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SloMoPo Solved

My first Strava puzzle SloMoPo was solved pretty shortly after posting it. I was starting simple, so that’s not too surprising.

Ben saw the pattern in the alliterations. Nice work, Ben!

Step one: ignore everything that wasn’t the “activity of the day” (in other words, ignore every activity that isn’t prefaced with a day #)

Step two: break the activities into groups, where the dividing line is any ride that is not an alliteration. Hints for this included titles like “Spaced Out” and “You Deserve a Break Today”.

Step three: each activity group is a word, composed of the alliteration letters from each title (e.g. 1/14 – 1/16 was JOY: J (Jury-rigged Jaunt; Joking Justified) + O (Outing Offsets Obsessing) + Y (Yester Youth)

Put it all together, and you get the following Haiku:

Spreading Joy Slowly.
One New Character Per Day.
Don’t You Love Puzzles?

Annie Are You OK?

This Strava puzzle was more compact than my first attempt for the year (SloMoPo).

You got this?

The Trail (Of Certain Death) Not Taken

I love Robert Frost … if you don’t believe me, check out: We can laugh about it now, we’re okay. I wasn’t quite as committed to this mimic, so I followed the wisdom of the ages from The Holy Grail: “skip a bit, brother.”)

Two trails split on basically a cliff,
And sorry I could not turn around
Without some ridicule, I stood stiff
Then leaned to ’til the bars hit my midriff
Praying I would keep the rubber side down;

…

I shall be telling with voiced raised high
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two trails diverged on a cliff, and I–
I took the one where I wouldn’t die
And that has made all the difference.

Uh, because, duh, I wouldn’t be here to tell you this if I took the one on the right that basically bombs straight down a 30% grade. Pro-tip: switchbacks are your friend.

100: Prince Was Right About Repetition

Objectively Badass

Objectively speaking, I look pretty badass in this photo, right?

I’m no “Blue Steel”, but I’ve got my game face on, and looking pretty good at it.

Now, what I I add some context and tell you that the tune playing in my buds at the time of this photo is Debbie Gibson’s “No More Rhyme”?

What’s the badass level of this photo now?

PPV++, to snag an elusive tile in Mukilteo

-1 + -1 = -1

There’s an age-old equation used to represent synergy: 1 + 1 = 3. “Two or more independent things combine into a whole that is greater than the sum of its individual parts.”

I think there is a corollary equation: -1 + -1 = -1. “Two things which independently suck can be combined in such as way that their combined suckiness is reduced.”

Paul McCartney is not a name you would think would follow a sentence about sucking. He is a god on many levels. And yet, he produced the song “Temporary Secretary.”

Timothy Hutton has been in many awesome movies, and yet he also appeared beside Lara Flynn Boyle in “The Temp.”

As painful as each of these are to experience in isolation, I think that combining these two makes for a much more palatable experience. See for yourself. Play the above trailer muted, and kick off the above spotify track to play simultaneously.

100: Prince Was Right About Repetition

Power Through It

When the only button that works on my bluetooth headphones is the Play/Pause button, I am forced to power through the crappy tracks.

My college playlist (VT Crew) was playing on this morning’s bike ride and when Tiffany came on (I will hope that song was added as a poor attempt at humor), I simply had to get through it. The only saving grace was that Paula Abdul’s Spellbound was waiting on the other end of the track.

“Spellbound”, unlike “I Think We’re Alone Now”, is so terrible it’s funny. And that irony is why it ended up on our playlist (cemented by the fact that, in my week-long cross-country drive with John, it was a requirement that “New Moon”, “Running Down a Dream”, and “Spellbound” were each played once every day of the drive).

“Spellbound” follows in the footsteps of Lisa Lisa’s “All Cried Out”.

Tiffany is just, different. I don’t know, it feels like a “not worth the ammo” situation.

But she did serve as a good reminder that we have to take the good with the bad. College was great, but that doesn’t mean every detail of it was great 🙂

Kevin Nealon said it best:

99: CKC Now Connected

SloMoPo

Slow Motion Poetry … success.

More than two months of work for a mere 17 syllables.

Do you see it?

Re-new

The Jeff that returns home after an extended ride is not the same Jeff that set off hours earlier. The Jeff that returns home after a retreat is not the same Jeff that left a week earlier.

Re-fresh. Re-center. Re-discover.

2021.03.13: !!BLAST!! Forward

Drivetrain Envy

I was proud of myself for finally establishing a good post-ride routine for cleaning my bike. I researched online, finding several good videos and using those to start a discussion with my bike team about their preferred routines.

Now I’m 4-5 months into this routine and have been feeling good about myself … until I saw Joseph’s drivetrain on this morning’s ride. The drivetrain on his gravel bike 5 miles into a muddy exploration looked cleaner than the drivetrain on my road bike on its best day.

So today’s 8-minute bike scrubbing routine was extended to 15 minutes, with pretty satisfying results:

It’s not a competition, right? (says the one who’s clearly losing !!)

65: Pleasant Pedal Party, Planned Partings Provided