Early Summer Beer Fest

I live in a town with a fair number of beer fests. I also now live on the side of town in which most fun activities happen, which means that I can bike to most of these fests! My best friend, her friend from high school (who has now become my friend), and I went to a beer fest towards the beginning of the summer. We'd started the day with a 15 mile run, so we were definitely ready and thirsty when it started. Also happened to run into other friends there!

The taps from one of my favorite breweries (I must admit, I'll frequently buy the beer solely for the nature-themed names and pictures on the holder!)

An ingenious way to carry your beer around in my neighborhood -- though you'd run the risk of theft, depending on what type of beer you're carrying...

Cheers!

Bicycle Race

In honor of the Queen tribute band I will be seeing this weekend, Max poses for a picture to represent their song "Bicycle Race" (which I sing to myself every morning as I bike in to work.)

I'll have to see if the parrots will cooperate in reenacting other Queen songs this weekend.  They have no idea what is in store for them!

September 21, 2012

I live in a very bicycle-friendly community now.  However, my bike has been broken (disintegrating tires, among other things) for the past four years.  After I moved out, I had always planned on fixing my bike, but I had never gotten around to it -- until recently!

I intended to have my bike shop take a picture of me with my new bike, but I forgot my camera, so I had to wait until I was back home.  I picked it up this evening, which means that starting Monday, I am a bicycle commuter!  One of my coworkers is also a bicycle commuter, and every day he stops by my office to ask if I've fixed my bike.  This has been going on for a couple of months, so he was shocked when I told him that starting Monday, I might see him on the bike path.

I only live about 2.5 miles from work, and I'm just a few blocks away from a really nice bike path that takes me right there, so I am really excited about this development.

Coming home from the bike shop, I forgot how much fun being on a bicycle can be!  I really should be doing much more cross-training instead of always running!  I have good intentions to start weight lifting again, doing yoga, etc., but running is really the only thing I do consistently.  And now 5 miles per work day of biking.

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Just to add a bit of parrot, here's Max, keeping an eye on things.  My apartment building was built around 100 years ago, so there was no such thing as open concept.  That means that even if we're just one room away (here: I'm in the kitchen; Max is in the dining room) she has to position herself carefully in order to watch me.

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I had my third date last night with this really fun guy.  We went to see the Queen documentary/concert movie (which I highly recommend.)  I am very sad that I was never able to see Freddie Mercury perform live, but they did such an amazing job remastering the concert footage that you'd never guess it was filmed nearly 30 years ago.

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And ending with someone who just thinks she might be one of the cutest parrots ever:

Actually she was probably trying to get me to give her a nut!