Satisfying my 'noms'

Man, what a rough week. I don’t even remember it all due to lack of sleep, studying, and cramming in 30 hours this week at NASA. I finished my Spring internship on Friday, and had a technical paper that was due. I hate writing papers, especially scientific ones. Also, this week was the last week of class. Hard to believe I am done with undergraduate school…forever! Wow. I finished on Thursday, but did not participate in any festivities since I was finishing up my internship. On Friday, I had the ‘end of the year’ meeting with my area director for ResLife. That was fun…it just made me realize how fast time really goes by. I also realized that it’s a lot easier to tell someone you are going to stay in touch, then to actually do it. My A.D. and I were talking about how very few of the old RA’s stay in touch once they leave. Out of the 60 people in the past 3 years… maybe 10 still drop by an occasional ‘hello’. I try to keep in touch with the people, and it’s definitely hard. From high school, I haven’t talked to anyone in a year, and I wonder if it is going to be the same for college. I feel like that is the way of life though. You make temporary friends to get through situations, and have someone by your side when you need them. Once you leave that environment, you don’t need that people anymore so you look for other connections. Right now, I still stay in touch with a few people from college—Mike Orciga (who came to visit me this weekend!!) and TJ Storm. There are definitely others, like guys from the WiMa cycling team, but these two are probably the highest on my priority list. Upon graduation in 2 weeks, I intend on keeping up with the cycling team here. They are a great group of guys (every one of them!), and I can’t even find the words now to say how appreciable I am. Being in Richmond next year, I’m excited that it’s only a short 3 hour bike ride to Williamsburg…or a 1 hour drive. So I’m definitely going to be making some trips down, and be that kid who never left…whatever. Crashing in rooms, ridin bikes, and drinking beer. The good life…

Also, this week was pretty stressful. People get too pissed, too easily. Maybe it’s the stress from the approaching finals… I don’t care though. I’m definitely not going to be seeing them after 2 weeks; just have to make it until then!! In 4 days, I will hopefully fly out to Madison, WI for collegiate cycling nationals. I’ll get on that paperwork on Monday. Super pumped for that!! My fitness is decent right now. It could be a lot better, but I have all season to improve. I mean, the really big races are in the summer anyways, so there is time. This weekend, I rode out in Surry with Greg Grosicki. It was about 90 degrees, and we had an eternal head wind. Which was nice in a masochist way—we rode 120 miles!! (I ended up doing a loop when I got back to Williamsburg and make it around 132 miles.) Fun times. Greg did really well. It was his 2^nd century ever, so kudos to him. I’m use to them by now. Last year during the summer I would hit up a 5-6 hour ride at least once a week. This is why bikes dominate my life, and I’m not complaining about that at all. It’s what makes me happy… I would much rather go on a 3 hour ride, than hang out with friends. It gives me a chance to get away from the real world, think about the day, and the following day. It’s my time to plan the schedule, which is why I never write anything down-- It’s all in my head. Usually that plan works, and I feel like if something is really important, I will get reminders about them prior to the event. Sometimes there is that one moment in a day, and on a bike ride, that everything is perfect. I was talking to Greg about it on our 6 hour expedition the other day. It’s when the tailwind is blowing at just the right speed and direction, and everything is quiet. All you hear are the tires whooshing along on the tarmac, and the churning of the crank 90 times/minute. In an awkward way, its peaceful. Even if you feel like complete crap, it makes everything better (until the head winds hits you again).

Anyways, let talk about the upcoming summer…wow! Talk about CRAZY! I’m interning at NASA, as well as doing Richmond Pro Cycling, and volunteering- hopefully as a tutor in juvenile development center. (RPC is all about civic leadership). And then I have to add in the 20-30 hours of training per week (riding bikes), as well as driving to Richmond to do RPC stuff every week, AND racing bikes in various locations on the weekend. Sleep? Eat? Maybe, if there is time. Right now, it’s looking to be 90 hour work weeks, by the time I do everything I need to do...

I really wanted to go down to Kill Devil Hills or Cape Carteret to stay with my folks. Not sure if there will be time for that. Maybe one weekend if there is no race, the RPC guys can come down to the OBX and chill/surf/ ride bikes/ eat good food. We shall see!

Lastly subjects… coffee and bikes. This week, Greg and I made a new invention…kind of. We get a bag of chocolate chips, melted them over a double pan, and threw some whole coffee beans in...num num num. Talk about le jitters. That stuff works awesome!! Each piece of candy has about 20-30 beans, which is around 2 cups of coffee. Great news for final exams coming up this week. Also, I just pick up my Kazane frameset from RPC and spent Saturday night building it up in the Duty Office with JOA. Good times, and a great friend. Thanks for the help!!