

Just another photo of my cockpit :) I just realized that when I installed the faceplate on the stem I put it on so that the Burley is upside down, I'm too lazy to change it though.

Well I managed to get in almost 15kms of cycling today. I went out around 4:00pm and it was quite nice. I stopped at my local bike shop because they were supposed to have ordered some tandem rear shifter cables for me, but because they just placed an order they told me that I would have to wait until they placed an order again :( I don't really need them right now, but it kind of surprised me because I wouldn't have been very happy if I did need the cables right away. I'd really like to start my own shop one day, the work I went through to get my 'bent just proves that Saskatoon needs a recumbent shop, and the hell that my friend went through to get a folding bike proves that we need a shop that offers some service and isn't all hung up with trying to be hip and cool. Most bike shops aren't big money makers however, so maybe this is something I can do when I retire :) I'm talking about staying in Saskatoon now because I got a call from the potash mine in Allan on Friday and they want me to come in for an interview on Wednesday. Since I'm having a hard time figuring out what to do with the company in Red Deer, I will take the job at the mine for sure if it is offered to me. I'd actually prefer Red Deer, because I think that Alberta offers more of a future for young people just starting out, and work is easier to find, but staying in Saskatoon means that Tina could keep her new job and I would probably be able to buy a really nice house in Allan, SK. for much cheaper then Saskatoon. Also potash is a growing industry with China starting to buy a lot of potash for fertilizer. I'm kind of leaving the whole situation up in the air and just going with the flow. Most of my photos are from the University today because I spent most of my ride cruising around the university grounds. Anyway, I got to have a shower now, so check in tomorrow for more, and ride safe, and always have fun!