What am I up to on the day-to-day? I am never really sure myself. I need to make some motivational and organizational charts for my desk to keep all this in line. Here I am laying it out for the first time outside of my head.

Work– I have two part-time jobs, one doing nutrition education through a grant that originates with the Food Stamp program and one teaching two college courses. I have about 100 students, which significantly increases my workload. I’m just about full-time. Classes end the end of May.

Bikes– I am working with Alex Thompson on what is tentatively named the 5% project. It’s going to be a mass public education campaign that is not as specific as the Ride to the Ride stuff (which I am slowly distributing when I go on road rides). The Bike Writers Collective is going to help with this project and I am honored to work with them.

Swarm!– With the help of Chris we got the stickers to the printer, hope to see them this week.

Vegetarian– I work with the Vegetarian Nutrition Dietary Practice Group in a number of ways including as a student member coordinator and a co-coordinator for California. Am also heading up a media group to work with the ADA’s Spokespeople who unfortunately have continually given poor information regarding vegetarianism in mainstream articles. I just got back from our Spring meeting in Utah, so the work pile for them is pretty large.

Vegetarian Bikes– I am starting to help Organic Athlete with some more vegan diet plan stuff for some projects they have coming up this summer. Am slacking here so have recruited someone to help out.

Being smarter– On paper I am a graduate student in an MA Anthropology program. My current course is a directive study in Nutritional Anthropology. It is very difficult to do school work when you are not actually attending school.

Living– Our house is coming along quicker now that Morgan moved in. He’s on Team No Job, but thinks getting up at 630am and working on the house is some how not work. My new project is clearing the gigantic backyard. Will try to post photos soon. Some friends saw our house for the first time the other day and had two amazing quotes: ‘This isn’t LA, it’s Mississippi’ and ‘The world without us. That’s what your backyard looks like. How everything would look without humans.’

Being a Sporto– I’m still trying to keep this training schedule. But I like to skip both runs each week. Not good, considering I have a half-iron race in a week and a half. I am down to 187 pounds though!

In between all this I try to cook most of my meals, be social with people I don’t live with, call my friends in other cities, read books, etc, etc. But it’s real easy for any of that to go out the window when I get home at 8pm and am exhausted. Is anyone else this busy? Do you enjoy it?

Not many ways I can spin (haha) a post about a 3-hour spin class to make it sound cool. Or even that interesting. But come on, my local YMCA organized a cycle-a-thon, how could I not participate? I tried to not, but then was told I didn’t have to raise the full $250, but only ‘what I could’. So why not? I’ve only done a couple spin classes cause they are too hard.
They can’t all be like Steevo’s spin class in Pittsburgh.
The girl next to me asked if I was a ‘street rider’, which means that, unlike 75% of bike shoe owners, I use bike shoes on a bike outside of the gym. I did almost crash once when I stopped my pedaling abruptly, to go from standing to sitting, and the momentum of the wheel sprung me forward and lifted the rear of the ‘bike’ off the ground. Oops.
Thanks to everyone who donated money, which was mostly my workout partner Mike T and my co-workers. And Chris and Megan for stopping by.

Cute blonde? Fit? Be a spin instructor!

(not really, but it looks like it, right?)

And it is Earth Day so check out this Humane Society ad.

Cold and wet, even in LA. Am slacking hard. Here are some more links to stories, photos and people from the past weekend.
Orange 20 put up some words and shots. As did Trackosaurusrex on their bloggy blog. Forgot to mention too that vegan elite cross-racer Molly Cameron was at the race with postcards that said,

Drink espresso.
Go vegan.
Take yourself seriously.
Not too seriously.

10-4.

Please file this post under: How to waste time and ignore all of your A, B, and C priorities.
After 3 months earlier this year of caffeine abstinence, I slowly worked my way back to full-time coffee drinker. Luckily not to the levels of Budge and I last year. We were polishing off a 32-oz French Press of strong coffee every morning.
In denial of my coffee drinking habits I am yet to unearth my mug (read: I am throwing out a paper one every time I drink it). A quick internet search (which reminds me: Did you hear that Google is coming out with a cell phone? wtf?) I came across Kent’s bike blog. He then pointed me to, I am not kidding this is a real link, bicyclecoffeesystems.com. A serious site. Do I have the intellectual ability to sort through this and pick the best one? Maybe after a strong cup of coffee.

http://www.youtube.com/v/H6EZkIaJcCI&rel=1

I wasn’t sure, but be assured, they do. Even some sun, which I was positive they did not have. Here is some stuff I cannot help but pass on. Hopefully get some photos up before I leave for France. Not sure if they have the internet there.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rN2VqFPNS8w]

Some of the google search terms that have directed savy and not so savy web users to my blog in the last week:
catch fish pond malibu las virgines
“tall bike” orange county july 2007
sweet cherubum
south philly soft pretzels 430am
Steevo Cummings blog
funny “new zealand signs”
“pure luck” heliotrope
fatalities of the Pacific Crest Triathlon
whipping passing bicyclists england
Death valley super marathon
dumpstering anchorage
vmaas frames
justin cummings push

I slept in five different places in six nights. It’s mostly pretty fun. Wake up in El Segundo, drink a kale/cocoa shake with raw Alec before running on the beach. Go to sleep in South Central, after being called a pig twice in one day. Slept six deep in the Heliotrope Village warehouse where the bike to room ratio is 20:1. I was going to head to the East Coast in mid-June, but got a temporary position I could not pass up. Am here till mid-July with no permanent home. Many of us have done it at some point in our lives, but this time it is complicated by not having a car and training for that pesky triathlon.

My stuff is in six different places. If it’s Tuesday morning and I am going to work I need to have my goggles and swim cap if I have a swim planned for Wednesday night. So far only once I’ve had to borrow bike shorts for a road ride or buy a dress shirt on the way to work. You start to look at space/time differently when you have to think 36-48 hours in advance and know where what will be when. My bag is always full. I’ve left my commute bike in my office to take a train to my road bike (I was leaving my road bike some where else and needed the commute bike to be there the next work day).

Without your help I could not attain Maslow’s D-Needs. Thanks fam.

So this past week we moved out of the A-partment. And I have a billion things due for school. While being homeless. Also time to start training for that full iron in August. So, Paul, my apologies for not having completed my Great Divide posts. I swear I’ll have pictures and stories up before it has been one year since.
For now, check out that Race Across America starts this Sunday. The race is now put on by the Ultra Marathon Cycling Association and they promise to have better media. Will Chew’s views stay? Once someone asked me, ‘When will it be enough? What distance?’ To answer: I have no intention of ever doing RAAM. To paraphrase Bob Knoll about things everyone should do in their life, ‘You should ride across america, you should not race across america.’ Though this week I got the confirmation that I am racing a RAAM qualifier this year, which would be the 508 in October. Whoa!
Some updates on recent events with pictures, etc soon. Still have some time to waste? Read Foucault’s wiki page and send me a 500 word summary. Thanks.