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Happy Father’s Day!

I hope all the fathers out there are having a nice father’s day.  My dad is enjoying his first Father’s Day as a retiree!  They spent the day hiking in the mountains near their new home of Greenville, SC.  I’m so excited for them.  They’re always off on an adventure or at a concert or something going on around town.  It sounds like they’re having a lot of fun exploring their new home.  He’s a picture they sent me from today’s hike.

I started off the day with an hour on the road bike, did some serious house cleaning, enjoyed some TV and relaxing, and just got back from a quick Potomac River kayak lap around Roosevelt Island with Kristin.  I took a few pictures while we were out there, if you can believe that…

Cousins, Wine, Cars and Biking

In keeping with my semi regular posting, here’s another update. It was a fairly busy week again and I feel like I made some headway at work, which has been hard to do lately. We’ve got a big deadline coming up at the end of the month, and then I’m off to hang out in Greenville at the parents’ new place for a week.

On Tuesday, I found out my newlywed cousin was in town on a short business trip with her husband. We met up for dinner in DC and walked down to the Capital so they could check it out at night. All my relatives live in Florida, Georgia, California, and Chicago for the most part, (Chicago is a separate entity from Illinois, in my mind) so I don’t see any of them too often. We took a cheesy cellphone pic to commemorate the occasion.

I also ordered my iPhone 4 on Tuesday!

On Thursday, Mike, Geordie and I made wine at Carafe Wine Makers in Alexandria.  The making part should be loosely interpreted. We dumped a few prepackaged ingredients into a big white 5 gallon plastic bucket. The kind you get when you buy paint in bulk. The best part was filling a sock-like fabric pouch with wood chips and shavings to simulate that taste of wine actually aged in a wood barrel. In 6 weeks, we go back and bottle the wine. We’ll end up with 10 bottles each of what is likely to be some pretty shady “Brunello style” red wine.  I’m sure 9 out of 10 Italians couldn’t tell the difference… Here all all my pictures of this adventure.

On Friday, I took Mike over to the VW dealership so that he could work his bargaining magic and attempt to drive off in a new GTI. He was successful and is now enjoying the upgrade from his early 90′s Civic with absurdly stiff suspension, racing seats, and no AC. Mike also made a new BFF in the process. Here they are together with the new vehicle.

Today, I went on a nice 30 mile bike ride out the W&OD and then hit the Arlington hill loop on the way back. Patrick and Mike joined in. A ridiculous guy on a Cervelo carbon tri bike road off the left side of the paved trail trying to pass a group of walkers and had his bike come out from under him as he unskillfully ignored the low shoulder trying to swerve back on. The walkers felt bad. I found it hard to as I passed him laying motionless in the middle of the trail and saying “I’m not going to be able to make it back”. You tipped over going 8 MPH buddy. You’re gonna bounce back. I promise. Maybe you should get a stationary bike? I’m such a nice guy.

Today, Kwabena is having his annual Rum Punch Party so that’s the agenda for the afternoon and early evening.  I think tomorrow morning might have to include another bike ride.  I might even clean the house after that.

Have a great rest of the weekend!

Weekly round up

Another weekend is almost up and I took some pictures again this week, so here’s the latest. Last Tuesday I went to the Nationals game with Kristin. It was Stephen Strasburg’s first game.  For those of you who follow sports as little as I do, he’s a pitcher, he was the #1 draft pick last year, and this was his first Major League game. The hype was that he’s awesome, and he apparently is.  He struck out 14 batters before leaving the game after the 7th inning. He pitched his second game today and it looks like they won again.  Here are some pictures.

Yesterday, I got up nice and early and met my friend Patrick to go mountain biking at Wakefield Park. First mountain biking of the year, sadly. There’s nowhere to go close to home and it can be hard to get motivated to pack up the car and drive around northern VA just to bike. After returning from Wakefield, I walked over to watch some of the Clarendon Cup bike race festivities. The lower category races and women’s race were already over, so first up was the kids races, then the pro race. Here are the pictures I put up on Picasa. I also took a bunch of HD video that I’m going to play with soon and put up.

Today, I went on a nice road ride up the Capital Crescent Trail and through Rock Creek Park with Mike. I’ve got a fairly busy week ahead of me. I’m making wine on Thursday so I’ll get back to you on how that goes. Also, don’t forget to pre-order your iPhone 4 on Tuesday.

Great Falls hiking

Today, Kristin and I met Pam and Patrick at Great Falls to do a little hiking.  We were planning to mountain bike at Wakefield, but figured the trails would be fairly muddy with the recent storms, so hiking was the backup plan.

When we got there, we realized there was a trail running race going on.  It was unusual because it was only around 200 people and they were doing loooong distances.  Some were doing marathons and 50 milers.  They let random park visitors share the trails, since it was pretty low volume and few were in a giant hurry with 35 miles under them and 15 left to go!

We ended up walking to the far end of the park on the back trails and then taking the river trail on the return.  It was hot and humid but great to get out there.  I took a few pictures as usual.  Here they are on Picasa.

National Doughnut Day tomorrow!!

My favorite day of the year!  Go to Krispy Kreme for a free donut or Dunkin’ Donuts for a free donut with purchase of a beverage.  Mmmmmmm…….