Stan’s Obligatory Blog

This afternoon, Susan and I went to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Bank of America is having a promotion where having a BofA credit card is good for free admission there on the first weekend of the month.

We went to see the “Los Angelenos” exhibit. For some reason, the opportunity to see the art collection of Cheech Marin was just too good to pass up.

Afterward, we went to see the Contemporary Art building. That was interesting. We saw a lot of nice art, and some pieces by famous recent artists as well. I think the giant balloon animal was our favorite.

Before we left the park, we took a walk around the tar pits. As always, I’m amazed at plants that grow right in the middle of the tar.

Today’s ride was the route I made up last May. The intention was to come up with a route with as few hills as possible.

We started out from Victory Park in Pasadena and headed east. The route goes all the way out to Glendora, and then makes a loop back through Covina to Irwindale. This includes a couple of nice roads that are just slightly downhill. Just enough that we can feel strong and ride fast.

Of course, I got the obligatory picture of Susan with a packet of Gu.

Our snack stop was at Planet Cookies in Monrovia. Then we headed home through Sierra Madre. This involved a little bit of uphill riding, but it was still a pretty flat ride. Our average was about 16mph, and we were home by 11:00.

43 miles.
cycling

On Friday night, I took Lucinda and her friend to see the fireworks show in South Pasadena. We’ve been to this before, and it’s usually a pretty good show.

We got there and took our places on the artificial turf. That was a little weird. Sitting on fake grass that had fake dirt underneath it. The fake dirt was made of ground-up tires. So it was a totally un-natural experience. But it was soft and pretty comfortable. So I guess that’s just how it goes.

The show was good. They didn’t waste any time. As soon as it was dark, they started up. And right after the climax at the end, the lights came on, and everyone went home. No wasted time or motion.

It was a fun time.

Today is the July 4th holiday. Lucinda is off at the Sierra Madre parade with her friend from school. And there’s no official bike club ride. So Susan and I made our own.

We started out from my house, and almost immediately, I got a flat.

In Monrovia, we saw some people riding horses. The adults had big horses, and the kids had little kid-sized horses. Then we crossed the San Gabriel River and took the Santa Fe Dam bike path down around the top of the dam. We rode all the way to the far end of the dam just to see where the path went. Apparently, it just goes until the dam ends, and there’s just a little turnaround loop.

On the way back around the dam, we noticed the flood gauge on the inside slope of the dam. I guess the numbers indicate elevation above sea level.

We stopped for water at Encanto Park in Duarte on the way back. It was pretty hot. But it was a fun little ride.

37 miles.
cycling

On Sunday afternoon, Susan and I went over to Beverly Hills to visit the galleries at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. The two current exhibits are:

• Ink and Paint: The Art of Hand-Drawn Animation
• Pulling Back the Drapes: Set Decoration Revealed

I’ve been to these sorts of things before, and they’re always fun to see.

The animation exhibit was interesting, and we got to see a lot of original artwork from cartoons from the 1940s to the 1960s. And upstairs, we saw parts of sets of quite a few recent movies. We saw Indiana Jones’s desk. Too bad he was denied tenure. We also saw The Chief’s desk from “Get Smart“, got our picture in the cave with the Mark 1 suit from “Iron Man“, and Susan poked around the props from “The Spiderwick Chronicles“.

It was a fun little afternoon, and we finished off with dinner at the French Quarter in West Hollywood.

Sunday morning’s ride was the La Tuna Canyon route, complete with the four-mile uphill that I love so much.

The ride out was pretty uneventful. We caught up with a group of three riders on Glenoaks. They turned off and took a shortcut to La Tuna Canyon Road. When we started climbing, Jon caught up with them. The rest of us were catching up to them when I got a flat. So that was that. Susan took the picture for the Flat Tire Gallery.

A little farther up the canyon, we saw a nice set of abandoned couches on the side of the road. At the top of the hill, we stopped for a few minutes before heading down the other side into Montrose. We rode around the weekly street fair there, and then up Hospital Hill to our snack stop at Goldstein’s Bagels.

After the stop, we rode down the hill and back into Pasadena. We took a left at Windsor Road to go up into Altadena. We took a small detour to see Charles Richter’s old house. Then we took Mendocino back across Altadena and then down the hill back to the park.

41 miles.
cycling

Just a couple of parrot pictures. There is a large colony of feral parrots that live somewhere nearby, and I see them around my house most days. So I tried taking a few pictures of them just for fun.

As always, my camera rocks.

Today’s club ride was the “La Mint” route. This is a bit of a misnomer, in that the La Mint restaurant no longer exists, and then we stopped at the Bagelry instead of the restaurant that was formerly known as La Mint. But it was still a nice ride.

We met at Arcadia Park in Arcadia. While we were waiting, I saw some women doing some sort of training that involved them taking turns looping an inner tube around each other and running while pulling the other along.

The route went pretty much straight east all the way to San Dimas. We stopped at the Bagelry on Lone Hill Ave, which was pleasant. From there, we had a choice of routes home, and we chose the longer one.

Riding back through Covina, we had to stop along the way because Silvio got a flat. So I took the picture for the Flat Tire Gallery.

After fixing the tire, we turned south and headed into the hills near Bonelli Park. We took a somewhat roundabout route through there, which was nice, even though a few of the hills were pretty steep. By the time we made the top of the last hill, I was running out of time. I needed to be home by 1:00, so Susan and I didn’t stop to wait for everyone else. We just kept going and headed straight for home.

Around Encanto Park in Duarte, my phone rang, and I found out that I had more time than I’d thought. So we were able to slow down a bit. We stopped for water at the park, and then when we left, I heard that unmistakable “PANG!” sound of a spoke breaking. My back wheel went gimpy, and I had to stop to mess with it with the spoke wrench so the tire wasn’t rubbing on the frame. Then we continued home, albeit at a reduced pace.

In Arcadia, we saw Gene on his way home. He must have been riding pretty fast, since we’d last seen him miles back in Covina. Then we turned and headed back across Sierra Madre to home.

It was a nice ride, even with the broken spoke. And we made it home at 1:01, which wasn’t bad.

57 miles.
cycling

People from Foothill Cycle Club may have noticed that the pictures from this morning’s club ride don’t include any pictures of Susan. She had to go back to New York for the weekend for a funeral. So now I’m just watching her plane as it crawls its way back home across the continent…

This Sunday’s ride was a route that I made up a couple of years ago. It’s a ramble through La Crescenta and Tujunga, with a sightseeing stop at the house where they filmed “E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial“.

It was hot today, and that made riding up the hills even more of a joy than usual. But it was still fun. We rode up through La Crescenta, and then straight up Rosemont to the top. There was a sign near the top warning us that mountain lions have been seen there. So we attempted to maintain a brisk pace. Then west across to Tujunga, where JJ got a flat.

After fixing the tire, we headed up the hill going up to Elliott’s house. That’s something like a 15-18% grade. There was a house with sprinklers that were watering the street, so we all rode through the spray to cool off. At the top, we took a picture in front of the house before heading back down.

Coming down Tujunga Canyon Road, we stopped at a little park to get water, since we were running out. Then down into Montrose, where we stopped at Oven Fresh Bakery.

After the stop, it had gotten quite hot. So we had a secret ballot and voted to take a shortcut home. It was a nice ride, but pretty hot today.

37 miles.
cycling