Saturday and the weather is beautiful. What a great time to go for a bicycle ride with some new friends that I have recently met at the Velo Monrovia bicycle shop.

The ride started early around 07:00 and headed out through Arcadia and up into Sierra Madre. Climbing about 1500 feet into the base of the San Gabriel mountains and then on towards Pasadena and the Rose Bowel. By this time I was getting a little worn down. The route I was familiar with and the climbing is something that I have been doing regularly because I live at the base of these beautiful mountains. The pace was a little faster than I was used to and combined with extensive climbing the toll on my legs started to mount up.

At this point, when we reached the back side of the Rose Bowel, about half of the group returned due to early commitments. Silly me, I forged on with the remaining “A group”. By the time we climbed through Montrose and past the Descanso Gardens in Verdugo I had hit the wall. The plan was to go on to Little Tujunga canyon and the three mile climb over the top and back. Discretion is the better part of valor and I decided, my legs rather made the decision for me, to let them go on ahead and to lick my wounds in peace and quiet. At the base of Little Tujunga I hastily beat a retreat. Better to withdraw and fight another day I always tell myself.

Limping home, mostly down-hill was still a struggle. You know you have had it when the road takes a slight turn upward and you resort to your lowest gear and just grind away going about eight or nine miles per hour. This is not what you want your sponsors and loved ones to see. My plan is to make it home so that I can recover enough to hide again Sunday with the same Velo Monrovia group. This is basically a recreational club with a few racers sprinkled into the mix but the pace of the rides are never ridiculous. These people has really inspired me to ride more and to become thinner. Climbing requires a thin svelte physic. Currently I have been struggling with my weight having crept up to almost two hundred pounds. Ridiculously high for any kind of quickness in the mountains.
Tomorrow is another day. Lets see what it brings.

Last week I toyed with the idea of writing an article on hummingbirds and what it takes to get them into your yard feeding and buzzing around like crazy. Well this morning I looked outside the kitchen window and tried to catch the little buggers with a point and shoot digital camera. You can see my conversion to digital further back in the log under Photographs of the Future. Anyway, the little digital point and shoot may not be the right tool to freeze frame a hummingbirds wings in flight. The little critters beat their wings something like 50 beats a second. Pretty fast. Another interesting point is that hummers do not push off a limb with their feet when flying. They lift off with their wings like a helicopter. Amazing little guys. I will talk a lot about all of the little details later, but for now enjoy the pictures from this morning. The camera will have to change to get better shots. All that and more at DavidGodden.com

The sweetest little Hummingbird of all is my friend from Florida back from her honeymoon with Chris. Can you guess who this is? I will give you a hint. She eats like a hummingbird about every 10 minutes or so because her metabolize is so fast; she is light on her feet and weighs ….. Hmmmmmm, something under a hundred pounds….That’s really small right! Well without further ado, here she is and we are so glad to see her again.

I had an idea today for a new article. It came about quite innocently when one of my co-workers asked me about feeding and attracting Humming Birds to their back yard. After more than 30 years of feeding and watching these little flying wonders, I think that I have some experience that could be interesting reading.

There is plenty of information on the web (Debbie’s Tips For Attracting And Feeding Hummingbirds) and in print on feeding wild bird and humming birds as well. Just this last week I was searching around for something to read and was looking at some great pictures of some Hummingbirds from somewhere back east at Enjoyable Hummingbirds that really looked nice. So, I will have to take some pictures of our little Anna’s Hummers and what ever else flys by this coming weekend. Additionally, I will have to supplement my personal experience with some reading and put up something of worth to read. This sounds like something that I would like to do.

The Humming birds that I have here at the house in Arcadia get pretty thick during the summer and taking pictures will be “no problem”. Some of the web sites that I will be linking to in the article could include such places as Wild Birds Forever and The Hummingbird Web Site.

Links are always nice but finding the right style of writing to keep the readers interest is the real trick I think. That will be interesting to see how that develops. When I think about outlining the article it will come up here first.

Alison is a great nurse and friend at UCLA. It is my privilege to know her. Alison is one of those people that thinks deeply about life and how she can impact others. She does this so well in her work at UCLA. Thanks Alison for being my friend.