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I didn't ride today. Having ridden daily for the past week, I felt quite tired last night. Muscles require rest for recovery. Instead I got out the parts and began to assemble the bike. It looks good. Most of it has come together well. Once I get the stoker stem and seatpost, I can put on the last set of handlebars and finish her up. Then it will be a second going over to tighten nuts and taking her out for a test spin. For the first ride, I am thinking someplace without too much stress. Just a smooth run for a shakedown ride. The parts will be in for the weekend trail grand opening but right now the forecast is for rain. That would really dampen (pardon the pun) the festivities. Now I have a job to reassemble the axle of the old rear wheel so it can resume duty. That shouldn't be that hard. Just messy. I will be working some additional days for Joe this week. A little extra income considering the possibility of reduced income in days ahead. And coming in less than 4 weeks, the

The future comes so quickly for us. These images based on the Calvin and Hobbs Comic Strip remind me that it is coming quickly for my little guys.

36 days to the Safari, 191 lbs I ordered all the parts for the new tandem. So far they are all in transit. Some of them are backordered and will take a little time to arrive. The bolts that secures the eccentric are missing and I don't know what size to get. Maybe the emails I sent requesting info will come today.

"The secret of happiness is.... low expectations" Barry Schwartz This is an oft repeated refrain. Schwartz claims in his TED lecture that having too many choices reduces freedom, encourages disappointment, and assigns blame to the individual. I like it. I don't have a way to test how true either premise is but I know the idea about happiness is reasonable. There just isn't enough of an individual to cover all the intellectual ground there is to cover but I think I am going to just take this one and run with it. I am going to lower my expectations and reduce the number of choices available to myself. In fact I have already done so in many situations. I eat the same cereal day after day. I order the same meals at the same restaurants time after time. I stick with the same patterns in work, play, and exercise. And I think I am happy. I should go for the pleasant surprise.

The weather guys got it right. The area wound up with 2 to 4 inches of snow. It didn't affect travel but it would have been a miserable task to break camp with snow and ice on everything. There will be better weekends to do the overnight hike. Now it warms back up over the week to bike riding kind of weather.