It's been a while since I've posted anything new. I apologize for being absent, but the fact of the matter is that I've been very busy. It's summer time, so when I'm not working, I prefer to be out and about enjoying the warm weather. Here's what I've been up to since my last update:

• For work I've developed an entirely new CMS system for a client. Lots of coding... quite a bit of time invested.
• Placed 3rd in the Pro category at the Neshaminy Classic mountain bike race. My best race result in quite a while.
• Made the long journey to Maine to visit my family. Some of the highlights of the Maine trip were:
• Driving from Delaware to Central Maine in less than 10 hours and not hitting a moose at 2 in the morning.
• Riding with Bicycle Bob, the Rose kids, and Mattawamkeag Dave in Orono.
• Getting schooled by Bob, the Rose kids, and Dave on their home trails. Those guys have mad skills.
• Swatting black flies and mosquitos.
• Bass fishing with Ernie and Mike.
• Watching Mike try to ride a skateboard deck behind the boat.
• Watching my nephew Tyler play baseball... he's wicked good.
• Eating Pat's Pizza. Not the crappy Delaware Pat's, but the good Pat's in Orono.
• Drinking Geary's Pale Ale. Now that's good beer!
• From Maine I drove to Vermont to visit my friend Brook at his parent's farm. Some Vermont highlights were:
• Riding the Kingdom Trails with Jimmy, Elizabeth, Pete, Brook and Iffy Dog.
• Staying on the beautiful Brouha farm.
• Going to a Sutton, VT town hearing to oppose the construction of a giant wind farm in the Northeast Kingdom. I spoke in front of the hearing panel expressing why I oppose the construction of 400 foot tall windmills along the the ridge tops of the beautiful Vermont country side.
• Seeing Luis Guzman at the Sutton town hearing (he plays the chef who explains what the goat is in the movie Waiting). He owns a farm in Sutton.
• Drinking Trout River Scottish Ale, brewed locally in Lyndonville, VT. I'm usually not a big fan of Scottish-style ales, but Trout River got it right, it's delicious!
• Eating 6+ pounds of Vermont cheddar in three days.
• I went to Chesapeake City to eat way too many crabs at the Tap Room with Marc, Diane, Amy and Kathleen. Marc put on a clinic on how to eat crabs.
• Racing to another 3rd place in the Pro category at the Fairhill Classic. Two out of town chumps beat me on what I consider to be my home course... some day I'll get a win.
• Saw the Phillys beat the Yankees at Citizen's Bank Park.
• Came close to death at the Curse of Dark Hollow mountain bike race. The monster XC (35+ miler) race almost did me in... what a course!
• I gave Big Bush the goat before the start of the Curse of Dark Hollow.
• Spent lots of time with my wife, Kathleen. See has had a few weeks off between residency and her new job. It's been nice having her around more often.

I've got loads of pictures from my Maine and Vermont trip that I plan to post once I sort through them all. Check back, I promise I'll have some new stuff for ya to look at.

Delaware is known as:
"Small Wonder"
"The First State"
and most importantly, "The Home of Tax-Free Shopping"

For my wife, Kathleen, and I Delaware is the vortex of our universe. We have never planned on living in Delaware, but yet opportunities arise that keep us in "The First State." Looks like I'll be a Delaware resident for at least a few more years or possibly until the end of my time...

The vortex first captured us when Kathleen was finishing medical school in Philadelphia. We were currently living in Chestnut Hill, approximately 50 yards from Wissahickon Valley Park, a great place to live in Philadelphia if you enjoy the outdoors. We really liked living in Chestnut Hill, but we both knew that we wouldn't be staying forever. After medical school, all med school graduates are subjected to match day. Match day is the day when every medical school graduate in the United States gets assigned to where they will be doing their residency program. Nobody knows for certain where they will be doing their residency until match day arrives... it's a very nerve wrenching experience knot knowing where you will be spending the next 3-5 years of your life.

The match is not random, but mathematically determined. Potential residents (med students) interview at various residency programs, once the interview period is over, both the potential residents and residency program submit lists containing their choices for placement. Kathleen's list was this: Baltimore, MD (U of Maryland); Portland, ME (Maine Med Center); Wilmington, DE (A.I. duPont Children's); Minneapolis; Alberque; and a few others. Her first choice was Baltimore, so we were expecting to be placed there. When the match lists were calculated by the computer matching system, Wilmington, DE came out on top as the best match. The Delaware vortex strengthens.

Now it is three years later. Kathleen's residency program ends in a month. She has been to many job interviews, most of the interviews were in the greater Philadelphia area (we love Philly), some were on the west coast in Oregon, a couple in Jersey, and a few in Delaware. Wouldn't you know it, the best job offers came from Delaware. Being level-headed folks, Kathleen and I decided that one of the Delaware positions was our best option. The vortex kicks it up a notch.

Tomorrow I start a new consulting position with a local company. For the three years I have been in Delaware I haven't worked for a local company. All of my clients have been located in the Philly area. I guess Delaware really wants to keep us here... at least it's not Jersey!

Last weekend was Memorial Day and the temps got well into the 90?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s, it?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s summer time! This time of year is pronounced "summa" time in Northern New England, where I grew up, like "ca" for car or wicked "pissa" for wicked pisser. The wicked good holiday weekend involved lots of bike riding, BBQ and good times with friends. Sadly my wife Kathleen had to work on Memorial day and missed out on some fine BBQ. Thanks Josh for the delicious pork chops. Here are a few other people I would like to thank for making the kick-off to summer a memorable one:

Memorial Day Treats

Philly soft pretzels

Peanut Butter Kandy Kakes

Elk, thanks for the fresh Philly soft pretzels and Iron City on Saturday Fairhill ride.

Fat Marc, thanks for a fine location to consume Philly soft pretzels after chasing Elk around Fairhill for 4+ hours.

Amy and Diane, thanks for entertaining Kathleen on the fun trails of White Clay and Middle Run.

Tijuana Taco Shop, thanks for making the best beef chimichas I?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢ve ever had. TTS is my favorite restaurant in Wilmington.

TTS?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s Mariachi Singer, dude you rule, and you dress quite impressively.

Buddy B., thanks for coordinating the fine MTB ride at Granouge.

The duPont Family, thanks for being so damn rich and allowing a few lucky MTB'ers to ride on your estate.

Miller Brewing Co., thanks for making High Life.

State Line Liquors, thanks for selling 30 packs of High Life for $12, and stocking Troegs Nugget Nectar.

Matt C., thanks for discovering that drinking a High Life while eating a Strawberry Tasty Kake breakfast bar tastes like a Lambic.

The Yozells, thanks for the fantastic idea to take a dip in Brandywine Creek.

Tasty Kake, thanks for making delicious baked goods, especially Peanut Butter Kandy Kakes.

Kathleen, my Wife, thanks for taking me out to dinner at Tijuana Taco Shop, baking a mean batch of brownies, and putting up with all of my foolish antics. You are the best, Sweetie Puff.

I have added a new photo album which contains some selected photos I took while riding my bike in the Brandywine Valley this spring. The Brandywine is very close to my house, so visit the place often. It is beautiful in the valley year 'round, but spring is exceptionally nice. Spring is now almost over and the hot summer days will make all of us wish for temperate 65 degree spring days as shown in these photos.

If you haven't noticed, every time you visit this site you get a different background image. The image is chosen randomly from a pool of images I have uploaded to the server. A couple days ago I was uploading more images and I took another look at some of the existing background images. I felt that it was a shame that these photos are hidden behind the rest of the crap on this site, so I created a photo gallery of these images. The images that I have been using are primarily winter photos taken in Philadelphia by my friend Greg Klein. The new photo gallery link can can be found in the top navigation bar of this site, I'll be adding more photos soon. Check out Greg's photos here.

The Granogue water tower and mansion near sunset.
It's quite a crib. Photos taken from the Woodlawn Wildlife refuge
located on the other side of the Brandywine Creek.

The Escape from Granogue mountain bike race was this past weekend. Since I moved to Wilmington a few years ago, I look forward to the yearly Granogue mountain bike race. The race course lies approximately 5 miles from my house, and better yet I have a mostly non-paved, no car traffic route that will get me there... you could say that Granogue is my home course, but the fact is that the Granogue Estate is private property (owned by the mighty Dupont family) and is only open for riding on race day, so I only get to ride there once or twice a year.

Saturday morning was race day, it was rather relaxing. I watched a passing rain shower while sipping my coffee. I contemplated whether to ride Big Bird or my rigid one speed, I thought about tire selection, and even considered racing the 30+ age group rather than the leg-breaker expert 19-29yo, semi-pro, elite, pro, pro single-speed category. I do some of my best thinking over my morning cup(s) of coffee. I decided to take Big Bird out to the race, toss a skinnier, mud friendly tire on the rear, and buck up and race the expert 19-29yo, semi-pro, elite, pro, pro single-speed category. I felt good about these decisions... coffee makes me feel good in general.

I packed my large Chrome messenger pack with all of the race essentials, gels (gu), water bottles, granola bars (I hate power bars), pump, tubes, lube, tools, Camelbak and a sixer of High Life (on ice of course). My messenger pack is big, all of this stuff only filled it to a bit over half capacity. I bought the pack because I could fit two cases of canned beer in it or one case of bottles easily. I hopped on the Big Bird bike and did the slow roll over to Granogue, it was a nice ride, I saw a wiener dog in the Brandywine. I like wiener dogs... I think the wiener dog sighting was good luck.

Granogue was packed with racers, it looked to be the best turnout ever for this race. I was fired up, the racers were stoked, Marc V. (Fat Marc), the race promoter, was very happy how everything was coming together. Props to Marc and his volunteers for putting on a top-notch event.

The Chrome backbone, buy this bag if you want to carry lots of stuff.
It holds two cases of beer in cans!

The expert 19-29yo, semi-pro, elite, pro, pro single-speed category started staging around 11:30, I quickly noticed a lot of red jerseys in the group. It seems that all of the Trek VW East Coast squad showed and brought along 6 time 24 hour world champion Chris Eatough from the Trek National Squad. This is gonna be a fast one... Take the Trek "Red Army," the Visit PA team, the fast east coast Cannondale team (including Dirt Rag centerfold, Vegan Rob, AKA "The Hedgehog", and N. Jersey's "Rasta" Tim), toss in a few local pros, a few local joes (me), and you've got yourself a mountain bike race. This was a big field, luckily I had my own teammates, the Mighty Joe Reynolds and Big Bush in this race with me. Joe and Big Bush are both fast cats, little ?¢‚ǨÀúol Wissahickon Cyclery was well represented.

I have a theory about staging for bike races. It goes like this; if you can't get a front row start, start behind the group of riders who are the best dressed and look the most organized. I started behind the Red Army. These guys even had matching socks and gloves, so they gotta be fast right? The race took off fast and furious, I sat mid-pack after the short paved climb, but moved into the top ten by the top of the water tower climb. The water tower is the highest point on the Granogue Estate, it's not a huge climb, but it did the trick of stringing out the race quickly. I even rode next to Mr. Eatough for a brief moment, he took off even more quickly than I caught him, my theory is that he was still trying to figure out how to work the new 2007 XTR prototype shifters on his bike... they sure looked fancy.

Once the race had sorted itself out I found my self battling with 2 Trek dudes and the Hedgehog. It was a friendly battle, all three of these dude were stronger than I. They all would drop me on the wide open climbs, but I was able to make back time of the technical stuff and the downhills... I like going downhill. One of the Trek dudes tried to pimp me at high speed on the last lap going when going into a piece single-track, I shut him down, but it was still was not cool, NBC is the saying... Other than that incident the racing was safe, cool and friendly.

As usual Fuzzy was handing up beer to the racers in need. Fuzz usually has a rest stop set-up next to the creek on the Granogue course. I might have been able to take an additional place if I hadn't swung by Fuzzy's stop on the second lap, but not stopping at Fuzzy's was out of the question... even f I was winning I would have pulled over for a few moments.

When it was all said and done, I rolled across the finish in 7th place. Not my best result, but given the competition I was satisfied with my placing. The Red Army took 4 of the top 5 places, the Hedgehog finished 10-15 seconds in front of me, and Ray Adams from team Visit Pennsyltucky took second which stopped Trek from sweeping the podium. Nice job Ray, it's always nice to see a little guy get a piece of the action.

Next week is the Neshaminy XC just north of Philly. It should be a good one, maybe the race officials will properly put me in the race results at Neshaminy. In the Granogue results I'm listed as Ryan Leech (Wissahickon) in 7th, while the real Ryan Leech is listed as Ryan Leech (Visit PA) in 8th. Next week I have a feeling the local "Joes" are gonna show the Pros what's up.

The black "rat" snake found around N. Delaware.
Harmless, but still a slithering snake...

Yesterday while riding the Woodlawn Wildlife Refuge here in Wilmington I saw my first snake of the year. It was a medium sized black snake. I believe they call these snakes black "rat" snakes, and they can grow to be quite large, up to 8 feet in length! I saw a 6+ footer in Brandywine two years ago, it might have been the largest snake I have seen in the wild. The black snake I saw yesterday was next to a small creek and it jumped in the water once it sensed my presence, and yes, it could swim...

I don't have a problem with any wild animals, but snakes give me the willies, for as long as I can remember they always have. I don't mind the way snakes look, they don't frighten me (well, most don't), but the way they move make my skin crawl... they slither... I don't like the slither. I also don't like how they coil themselves up and unwrap themselves quickly when they sense you coming and totally surprise the crap outta ya. My wife, Kathleen, doesn't like eels, for some reason eels don't bother me, strange.

The Mattawamkeag River, great habitat for eels, not snakes.

Luckily my run-ins with snakes have been very few. Most encounters would be just a peek at the snake just before it slithered into the underbrush. I recall my first snake run-in when I was quite young. I was walking home from elementary school in Mattawamkeag, ME and a fairly large green garden snake slithered across the road in front of me. I waited for the snake to into the tall grass then I clutched my Garfield lunch-box and ran the rest of the way home. A few days later there was a flattened snake in the road near my encounter... the snake was the same length, but a bit wider from being rolled over repeatedly by logging trucks... yuck!

There aren't too many poisonous snakes here in the northeast portion of the US, but there are a few places that have rattlesnakes, mainly copperheads. I've only seen a few of these, but have heard quite a few rattling off in the woods... they are very loud! In the mountains of PA there are quite a few rattlers. West Virginia also has a healthy rattler population. I have been wanting to go to WV to do a mountain bike race called the "Revenge of the Rattlesnake"

A few years ago I had a close encounter with a rattler. It was scary, and I hope it doesn't happen again. The rattler was coiled up in the middle of a fire road near State College, PA at about mile 95 of the Wilderness 101 race course. This fire road was the last descent before the race course turns and follows a creek for the remainder of the 101 mile loop. I was trying to stay ahead of local State College fast guy, Bill Alcorn, Bill was hot on my tail and knows every rock, root and log in the area. At first I thought the snake was a tire in the middle of the road, as the snake was coiled up an staying quite still. I realized it was a snake when I heard the rattle... oh crap! At 30+ mph on a mountain bike I wasn't gonna stop, so I pointed to the right hand side of road an hoped for the best. The snake lunged at my bike as I passed, but it didn't get me, or even worse, gotten into my wheel's spokes... that would have been a mess... whew! I yelled back to Bill that there was a snake, and somehow he maneuvered around the rattler unscathed. After the race finished I asked Bill if he saw the rattler, and he replied simply by saying "yup." Guess Bill is a bit more used to snakes than I. Personally, I could do without 'em!

White Clay Creek's smooth as butta singletrack.

One of the best features of the Middle Run Trail system is that it butts up against White Clay Creek State Park. WCCSP started putting in singletrack a few years ago. The mult-user trail system has grown to include about 25 miles of the smoothest, best maintained trail on earth. The trails at WCCSP has it?��Ǩ�Ѣs own full time trail care crew. The crew does one hell of a job maintaining these trails, I honestly think that the trails are a bit over maintained... they are soooooo damn smooth and buffed out that they could use a couple of logs and rocks added in to mix things up.

Most of the WCCSP multi-use trails (read bike trails) are on the north side of the creek. On the south side of the creek there is a fire road that goes past the WCC Nature Center and heads towards downtown Newark. The fire road is popular with local fisherman. On opening day of fishing season the creek and fire road is jam packed with fishermen jockeying for a place next to the creek to catch some freshly stocked trout... it?��Ǩ�Ѣs one of the biggest cluster f?��Ǩ�Ѣs I?��Ǩ�Ѣve ever seen.

From the Newark end of the fire road, I veered right up the creek bank to hit a small portion of multi-use trail that eventually leads to the frisbee gold course located at the southern most point of the park. This is one of the few places where you can get water. I stopped to refill my Camel Sack and watched some dudes play a hole of frisbee golf. They looked like they were having fun tossing their discs at the metal net, I?��Ǩ�Ѣll have to try frisbee golf sometime. For some reason frisbee golf is extremely popular with the collegiate hippie types.

From hippie frisbee land, the Little Egypt portion of Fair Hill is less than a 2 mile ride on New London and Little Egypt roads. The Big Bird bike rolls quite well on the pavement making quick work of the short stretch of road. Once in Fair Hill I quickly noticed a change in the trail condition from the trails I had just ridden in White Clay and Middle Run. Fair Hill is for the most part, a horse park, and many of the trails are a bit rougher due to the horse traffic. Fair Hill hosts to the Fair Hill International every year, an international 3 day horse event. Some of the obstacles these people ride their horses over are huge, really huge, horses are pretty damn amazing animals. Even with all of this horse activity, confrontations with equestrians are far and few between. Mingled in amongst the horse trails, Fair Hill contains loads of horse-free biking and hiking trails. Another factor that reduces the number of equestrian encounters is that Fair Hill is quite large at 5,613 acres... that?��Ǩ�Ѣs a lot area to spread trail users out on.

Hey man, is that a frisbee golf corse?
Well lets go man!

I eventually made my way to the Fair Hill fairgrounds, home of the Cecil County Fair (I hear that the fair has a good demolition derby), and the fairgrounds are the furthest point from my house this ride would take me. I rode about 15 miles of super nice single track an get from Little Egypt road to the fairgrounds, Fair Hill rocks! I was a little over three hours into my ride when I reached the fairgrounds, I figured I was about half way done this journey and feasted on my PB&J and granola bar. With so much nice trail in such a large area it is easy to burn a few hours riding in Fair Hill.

It was now time to head back towards home, 3 more hours of sweet trail. I was worried that my single PB&J would be enough fuel to get me back home. Luckily for me it was. After close to six hours one the bike I found myself back at my place opening a High Life, the best way to finish such a great Sunday. Here are a few ride stats:

High Life, that's what I was living on Sunday.

• Ride time: 5 hours 50 minutes
• Approximate mileage: 70-75 miles
• Approximate trail mileage: 50 miles
• Number of mechanicals: 0
• Public parks ridden: 6 - Brandywine Springs, Judge Morris, Middle Run, White Clay Creek (in DE), White Clay Creek (in PA, very brief portion), Fair Hill
• Number of other cyclists spotted: about 20 - I saw 12 of these riders in one group. It was a huge group of kids riding the fire road through Little Egypt.
• Granola bars eaten: 2
• PB&Js : 1 (wish I had packed more)
• Post ride High Lifes: 5

Flavor Flav got lucky on reality TV...
Whatever happened to Chuck D?

Where was I... ah yes, Middle Run. Middle Run is an incredibly fun trails system made up of about 20 miles if super fast and twisty singletrack. On the first section of Middle Run trail I met the only other cyclist that I know for the entire day, it was a brief passing. The passing rider was John Thompson, father of Joey Thompson and former race director of the Escape from Granogue race. I figured I would run into a whole bunch of riders I know on this adventure, but I didn?��Ǩ�Ѣt, DE is strange that way. You can be out a all day on a beautiful day and not see a single person on the trails... guess reality TV has a firm grasp on this state.

The American car culture also has a loyal following in Delaware. I don?��Ǩ�Ѣt own a car, I sold my last car about 4 years ago. I sold my last car because it sat in the same place for close to three months without being used, and a friend of mine needed some cheap wheels to get back and forth to work... figured it was a good time to unload it. My work commute is an easy one, I work at home.

I almost always ride my bike to the trails to ride, why wouldn?��Ǩ�Ѣt I? I?��Ǩ�Ѣm going for a bike ride anyway. Most of the riders in Delaware drive their cars to the trailhead to start their ride, I don?��Ǩ�Ѣt understand this. When people find out that I rode my bike to the trail from my house they think I?��Ǩ�Ѣm crazy. The same people who think I?��Ǩ�Ѣm crazy are also are the same people that complain about spending 4 dollars for a gallon of gas. Suckas. The Middle Run trail system is about 10 miles from my house, which is less than a 45 minute bike ride (even on a single-speed MTB). That same 10 mile journey in a car takes about 35 minutes on a quite Sunday morning, the drive can take close to an hour in rush hour traffic. I would much rather spend 45 minutes on a bike than close to an hour sitting in a coffin, in traffic, wasting natural resources and ruining our environment. Yes, a coffin, cars are coffins...

Last weekend could have been action packed, there was plenty to do, including the Greenbriar AMBC mountain bike race. I opted out of the Greenbriar race because I've done the race for the past 6 years and the race course hasn't changed one bit... same 'ol event, different year, time to take a year off from this event. Elk did the race, get a top notch recap on his blog. Instead of racing, the plan was to head to French Creek to bike ride and go fishing with Big Bush and Jude. Due to some logistical issues I did not make it out to French Creek, wicked bummer... I really wanted to go fishing.

My new favorite bar. Peanut Butter is good too!

No race, no French Creek, no fishing, no plans for a beautiful Sunday. What is one to do? I'll tell you what I did. I filled my Camelbak with water, tossed in a couple of granola bars and an PB & J, and saddled up the "Big Bird" bike and hit the road. I set my destination to be the fairground at Fairhill, MD and to hit as much trail as possible getting there... it was good, here is the rundown.

I departed my crib in Wilmington at about noon. Weaved south through the surrounding 'hoods heading towards White Clay State Park and Middle Run Natural Area.

I met Michael Jordan on Sunday

On the way to Middle Run I pass through a small community park, Brandywine Springs Park, that has a small bit of trail. This little park is about at the halfway point to Middle Run from my place, it's a nice break from pavement and traffic... sharing the road sucks. The park was packed, there was a softball game, a baseball game, people paying basketball and loads of people picnicking in the park. It was a super nice day. Of course there is always some dumb-ass kid that has to yell "Lance Armstrong" as I ride buy. This dumb kid was playing basketball... I called him "Michael Jordan."

There was more pavement and church traffic from Brandywine Springs to the back of the Judge Morris Estate. I ripped half of the Judge Morris loop and crossed into Middle Run. I hit the Middle Run trails about an hour into the ride... this is where the real trail riding begins...

To be continued.