This is going to be a long one… bear with me here.

I have got to fix this late issue I have. Every time I have to be in Loudoun County, I always end up having to "one more thing," and end up leaving 20 minutes later than I intended to. So, as a result, I got to Franklin Park in Purcellville/Round Hill at around 7:14, and our team photo was scheduled for 7:15. Crap. Ah well, not a huge deal as I was the only one who wasn't wearing a team jersey. (D'OH! I forgot to pick mine up before leaving work on Friday.)

Anyway, I also managed to miss the "grand start" of the ride as I had to run back to the car to get my cell phone and cue sheet. I finally hit the road around 8:15 since I my sweet old time trying to pin my number on my jersey. (I finally just took off my jersey to pin it on… hopefully no one was blinded by the sheer whiteness of my torso.)

Best of all, when I put on my helmet, I realized that I completely forgot to replace the liner that I had taken out to wash the night before. Ouch. So the first 8 miles of the ride were spent with scratchy velcro digging into my forehead. (I remedied the situation at the first rest stop by folding some tissue over it.)

The suckier part about starting late is that you end up stuck behind the slower riders. (On the flip side, if you start right in front, you end up getting smoked by the spoke jocks and other overachievers.)

As I rode along, it occurred to me that many people cannot ride their bikes safely, and it really pisses me off. They ride double/triple, swerve all over the road, don't signal, don't say "passing" or "on your left," and (my favorite of all), don't look behind them before trying to pass another biker. You wouldn't change lanes on a highway without checking your mirror and blind spot, would you? It's pretty damn stupid to do something like that when there could be another car or mute biker (e.g., silent passer) right behind you. It's these sort of riders who give bicyclists a bad name to irate drivers… e.g., it gives anti-biker drivers ammo to not respect the riders who do follow the rules. As my dear dad says, "If you want respect, you have to give respect."

Okay, rant over. The route was absolutely beautiful, the weather was perfect, and overall it was just wonderful.

Then, disaster struck.

I was chatting with some of the Babes on Bikes ladies and made the ever-so-stupid remark that my bike was "working really well" (aka, chain was not falling off). Five minutes later, as we're going uphill, I go to shift down to my inner ring on the front, and hear "Clunk!" I say, "Oh man, my chain fell off!"

Then one of the BoB gals looks back and says, "Whoa, your chain broke!"

Oh SNAP!

Literally.

[A quick background for the non-biking crowd. Normally a chain is put on a bike by taking out a pin with a special tool and then reinserting it. I had replaced the chain with a Wippermann chain, which has a special link that eliminates the need for removing a pin every time you want to take off your chain. It's pretty handy, except when said link decides to jump ship as you're riding the bike!]

I jump off and trot back down the hill looking for the link. No luck, as something that's small, grey, and black is virtually impossible to find in gravel/asphalt.

At this point, I'm thinking, "Well crap. I'm totally screwed unless I can come up with an extra Connex link." Then I reflect back on a conversation I had with my dad a few months ago:

Me: "Dad, I replaced the rear cassette and put on a Wippermann chain as you recommended. That Connex link is really neat! Although I should probably buy an extra one in the unlikely event that my chain comes apart while I'm on the road."

Famous. Last. Words.

Fortunately, someone came up and had a chain removal tool, and we remedied the situation by removing a link to connect the two ends together. Chain fixed, I continued on my merry way.

[Side note: I'm a little ticked off at Spokes Etc., as they were the last people to handle the chain. When I brought it in on Wednesday to have two of the chainrings replaced, they shortened the chain to accommodate the new, smaller inner ring. Ergo, they put it on wrong or I had a defective chain. More likely the former.]

I caught up with the rest of the Booz Allen team at lunch in The Plains. Corner Bakery catered the lunch, and it was gooooood. We also had a nice bluegrass-type band playing for us while we sat and ate. We were told that the rest of the ride was much more difficult than the first half, with more hills. I'm thinking, "Oh great, and up until now I thought it was pretty easy!" I kept my mouth shut with that comment as there were many many riders on the ride who ended up walking up basically every hill. Including the dude who was clearly a triathlete, or at least a wannabe triathete.

Turns out it wasn't as bad as I thought. The only bad climbs were off downhill runs, as some riders would slow down so much that I'd have to brake and kill all my momentum since I couldn't pass due to the line of cars behind us. Better safe than end up as a hood ornament.

I stopped by two friends' farms as they were both on the route. Jan wasn't home, but I stayed at Melanie's for about half an hour while we caught up. It was a nice break/rest as the next section was basically down, down, then up. And up again.

The last 9 miles were also nice as they consisted of only the W&OD with a stiff tailwind. I rolled into the fairgrounds around 4, checked my cyclometer, and was pleased to see I had finished the 67 miles in under 5 hours. And I felt really, really good – not tired at all, as if I could do another 20 miles.

Overall, a very good day.

Updated route:

I had 66.something miles on my cyclometer, which may stem from the fact I put about an extra mile or so going up and down Mel's long driveway.

I'll try to make this brief, as I have a bunch of use cases to write up for… well, I can't tell you what since I'll get killed by the DoD if I do, but either way they're time consuming.

Yesterday was the first snowfall of the season down here in the DC area. When I was a little kid growing up in New England, any snow was great because it usually meant at least a delayed school day or cancellation. There was also sledding and skiing to look forward to on weekends. However. Now that I'm all grown up (ha!), snow means having to deal with moronic drivers.

Down here in "NoVa," the annual accumulation of snowfall averages to about 16.6 inches, whereas in Hartford, it's around 49 inches. Basically, I'm used to a lot worse. The low frequency of snow plus the large amount of imported Southerners and West Coasters equals horrific driving conditions when it actually DOES snow… due to the drivers, not the weather.

Around here, as soon as a flake falls from the sky, people freak out. Yesterday's commute to work was NOT fun. At that point in time, it had only just started snowing and wasn't sticking to anything that was above 32 degrees. Snow not sticking on warm road = no accumulation, no ice - just water… you know, the stuff that drops from the sky while it's raining. However, everyone on 66 decided this was just too dangerous and felt the need to go 25 mph. It actually could have been a lot worse - a co-worker driving in from MD had a 3 hour commute yesterday. Yikes.

Going home was a little different. Cass got the day off, as I had to stay late at work and it was down to 25 degrees and still snowing… so I found myself doing my least favorite chore: shopping at the mall. Sadly, I wasn't able to find the perfect gift for my mother OR father (hey, if you're reading this, please drop some hints as to what you want… I can't face the humility of gift cards), but walked out with some new stuff for my own wardrobe. Oops.

(That reminds me - I'm looking forward to the day that this "tunic top" fashion goes out of style - what is this crap? I look like I'm wearing a freaking maternity shirt - clearly not the intention when I'm out at bars/clubs.)

Heading home, the roads were a bit slushier, but not nearly enough to cause any real alarm to my Yankee self. I've got to say, though - Arlington County, the whole purpose of snow maintenance is to plow, THEN salt. Not just "salt salt salt."

I think I need to add a "Launchcast" blog category, since it seems I have at least one post related to it every few months.

I'm sitting here listening to my station, and what should come up? Think… Thanksgiving is no longer the harbinger of Christmas overload - I saw decorations up in Target in effing OCTOBER - so naturally, Launchcast has started shuffling some Christmas albums into the playstream.

I couldn't hit the "Skip" button fast enough for this one:
Christmas Carol Cats - "Deck the Halls"

WHY?! Seriously, why?!

then, if that weren't bad enough… a few songs later:
Jingle Dogs - "Ding Dong Merrily On High"

I kid you not. Who thinks of this stuff? Better yet, who buys music like this?!

President Bush commuted the sentence of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby yesterday, sparing Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff 2 1/2 years in prison after a federal appeals court had refused to let Libby remain free while he appeals his conviction for lying to federal investigators.

Another prime example of the "heads up our asses" administration we have going here. Let's take a step back and look at what's been going on here:

June 23, 2003: Libby meets with Times reporter Judith Miller. During the meeting, Miller says, Libby tells her that Wilson's wife might work at a bureau of the CIA. Libby denies saying that.

July 7, 2003: Libby meets with then-White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer. Fleischer says Libby tells him that Wilson's wife works at the CIA and that the information is "hush hush." Libby denies that.

July 8, 2003: Libby meets with Miller again. She recalls Libby saying he believes Wilson's wife works for the CIA. Libby denies telling her that.

July 12, 2003: Libby speaks to Cooper and confirms to him that he has heard that Wilson's wife was involved in sending Wilson on the trip. Libby also speaks to Miller and discusses Wilson's wife and says that she works at the CIA.

March 5 and March 24, 2004: Libby testifies before the grand jury. In a tape of his testimony, Libby tells jurors that he 'forgot' the information about Plame working for the CIA until he heard it from Russert. Anything he told reporters, he says, was just chatter passed on from that conversation.

Oct. 28, 2005: Libby is indicted on five counts: obstruction of justice and two counts each of false statement and two counts of perjury.

March 6, 2007: Jurors return guilty verdicts on charges of obstruction, perjury and lying to the FBI. A not guilty verdict was returned on one count of lying to an FBI agent.

June 5, 2007: U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton sentences Libby to 2 1/2 years in prison.

July 2, 2007 12:19 p.m. EDT: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit announces its decision refusing to delay Libby's prison sentence.

July 2, 2007 5:25 p.m. EDT: President Bush commutes Libby's sentence, sparing him from a 2 1/2-year prison term. Bush leaves intact a $250,000 fine and two years probation for Libby.

(thanks to washingtonpost.com for the timeline of events.)

So, here we have good ol' Scooter blabbing the identity of Valerie Plame on more than one occasion to more than one person, and then denying he did that. Unfortunately for Scoot, the jury believes otherwise and sentences him to a prison sentence. Libby whines a lot, tries to get them to delay his sentence so he can file a half-assed appeal while sipping gin and tonics in his pool, and throws a fit when he hears that he'll end up in the can after all. Bush, being a good ol' honest boy himself, thinks Libby's delayed sentence will have an adverse effect on the gin industry and overturns his conviction.

Okay, so maybe it didn't go exactly that way. But based on Bush's previous reasoning for such decisions, I wouldn't be surprised if he thought, "Well hey now, if I didn't have to go for jail for all those drunk driving and drug possession charges, then why should Scoot have to be punished for a slip of the tongue?" (May I add a "slip of the tongue" usually means it happened once, and the owner of said tongue immediately regrets saying it… but in Scooter's case, he may as well have typed it on one of those scrolling LED belts and flaunted it around D.C.)

Anyway, so Bush abuses his power, commutes Libby's sentence, and then acts all surprised because everyone (well, everyone except his wife, Cheney, and those who have an IQ lower than 75) is pissed at him for letting the slimeball walk:

At a time when his popularity is as low as any president's in modern history, Bush's action also defied public opinion. Shortly after Libby was convicted in March, three national public opinion polls found that seven in 10 Americans said they would oppose a pardon of Libby.

This whole saga reminds me of that South Park episode where Cartman goes on the Maury Povich show pretending he's an out-of-control kid in order to win prize money:

"Maury, I am out of control. Yeah, I use drugs. I can do what I want, bitch! I don't go to school and I kill people! What-evah! I'll do what I want!"

So Bush… what-evah! He does what he wants!

"Only a president clinically incapable of understanding that mistakes have consequences could take the action he did today." -John Edwards

Even though I've posted this under "Rants," I'm going to try my best not to make this into a wild-eyed ranting entry. Really.

It seems nowadays nearly every minivan or SUV sold has a DVD player/console in the back. Perhaps automotive makers were reflecting on their experiences with their own spawn getting antsy and impatient during long trips, thus inspiring them to thing of new ways to keep them quiet other than traditional road games. Fine. Having been in that backseat myself for 6+ hours at a time, I wouldn't have minded the same sort of luxury usually reserved for airline passengers once in awhile.

HOWEVER. It drives me absolutely up the $#%^ing wall to see parents who have this "convenience" turned on every time they back out the driveway. I find it hard to believe that parents in the parking lot of the grocery store with their soccer-uniform clad kids are driving more than 30 minutes and thus need to put "Finding Nemo" in for the "long trip home." Bull. The real reason is that parents are recalcitrant to actually discipline their kids when they get bored, so the easiest thing to do is to shove them in front of the TV so they'll shut up and Mommy can yap on her cell phone.

Okay, so that last sentence is probably just a generalization, but you get my gist. What really gets me is that today's parents seem to care less and less about what goes into their children's heads.

To me, every time I see the flickering light of a DVD console in the back of someone's minivan on a weeknight, I think parents are directly contributing to the overall "dumbing down" of kids today. "Scientists have found that watching television before the age of three could damage a child's ability to learn. And research into children aged five to 15 discovered that those who spent the most time watching television were least likely to leave school with qualifications."

In reality, it doesn't matter how old children are when it comes to the negative effects of excessive TV. Another study by the University of Washington in Seattle, looked at the maths and reading abilities of almost 2,000 children. It found that television viewing among under-threes seemed to harm learning ability, concluding that toddlers learned far better when they actively took part in word and number games. In addition, it has been reported that children under two should not watch television because it increases the risk of them developing attention deficit disorder. "Watching too much television increased the child's likelihood of being unable to pay attention in school, and each hour a day in front of the TV increased by 10% the chance that the child would show signs of disorder," the study found.

I can't go on and on about the negative effects of TV and claim that I never watch it and it's a horrific invention, because that would be a total lie. When I was growing up, my parents limited the amount of TV I was able to watch. At the time, I absolutely hated the "half hour" rule, but looking back, I'm glad they instituted it. Consequently I became a reading fiend and was able to survive those long car trips by bringing along a stack of books.