Happy New Year

Date: Jan. 1
Mileage: 18.2
January mileage: 18.2
Temperature upon departure: 32

Happy New Year to everyone! My celebration took a turn for the worse at the Edible Arts extravaganza when an all-too-tempting sushi dress (pictured) turned my night into an Edible Arts-born illness. I still sucked it up and waited out midnight while hunched over a table at Duggan's Pub, watching The Whipsaws and writhing in pain. Let this be a lesson - never eat perishable art; and don't sit in a smoky pub with sharp pains tearing at your intestines just because it's New Year's Eve. Once I got all of the sushi out of my system, though, I felt a lot better. I did a fairly relaxed ride along East End Road today and went home and took a nap.

I read a couple of year-end reviews in other blogs and enjoyed them. It inspired me to do one of my own. Here are Jill's memorable moments of 2005:

January: I learn to airboard ... a fancy sort of inflatable tobaggan with hard plastic edges to give its rider the illusion of control while she's careening down a narrow, tree-lined slope head first.

February: I discover Body Pump, and gain muscle definition in my arms for the first time in ... ever (and it's gone now.)

March: Nothing rings a bell. But early in April, I learned to draft off a herd of bison while bicycling in Yellowstone National Park.

April: I canoe down the Dirty Devil River, inspiring the best article I wrote for the Idaho Falls Post Register.

May: I go headlong over the handlebars during a mud ride in the Oquirrh Mountains, tearing some vital muscles in my left leg and walking like a rusty robot for the next four weeks. (I also earned the nickname "Gimpy McStiff," which followed me through the day I left town.)

June: I go on a crazy fun trip down the San Juan River with the Roberts family, full of stimulating conversations that led me to read three Jared Diamond books over the summer.

July: I discover the wonders of Lava Hot Springs, where I learned some real swim strokes and over the course of several weekends became a decent beach volleyball player.

August: I spend the month of my 26th birthday doing at least one thing that scares me each week: jumping off the 15-meter platform at Lava Hot Springs; hiking to the top of Mt. Borah; rock climbing in Little Cottonwood Canyon; rafting down the Snake River; applying for a job in Alaska.

September: I accept a job and move to Alaska.

October: I fly to Utah and hike across the Grand Canyon with my Dad and friends. Then I fly home to get my first real taste of Alaska winter, with a pre-Halloween snowstorm that dumped nearly a foot of powder.

November: I start this blog, thereby avoiding the necessity of buying a better TV for the long winter ahead.

December: I buy studded mountain bike tires, discover the wonders of winter cycling and register for the Susitna 100 race. Crazy training ensues.

That's my 2005. How was your year?

Last minutes

Date: Dec. 31
Mileage: 42.6
December mileage: 381.1
Temperature upon departure: 27

Today was sunny, calm, below freezing (but just barely). Perfect way to end the year. I biked the North Fork gravel road for a loop with a lot of ice and A LOT of hills. When the loop was over, I had biked for 3 hours and 39 minutes, and traveled 42 miles. On the way down to Anchor Point, I broke my mountain bike top speed record and coasted at 35 mph for nearly a mile. The last three miles consisted of a steep climb (one of four long hills on this ride) where I rarely broke the 5 mph barrier. When I arrived home, I thought I was shot. But then I ate a couple of peanut butter balls and took a big swig of water, and felt pretty good. I really should have gone for the last 19 miles. I especially felt that way after I found out that Geoff did a 15-mile run in Palmer this morning - before going out for some afternoon cross country skiing. But, considering my original goal for this month was 225 outdoor miles, I think I did OK.

Well, now it's time to go nosh on edible arts and get my New Year's on. Here's wishing everyone out in bloggerland a Happy New Year. May 2006 be filled with epic rides and powder-lined slopes - and may the wind always be at your back.

After dark

Date: Dec. 30
Mileage: 21.4
December mileage: 338.5
Temperature upon departure: 30

Today's ride was sponsored by Adam, and by Richard. Thank you! I left after work at 4:45 p.m. and did most of my ride in the dark - my longest night ride to date. It was a little surreal. When night strips the landscape bare, the shadows start to creep into your thoughts. I've had similar experiences hiking at night in the winter ... when there's only the dark and the silence, all of your senses are thrown into doubt. You wonder if you're colder than you feel. You wonder if the crunch of your tires on snow is as loud as it sounds. You know exactly where you are, and yet you can't help but wonder if you're lost - turned down another trail, slipped into another dimension, maybe. It was really interesting - never scary or dangerous. Just interesting. Night riding is definitely something I'm going to work harder to acclimate myself to before the Susitna 100. Plus, now I know exactly what I want in a bike headlight - which almost the perfect opposite of the one I have now.

Tomorrow I'm going to try to get up early (i.e. before the 10 a.m. sunrise) and pound out some miles before the New Year. Why? I don't know. Something to do, I guess. I probably should mix it up a bit and go cross country skiing - but the snow is so intermittently icy and slushy right now that if I was going to kill myself doing any winter sport, XC skiing in that stuff would probably be the way I'd go. Plus, I'm in training. It sounds so weird to say it.

I'm feeling bummed because Geoff just returned from New York but won't be able to come down from Anchorage until Sunday. Which means my New Year's Eve will probably go something like this: take as long a bicycle ride as I can stomach; down a couple of bowls of cold cereal for dinner; eat a cupcake shaped like a volcano at the Edible Arts Extravaganza; get my groove on with the hillbilly Anchorage band that I interviewed earlier this week; and go with Jen to the Masquerade Ball, where we will wear props left over from a middle school production of "Romeo and Juliet" and scream "Happy New Year" to no one in particular - at least no one we know.

Another holiday without the people I love. Oh well. At least there won't be another one for a while.