n_maher

Great day.

@TMoney - Try playing with tire pressures a little bit and nice job on the metric. Fueling and hydration are a battle and it's hard to come up with rules because weather plays a big factor. But one thing I started doing 5+ years ago that has helped a bit, drink every 10 minutes. If you can't remember the last drink you took, drink. I got the Allied out for a series of road tests this weekend with the hope that it'll be good to go for the century this coming weekend. Had a minor tragedy yesterday with a failed/ruin crank arm but managed to find some local used parts that'll get me through and the revisit of a shakedown ride this afternoon went off without a hitch.

I ordered the monthly special today which had one pound of BBK and Mysore in it.

The Juiciest Homemade Birria Queso Tacos | Chef Joshua We...I may struggle to pronounce it correctly, but this is an easy winner as one of the juiciest tacos you will ever have in your life.This is essentially the recipe that I used. Notable differences, I used 4 Roma tomatoes instead of tomato paste. I generally don't like tomato paste. I added a tsp of cumin, coriander, and oregano and I did a slightly different, but essentially the same, mix of Mexican peppers. Finally, I did a mix of queso fresco, manchego, and standard mexican shredded cheese that seemed to pair very well with the whole thing.

Lily wanted to come home for lunch today so I asked her if she was up for trying new tacos. She said yes so I tried my hand at Birria Tacos. I blended a couple recipes to come up with something. The day started with browning beef. Then cooking the veggies and rehydrating the peppers. Then everything was set to braise for 3 hours or so until it was time for assembly. They were tasty and will be made again.

For @MexicanDragon - Allied is now ready to roll as it should have been from the factory.

Just wanted to post a last note of thanks here. Never expected, always appreciated support led to me exceeding my fundraising goal. I've got the two bikes prepped and mostly ready. I just need to do a shakedown ride or two on the Allied which I picked up from the mechanic yesterday. Thanks again, d-_-b, #NFLO.

@Voltron - no doubt Al. If she was hundreds/thousands of miles away I'd be a bigger mess. That's for sure. But I'm very much trying to give her the space that she needs to grow so it'll likely be a while before we visit. @recstar24 - these things all hit us differently, but I literally feel your pain on the 'what am i good for' side of things. Do yourself a favor, spend deliberate time with her these next two years before things change even more. You will not regret spending more. @Dusty Chalk - the only thing we can't buy in life is more time. I feel that more each passing year. I do my best not to dwell on it since it is the inevitable but I'm also a softie and can't help myself at times.

A couple more donations rolled in over the past few days so I'm over the $2k hump and running down the last 20%. I needed to run into the office today so I decided to treat it like a shakedown ride for the Cervelo that my friend Paul (flying in from MN) will ride again this year. It was a good double-session despite somehow having a headwind both ways. And the bike is at least looking good.

Sucky.

This one will be hard to write, not because anything bad happened, only because change is hard. TL/DR - Nate is sad because Lily is in college. Longer, rambling version. Today we helped Lily move into college. She decided that she wanted to go to UNH in the spring time, so that's where we headed today. On top of the usual angst/sadness associated with dropping your first kid off at school it was a bit of an emotionally-charged day because that's where I went to school, met Maura, and lived for a few years even after graduation while Maura pursued her graduate degree. And in a simple twist of fate, the dorm that we lived in while Maura was a hall director is where Lily ended up as a Freshman. So it was a day of wildly swinging emotions. I'm confident that she'll do great there. The program that she's in (Occupational Therapy) is as good or better than any other in New England and it's very much right up her alley. So we know where she'll be for the next 5 years - it's a 4+1 masters program. What I can't figure out is why it very much feels like I have a broken heart? I mean I get it in lots of ways. As I explained to Andrew on the way home (he and I left first to get him to soccer practice), for every day in the last 18+ years I've known exactly where and when I'd see Lily next. Now, not so much. I expect it'll be at least a few weeks, if not longer before we see her. That's probably most of the pain I feel. But there's also a piece of me that feels a little, well, lost without her in the house. So we'll see how these next several weeks go with only one kid to day-to-day worry about. I'm not sure Andrew wants the additional attention coming his way. 😂

Wuhoo! We're 75% of the way there on fundraising with a little over two weeks to go.

10-12 week lead time. Geez.

Likely the last long training ride was accomplished today. I didn't start out intending to ride this far, but it happened and felt good.

Thanks Renato, really appreciate the support.

working through glitches and continuing to make good progress, I’ve now passed the 50% line on my fundraising goal and certainly appreciate all the support received so far!

We are off and running on the fund raising and 1/3 of the way there already, thanks d-_-b !

Logged some hot miles this afternoon riding to York, ME. Feels like temp was 93F and it felt every bit of that. Thank god for a little tail wind.

If it annoys you too much, let me know what you want to donate and I'll do it in your name. Thanks for kicking off the party, Mikey and Todd! I'm going to ride up to the Maine coast this afternoon for a friend's 50th and it's a scorcher! It's 9AM and it's already 80 in the shade. Good thing the ride will end at the beach.

I'm attempting to get started with fundraising a little earlier this year for the annual Kelly Brush Ride that I will once again be participating in this year. It's the same group of friends this year, likely minus one who unfortunately can't make it due to work reasons, but we're trying something a little different as a group this year. My friend Tom, who goes us all drawn into this madness, knows Kelly very well and the organization is trying to encourage folks to participate in the ride remotely. They've kind of reached critical mass in Middlebury, VT, with more than 800 riders participating so they can't really grow unless they change something. So our group sort of volunteered to be the pilot and we're headed to the coast of Maine to ride by a bunch of lighthouses and hopefully have some fun while suffering. Why am I explaining all this? Well, we want to show that remote folks can still effectively fundraise and participate. So we're going all-in and getting custom jerseys made to commemorate the ride. So all that said, I'm once again asking this group to be like no other forum. I'd very much appreciate any support that you can offer. The foundation is aiming to raise $1.2M to support individuals with spinal chord injuries to regain an active lifestyle. My personal goal is to raise $2,500. This organization and cause remains something near and dear to me as someone who takes the simple ability to get outdoors and do whatever I like, when I like, somewhat for granted. Every year I participate I find it helps refocus and recenter my appreciation for those that chose to not be limited by life-altering injuries, illness, etc. The foundation helps people discover adaptive sports and recreation, hosts camps to immerse people in sports and community, and most importantly, provides hundreds of grants per year to people that just want to return to the activities they love. Anyway, if you're able here's the link to donate to support me: Nate's KBF Fundraising Page And just for fun here's us with Kelly at the starting line last year. I'm hoping for much better weather this year so we can pound social media with pics and vids of our remote ride.

Well done!

Have a great ride, @TMoney !

Happy Birthday, Todd!

It's late and I'm tired, but here's a start. Needs a new seat post and seat. I'm going to update the cockpit properly. Already have a different wheel set for it, which is why I didn't bother installing the rotors.