nothin' new

Quiet weekend for the Hopkinson household. We, well by we I mean 'I', did very little. Saturday I cleaned the house in preparation for mum and dad coming tonight, whilst C was throwing a 'baby shower' for Mo. That went well and everybody had a good time by all accounts. Of course C was stressing about it all, what's new?, but it went off without a hitch. Saturday evening we headed over to Mo and James for a few beers with a bunch of their friends from NY and out of towners. We head a great evening, Kimi was thoroughly pissed and was funnier than ever, and as soon as the Champagne bottle opened my wife's louder, more belligerent, alter ego joined the party too. Thanks James! One sip of Champagne and it's like Jekyll and Hyde, still she did fall asleep in an instant when we got home.

Sunday we headed to the Irish pub for breakfast. In theory it was a great idea - a full Irish with all the trimmings - black and white pudding, tomatoes etc - but they let me down. The bacon was tasteless, only one banger and about 7 baked beans. We won't be going there again.

Sunday afternoon consisted of quality napping, watching the movie Sin City - great movie, I love the visual affects, and the fact that some incredibly hot women wear very little for about 2hours. Truly marvellous. Bean slept all afternoon with all 3 cats so she was perfectly happy. I could have made a purr-fect joke there but I restrained myself.

I hit the weights in the evening and got a bit carried away on the squats. I normally to 1 light warm up set, and then three heavy (for me) sets. I ended up doing 6 sets. I'm surprised my knees even move today. I've changed my squats a little, I put my bench behind my arse now, as my knees can't go past about 90 degrees with any significant weight on the bar. Good thing, is my leg curls are increasing in weight on my bad hamstring, but I still can't curl very much. Once they feel good again, I'll start doing dead-lifts once more. I ought to consider doing up body. I don't want to be fast and fat!!! Got to look buff for the wife.. or bmx moms! I only said consider, so I'll procrastinate for a few more months..

The new Clayborn cruiser frame should be here this afternoon, looking forward to that. Put the One up for sale, almost complete bike for about $300. It'll pay for the Clayborn and then some I guess.

My team idea is starting to take shape. I have made some good contacts and got some people interested in supporting me. I'd like to do something to help other kids out, get them to races, help with fees or kit or something. I love riding for Groove Merchants, Jamie is awesome, but I think so much more could be done, and I'd love to be able to get enough support that I can do something for those less fortunate than myself. We'll see, it may work out, it may not, but no harm in trying right..

Mum and dad here soon, very excited. Sod work this week.

$300. Tires also to go with wheels. Get in touch if interested.

new forks and bars..

Sex is on Fire

not my sex, but if you're a King from Leon (somewhere in France?) apparently your sex is! Still, bloody good record and I have purchased their new album from iTunes, as well as The Music's Strength in Numbers, their first album in 4 yrs. A great band. However, being new to KoL, I also realize how far behind my music collection is, and also my taste. There's me looking at Dire Straits and Genesis, and there are all these new bands to check out. Sutty, help me out here, recommend me some sounds please?

This past weekend, we were Boston bound for Crappo and Dave's wedding. It was an excellent time and I got to meet some of Beans friends from Uni as well including Megan Glaser, who had me in stitches the entire weekend! She was awesome. Also got to hang out with Jamie Nugget too which is always a treat. The wedding was great, went off without a hitch, although Crappo's younger brother decided to go for dinner with friends rather than attend her rehearsal dinner. Tosser. He also didn't want to come to the wedding cos she voted democrat. Complete tosser, and dumb ass wife too. I think he had to write L and R on her shoes so she could put them on properly. Sorry, Crappo. However, other than that, both Megan (Crappo) and Dave have a great family, although it's definitely a mine field trying to negotiate who has been married to who. However, Dave has a great brother, Josh - a teacher in Japan, who gave a great speech. He was a great guy and rides a Yamaha V-Max. You need big nuts to ride one of those. Also, Dave's dad owned several Vincents, and other classic English motorcycles. For the uneducated, a Vincent is about the equivalent of an E-Type Jag or Aston Martin DB5. Art on two wheels. My wonderful wife also gave an excellent speech. She never fails to amaze. I know I piss her off a good deal by being a muppet, but I am very lucky. She bought a tear to my eye and certainly had Crappo and Dave in tears. One other thing must mention Jenna's boobs. holy shite. how they stayed in her dress all night I'll never know. I think they were in a different State to the rest of her body. awesome.

Sunday we hooked up with Ross and Biz, had lunch and did a little walking and sight seeing, then headed home. A great weekend for sure.

Note to self. Don't try and use Jamie as an ally to buy a new car. She knows too much about cars and said the one I wanted was boring. I wasn't really onto a winner, but that blew my argument completely. damn.

Monday was work and more time at ManTech, I think they should be paying my salary at the moment. Tuesday was Veterans Day, so we unofficially had the day off. I did some work stuff in the morning, and seeing nobody was responding to emails, I headed to Severn and rode with the guys. Finally got a nice, consistent, line in the rhythm section. Pick up over the roller, jump little step, jump off backside roller to next roller, jump table, double, then manual onto the step up and bump jump the little double. Sweet.

Also got a nice pic of me in BMXToday, NBL's magazine, from Woodward National last month.

Got to hit the weights tonight, everybody seems to be stepping up and I seem to be doing nothing... again! Still last week, I hit 240lb (110kg) for 10 on the squats, after 3 sets of 20 at 190lb, so not too bad. I have been trying to avoid killing my knees and also working my weak hamstring too. As soon as the weather gets cold, my legs start to hurt. I need to move to Florida.

Mum and Dad are here on Monday, I can't wait. However, I have just been hit with several major proposals. Bollox.

Nice one my son, nice one

So we have an African-American President elect, bout fooking time too.

Am so happy he won. I really hope this will make a difference, that he won't just be a figurehead, but will be as important as Kennedy, Washington and the other great American presidents. And thank goodness we have got rid of Chief MonkeyBollox and Muppet 'Dubbya' Bush.. I can't find another way to describe the man.

I spent election night with C's company down in DC. It was wild. People were going mad, the streets were full of people running around, cars honking horns, people hugging, it was darn cool and I am very glad I was there thanks to the wife.

It will be interesting to see how the next 4 yrs plays out, it certainly can't be any worse for sure, and I think Obama is strong enough to be his own man and make the difference. I really am quite excited.

Now, if we can get him to endorse a bmx track in every major conurbation, built by Hudu, then it will be a right result..

Off to Boston tomorrow for a wedding. Should be fun. Am expecting at least one drunken fight or argument, and I am sharing a room with my wife and two other chicks. Boobs everywhere. Lovely jubbly.. :)

Call Norris, I've just set a world record!

According to my trip computer on my road bike during my 15m loop I hit a top speed of 79.2mph on Friday night! I'd like to believe that I am fast but that's pushing it. However, one point to note, the computer was spot on for my averages and for distance, so maybe I did really hit 79.2mph and maybe I am just fast as fook, so I am going to give Norris McWhirter a call and get my self on Record Breakers with Roy Castle and his trumpet..

Other things, hit ABA Severn after its rebuild. It's gone from being a fun play track, to "oops I've just left a nugget in my pants" crazy scary track. The first two straights are the same, but after the second corner a steep double, an even steeper and short table (like a spine almost) into a step, followed by a rhythm section that would be at home on most euro tracks, steep and deep! Scaring the poop out of people, which is perfect cos all the locals don't have a clue how to ride anything else. It consists of a steep roller, step up with roller on backside, roller, table, 3 three rollers, step up/step down. The last jump is shady, just not finished properly, but I guess it will settle in. It is mad. I've crashed in it a couple of times and I love it. This is the first time I have ridden a track since living here that made me really think and really pushed my ability. Needless to say local rippers had it dialled, Troy Farmer and Josh Grimes made it look easy. I am not so keen on the third straight, I can't hit it fast. The take off on the double was really shady and after a 'moment' I decided to play it easy and just float over it. Once it has wintered thought it will be awesome. At last Severn has stepped it up big time. I'd say tougher than most NBL tracks I've been to now. Great fun.

So as you can guess all I did was ride this weekend. Bean hit her bosses party on Saturday night. I didn't go which caused a minor war, but I wasn't feeling it. Sunday her allergies were really bad again and she spent most of the day in bed. Not sure what is causing this, but I think its being inside with the cats more on the weekend. It rarely happens during the week because she is not around them enough. We are going to have to start vacuuming the cats for their dander.

It's election day tomorrow if you didn't know. And if you had been trying to hide under a rock to avoid it all, don't worry McCain had a plan to get under that rock with you. He's a feckin geriatric and should be in a home under supervision, not running for presidency. Which leads me nicely to my conspiracy theory about the US anyway. How can a country so powerful allow people like George Dubbya and now potentially McCain run the country?? I want Obama to win desperately, but he's too much of his own man, how will 'they' control him. Call me Fox Mulder if you like..

a little cruiser action from Woodward..

long time coming..

.. my blog update that is, not my sex life!

Well I suppose 2 weeks isn't really that long in the grand scheme, but apparently people have been waiting for my update. Well my wife has, and now I have mentioned sex in the first line, I'll be in trouble when I get home.

Where have I been I hear you ask? I'd like to say exploring new climes, venturing into the unknown, rocking the bmx, but nothing so exciting. In fact I have been stuck in a conference room for 2 weeks straight working with our partner on $130m and $6.6bn project. Yep, $6.6bn. I can't imagine what that would like in quarters (25c pieces mum), but I bet it would take some patience to stack it in nice little piles. We are coming to the end of the draft sections so I am back in the office and catching up on stuff. I have had time to update at home, but truth is the last few weeks have been pretty intense, and even though I have been working regular hours I have been blown away mentally by the time I get home. TV, dinner and bed has been the limit.

Random things to update on then.

First off, shout to my buddy John Paul Pfeiffer for his results at the South Carolina national a couple of weeks ago. JP took 4 from 4 in 26-34x and 30-34cr, not bad for an old fella.. :) John and I hit the 35-40 class after Christmas, damn I'm getting old.

I raced the VA state champs and came away with State No.1. Kind of cool. Sadly the guys in my class didn't show, well only 2 others, and it was pretty lame on a shite track. Sorry Richmond. The weather didn't help, but it really is piss poor. Still I hear Tom Ritz is coming in to rebuild and the people at Richmond are really committed to developing the place and facilities so that's super cool. Behind the track is a set of trails that would have DC Blog Icon wetting his pants. It's such a contradiction - poop track, unreal trails. I hit some of them, but the main line was feckin' ridiculous.

I started running again, and then stopped. I was totally into it but on my third night out, I got cramped up real bad, stopped, slipped on wet leaves and pulled my hamstring. Took me an hour to walk home. Fook that. Either I am buying a treadmill or I'll start the running again when I finally knock bmxing on the head when I'm 50 or something. So I've been tentatively trying to stretch it out as this weekend looks good for riding. I've chucked the road bike on the turbo trainer and am doing 45 mins a night on that, some spinning, some sprints, some high resistance just so my legs keep moving.

Here's a thought I had the other day. No matter what I'd like to believe, I don't really train, and when I do, very rarely do I kill myself. I do ride a lot however, almost daily when its warm. So the question is how can I still snap and stay with somebody that can squat 500lb for fun and guys that train their arses off? How is that physically possible? If I don't have the same strength as them, how can I ride with them? I can't figure this out, it shouldn't be possible should it? of course sprinting on a track is not the same as pumping out squats, although uses the same muscles but I don't understand the mechanics of it all the same.

Warlock had his Kuwaraha nicked. Bastards. String them up by the knackers I say.

The ABA and NBL schedules are out, and what a load of shite they are. Not sure how much racing I'll be doing over the next yr. Nothing at all local, except Christmas Classic and Woodbridge, after that I have to saddle the horse and trek into the wilderness to ride my bike. Pissed off about that, and one more nail in my coffin of motivation. If I had the skills I'd just ride trails, wear tight jeans and change my name to Daisy.

Got some great photos of Charlie, from my bro last night. He's a great looking little kid, hate missing him growing up. I don't know him at all and he doesn't know me. Also some cute pics of Bobbin Eames too. Thankfully she looks like her mum so will be fine. I hope we have a little girl too. 2010 is the yr according to the wife. I'm already giving my 'boys' a pep talk..

little bleeder

Nope, we haven't got one on the way, I just managed to pump what felt like half a gallon of blood from a 1 inch wide gash on my leg yesterday! Over shot the big doubles to flat bottom, foot blew off the pedal and spun round in to my shin. I had a dirty set of Shimano DX's buried in my leg and when I pulled it out, blood went every where, including up my arm! How it got up there I don't know. Freaky thing is, no pain whatsoever, just lots of bleeding. A bit of gaffer tape and I carried on riding for another 30mins but I must have done something to my hamstring too as that went very tight and is extremely sore this morning.

So, what a beautiful weekend, temps in the high 70's and low 80's all weekend. Gorgeous. Saturday we headed to Rockville to help Ma and Pa Laurence move into their new abode, about 500yrds away. Cheaper rent I guess. We had a fun day actually, although I am glad it wasn't done in the middle of summer as I was getting a bit of a sweat on. I am a sweaty bugger for sure. Hormones or something!! It was good to catch up with them after their latest European odyssey. We also took the couches for an outing, well they needed the fresh air. We borrowed Ben's awesome Lincoln Mark LT pick-up and took our old sofa to be sent up to Hannover on the moving truck, but when we had done that, we realised there was no way we were going to be able to get the new sofa into our house. It was just to big to get through the back door or down the stairs. So our old sofa is back in the basement again.

Saturday night we went to a restaurant called Crisfield in downtown Silver Spring. Been open since 1945. The decor looked like it was from an old battleship circa 1945 as well. It's a fish restaurant, that is supposedly famous with the locals. We thought it would be cheap and fun. Apparently not cheap, and not all that good either. I'm in rush to go back soon. Still it delayed C having to go to Outback with me for another week. I've been here over 2 yrs now and still not been there, it will happen. NMKY has a plan to cross the USA in a camper for his 40th, mine will be to go to Outback and wallow in kitsch and tackiness to my hearts content. I had a bad case of the farts on the way home too.

Sunday I headed to Southern Maryland track. I've not been there before. In a lovely part of MD and in a great, well managed park, with houses dating back to the 1660's, kind of cool. Also it was next door to Budds Creak Motocross track, home of the 2007 or 08 Moto des Nations I think.
The track was great fun, first two straights were so long. I would say probably longer than P'boro's first two straights, you were blowing by the time you got to the second corner. The second straight was awesome fun. Three progressively longer doubles, with a long triple into the corner. Sadly the only way to get the speed to jump the triples was manual and tap through the first three doubles, jumping them was not giving me any momentum all, backsides were too shallow. But for an ABA track this was pretty aggresive, nothing like Preston back home, but really good fun. Apparently I am only the second person to jump the triples too. Had a great day out with Bruce, Jason and their kids. Cody and Little Jason are fun, they spend more time ragging each other than riding which is great to watch. I got the win in a rather broad age range of 14x to 35x! good for the legs if nothing else. Will be heading back for sure.

Dropped some new black S&M Race Forks and Chrome S&M Slam XLTS's on my bike over the weekend. It looks awesome, really stoked with it. I am thinking maybe a chrome .38 Special for next yr?

On the subject of Chromo, NMKY go or it, either one rocks..

Yesterday was Columbus day, after Sir Christopher of course. Not sur what he, founded America, who knows? But I had a semi day off. Our building was closed, so I did some adminny stuff at home in the moring, some jobs for C around the house and yard, and met my mate Chris in the evening to ride and promptly spurted blood on Severn BMX track. Sweet.