After getting home from the ride in Dillon, I met some friends in Boulder for a drink at the Walnut Brewery. After arriving late due to a 30-minute detour on Highway 93 (yuck!), I was pleased to see Patrick and Jeff, some of my best friends from CU. Patrick and I practically lived in each others' apartments in Creekside, while Jeff and I both deposited many hours in the Pain Bank that is Triathlon. John Bergman also attended; he was the first kid we met when we moved to Colorado eight years ago, and we've continued to be friends ever since. Wow, guess that's the longest-running friendship I've got. Cheers!


Patrick, John, Nick, Jeff.

After a little while, we made some calls, and were able to wrangle Monica and Matt Arnold into the bar too. Matt was this year's tri team president, and a great guy.




It was really great to see some of the guys again, and just yak about old times. When I told Matt how much the ride to Vail Pass (see below) made me miss Colorado, he asked me something rather odd.

Matt Arnold: "Did you eat the dirt?"
Judge Nick: "What?"

MA: "When you moved away. You know, the Chief Niwot thing."
JN: "I have no idea what you're talking about."

MA: "Chief Niwot said that, because of the beauty of this place, if you leave without taking a piece of it with you, you will forever have a need to return. He said you have to eat a fistful of dirt to rid yourself of that deficiency."

For my part, I don't mind returning every once in a while. I think I'll lay off the dirt for now :-)

My dad once said that nothing is entirely good, and nothing entirely bad. That is, even the worst events in life come with a glimmer of sunshine. This past weekend, a sad event drew my dad and me back home to Denver to be with my mom. The "sunshine" in the weekend was a gorgeous 50-mile bike ride I got to do with Mom, going from our house in Dillon to the top of Vail Pass, and back.

We drove up to the mountains on Saturday night, and did some groceries for the following day. I was able to get my parents to play some silly games with me:


"What are you lookin at?"


The prompt was: imagine you are a person who has never seen the color green, and have just been handed this bag of lettuce.

Anyway, we got out of the grocery store, went home, and started cleaning bikes. Mom's is much cleaner than mine; her chain shines silver, while mine's dirty black.


Mom keeps a very clean bike; it puts mine to shame.


And of course, it has a sweet name badge, a la USPS.


Dad relaxing on the couch.

Next morning, the sun came up, and the mountains looked gorgeous. The ride was SO beautiful. I had a hard time narrowing my 100+ pictures down to a manageable gallery here.


I snapped this one off of our deck just before we started riding.


Dad set to his yardwork while we rode.


Riding Mom's wheel into Frisco.


Mom lookin' happy to be on a bike. It was so great to ride with her again.


In Frisco, even the roadside construction is picturesque! Contrast that with New Orleans ...


Basically, our ride was 50 miles of this. Are you jealous? You should be.


Back on Mom's wheel, riding towards Copper Mountain.


There's Copper on the right.


Mom sheds the jacket she was wearing, and maintains her perfect form. I don't know how she warms up so fast; I was still in my arm warmers, tights, booties, and gloves.


Out of Copper, headed up towards Vail Pass. The ride here got REAL pretty. The path is secluded, green, and beautiful. It's a well-maintained cement path (no seams!) punctuated by old-style wooden bridges. Couldn't ask for anything more.


A view looking backwards on one of the switchbacks.


Made it to the top! My legs were shot, but I was beaming from ear to ear.


"Yay, Mom!" She was fast! Although we split from Copper to the pass, she was right behind me when I got there.


Headed back down.


Check out this downhill! Nice place for an aero tuck. I taught Mom how to do that.


Mom after 40 miles, still practicing great form on the bike.


Lake Dillon had a relatively large flotilla out in force!


Another shot of the lake.


My mom is a badass. Don't worry if yours isn't; they can't all be this cool.

The ride was dedicated to our faithful pooch, Scully, who loved Dillon as much as we did. She was a great companion, and will be missed.

So, I just finished formatting this page -- I think it looks great! I started from a template called "K2," made by Gecko & Fly, who I found from a simple google search for "Blogger Templates." I modded it a bit, made my own banner, and that's about it. Looks pretty sweet, huh?

Expect some real content tomorrow afternoon.

Welcome to Nick's Verdict, my journal. Welcome, friends and family, I'm so glad you stopped by. But don't get all mushy on me ... I'm not going to kiss you or anything ... unless you are an attractive, college-aged triathlon babe or something. Then we can talk (or maybe just make out).