North or South Jersey?

Came across this while reading the New Jersey news.

Growing up and working in North Jersey and having lived in Philly and Delaware. I certainly understand the difference between North and South Jersey.

There was some interesting stuff on the blog. Like Rutgers football is the great unifier for New Jersey!

Here are some of the questions:

Wawa or 7-Eleven?
Jimmies or Sprinkles?
Taylor Ham or Pork Roll?
Sub or Hoagie?

Then there is the whole sports aspect to it:
Eagles or Giants?
Flyers or Devils?
Phillies or Mets-Yankees?
Sixers or Nets?

fun stuff!

What we've been up to lately:

In photos:








Add to that a memo assignment and an exam...
...Busy past couple of weeks...

Monte Paschi Erocia Video

OK, so I found video from the Erocia race and I thought I'd try and post the video.
This will be a good test to see about uploading Sophie's video. The Slipstream rider off the front in the first video is the former mountain biker Ryder Hesjedal.

Eroica1
Uploaded by burnie87

Holy crap! It worked!

Part 2

Eroica2
Uploaded by burnie87

Monte Paschi Erocia

This race sounds awesome. Check out the gallery. Makes you want to ride your road bike on some dirt roads dosen't it? Here is the english version.

Hopefully, I will be able to do a ride on the "le strade rosso." There are a ton of "red" gravel roads in the area. I probably won't be able to do anything until after class is wrapped up in mid May.

Another hopefully... I'd like to do a Tour of Flanders "tribute" ride down in Manyunk to hit the cobble climb near the start of the bike path, any takers? I think my parents are in town that weekend. So, it is a distinct possibility. I could probably use some help getting to the top of the climb as I haven't ridden in a while...

Integrated Land Use and Transportation discussion

For class we had to discuss another student's essay in an online discussion forum. Well, my response included a paragraph on the importance of mixed use developments...

My answer led me here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Place

then here
http://www.pps.org/info/placemakingtools/placemakers/roldenburg

The subject material covered in the Project for Public Spaces are some of the reasons I'm pursuing the planning profession...

All of it is kind of a synthesis of "droopy" and "david," huh?

After some looking around I saw that this guy is a "Place Maker." Yes, I'm a regular reader of his website.

Video is worth...

When I got home from work the family was upstairs in Sophie's room. Jacob came running to the top of the stairs and said something about what Sophie can do. Sophie runs out with this big smile on her face looking all proud. OK, this is going to be good.

(here's where I would insert the video, like I have time to figure that out...)

Kris and Jacob get Sophie to show daddy. She walks over to the rocking chair and pulls herself up onto it. Then reaches over to the dresser and climbs up on top of it. She stands up, yes on the dresser, and claps, Yeah Sophie! Then she walks across the top of the dresser to her crib, grabs the side of the crib, throws her leg over the railing and then she flops into the crib, a good 2' drop onto the mattress. Then gets up laughs and claps... Yeah Sophie! She did it another 3 or 4 times for me. She is going to be quite the daredevil.

Apparently she was doing it about 15 times before I got there.

(I'll try and post the video. Anybody from the "AV Club" have any pointers, shoot me an email...)

Falling apart...

Sunday prior to the Super Bowl I actually went out for a ride. I have not ridden very much in the cold in the past, oh, maybe 6 years. So, I have kind of forgotten the art of dressing properly for rides in the cold. It used to be I'd look at the temperature and know exactly what I needed to wear. Now, not so much... Temperature was 48 when I left, and what did I do? I put almost every piece of clothing I had on. Yeah, way over dressed!

I went out on my normal "morning" loop and struggled big time. At least I wasn't the only one over dressed, the llamas had their full winter coats on. (I wish I brought the camera)

For the past few months I've had this gray spot on the back of my head and it keeps getting bigger. The fine folks at work are accusing me of dying my hair in an attempt to look distinguished, thanks guys!

Tonight, Sophie was showing me her somersaults (assisted). Then Jacob showed off his. Then Kristen showed off her mad somersault skills. My turn, I crouch, and roll... holy crap! I had no idea where I was rolling! I was sure I'd end up crashing into the wall or door frame or something hard and immovable. Instead, I gracefully completed my somersault sprawled all over the hall and a massive crick in my neck. Yeah, I'm typing with my head at about a 90 degree angle.

Falling apart...

droopy doesn't update...

yes fatmarc, and all my loyal readers (mom), I haven't been, sorry. not really been "feeling the blog" lately.

Here's a quick little story. This past weekend was our annual "hookey day." We hung out in Philly on Friday, then we went to play some paintball up in Jim Thorpe. I felt like total crap all day. Might have had something to do with drinking in philly the day before??? So, I was kind of miserable, my head was killing me all day. My buddy's were concerned and asked how I was doing throughout the day. Which was fine except for my headache. So, we are driving home after 6 or so hours of paintball, and a headache. Chef asks if there is anything they can do to help. I say, thinking of the impossible, "Well, some advil sure would be nice." Chef says, "Oh, I have three in my pocket. I've had them all day." Thanks! If only he offered when we first got there...

I set up thee tent in the house today while Kris was at work. We had lunch in there. It didn't really work to well. Sophie decided to walk across our "table"... chips went everywhere! There sure was a lot of static electricity in the tent:


I'll try to update more often, I promise.

It's been a while...

monthly update here...

I finished my class earlier in the month. What a relief! I've only finished 9 credits and if I get accepted into the program, I should know by the end of the month, it is going to be a long tough road to get my masters.

A couple of neat things I came across from the class:
- mkd homes
- community supported agriculture
- the end of suburbia

I've been passing the "free" time trying to do things I have not been able to do while taking classes... time with the kids, playing video games, drinking beer... what? no riding on the list, Nope, too frickin cold out there!

I got a call from Michel this afternoon, he was in town today. I had planned to go down and see him in DE. Then go check out all the_sht go-cart action, but alas things were pretty hectic with errands at home and Michel had some jet-lag to deal with. Maybe next time...

busy, busy...

To pick up where I left off...

After the Granogue race we stayed at mimi's and Pete's which is right down the street from Ludwig's corner. Had a great dinner prepared by our very generous hosts. It was like being on vacation! After dinner we got watch a movie on the home theater system, man is that sweet. Problem was I only made it through the first 5 minutes of Herbie, Fully Loaded, before I went to sleep.

The Wissahickon race went reasonably well, all things considered. I did get myself taken out on one of the first corners. Some guy was trying to sneek on the inside and we bumped, well I go the worst of it, landed right on my back!
It was kind of crazy having bubba and pappy there. Their first time watching me race, too bad it wasn't when I was faster...

I did the Lehigh Velo Cross the following Saturday. MUDDY! Check out some of Dennis' photos. I was pretty happy that I didn't get all disgusted with the whole thing. The one race I did last year in similar conditions had me dropping out after a half lap. I think the fun course had a lot to do with hanging in there and having a good time.

Anyway, I've been busy with school the past few weeks. We had a group presentation, I think we had something like 150 power point slides!

Yeah it was frickin' long probably close to 2 hours. By the time it was my turn to present my final part, I did the intro as well, I was ready for the thing to be over and I could tell that we had "lost" most of the class by that point. I flew through my slides just to get the thing over with...I hope it wasn't too noticeable.

sorry about the lack of updates. My class is over the first Tuesday in December!