Dirt Reunion

Just got back home from a great ride out at Montgomery Bell. I've not been riding on dirt for at least a month and a half. Life has been a little strange these past few months. Studio work slowed down to less than a crawl and I was having to really reconsider my future ideas. I am so fortunate that Beth's business is doing well and continuing to grow and that I can offer her some help with my free time. It was still a time of soul searching without many answers surfacing. I was laying low mainly as a way to conserve money but also as a way to avoid having to face some of the decisions I was trying to make. Being out of town so much helped to keep me busy but also made the whole thing frustrating since I didn't always feel like I could dedicate a lot of time to my thoughts.

I have started working for a studio out in Bellevue this past week and it's been going great so far! I've worked 3 sessions for them already and everyone has been really happy with my work and we all get along well. Between those sessions and filling in for a buddy on some jingle work, I've worked in the studio the past 9 days straight! Talk about a 180 from the past few months. That about equals my past few months of work. We always say the music business can either be feast or famine and no in between and man is that so true. It's strange to be so close to quitting the only career I've really wanted to do since highschool and then have work pick back up again. I know I have some friends who've gone through this same thing with audio engineering, but this was the closest I've come to be totally unemployed since I started.

In all the time I wasn't working I have decided to start a new business. I have taken over the social media department of Beth's company of 1, I mean 2. In doing so, and after lots of research which is on going, I've decided to try and offer my services and knowledge to other small businesses that either don't understand the great benefits of social media for their business or just don't have any desire to learn and take part in it. I'm not sure what this will turn into in the coming months but I've worked out a couple packages to offer and am slowly putting the word out. If it's meant to work out and turn into something I'm sure it will...and if not, I'll be that much better at the job for Freshie & Zero.

Sooo back to the riding part, this is a blog mainly about cycling right? Well atleast for now. I have some ideas on that too for another time. (Anyone with some Wordpress knowledge or tips, feel free to pass them on).

I finally felt like I was ready to dedicate some time back to riding in the woods. I think I was avoiding it a lot too out of guilt of not working much. Sure I had free time, but what should I do with it? Should I be out riding around enjoying myself or should I be hunkered down trying to work out what to do next, professionally? Well, I felt a weight had been lifted this week, even if just for a short time, and I took the opportunity to get back out and ride. The old crew was ready and willing to let me tag along again and join them for some Montgomery Bell dirt.

Thad, Hilary, Hannah, Jeffy and Wendy all came out to ride. It was such a fine morning that the parking lot was packed with people. The trail was in great shape, a little dusty but I'm not complaining. We varied our normal route some and added some new sections in reverse order. I was feeling awesome for the first 3/4 of the ride. I was actually surprised as how well I felt. Thankfully Jeff and Thad kept a very reasonable pace and didn't kill me. I was able to stick close and chat and catch up on life with them as we winded our way through the woods.

I hit the wall after about 11-12 miles and was ready to be done. I'd had enough and didn't want to stay out so long that it stopped being fun. We all decided it was time to call it and got cleaned up and headed in for some El Monte and 2 for 1 Dos Equis. At lunch, I started following the Leadville 100 race on Twitter after getting a text message from Doug that Lance Armstrong was in the lead by 15 min. It was another great example to me about how cool Twitter can be. I was able to just search "Leadville" and then follow all the spectators who were posting updates about the race in real time. Sure people make fun of Twitter... but there are some cool things with it. (by the way, I just wrote a blog, I'll probably mention that on Twitter.) Lance ended up winning the race, setting a new course record of something like 6hrs 28min and rode the last 5 miles on a flat tire. Wow!

Ok so, until I feel inspired for more blogging....sayonara. Time for some pool action and maybe some wordpress research.

Handling

We're back from San Francisco and had a great trip. The craft show was good with a surprising turn out. Unfortunately there were a lot of window shoppers and not many people committing their money. We still enjoyed our stay though. The GoCar tour was a lot of fun. Sure we looked like dorks, but we put a smile on the face of everyone we drove by! We explored Fishermans Wharf, the beach front area near where the craft show was, The Golden Gate bridge, then up and into the Golden Gate park and through some of the famous parts of town like Haight-Ashbury and saw the Painted Ladys. We were both cooked after a couple hours though since the handbrakes were quite hard to use on the buggy and the little lawnmower engine was quite loud. It took us places we never would of gone though even if we had rented a car and the audio tour was great.


We survived a 1 1/2hr flight delay leaving San Fran which made us have to run from gate D6 to gate C12 in the Salt Lake City airport. We just knew there was no way our bags would make it given we only made it by 5 minutes. We also didn't realize until we checked into the airport on our way to San Fran that Northwest airlines is now owned by Delta.... ugh, our nemisis! (Delta = Delivering Everyone Late Through Altanta) To my utter surprise though out bags did make it! It was truly a miracle. On our return trip our big 50 lb bag wasn't searched like it was on the way to San Fran. On the way there they searched it, and of course, repacked it completely differently than I had it packed and things broke. I guess they weren't used to seeing a bag full of carny crafter's display supplies.

Beth has been hard at work the past couple days wipping out wholesale orders. I've been putting in a lot of hours designing and managing her Facebook fan page and Twitter acct. I set up a cool landing page for non-Facebook fans that better shows off her work. Check it out here: Freshie & Zero Fan Page If you like the tweeting with the twitters around the cyber watercooler, here's our Twitter page: http://www.twitter.com/freshieandzero

I finally got back out on the bike a little last night. It had been a couple weeks and I could tell. It was a good thing the roads were pretty dead cus I was using a lot of them. It was such a nice night though and I had the itch for some Yazoo beer and some catching up with friends time. Beth ended up going out and meeting with her Ladypreneurs group and made some great new connections. It was a win win evening, though poor Zero had the spend it our in our (awesome) backyard. I'm sure he was pissed.

Here are the lot of photos from our San Francisco trip.
(click any of them to go to my Flickr page)




Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

time won't let up

It's funny how things progress. You think you know what will happen for the next month, even week, but life has a way of moving at it's own pace, whether that's lightening fast or dsl slow. I always have lots I want to say and put up in this blog, but then I have trouble with the follow through. I get sucked into other, more engaging online activities like facebook/twitter/research etc and then lose the creative surge of energy to update the blog. I also haven't been cycling much lately which leads to not many updates, but I think this will be changing soon. Life has been giving me lots of lemons here in Nashville for a while, but lately it's changed to pears. I'm still not sure what to do with these pears but I hope to document the journey here.

Beth and I are currently in San Francisco, staying at the historic Hotel Vertigo where they filmed the Alfred Hitchcock movie. We just wrapped up the Renegade Craft Fair which was our first show on the west coast. It is my first trip to the left coast as well. We haven't had much time to explore during the day but we've found a few nice cafe's for breakfast and coffee (we're addicts, yes) and of course some fun pubs to unwind in the evenings. We've enjoyed some local Anchor brewing beer and many other Californian beers. Last night we explored the Mission area and ate and drank at The Monk's Kettle. It's a self-professed gastropub and the menu and beer selection didn't disappoint one bit. Upscale pub food, as it was described on their site, completely under-estimates the level of food. Unfortunately the walk from the 49 bus stop down 16th street was not so enjoyable. Wow, we definitely found a seedy area by accident.

We have all day tomorrow to explore the city. We don't have any set plans other than to rent the tour buggy which has a GPS guided tour. Should be a blast if I can get a hang of the motorcycle controls, wonder if it will be front brake on the right or left. We've had a very nice view of the Golden Gate bridge and Alcatraz from the festival pavilion but we're hoping to get a closer look in the buggy.


I've been a busy bee lately emmersing myself in everything social media and learning ways to promote independent, small businesses online. I've setup Beth's jewelry company, Freshie & Zero with a Facebook Fan Page and also a Twitter Acct. If you're interested, follow us, I promise you'll get a much more up-to-date account of our travels and business experiences. I'm hoping that this may become something I can offer to other indie style businesses in the future. I've already talked with one company about it and need to continue brainstorming and follow up. It's all about follow through in life right?

So, hey look, insomnia can lead to productivity! Here are a few pics of our trip so far. I'll most likely wait until my return trip to upload the lot of them to Flickr.

Yes, that is a guy playing the piano, that he pedaled to the show.

random musings

no riding going on here so I've been sitting in front of the computer a lot lately. Doing some Facebook work (yep I said work), Google Analytics learning/setup and basical SEO learning. Today I found out about Drupal. I've been reading up about that over a beer. It sounds awesome...yet another thing with a learning curve for me to get my head around and learn. It's added to the list.

I've been frequenting Crema a lot lately. That place has THE best espresso based drinks in Nashville as far as I'm concerned. I have yet to experience their 'basic' coffee so unfortunately I can't comment or rate that yet. I've been too busy enjoying their other drinks like the cappuccino, americano and the cuban. All have been stellar. I'm serious.... if you know me you know I have a love for coffee but this place is above all else in Nashville. I knew it would be good when I started with their cappuccino and it rivaled those I'd had on my honeymoon in Italy. It's rare to find a place that can make a European style cappuccino. The Cuban is also a treat and is their best selling drink.... basically it's a latte but the cream portion is split between creamer and condensed milk which adds a bit of sweetness. YUM! (oh and they won't gouge you on the price...check it MENU. Cheaper than most in town, including *$)

Anyhow....in my attempt to make the best use of my extra time of late, I've been brainstorming how I can help Crema out. Nothing is planned out yet but ideas are floating around and I hope to have things worked out soon. Stay tuned for more info here....and maybe other places as well, we'll see.

Another random thing I happened upon today as when Crema added me as a contact on Flickr. I was checking out their profile and noticed a group they were a member of.

Baristas and Their Bikes

wow... hehe What an off the wall group yet oddly endearing and cool. Not a lot of photos yet but it's great to see more people in the world enjoying their bikes and proud about it.


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

a little catch up

I'm way overdue for a blog update. Been keeping busy with lots of odds and ends. I've not been riding the bike much outside of weekly polo games. I got out this morning for a meeting over some Crema coffee. Early meeting meant cool temperatures and a great ride through the city. Crema is just down off Hermitage/1st Ave but I took the scenic route to avoid the short stretch through the hood. Got back home with a green thumb and watered, aerated and planted some grass seed. Caught up on the happenin's on the interweb while enjoying the shade on the back porch.




Beth's officially put me in charge of her Facebook page for Freshie&Zero and Facebook advertising. I've been educating myself for the past week and also installing Google Analytics code on her website. It's been tough to sit and wait for data to accumulate but fun to learn new skills. We're starting prep work for the big upcoming wholesale show in Atlanta. After only a day back in Nashville, we head to San Francisco for the Renegade Craft Fair. I'm really looking forward to that trip as I've never been to Cali. I was hoping for a tour of the Anchor brewery but it sounds like their tours are booked up through August. bummer

Filled up my moving karma last week by helping my old roommate and her husband move. Good times were had a great mexican food at Las Maracas afterwards.

Pretty much life is moving on... not as I would of planned had you ask me a few years ago but I'm along for the ride.