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This will be a jumbled pile of somewhat related riding stories.

Been riding more lately and it's been awesome. Raleigh and I have gotten out to Nashville's Greenway at least once a week since we got her trailer. We've worked our way to riding all the way to the dam and back which equals about 23 miles. She does great in the trailer. Stays awake for 2/3-3/4 of the ride then passes out until we get back to the car. That's about an hour and 45 minutes of straight riding which is pretty impressive for a 15 month old to handle. She's got her snack cup, drink and maybe 1 toy and she's happy. Pulling that 50 pound trailer can be cumbersome on some of the climbs but I have to think it's making me a stronger rider.

I've been able to make it out to 2 gravel grinder rides in the past month or so. I bailed out of the first one at the 22 mile halfway point. (in the 40 mile route). I felt pretty good that day but we got a late start and I didn't want to be out for the full day. I also didn't trust myself to be able to safely make it to the 40 mile mark. I felt good at mile 22 and felt I could easily ride another 5-10 miles, but I wasn't sure about 20 miles. We had a good crew though, some regulars like Jeffy, Jim S, Parker and Monster McConnell and a few new guys (at least to my riding) like Jim's 12 year old son, Jims co-worker Stick, Jeffy's wife, and a few peeps from NMB. It was a fun route out near White Bluff TN.  You can view the details of my ride here: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/106271502

The 2nd gravel ride was this past weekend. A similar crew but on the dirt roads of Hickman County this time. I finished this ride feeling great and we managed about 45 miles. I was treating this as a test of my fitness for the upcoming Crush n Rush 50 mile gravel race/ride/party. I felt good for most of the day. I did a great job of keeping food in me and we stopped at 2 different stores so I was able to keep my bottles filled as well. We lucked into a great respite from the heat and had temps in the mid 80s most of the day. We did Jim's normal Hickman route backwards which I thought was a lot of fun. We ended up with 3600 feet of climbing in 45 miles but it didn't feel like a lot of climbing. There were long stretches of rolling or even flat gravel road that were a lot of fun to ride. We hit a few of the old favorites from a couple years ago like Tyler Ridge and the hog farm. All in all if was one of THE best days on the bike I've had in over a year I'd say. Loads of fun.  Ride details can be seen here: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/110151838

I was also able to participate in another Ride for Reading book delivery recently. I've missed quite a few but this was to be their biggest delivery yet with over 60 riders signed up. We ended up riding 6 miles to the school with the first lady of Tennessee and delivering books to an entire elementary school. The ride was fun and very low key but the real reward was at the school. Seeing how excited those kids were to receive free books and to see so many people having fun on bikes. It's indescribable really. What an awesome non-profit! Photos HERE. Video posted in previous blog entry.


Today I decided to ride my bike into the studio in Franklin. I've been working on jingle sessions there Tuesday-Friday and have been taking our dog with me each day. While driving home in traffic yesterday I got a huge itch to ride my bike in today. The ride down to Franklin was great in the morning. It wasn't too hot yet at 8am when I started. It's a hilly ride to get down there and I was feeling it in my legs by the time I arrived. Google maps told me it would take 1hr 30 mins to ride there. I know they are quite conservative but I didn't want to cut it close so I gave myself 2 hours before the clients came. I made the ride in 1:05 which worked well to give me ample time to cool down and change clothes.

By the time I was ready to ride back home it was 100 degrees outside. I figured I'd take it easy and just ride as slow as needed since I was not in a hurry to get back. I am terrible at riding a slow pace so I ended up just riding what felt comfortable. The heat wasn't that bad as long as I was moving. Stopping at a light was all the reminder I needed that it was 100º. I ended up making it home in 57 minutes. There is less climbing on the way home so I figured I'd be quicker but with the heat and the traffic the ride didn't feel that much faster. When I drive it takes me a good 45 minutes to get home with all the traffic so it was only an extra 15 minutes to do the route on bike.

I ended up with 200 miles logged in the past 30 days which I know isn't a lot for most cyclists but it's more than double my usual August miles. With the new family addition it's a ton of riding for me! Hopefully I can keep it up into fall.


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

The emotions of mixing a song

It's amazing the emotions I go through while mixing a song.



Excited to start

Accomplished to get things roughed in

Overwhelmed to have things not come together as quickly as I'd like

Anxious to check how it sounds in other places like the car

Let down to struggle with parts of the mix

Excited to see the song polished up and coming together better

Anxious to hear feedback from the client when a ref is sent

Second guessing my skills as I wait to hear from client

Pumped up to hear from an excited client who likes the mix



I go through about every one of these for every song I mix. It's a rollercoaster which can wear me down sometimes and also build me up other times.

Happy New Year!

Never did make it back here to share our trip to Utah. It was a lot of fun, I got to know Beth's family better, found out about some great new beers, did some awesome skiing, and broke my ski boots that were 15 years old. I posted up my photos from the trip on my Flickr page HERE so you can live vicariously through them if you want. The weather was colder overall this year but unfortunately I still was not able to experience the true, amazing, second-to-none dry powder skiing that Utah is known for. But of course I still managed to have a great time on the slopes! I hung out with Beth's sister, her step-dad and his brother's family on the slopes almost the entire first day. It was really fun to watch them pick up skiing and get better and better each run they took. It's tough to learn to ski the older you keep and I have a lot of respect for Beth's stepdad and his brother for trying it over 50, and not getting so frustrated they gave up. I was fortunate to learn when I was young around 4th grade but I've witnessed many an adult try to learn and give up. It's tough!

After Utah we got back to town and only had 3 days to get all our stuff organized and packed for our trip to Atlanta for the Americas Mart Gift Show. We did this same show last Jan and July so thankfully most of our display was already worked out and made. Beth still had to bust out 1 of every style she makes which is a ton, easily over 120 pieces. We were in Atlanta for 6 days selling jewelry to owners of boutiques and other stores. We got back last Thurs and jumped back into work. I had some studio work lined up and Beth had whole orders to fill and retail website orders to get out.

I got all Bob Ross on Beth when she asked me to touch up the white canvases!

We've finally had some time to get organized and get Christmas totally put away, cleaned up and stored. Our downstairs is starting to look normal again and I even had time to get outside for a bike ride. I met up with my friend Graham from NMB and we rode a cold lap at Percy Warner park. I cut it to just one lap as my feet were pretty cold and I'm out of shape truthfully. I have been off the bike completely through the holidays and Monday was my first ride of the new year. We got dinner and some beers after the ride which were earned. I tried to ride just enough to justify a couple pints of the Sweet Potato Stout that was a 2 for 1 deal at the Brewhouse 100.

Oh and I got a new pair of cycling kicks from my mother in law for Christmas anxious to try them out!

I decided to make an attempt to participate in the 365 "project" on Flickr. Post 1 photo every day for a year. So far I'm off to a decent start, though not all my photos have been that interesting, or that high quality. I think it will be interesting to look back at the end of the year and see what all I thought was worth documenting. 2010 will be quite a different year for Beth and I with a baby girl on the way so this should be fun. I'm also going to try to not be too anal about it and not worry if I miss a day here or there. You can follow it if you're interested here: Chewieez 365.

Hopefully I'll also begin to keep this blog more up-to-date in 2010. I have been quite a slacker lately.

New times call for new skills

When opportunity knocks what do you do? I hope that I can recognize it and open the door.

Beth has come up with a great idea for a Freshie & Zero promotion but it involves a little bit of sewing. Not hand sewing but some simple sewing on a machine. First thought: Can we send this to my Mom? (she's a great seamstress!) Logistics are hard though since she lives 12 hrs away in Virginia. So what's a budding entrepreneur like Beth to do? Buy a sewing machine.

With time on my hands and a sewing machine on the dining room table, I jumped right in to the instruction manual. Started off easy enough, put thread here, pull through here and put on a spool. Wait where does this spool go. Ok, Read some more.... got it, I think. After a bunch of back and forth between the machine and the manual I had some scraps to practice on and I was off.


We've had some table skirts for our show display that unfortunately shrank in the wash a while back & have needed to be re-hemmed really bad. Like many to-dos, we've always managed to put it on the back burner each month. Well, this was my first project Beth gave me. Thankfully it was a simple task and after a little practicing I was ready to tackle it.

Fast forward a few hours to Beth posting up a photo of me on her Facebook sewing and the comments from women start coming in. Turns out I'm quite sexy for running a sewing machine. Who knew. Guess I can stop showing my chest hair and put the gold chains away. I've found the new way to impress the ladies. heh

We're in Atlanta now for the Summer Shade Festival and got all of our stuff setup in our booth this afternoon. It was a proud moment when I got to put the table skirts on and they fit great and all the velcro matched up perfectly. Sewing, not the manliest thing for a guy to know how to do, but it seems quite useful and the ladies love it. I've already fixed a bathing suit that I have where the velcro fly was coming unsewn.

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.

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.

It was nice while it lasted

RIP Bike room Nov 2008-April 2009




One more step towards adulthood, we are now owners of a nice dining room table.
Adulthood=1 Bikes=0

We've been getting a lot of work done around the house and yard in preparation for a housewarming party. Not much worth taking pictures of just yet. We're hoping for great weather for the partay and I'm sure there will be many photos snapped. Our place may never look this good again so we'll have to document it!

I haven't been getting the camera out on any rides lately either. I've been getting in some fun, hard rides. The boys all got their Moots and we all hit up Monty Bell for shakedown rides, heckling and supporting SORBA MidTN.

Last night was Yazoo tap room night. I've been working so hard on the house that I haven't been able to get out on the bike this week. Tap room night was my only excursion so I wanted to make the best of it. Of course I had to fix a flat right as I'm airing up my tires, so I'm off a bit late trying to get to Hillsboro Village before a friend leaves work to pick up some Flight of the Concords tickets.... wooo! "What?" "What?" 16 minutes flat for the 5 mile commute with the help of some well timed green lights. I headed down to the tap room after that to meet up with the crew. Saw lots of bikes, some locked up outside and the usual pile inside. Spring is here...good to see people taking advantage of it. Beth even came out and joined us which was a treat. We headed to McGuinness for some food with Thad on his new stiffMoots and Hannah on the bluefish. No crazy sidewalk riding this time and we all arrived in one peice, with the Moots getting it's first taste of a padlock on a fence.


oh and I just discovered the One Day As A Lion EP a couple weeks ago.... man, I'm really digging it! Wonder if/when they'll come out with a full length album. You should all check it out, even Beth says it's "Not Bad." and "Not as mean as the Rage Against The Machine"

All this talk of 8mm wrenches, 5/16th socket drivers and fiddly bolts is going too far. This all I need, it's fully adjustable and has a full range of torque specs:






This is just for you Thad....

thoughts

These are things that have crossed my mind as I sit here at work, watching someone else mix.

• I need to get paid for work I've done. It would be great to have a free collection service to call upon. Why are the clients with the most noble aspirations the ones that are the hardest to get paid from?
• I'm getting fat. The eggnog and bags of M&Ms are catching up to me.
• Weather looks good for tomorrow, I want to ride into work and take the new bike.
• I wonder what 32x17 feels like on the road on a 29er with big monster truck tires.
• Is Blackbird the only studio still busy?
• Wonder how much of the new political atmosphere is talk and how much will be action
• Nashville really needs to adopt some plan like this one for bike commuters. Who wouldn't want to be paid to ride their bike to work?
• I'm kind of famous now and have my mug on the Walz Cap website.
• I can't wait to get my new Walz cap, wonder how the cotton ones fit compared to the wool.


• It's almost lunch time, time for some pb&j at home. I love living close to work.

been busy, real busy

yep, I know, it's been forever since I put up a post here... life got busy again and it remaining busy. I haven't even had time to ride my bike but once since my last post about my fit at Harpeth.

Work has been slow this summer. Heck, it's been slow the past 2 years, but it's summer and it's always slow in the summer. This makes this summer slower... fun. I've been trying to make the best of the time I have free from commitments. I think I was doing a pretty good job. I was rdiing a lot, spending a lot of time with Beth, getting things done around the house and helping Beth with Freshie & Zero. When I had some work, I also tried to make the best of it and make sure I was giving 110%. The quirk of freelance work being that each gig can be thought of as a job interview which I think is good. It keeps you honest, and keeps you working hard and hopefully not getting too complacent.

Fast forward through July and to the first week in August and between a couple days of work and a trip to Virginia for a craft show, I had no free time that week. The trip was a lot of fun as my brother lives where the craft show was, the Roanoke/Blacksburg, VA area, so we were able to visit with him and his growing family. My parents took the opportunity to come and visit also so it was a mini Lawrence reunion for the weekend. Sales wise the show could of gone better but we debuted a lot of new displays and booth setup stuff which all worked very well and looks great. We've officially stepped up the Freshie and Zero booth to the next level of professionalizum.

(our new track lighting setup, canvas displays and mesh sidewalls... yea we're big time now!!)

I started right into a session starting on the Monday after we got back from the craft show. I was starting what turned out to be a marathon 3 day session of Gospel music. I was the head engineer on overdubs and editing though which was a lot of fun and more responsibility. It was a lot of work and long days, like 11am-4am, but equally rewards and as it was frustrating. So this session ended very early Thurs morning and I slipped in a small project I needed to take care of later in the morning on Thurs and tried to recover the rest of the day with a nap.

Beth's parents took us all out for a belated birthday dinner celebration for Beth's 30th bday Thurs night and then I started right back into more session work Friday. Three days of assisting on some mix sessions for Blake Shelton and we are now up to date. Tomorrow I start back working with the Gospel clients again for the next three or four days so I'm trying to get my body ready for the late night sessions.

Truly feast or famine. This work couldn't come at a better time though as I could use some extra money to help fund my new bike purchase, and also Beth and I are starting to house hunt so more money for that will always be much appreciated. I'm hoping to have a slightly more relaxed schedule this week and fit in a few rides. Hope to make it out to the tap room since I missed last week. I have a big order of super hero socks to pick up from Sharpie also that I'm super excited about. Finally going to be able to try the olefin material and also the hip no-show cut! I'll report back soon I'm sure so stay tuned. Hope I haven't bored everyone too much lately.... it's life, my life at least. :)

I snapped this shot while at the craft show in Va. Is this bike locked? I don't think so. I couldn't help but find some humor in it. Luckily the guy was in a small town. He didn't even lock his daughters bike up at all.





I helped record a campfire performance out on a farm in Leipers Fork a couple weeks ago. Fun stuff, but HOT with no A/C!











Gotta love a trip to Peter's Sushi in Brentwood. They having opened in their new, larger location (right next door to the old place). YUM!!

Mimosas are nice

It's been a fun week since Thanksgiving break. I helped Beth setup and tear down two shows in one day and Thurs night tap room was fun. I've been glued to my new Centro, personalizing it and downloading programs. On Saturday, Thad and I rode Chickasaw in the amazing weather we had. Our bodies didn't know what was up with the 70 degree temps and clear skies. We were both feeling less than 100% but we still managed a great ride. The trail was in perfect shape. I really enjoyed riding the Soma, it was one of those good mojo days. Even with the lack of riding lately, I managed to have a great ride and not feel empty after. I really need to try to step up the riding in December to be ready for Snake Creek.

I took it easy on Sunday and got a lot of errands done with Beth. We had brunch with her parents and Beth did some needed rearranging of the office. Today was the first day I've had engineering work since before Thanksgiving. I'm assisting on a demo session with the Warren Brothers tomorrow so I went and setup the studio this afternoon. It's a new-to-me studio so the setup took a bit longer than I'd have liked. It should be a fun day tomorrow though (I hope). The engineer is always fun to work with and the Warren Bros are a trip.

The town is turning into one big Xmas decoration. It feels strange to think we are so close to Christmas. All the decorations are helping get me in the mood but it still feels like we've rushed into it. At least people waited until after Thanksgiving this year.

My brother and sister-in-law are having a baby girl on Wednesday! My first niece ever! It is so exciting, I can't imagine what they are feeling! We are going to try to go and see them before Christmas if we can.


There is rumor that there may be a new bike ordered soon for the Lawrence's.... It already has a place waiting for it in the living room. (shut up Thad!)