Author: Dale Sackrider

When Johnny Castle said “Nobody puts Baby in a corner” and those girls started screaming, I couldn’t help but laugh.

Stephanie and I were still only dating she told me she had always dreamed of honeymooning at the hotel in the movie Dirty Dancing. That’s exactly where we went: Mountain Lake Resort. I learned a lot about the movie while we were there.

So, when my wife heard they were playing Dirty Dancing on the big screen to celebrate the 20 year anniversary, I knew there was no chance I was going to get out of taking her.

When we got to the theater, the first thing I noticed was the audience was 95% female. The second thing I noticed was that amount of those women that were extremely overweight. I’m not sure what that was about, but I would say about 30% of the women in the crowd were over 100 lbs overweight. I don’t mean to make a BIG deal about it — pun intended — just something I noticed.

Large female crowds aside, I actually had a great time. The movie wasn’t bad – of course I’ve seen it many times; Stephanie quoted the lines with most of the movie. I also learned that there is a live production version of the movie that is playing around the world – if its anywhere near here, I imagine I’ll be taking Stephanie to see that too. The cool part for me was the audience interaction. All those women clapping, laughing, whoa’ing when they saw Patrick Swayze’s naked backside. It was an experience.

We are back from the cruise. It was fun but I don’t recommend taking a three year old on a cruise unless you are willing to put them in the kids program; my wife wasn’t. The at sea days were the hardest.

Now that we are back, I have to get starting on the 1000 mile bike training. I rode the stationary bike for an entire 10 miles on the cruise. The ride to work yesterday was tough – I’m out of shape, and I broke a spoke yesterday. Its 6:40 this morning, and I have to be on the road no later than 7am if I’m going to make it to work in time to take a shower, so until I have more time…

I don’t usually post on such grave matters, however I just read several online posting about gun control in response to the recent horrible event at Virgina Tech.

One such post had this quote:

When will we learn that freedom and guns do not play well together?

The students at Virgina Tech were killed by a deranged lunatic. Jack the Ripper used knives, Hitler used gas chambers, Jim Jones used poison, Cho used a gun – Guns are not evil, Cho was.

If the students were allowed to carry guns on campus maybe this could have been stopped before 32 people were killed — remember the Appalachian school shooting in 2002? Two students went to their cars, got their guns, and stopped a killer just like this one.

Criminalize guns – and only the criminals will have guns.

“I had a big bash last weekend. I went off the diet, and I thought, “All right, this is going to be cool,” and it wasn’t that big a deal. … I didn’t have all that much, but what I did taste, it did not have the sense of nirvana to it that I thought it would.”  — Rush Limbaugh

I was reading Rush Limbaugh’s website and came across this quote regarding his weight loss program. I believe my weight loss issues are because of my diet. I have to get ahead of this – I have to get the weight off. The idea that “nothing tastes as good as been thin feels” is one I haven’t been able to commit to yet… I’m leaving on a cruise today – all you can eat, all day, everyday for the next seven days… doh!

It felt like I couldn’t get on the road for anything the other day. I had a flat tire Wednesday morning that I didn’t discover until after I had suited up for a bike ride, packed my work gear into my pannier, and headed out to the garage. I drove the car to work that morning but not until after I fixed the flat. That night I was determined to ride the bike for at least a few miles. I grabbed Zander, put him in the baby bike stroller and hit the road. After I got a couple of miles from the house – the wind picked up – going in the ‘other’ direction and the bike stroller acted like a big parachute. I only got about 7 miles like that.

So I brought the bike in the house, put it on the bike trainer and rode another 5 miles. The next morning I rode the entire 19 miles to work AND I took the long way home for another 21 miles. Now that’s more like it! After this week on the cruise (whaaaoooo!!!!) I only have three weekends left before my 1000 mile bike ride. One of those weekends, my Columbus friends are headed to Vegas which is only a five hour drive — I really want to head that way but that would take another weekend out of my training time. We’ll see — in either case, I have a lot of riding to do between now and May 26th.

I rode for 26 miles on Friday and then for 30 on Saturday. I intended to ride on Sunday but with church and family functions I never got out there. Monday I wasn’t feeling well and I was actually going to call off work, but I had just too much to get done before my vacation starting this weekend, so I worked from home: translation – no bike ride. Yesterday I had to go to another building several miles from my normal work place, so riding the bike was out of the question. So, although I had intended to ride my bike for four days this week with at least 20 miles a day – I haven’t been on the bike yet. So today was going to be different. I went to bed early last night, I got up on time to ride the entire way to work without having to catch the bus, I got dressed and headed to the garage to get on the bike… WAIT FOR IT…. That’s right – I have a flat tire. Arrgghhhh!!!!

If I’m going to ride 1000 miles in less than six weeks, I need all the training I can get!

The maps are here! I ordered them from http://AdventureCycling.com and they are here! The first map starts in Tempe and ends at El Paso. The second map begins in El Paso and ends in Del Rio. There are turn by turn directions as well as helpful information like road conditions, climate, elevations, camping grounds and hotels along the route.

Its not all good news however: the elevations have me very concerned. I still have a hard time climbing hills around town. I start here in town at about 1200 feet above sea level. I climb to 8228 ft above sea level. Some of the trip has me climbing 3000 ft in 20 – 30 miles. I have a month to get my legs in shape to make those kind of climbs. I’ll keep you posted…

Many of you have heard me talk about my biking commute to work. Last summer I put about 1500 miles on my bike 19 miles at a time. Well it was on those rides that I began to appreciate being on the bike; I really enjoy cycling. Then I stopped riding for any number of excuses. I stayed off the bike when winter hit. I know, for many of you still looking at snow the idea of an Arizona winter seems a joke, but it gets cold! (more…)

GIRL!!!

The family went to see Premonition this weekend. Its about a housewife named Linda (played by Sandra Bullock) that is shocked when her husband dies in a car crash and reappears the next day. Linda is living the days of her week out of order where she doesn’t know if she is going to wake up today, tomorrow, or yesterday.

After seeing the movie, I have to say I wish I could wake up yesterday and not waste my money.  The movie doesn’t have a feel good ending and there were several plots holes that don’t make sense.  The main character seems to not catch on which is frustrating.

All in all, I feel like the movie treats the audience like they are slow and leaves us feeling bad in the end.  Two thumbs down, Zero stars out of Five stars…