Stolen moments

Date: Jan. 13
Mileage: 24.4
January mileage: 188.8
Temperature upon departure: 18

Friday the 13th. I woke up, ate some of that cold cereal that I tried so hard to vilify yesterday and deliberately did not turn on the radio. I piled on layers, hoisted my Camelpak and went for an extended commute to work with Geoff. We rode Skyline, the snowmobile trails, the reservoir. I dropped down East Hill sucking up the wind chill at 35 mph and pulled into work just as my boss was duct taping the front door shut.

My odometer read 12:08 p.m. "So much for not exercising outdoors, eh?" she said.

"I take it the volcano went off again," I said.

She looked at me like I was wearing one of those sandblaster masks that everyone's been hoarding as a hat. "It's gone off three times already," she said. "The first eruption happened before 5 a.m."

She told me there was an ash advisory for 1 p.m. and she was shutting down the office. She told me I could go inside if I wanted to, but she had Saran wrapped pretty much every piece of electronic equipment inside. She told me she was duct taping the door either way. She was pretty much telling me I had a free day off.

"I could probably make it home by 1 p.m.," I said, but she insisted on driving me. We took the long way so we could loop around the Cook Inlet overlook and see if we could catch of glimpse of Augustine's ongoing temper tantrum - but it was just too overcast. The rest of the afternoon I lazed around the house guilt-free as snow fell lightly outside. At least - I'm pretty sure it was snow.

The AVO reported that the wind shifted and the ash advisory was lifted, so Geoff and I ventured out into the ghost town that Homer became. There had been a bunch of events slated for tonight and most of them were canceled - except, for unknown reasons, an impromptu bluegrass jam by the Homer Old-Time Fiddlers at Captain's Coffee and a reading by Fairbanks author Marjorie Kowalski Cole The poor woman drove all the way from Anchorage through an ash storm to host the publicity event on a night when all area residents were warned to stay indoors at all costs. The turnout, for the circumstances, wasn't too bad. I enjoyed the reading because, from my brief interaction with her, I sensed that Marjorie is the kind of writer I would be if I were a novelist - unapologetically twisting actual events until they take on a life of their own (not, of course, that I do that as a journalist.) Her husband talked about their adventures looking for an air filter in the sparsely populated southern Kenai Peninsula, and she didn't seem to care at all that just 70 miles away a molten mountain was belching thousands of pounds of glass shards. She read exerpts from her book and then talked for several minutes about how strange it was that she was the only one staying at her hotel. As it stands, the volcano erupted one more time, the ash never came, and seismic activity continues. Here's crossing my fingers that Augustine decides to call it a decade and give up, and if not, here's hoping that the wind stays at my back.

Step away

I did an hour-long ride on the trainer tonight so I could cook some dinner and amp up for a short outdoor ride later. It's finally good and below 20 degrees, so I thought I could try out some of my colder weather gear. Only now it's later and here I sit, losing steam by the second (much like Mt. Augustine, currently settling after her initial blow.) It's not that I feel psychotically compelled to ride every day. It's just that now the conditions are ideal - clear, calm, cold, and no volcanic ash clogging up the air.

Perhaps I'll leave first thing in the morning for an early ride before work. Hmmm - that sounds just like one of the "lies we tell ourselves" mentioned on Fat Cyclist's site. Reading Fatty's and other real racers' Web sites has fueled my ambition and focused my training, but one side effect of this information glut from endurance athletes is a heightened focus on a much more ambiguous part of myself - my weight.

I'm never been one to gain or lose weight too quickly, so I never really noticed the fluctuations. I was honestly shocked when I bought my first gym membership two years ago and learned I weighed 159 pounds (this happened mere months after I returned from a 3,200-mile bike tour that, at the time, I believed left me in pretty good shape.) But thanks to an increased level of road biking, my efforts to curb my Pepsi habit, and the peer pressure of well-meaning Spin Nazis at the Apple Fitness, I was able to shave off 30 pounds without trying to diet. I weighed 128 toward the end of summer 2005 and hardly noticed the difference, except for occasional comments my mom would make about my need to buy new pants ('but wearing jeans around your hips is all the rage ... isn't it? No?' The truth is, I'm tragically turned off to fashion cycles.)

But the only reason I mention all this now is because I'm gaining weight again. I have an admittedly ancient bathroom scale that was purchased at the Salvation Army when we first moved to Alaska. On first use, the needle hovered around 130. Now ... closer to 135.

I'm not sure why I'm gaining weight. I do think it has something to do with my increased physical activity over the past six weeks. It could be muscle ... although I haven't done all that much strength training to really build muscle mass. It could be that my equilibrium is thrown off and my appetite has skyrocketed, causing me to inhale box after box of cold cereal without the former benefit of guilt. I don't know. But the worst part is, I do feel guilty about it. Because if I'm going to be carrying myself over 100 miles of snowmachine trail in February, less of me is better - right? I haven't really decided whether or not I'm going to start a cliche New Years diet or simply ignore my scale and hope my body finds its happy place. After all ... you need body fat to keep you warm for winter riding, don't you? Oh, the lies we tell ourselves.

Ashes to ashes

Date: Jan. 11
Mileage: 13.6
January mileage: 164.4
Temperature upon departure: 22

Somewhere, hidden deep within a shroud of fog and the forgotton hours of the morning, Augustine coughed up an explosion - unseen, unheard, almost as if it never existed, except for the five-mile-high ash cloud that is now probably drifting over Denali National Park.

The volcano began was is expected to be a series of escalating eruptions this morning at 4:44 a.m. It was enough to raise the concern level to code red and keep people glued to their radios and raiding the stores for face masks and Spam - but didn't really do much else. The ash headed north and east and pretty much away from Homer, Anchorage and any relatively populated area of Alaska. The fog stayed, blocking anxious eyes from any view of the rumbling mountain, and gripping the town in an eerie sort of silence.

My editor rushed into the office first thing this morning to demand I upload an update the the Web site. In the great irony of weekly newspapers, our current issue - published yesterday and released two hours after the volcano blew - ran with the headline "Scientists say eruption not imminent." Our ad rep won the office poll with an exact guess of Jan. 11 - but in the great irony of advertising executives didn't even take the opportunity to gloat. We just typed quietly and waited for a glimpse of ash or a phone call from an panicked resident - anything - but all we did was wait. "Something's just off about today," my co-worker said. Maybe it was because a volcano 70 miles from here erupted. Or maybe it was because a volcano 70 miles from here erupted and nothing happened.

Geoff and I had made plans tonight to see an avalanche presentation by Jill Fredston, but I had a free 90 minutes between work and the slide show to catch a trail ride. I looped around the crunchy ski runs along the crest of Diamond Ridge, racing the fog as it climbed out of the valley until I was encircled, and then enshrouded. Today's ride was sponsored by Tracy in Iowa, for the intended purpose of buying chemical handwarmers. It's funny because suddenly, with seismic activity on the rise again and "escalating eruptions" looming, I may have a more immediate need for a medical face mask and a stack of good DVDs for when I have to do a lot more of my riding indoors. Or ... maybe not.