another rainy sunday

First: WE DID IT! We elected Barack Obama to the presidency of the United States. For the first time, i voted for the winning guy for president; I also did my (small) part during the campaign, giving what I could in cash money to help the guy win. After 8 long years, we can finally get to work repairing this country and pointing her in the right direction.

Second: Quick race report. Went up to Salem yesterday to ride 'cross at Battle Creek, a former golf course that has now become quite overgrown. The course was flat and fast, and quite muddy in parts. I ended up placing 4th out of 18 women in the Beginner category; helped, no doubt, by the presence of real actual *beginners* - like, "this is my first bike race" beginners. Great to see so many women out - cyclocross is definitely getting more popular among women as well as men. And, keeping with my "strategy" from the past few races, I "allowed" the winner of the A category to lap me close to the end of her 5 laps, and thus didn't have to do another lap. An excellent strategy, though it won't continue to serve me well if I'd like to improve, or (gasp!) upgrade to category B someday.

On the to-do list for today:
#1. Wash my bike from yesterday. Pictures will follow to show just how muddy we got. I washed myself, but the Surly has become encrusted with mud since I was too tired yesterday to wash it.
#2. Ride the Xtracycle in to Eugene and buy a set of rollers off of a guy. With winter almost here, I think I'll want to have a way of riding indoors on days when it is too wet and/or too dark to get out for a good ride.
#3. Go pick up trash with the UO crew after a volleyball game. Evidently we (aka the team) gets paid if we do this. Shouldn't be too hard to go throw some cups and candy wrappers in the trash...

And, almost certainly:
#4. Try out the new rollers; try not to kill myself while learning how to ride on them.