Staying up to meet the New Year

Too cold for the fluorescent lighting in the bike shop to fully ignite. That smile may be Cheeto induced.

After a prolonged mild Fall, Winter arrived in full force yesterday with snow and plunging temperatures. As of now, 11:10pm Standard Mountain Time, our girl is still going strong. This was the first year that we thought she might be able to stay up until midnight. We asked her if she wanted to give it a try, and of course she was game. To celebrate this momentous occasion, we as parents are allowing her to experience indulgence characteristic of New Year's Eve partying. We're enjoying some snacks and bubbly drinks of carbonated French lemonade and orange juice mimosas, simulated for the grade school crowd and spirit fortified for the Mommy and Daddy crew.

A lot of great bike events and advances occurred this year, and we had fun on two wheels in our family and with friends as frequently as possible. As in the past, some bikes entered our household and some left. The Big Dummy continued to be well ridden and transported us on many trips, both for utility and for fun. The year 2010 will always be remembered as the year our girl learned to ride a bike. There's no telling what she will be up to in 2011, but no doubt it'll be great. On behalf of all of us here, we look forward to seeing you on the trail or the street soon.

This is cold for us: flirting with 0F, or about -17C.

December 24th

Yes, those mittens are as fuzzy and warm as they look.

Four years ago Denver was in the midst of a string of blizzards that brought deep snow that stayed on the ground for several months before melting, which is a quite an uncommon phenomenon around here. Today was quite different, with temperatures around 52F and not a speck of snow anywhere. We all had the day off, so we enjoyed a ride through our neighborhood and around the park.

We're a happy family.

Checking out the ducks and geese on the lake.

Whenever we ride through the park, it's tradition for us to fit in a couple of rounds on our little stretch of single track. As traditionalists, we did not waver from our duty to lay down some tracks on the dirt. She parked her bike for a bit and hopped on the Big Dummy to do the circuit.

Zooming down our favorite hill.

After our ride, we had a few preparations to tackle before going over to Oma's house for the evening. There would be cousins to play with and a birthday for Uncle Chris. Our girl never shies away from an opportunity to dress up, and Julie had assembled a perfect holiday outfit including a green velvet dress with red and white snowflake stockings.

All gussied up in her holiday dress and topped off with Daddy's Soviet naval officer shopka, in front of the illuminated B-cycle.

A bit later, just before bedtime she and I prepared a snack for Santa. She thought that he would have mostly had enough of cookies by the time he reached our house, so we opted to serve Santa some genoa salami, cheese, crackers and a small cookie. She carefully counted out eight carrots for the reindeer. For a change, it didn't take much coaxing to get her to go to bed tonight, and she was asleep quickly. I'm hoping that we get to sleep in until at least sunrise tomorrow.

The snack, which was accompanied by a question for the ages...

Dear Santa I want to know if there is a real Rudolph?

Celestial sightings on the winter solstice

I don't make it a habit of witnessing too many sunrises, but yesterday, the shortest day of the year, I tried to maximize my sun time. Well, that and I had an early morning meeting. The ride leaving home was brisk, hovering around 20F, with a small headwind. My eyes teared up a bit and my cheeks felt numb by the time I got to the train station. On this first day of winter there was a thin coating of frost on everything, and the colors of the landscape were muted and as slow to awaken as I was.

My bike for this part of the day was one that is ordinarily my stay-at-work office bike, but it ended up at home for some regular maintenance. It's a single-speed utility bike, hybridized from the frame of a vintage mountain bike of the lugged steel era and the components of a modern cruiser, coaxed into cooperation through the aid of a Surly Singleator.

Reconfigured 1988 Panasonic MC 4500, in nice and big 22" size.

The Panasonic in its current configuration is a swift and comfortable utility bike. I especially like the smooth and slightly bouncy ride of the Ritchey Moby-Bite 2.1 slicks. Surprisingly, these tires do fairly well on snow and patches of ice, although there isn't any of that around right now. I rode the Panasonic quite a few miles while going from meeting to meeting, eventually returning home.

Early in the morning on Dec. 21st I had seen the rusty glow of the lunar eclipse, but a subsequent appearance of the moon about 15 hours later was spectacular in its own right. In the evening on the way to the BikeDenver Winter Solstice Ride I observed the moonrise over the Denver Zoo. The photo below poorly portrays what I saw. In actuality, the subtlety of streaks of creamy gold clouds washing over the moon reminded me of the hues of the sublime Stranahan's Whiskey Brickle ice cream, my new and possibly permanent favorite flavor of all time.

This was the best the zoom on my camera could do.

During the day I had returned home to swap bikes for the solstice ride. I chose to bring my Titan 1/2 Trac out of hibernation, it being arguably my most festive bike. At the Zoo, approximately 100 or so bikes and riders readied themselves. The weather was much more cooperative than for past solstice rides, holding somewhere around freezing with no precipitation. For comparison, the temperature for the ride in 2008 was 2F, and the ride was mercifully truncated to the shortest route to the pub. This year, the route highlighted several scenic and decorated landmarks while showcasing some recently installed bicycle infrastructure along the way, such as the buffered bike lane on Champa.

Solstice riders taking a look-see at Union Station.

The ride rolled through 6 or 7 miles from the Zoo to LoDo to Civic Center Park and the State Capital before depositing us at The Irish Snug for hot food and drink. The Titan was as nimble and speedy as ever, and as usual, was lavished with attention for its fenders. The ride was just the right length and mostly avoided the construction-induced traffic jams along 14th Street. In all, it was a great time riding and enjoying libations with friends, and a pleasant way to usher in the seasonal marker for incrementally increasing daylight.

The flash shows the reflective effect of the license plate fenders on the Titan 1/2 Trac.

For comparison, this is the same shot without a flash. The illuminated City and County Building is visible in the background.

Decoratively toothsome

A new reason to love everyone's favorite oviod chainring.

I'm not much of a festive person, but I do enjoy constructing and repurposing. Sometimes there is an opportunity for these things to coincide. That's how the toothy tree topper pictured above came to be. In past years, I've installed a single 28-tooth chainring at the pinnacle with some zip ties. This year I decided to step up the quality of implementation a little, using a full set of circa 1986 Shimano Biopace chainrings from my parts bin, in 28, 38 and 48 tooth sizes. I cleaned the rings up and wired them together with the smallest ring positioned to encircle the top of the tree to support the other two. The results turned out pretty well, in my opinion.

My contribution is to put the tree in the stand and the decoration on top; everything else is due to the efforts of the talented ladies of the house.

In the mean time, the girls did a little fabrication of their own, in the form of sugar cookies. The creation of consumables meant to be decorated or decorations meant to be consumed is a festive tradition that I can truly get behind.

Another cookie is born.

Our colored sugar sprinkler takes her responsibility very seriously.

Ekeing out a little more sol

The sun sinking low over the lake

I feel like a broken record to even mention it, but we just keep getting beautiful days, now all the way into mid December. I'm sure that the other shoe will drop sooner or later in the form of a big snowstorm, but I am am determined to appreciate as much of this great weather as possible.

Command center of the Big Dummy orbital module

We took an extended ride home, turning about a mile-long trip into five. During the ride, we seized to opportunity to ride through some of our favorite areas of town, including past a municipal flower garden that has been dug in for the winter and past Ketring Lake.

Over the top and down the hill

Our route was bordered by hundreds of foraging geese and splashing ducks, along with a coot or two. We covered a fair amount of ground as the shadows grew longer. Of course we carved out enough time to ride our tiny local piece of singletrack, which includes a short downhill section that never fails to elicit happiness from the back seat.

A grinning co-pilot