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October 24, 2005
Big weekend 
photo of me on Pinky by Jonathan Maus
It's been a big weekend. Jon has done his first marathon, the Detroit Marathon, that I hope to do if and when I ever get fast enough.
Friday, I made contact with the career counselor guy. I have an appointment this Friday. I'm tremendously excited!
Friday night, my beloved and I went to our favorite restauranteur, to see how he did on his first marathon. He finished in about the same amount of time as Jon, 4:47, and he also had a hard time, and felt like he was too slow. "Nothing went well that day. I hurt from the first mile". But he has the bug, and he's already thinking about Portland next year, and was asking if I was planning on doing it. Hell, yes!
Saturday, I went to the Urban Planning open house. There were a lot of people there. It was all very interesting. There are some big holes in my knowledge, like, would I like doing this for the next 10 years or so? Maybe. Dunno.
Sunday was Slug Velo's Fall Colors ride. There was a great turnout, and it was really cool to recognize people from previous rides. As I was chatting with someone, here comes Hollie, riding down the street. Turns out she has a broken leg, but she's a bit of a tiger (as you all know), so she's bicycling. Huh? I don't know how that works either, but it was lovely to see her and get to chat for awhile.
Jonathan from Bike Portland was also there, so we talked about our tremendous need for more mapping applications. I've been obsessed with the subject now for a couple of months, but have been a bit cowed about it. Talking about it made me want to get home and get right on it.
I fell into a big conversation about neighborhood activism with a St. John's neighborhood activist which continued from the ride through lunch at the Lucky Lab. Maybe it was just natural after spending part of the day thinking about planning the day before, but I was totally framing my arguments, and his, in planning.
The colors were gorgeous. It was fun to ride through Sellwood, which has some nice quirky gardens and houses, and as usual, it was gratifying to realize, wow, I biked from NE to Sellwood, and then to Yoko's, and then to the Lucky Lab! This is doable. This is fun!
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Oh, and there's one of everything even without the internet: the Hummer LX Tactical Folding Bike. Bright black and safety yellow, of course.
The other day, walking around Portland, I saw a security guy on a, wait for it! Wait for it! A Smith and Wesson bike! So I asked him about it, and he said he gets asked about it ALL the time. Imagine!
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I'm feeling a bit shell-shocked this morning—my next door neighbor died.
In some ways, it's not a huge surprise. She went to live with her daughter in late spring, and she had alzheimer's as well as a heart condition and sickle cell anemia. I lived next door to her for 11 years, which is 8 years longer than I've lived near anyone but my parents, and Katie was like a wonderful aunt to me. She chided me about the yard constantly, but was always there for me, seemingly always happy to see me. I'm really going to miss her.
Posted at October 24, 2005
Comments
I'm sorry about your neighbor. Glad you had a nice weekend. I read an interesting article in "More" magazine about reinventing yourself after 40. As much as I enjoyed the article, reading it in a magazine I got from my mom for women over 40 was kinda unnerving! :-O
Posted by: neca at October 25, 2005 5:14 AM
I am so sorry to hear about the passing of your neighbor. It sounds like you were able to enjoy your weekend. You ride sounds great! And I love the photo of you on your bike!
Posted by: Liz at October 25, 2005 6:19 AM
I'm so sorry about Katie! I love our neighbor and would be crushed if something happened to her. Good neighbors are very important, they can really become a part of your life.
Posted by: cheesepuppet at October 27, 2005 5:46 PM