My Shangri-la Beneath the Summer Moon

I talked to Morgan on Sunday night, after the inaugural stage.
After the first stage of Transrockies on Sunday they were in 16th place. After yesterday's stage two, Dos Machos Sasquatchos had slipped down to 22nd - out of 71 two person teams, in their age group.
It seems though, at least according to Morgan, that the first two days would probably be the hardest. Monday's stage had the most amount of climbing out of all the stages. And he knew that the climbs would be the hardest for him.

He said they raced through snow, rain, thunder, freezing temps, sun, hike a bike and singletrack.
Morgan's like a diesel engine. He tends to not jump at the gun, but winds his way up and along the way steadily making good progress and gradually passes all the engines flittering out - to finish pretty strong. He's strong, steady and solid.

Me, I'm an old volkswagon. More like a karmin ghia. Trying to pretend I'm cool, trying to start out fast, puttin' along and barely hanging on, but happy to be all red and shiny.
And then Matthias, well, Matthias is strong all around. Morgan mentioned that during the first stage Matthias was holding back and having to wait a little on the climbs. But things were going well for them
Today's stage looks like it'll give them a little reprieve - and less climbing. So maybe things will settle out a little bit and they'll slowly begin their ramp up.
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Here, on the west coast, shortly back from LA and the bum rush of the cat lady...
Sam fractured his ankle on Friday about an hour after I dropped him and his buddies off at camp. Some kid slide tackled him during a pickup soccer game at camp. It's hard to tell with Sam when things are really wrong. Because un like both Lulu and I, he never complains about anything. He's a lot like Morgan.

But sure enough, after 5 hours in the ER on Saturday and still not a peep of complaint from him, we had our result.
So he's recuperating at camp grandma's for the week.
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And me, well, I'm riding my bike and...

Today's donut Tuesday here at work. Every Tuesday, Dale the doorman, brings a bunch of boxes of donuts and spreads them out for all to enjoy.

I don't eat donuts. I know my limits. Donuts are like crack to me. If I even have a tiny bite of one it's all over and then the whole day is lost. It usually starts with me cutting a small corner of and having one little bite, and then while I'm standing there eating the corner I'll eat the rest. And then I'll eat another one and tell myself I'll just run/ride at lunch and it'll be ok.
This is the start of the rise up to peak, when I rationalize that if I eat only 1 or 2 more then I can have a banana and almonds in a few hours, still before lunch and still feel ok to work out.
Because right then, I feel great. And everything is beautiful.
And then, I'm spinning in circles with the golf club and hitting golf balls down the hallway into the sales area and kicking the exercise ball at people I don't necessarily like as they walk by the studio. And then I'm riding my bike through the sales floor as fast as I can trying not to hit the cubicle partition walls.

And then in another half hour, I'm sitting at my desk complaining with a headache and feeling sick and telling the photographer to shut up. All this because of donuts.
But that was at my old job.

Nowadays, I just don't eat donuts. I just turn and walk away.