Okay, I’ve never done one of these before. But it being Halloween, it seemed strangely appropriate. I stole this one from Chelle

1. What is the scariest movie you have ever seen? The original Alien. I can remember being so impacted by it, I could almost swear I checked inside my closets and under my bed till the day I left home for the Navy. I was that scared.
2. What was your favorite Halloween costume from childhood? I didn’t do much trick or treating as a child. My mom didn’t like us doing it because she didn’t want us to have all the candy. The only costume I remember is this really lame Casper costume with the plastic face mask cutting into me.
3. If you had an unlimited budget, what would be your ideal Halloween costume? I have no idea. I went out as a Dr. this year and as Daisy Duck last year (don’t ask). I was gonna go as a Pirate Wench, but changed my mind. Hmm… it could have been fun, though.
4. When was the last time you went trick-or-treating? Last year, but I’ll go out tonight too.
5. What is your favorite Halloween candy? It really does vary. I like candy a lot. I really like Smarties, Sweetarts and Bottlecaps. But I can get by with a lot of stuff. I try to keep the sweets to a minimal these days so as to avoid spiking my insulin levels. It gets harder to deal with it as I get older.
6. Tell us a scary nightmare you have had in your life. To date, my scariest nightmares still have to do with me waking up and realizing I missed my final examine. It never matters the class and this was a recurring nightmare for years. I guess it didn’t help that I went through college simply taking my tests and not going to classes. It’s amazing I ever made it
7. What is your Supernatural Fear? Um… IDK! LOL! Remember that movie “Scanners”? I used to wish I could make people’s heads explode just by my thoughts. Years later I can at least make their heads hurt by my thought, LOL!
8. What is your Creepy-Crawlie fear? Cockroaches creep me out. SO… any thought or movie of them does me in pretty good. Oh yeah, I don’t like black widows or brown recluses. I get massive heebie jeebies checking shoes that have been sitting idle for a few months.
9. Tell us about a time you saw a ghost or heard something go bump in the night? The closest thing I can think of is right after I became a Christian. I can recall waking up and feeling myself pinned down in my dorm room bed. A demon appeared to me and let me know that “they” were very angry with me and that they were never going to cease tormenting me. As soon as I was able to move again, I called up a friend of mine, but she didn’t believe anything happened. She was convinced I just had a dream. A while later I mentioned the dream to my singles pastor and he confided in me how he had a similar experience shortly after he became a Christian too. It really freaked me out as I simply couldn’t move.
10. Would you ever stay in a Haunted House overnight? Uh… no! I don’t really believe in ghosts, but I’m also not going to start double dog daring demons to scare the crap out of me either.
11. Are you a traditionalist (just a face) Jack O’ Lantern, or do you get really creative with your pumpkin. Um… just a face. I can’t see dressing them up or anything.
12. How much do you decorate your house for Halloween? Not much. LOL! Others do that. I just buy all the candy and eat it
13. What do you want on your Tombstone? Pepperoni Actually, I have no idea. I suppose I’d like it to say something to the effect that I lived what I believed.

Happy Halloween to all of you! I hope you all have a fun, safe night.

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1. I’m totally used to the sunny weather of California and snow is something new to me.
2. It’s very pretty outside and I love to watch wild rabbits and the deer running through it.
3. I grew up sledding down mountain grass on cardboard. Now I get to do it on snow.
4. My body temperature tends to run really hot and the cooler weather actually feels very comfortable to me.
5. I get to wear some of my cold weather gear, and feel not too hot in it.
6. It means it’s mountain biking weather. While I’ve been enjoying riding my road bike up the hill, there’s always something better.
7. Did I mention snow bunnies?
8. The thought of snowball fights brings back fond memories of when we had 2.5 tons of shaved ice brought to the base when I was stationed in Orlando. We had a summertime snowball fight. All was great till someone pegged the Commanding Officer in the head. Needless to say, Capt. Morrow wasn’t too pleased.
9. Thinkin’ about my first pair of snow shoes.
10. Toasting marshmallows in such conditions makes much better sense than doing it in the summer over a camp fire.
11. The snow here melts as opposed to accumulating all winter.
12. Snow boarding really looks like fun and I don’t have to drive far to do it.
13. It means it’s not as sticky to cuddle in.

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1. I like to wear shorts year round, even when temps get super cold. My body temperature tends to run a bit hot so it’s easy to use my legs as a sort of thermostat. If I do get cold, I can always throw a hoodie or something on to keep my upper body warm.
2. I’m 39 now But the good news is I still have all of my hair and teeth. And my hips and knees are also original equipment.
3. I love to watch movies at the theater. Sure, I can get them on DVD. And sometimes I look forward to it. But I really like them on the big screen with the super loud sound, with other people just as excited to watch the flick as me. And I love to get my hot dog bathed in mustard and jalapenos along with a small popcorn with plenty of butter and salt. Saw the Robin Williams movie this past weekend (Man of the Year) and loved it. The popcorn was a bit over the top, though. You know it’s bad when it leaves grease skids everywhere you set the bag.
4. I love the outdoors!!! I have always loved the outdoors, whether it’s biking, hiking, walking or any other “-ing”; I simply love it.
5. I actually do like to swim in the ocean as opposed to a lake.
6. I love hot and spicy foods, whether Mexican, Chinese, Thai… it doesn’t really matter. Oh… no Indian please.
7. I was one of those people who you never know, but who kept JAG at the top of the ratings for several years. I loved that show for so many reasons and it was a bummer when it finally ended.
8. I think I prefer dark chocolate to milk chocolate these days. This weekend I had a bag of dark chocolate M&Ms and it was great. I saw them in the store and figured what the heck. Man were they good.
9. I go out of my way for my friends. If you’ve ever had a crappy friend, you’ll know why I go out of my way for them. Good friends are few and far between, so I really try hard to be a good one.
10. My two favorite colors are navy blue (and not because I was in the Navy) and pastel pink. I know this later one isn’t politically correct for men, but who cares. I loved it in the 80’s when it was cool and I love it still. I can’t say I’m always huge about wearing pink. LOL! But I do love the color. And please… none of that hot pink stuff.
11. When I was younger I think I vowed never to do anything with Software engineering because I viewed it as fake engineering in comparison to Electrical engineering. These days… I pretty much just do software.
12. I get depressed when my hair grows longer. Yep. I’ve been that way since I was a kid. I love to get my hair cut. This weekend was a bit nerve-wracking for me as I had to find a new person to cut my hair after years of using the same person. This has been a problem in the past because not everyone can cut short hair right. But I was fortunate in finding someone who could pull it off. And she really paid attention to those long stragler hairs that sometimes get missed with the clippers.
13. I’m afraid of clowns. They really, really creep me out.

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1. No busses or any other type of diesel to lay soot all over my skin and lungs.
2. Don’t have to worry about car doors opening up in front of me, though I do occasionally worry about pissed off cows.
3. The scenery is great! Sure the same can be said about some road rides too. But in the mountains I can really be flexible where I go.
4. I could be wrong, but I think I look a heck of lot better in cargo shorts and T as opposed to spandex. But then again, spandex…
5. My Mt. Bike is much more resilient to flats than my road bike. Hey I can keep allow my air pressure to float from 60 psi to 40 psi. I’ve even gone on rides with my tires around 10 to 20 psi. But on my road bike, I have to check the pressure every single time to make sure I’m at 120 psi or I’m sure to get a pinch flat.
6. While all of my bikes are custom, my Mt. Bikes tend to be much more exclusive in terms of component choices. I even do hand made rims, etc. So, the level of personalization is far greater. On my road bike, I just cared about weight and now I leave it as is.
7. Depending on the terrain, I have a 20lb. hardtail or 25lb. full suspension bike. I love both, but it’s nice to have flexibility. I just have my one road bike and while I’ve looked at Scott and Pinarello, I just can’t see dropping another $10K to $20K for another bike. I’m not sure what I’d get over what I already have– maybe another 4 ounces of weight.
8. Love my Chris King hubs and headstacks. Sure I can get these for my road bike too, but not in Pink! And for those who wish to be critical… go pound sand! I love pink!
9. I’m a big guy, even after my recent weight loss. No matter how I cut it, I have no intention of getting down to the 150-160lb. range. I have no desire to be that small. I’ve worked hard on my build over the years and I’ve worked hard to get a bit more streamlined. But my body is built more for Mt. biking than it is for road cycling. Just reality.
10. I love that I can take breaks after difficult sections without anyone looking at me oddly. When you’re riding road, there are some things you just don’t want to get caught doing: stopping to rest or dropping below 10mph. on any section. Again, I’m a big, 39-ish kind of guy. I get tired these days. Sorry
11. I love learning to ride more technical terrain. I love that as I get older I can continue to work on my difficulty level without necessarily killing myself. That’s the case in the mountains as I learn to ride more and more over rocks and trees, etc.
12. Camelbaks are much nicer to use than bottles. And I go through a ton of fluids. I just love to stay hydrated. At least where I tend to ride, you look pretty silly if you’re riding road with anything but bottles. So perhaps I am vain. But hey… I’m wearing spandex as it is. I don’t need more things to make people look at me. When I’m riding in the mountains, there’s no one to care but me and nature.
13. Sometimes I love to stop under a tree, take a break and look around or hike to different spots. I love the scenery and I love nature. When I’m riding in the mountains I usually don’t have problems with allergies and such problems. It’s very peaceful.

This really isn’t intended to be a long post. I mentioned I would post again after the reunion picnic on Sunday and that’s really what this is intended to be.

In short, my experience was truly fantastic and something I am so glad I participated in. The only thing I could possibly wish further is that it could have lasted a week. But you know what? That may prove to be too long. The way things worked out, there is this sense of desire to see people again. That’s a nice feeling to have. It’s like eating a really fine meal and wishing you could have more. But then again, there’s the chance of over indulging and feeling “stuffed”. I’m glad I have this feeling.

Over the last few days, I have really enjoyed hearing the other accounts of the reunion from friends. I think their impressions are much like mine.

Then I have other friends who have either skipped their reunions or who are anticipating one. All I can say is take the opportunity to go, if you can. For the most part, I was really looking forward to this for so long. But there were a couple of people I was a little nervous about seeing after all these years. I had these thoughts of what they might recall, and they have been in the back of mind all these years. What I learned from all this is that as much as we may think we’ve gone separate paths, we all have similar journeys. There wasn’t a hint of grudge, resentment or anything else at either of the events. I think, if anything, the common sentiment was a feeling of wanting to maintain contact this time around.

The Sunday picnic was rather uneventful. The crowd was significantly smaller than at the dinner. But that was to be expected. It was still a nice sized crowd, regardless. What I really enjoyed about it was that it was quiet and a chance to have rather personal conversations with folks. There really wasn’t any interruption or loud music to deal with. About the only disturbing thing was having my boy talk me into watching him on the slides. He was dragging his heels and building up lots of static, only to discharge it into me a few times. At first I thought it was accidental. But after the 3rd time, I simply ran from the little guy. Crap it hurt!

I didn’t get back to my new home in CO till around 2am Monday morning. My flight was horribly delayed for some unknown reason and I really didn’t like the tiny jet we were on. On my way home, I simply felt an incredible sense of lonliness and wanting. It’s hard to explain. I missed those I was leaving and I missed those I was returning to. What else can I say? But once I was home, it all began to gel and I felt a greater sense of warmth of the overall experience.

Where am I now? I’m pretty much working on refining myself as a result of the trip. To the dismay of some (not those of my class), I am liking myself and am growing increasingly comfortable with who I’ve become and am becoming. But I do plan on being a better friend, as I’ve stated before. So far, so good. Friendships/relationships are only as good as you’re willing to pour yourself into them. And I’m pouring myself into several. For some, the first move has been made and I’m just waiting to hear back. My expectations are fairly low, which helps to minimize any potential for let down. And I’d like to think it also lets some off the hook rather easily. You know, it’s really hard to go from no contact in 20 years to all of sudden want to rekindle things. Life is sometimes complicated enough without adding to it. If you’re someone from my past, and you’re feeling that… don’t worry. I totally understand and I will not hold it against you at all. Life’s far, far too short for that. And believe it or not, I’ve got plenty to keep me busy.

Speaking of busy-ness (Is that right? Business, sounds like business, not being busy.), I came back from the reunion to another contract and to startup activities proceeding further and to the next level. So, I’m rather busier than a one legged man in a butt kicking contest. Yes. I know I’ve used that one before. But it still holds true, more so than ever.

Take it light,

-Mike