Michael took me to see "Race Across the Sky" last night. I'll be honest, I wasn't really excited about it, but he wanted to see it so I went. I was so glad that I did...it was fantastic!

This is a movie about the Leadville Trail 100 mountain biking race. A quote about the race from www.leadvilletrail100.com "The 50-mile out and back course is in the midst of the Colorado Rockies. Low point, 9,200 feet; high point is Columbine Mine, 12,424 feet. Majority is on forest trails with some mountain roads"

You have 12 hours to complete the ride. The movie had some excellent shots of the course and it looked, in a word, painful! The thing that I found really, really cool about the movie was that it didn't focus solely on the favorites or the winners, but the people who just set the race as their goal and went for it. Some of them made it, some of them didn't, but every story was incredibly inspiring. I cried several times. If you have the chance to check it out (it is playing again in select theaters on November 9th) I highly recommend it...it'll absolutely inspire you, give you a chuckle, bring tears to your eyes,and make you think about your own goals.

Hello again! It's been a while since I've written and I've been reminded, yet again that some people actually check this blog to see whats going on in my life. Crazy, right? So here is what my life is like...

I have a fantastic boyfriend that I could not love more, we get together most nights after work...

Awesome friends that do fun stuff like birthday parties where they take our picture (love you Abby!)

And a loving, fun, fantastic family, that I love hanging out with. This is some of us at Gardner Village...

(This is (from left to right) my sister-in-law Anikka, me, a witch, Jayda with her mom (my sister) Ashley, and my Mom)

The rest of the family got together on All Hallows Eve (ok it was the 30th but it was Halloween to us) for a killer party with homemade root beer, soup, and brains.

In a word...right now my life is wonderful, and I'm happy

Jason and I decided to head down to the dunes as it has been a long time. Before going I decided to change my oil, as I hadn't ridden since May '09, and my fuel filter as it was the original one. This was a good thing, as I discovered that my battery was dead. I threw it on the charger while I worked on my bike, Friday after I got off work.

The fuel filter was a first time for me, but wasn't too bad. It's in a swirl tank under the main gas tank itself. So I pulled the gas tank completely, and was able to change it. Wow the old one was dirty. It really needed to be changed, so it was a good thing I picked it up. The oil kicked my butt a bit. Draining the reservoir was simple, but draining the oil from the motor itself was a frustrating endeavor. I ended up completely pulling my skid plate off, and then finished draining it.

Putting it back together was just as frustrating. I dropped two nuts, never to be seen again, but still got the skid plate secure. As soon as Jason arrived, I grabbed my battery and slapped it in the LT-R. It fired right up! Woo hoo! We loaded it on the trailer and then backed it up next to the van. I wanted to grab some snacks, so we took my car down to Smiths really quick. Snacks acquired, we went back to my house to get to bed. I parked behind my mom to box in the wheelers. Since I was leaving my car outside I wanted to get the major stuff out. I pulled my empeg out, set it on top of my car, then got into the back seat. Grabbed my leather jacket, a game, and some shoes I had back there. Grabbed the snacks we just picked up, and headed inside with all that. Do you see what I missed? More later...

We went straight to bed, and got up at O dark-thirty (5:30). Got dressed, filled camelbaks, and jumped in Jason's 4-runner headed for the dunes. We to Oasis just after 8, and unloaded. While the bikes warmed up we got ready to ride. Then we were off. I was taking the whoops easy as I didn't want to risk my back again. We got out to the dunes and started cruising around.

We paused and chatted about being back out on the sand, and decided where to go next. I told Jason to lead and I would follow. He took off and I hit the starter. It tried, but there wasn't the juice. Fortunately I was pointing downhill, so I tried to pop it. It tried to start, but just wouldn't stay running. After a couple minutes Jason came back to find me. I told him the bad news. Fortunately we weren't too far out, so Jason rode back to the car to grab a strap. I meanwhile climbed a tall dune so he could see me. As soon as he got back we strapped up, and I thought what the heck, and tried to start it.... it fired right up. We never even got to pulling it. Fortunately that was the only time that happened. While I continued to park facing down hill, it fired right up every time after that.

We went to the site of the four jumps in a row, or "The Sisters" as Jason likes to call them, but none of them felt good. We both hadn't ridden like that in over a year, and were wusses. After about two hours, the rain started coming down, so we cruised back to the car to chill and get something to eat.

About 20 minutes after we got back to the car, the rain let up, and we headed back out. This time we headed down towards Sand Mountain. On the way we found a really nice smooth jump. We were only going about 20 feet, but it all felt really smooth. It was good to get the feeling back. We continued to the mountain, where we only climbed the valley. After hitting that we cruised around to the back side. The bowls were big, and there were lots of smooth transitions between them. We cruised and cruised and cruised. It was a blast.

We went around the west side of Sand Mountain, and headed back towards Oasis over the dunes. We went around the west side of the hill at Jericho, and kept playing in the dunes there. We had about 30 minutes of time left before we needed to head back when my gas light came on. That is the first time I have ever let my tank get that empty. We just cruised back, and loaded up to head home. To be cautious I put my back brace on for the ride home. It was uncomfortable, but worth it if it helped. And although my legs are dead sore, I had no back problems after riding.

When we got back to my place to unload I immediately saw what I did. I left my car parked outside, blocking my mom in. And sitting on top of my car was my empeg. In the rain. All night and day. I took it inside to let it dry out. Last night I took it apart and cleaned it with some contact cleaner I have. I slowly reassembled it, and powered it up. Hooray! It still works!

It was great to get back out to the dunes. I'm hopeful I can get out again and again. Jason has pictures and videos... And they are posted here!

Last night Katie and I went to try out a new restaurant. The Bayou. I've been wanting some Cajun for a while, and it seemed like the place. We amazingly found a parking spot, and went in. I ordered us popcorn crawfish to start, so she could see how they tasted. It wasn't nearly like going to a crawfish boil, but it got the idea across.

For dinner itself I ordered blackened catfish, and Katie had the jambalaya. With my entree I got a bowl of gumbo. That's where it started. Part of making the roux in gumbo is burning flour. But it has to be done right, or it tastes like you... burned flour. The whole bowl tasted burned. My gumbo is 1,000 times better than theirs. Katie's "salad" came out with the wrong dressing.

Next our entree's came. I started into mine... tastes odd, but ok. Katie tried a bite and immediately winced. To her it tasted like aquarium chemicals. After she mentioned that I couldn't take a bite of the fish without tasting the same. I didn't finish. The pasta and beans on my plate were decent though. Katie's jambalaya tasted pretty close to authentic. I wouldn't complain about it.

Their motto is "Welcome to Beervana". I guess they have to promote the alcohol because the food is so bad.

Verdict: Don't ever go there!

I haven't been biking lately near as much as I did over the summer. Last night I decided was a good night to get back out there. When I got home I changed and got on my road bike. I started heading west, down the hill. I did a couple runs up and down Sego Lilly, then back home. It was just over 10 miles, and felt really good to be out riding. I still much prefer riding with people, as it helps motivate me, and am not looking forward to the end of the season, and moving inside.

Last night I decided to finalize one of the panorama's that I took down in Moab. I've put it on Photosynth so you can experience how truly cool the view was. This is in Devil's Garden, on the way to Dark Angel. Notice the rock fin that I was standing on. That is part of the trail. Drops on both sides. A crazy trail.

... Welcome to the new site! Well, really it should be exactly the same as the old site, but it's on a new host. I'm growing tired of hosting it myself, so I found a hosting company and signed up. Hopefully this should make the site much faster, especially in the Photo Gallery & DVD sections. One nice thing is with the speed I should be able to host videos I do... of course with YouTube now, who needs to. (Unless you want to download them...)

So if you see any problems with the site, let me know. It may work at one location and not another for a while as the DNS updates need to propagate around the web.

Saturday September 18th...one for the memory book!

I woke up around 9 and went to a couple of garage sales, stores, and vegetable stands with my mom. Came home and made a ton of fresh salsa, because I told Michael I'd make him some of his very own, and then my mom wanted some too. Then I got all prettied up and went over to Michael's house. From there we went up Little Cottonwood Canyon and he taught me how to use his awesome Canon T2i DSLR camera. We got some really good pictures, and a lot of really bad ones. Then we went over to Eric and Natalie's house where they fed us delicious chili and gluten-free biscuits (Natalie has to do the gluten free thing), and taught us an awesome card game. Well, first we played Life with their 9 year old daughter, then we learned the card game. I like his friends (all of them) a lot...it's like hanging out with family because they've all been friends since high school.

I know it doesn't sound that awesome or out of the ordinary, but it was the most fun I've had in a while. What can I say, simple things are sometimes the best.

UPDATE: Here's a picture.