Alaskan Pack Fodder

I have a habit of assigning nicknames to places, children, and pets, which may or may not reflect some aspect of their character or outward appearance. I probably do this because I am horrible with names, despite being a stable genius.    One day years ago I blanked on the name of a shopping center, and instead referred to it as the "crack whore mall." There was immediate understanding in the room, and many still use the name.     I named my daughter Stinkfish when she was a baby, swimming in a local pool. Over 12 years later, she's still Stinkfish. People like that one.    My son is Possum, but it never really stuck. Can't win them all.    My first dogs were Old Dan and Little Ann, named after the dogs in "Where the Red Fern Grows." If you haven't read it, or re-read it within the last year, you're a horrible, horrible person. Anyway, Ann sounded too much like Dan, so she became Baby Girl. Not incredibly creative, but the name followed her around...

My father-in-law passed away after a brief-but-intense fight with pancreatic cancer. He had about enough time to get his affairs in order before the disease took him. Just like that, he's gone.    The house he leaves my Thai Buddhist monk mother-in-law is old and has its issues, issues that have been around for decades without being resolved and slowly getting worse. The bones are there, but some things weren't done right at the start and have festered. My  father-in-law was more the "hire somebody to do it when I get around to it type".  This is where I come in, I guess.    In the last couple days of his life and in a confused state, my  father-in-law ripped away some packing tape that had been patching a hole in the shower surround. This had been this way for as long as my wife or her sister could remember. I held my tongue, went to Lowes, purchased what I needed, and replaced the broken panel. I tried really, really hard to ignore all the rest of th...

It's been raining frequently here in Fairbanks.    Each day I'd pick a different time to ride, and each day it would rain at that time. It's not like I said it out loud or anything. Given that I'm living out of an RV with my family and a limited water supply, even a warm, wet ride creates its own unique issues when you arrive home. Where can you hang all of the wet kit? How many seconds can you shower to keep the road grit out of the bedsheets?    I can deal with the wet during a ride, because it cools me off and hide my fat's tears. Nobody looks especially great when they're sucking down the water and road debris off the tire in front of them, so my suffering blends in until I'm dropped. One minute I look like everyone else, and the next I'm the fatty off the back.    I missed the Saturday group ride because of child-supervision duties. I understand they got soaked pretty well. I took the the kids to Chena Lakes and went canoeing. We got soaked too. My ...

In Fairbanks for the an undefined time, I decided to take advantage of the excellent riding they have around here. For the most part, the pavement is falling apart. Frost heaves, melting permafrost, and all sorts of damage pretty much destroys even the freshest asphalt within a couple years. However, as bad as the roads can be, they lead to some pretty great places with some awesome views. Unlike the Anchorage loops I've worn ruts into over the years, these are all new. I can get lost and see new stuff, which is invigorating.    I linked up with Chris Knott for a couple hours last Tuesday, and he took me on a loop (or five- I lost count) of some of the local climbs. The extra weight did me no favors, and my strict regime of non-riding didn't help either. Chris rode along at a recovery pace while I gasped and wheezed up each climb, whining about when the suffering was going to end.    My fat cried.    This, of course, was exactly what I needed. I need to rid...

On the ride from South Rolly Lake to Big Lake, before my day went to shit with gravel and pinch flats, my mind wandered.    Say, if I was bitten by a vampire and turned, would I stay fat? I mean, I get I'd be all super-strong on the bike, but I'd want the power-to-weight ratio as well. I don't want to be fat for eternity, especially if I'd be limited to twilight crits and velodromes for racing. If I'm super-vampire skinny, nobody would think twice, but when a fat guy starts dominating, the USADA comes calling for random samples.    As long as I don't turn into a complete douche like those Twilight kids, I'd be good. Just give me a solid Selene from Underworld physique, and I bet I could win a few sock primes.       That's the kind of stuff I think about when I'm on a longer ride. I don't try to fix the world's problems, I just work out the logistics of vampire doping.    Marginal gains and the like.

I skipped the last week of posts because I haven't been riding enough to think of new things to say, and when I do venture out it's usually not all I hoped for. So, instead of feeling guilty about it, I just took a break. OK, taking a break isn't much different than my non-riding, except this way I fully intended not to ride. If it isn't happening, forcing it will probably make it worse.    The Friday before the Fourth of July, I went for a ride from our campsite at South Rolly Lake to Big Lake, right at about 50 miles. I puttered along, picking up some mechanic's hand tools along the side of the road that fell off a truck. The wrenches weighed down my jersey a bit, but it wasn't like they were slowing me down.    On the way back I opted for the bike trail, which was a colossally bad idea. The four wheelers had kicked a bunch of gravel into the bike path, and I got two pinch flats on descents because I just couldn't avoid all of the debris. My mood went sout...

As I made the seven hour drive home, I reflected about how Alaska can make you feel small. Of course, the part through Denali National Park is designed to do just that.    Last Monday my wife rushed out and told me her father had stage four pancreatic cancer. Within an hour the RV was loaded and we were on the road to Fairbanks. We spent the week living out of the RV in the driveway while my wife came to grips with the situation and helped make arrangements. As usual, I was useless.    I brought a bike, but because of rain, mosquitos, and a general lack of give a shit, I didn't ride it until Chris Knott shamed me into joining the Saturday Goldstream group ride. I told him I would be dropped, and he assured me I would hang in there. I was right and he was wrong. I was dropped and left far behind when the pace increased, but I had a nice ride on unfamiliar roads. The wrong turns I made led me back to the start just as the fast guys arrived.    That afternoon ...