Strange Days

Well first I must say I'm surprised with the amount of positive feedback I've gotten after sending an email to family and friends telling them of my plans for 2007. It's always good to know those around you buy into what you are working on. It's also interesting that one of the (bike) blogs I frequent had two posts centered on global warming recently. Check it out at http://whittingham.blogspot.com/. Maybe bike racers are just a bunch of liberal freaks.

I've also had a lot of questions about how, why and what I'm really going to be doing to increase awareness on the environment and global warming. First off, as many of you know, I'm not an expert on the matter, nor do I have any scientific background. I've just been reading and realized there seems to be a real issue and maybe I can do a little to help. So how am I going to help? Well the blog is one step. Through this I can begin to create a discussion on global warming and provide links to help people further their knowledge and form their own opinions. For those of you unfamiliar with blogs check them out. There are blogs on every topic of interest and give you insight into peoples lives. Hopefully from checking this one out (and others) you can find some useful information. The best part about blogs for me is spelling is optional, call it poetic license.

Second, I'm making changes in my lifestyle (kind of) to reduce my waste. Things like recycling grocery bags, using energy efficient light bulbs, buying products that are in recyclable materials are some of the examples of things I'm doing. Also commuting by bike, which has a two-fold benefit the first, is allowing me more time to train for racing and second a significant reduction in co2 emissions.

So overall the plan for getting started is to provide people with some ideas on how they can reduce their waste, provide practical input on what I've tried, provide people with some resources to investigate global warming on their own and finally to try to help fund groups that help protect our environment. Oh yea, I'll be racing bikes too and hopefully giving a glimpse into what it takes to try to race a bike with some degree of success while being married (Ade), raising a kid (Seamus) and working.

Related to the riding I rode home from work today, the first time since our two big snows. The first few miles heading out of downtown weren't very bad but as soon as I hit the neighborhood it was rough going. The last two miles took as long as the first five. None of the streets had been plowed and it was an icy pothole filled route to the house. The good news is the fenders I bought today worked great and I was totally dry when I got home. Hopefully the roads clear up more, especially by the weekend so I can get in some long rides.