Sunday was Bake's birthday. After our neighborhood birthday walk, as seen above, (not that it's a tradition or anything, it was just sunny for the first time in a while; though it does seem like a nice tradition, dunnit?), we headed north to Vancouver. That's where the Pink Pearl (
www.pinkpearl.com/) is, Bake's favorite restaurant. It's a vast Chinese place with dim sum that's out of this, or any other world.
The Pink Pearl happens to be on Hastings Street, definitely the scariest, skankiest street I've ever been on in my life. Nothing but junkies, junkies, and more junkies! Last November, we stumbled upon it on our way to the Pink Pearl from Chinatown and had the holy bejesus scared out of us. See my November archives for my write-up of that thrilling experience. (Though I didn't include the bit about the ancient, scraggly junkie with the upset tummy who pulled down his pants and well, I'll leave that to your imagination ...)
Luckily, the Pink Pearl is not on the real, real bad section of Hastings. Below, please take note of me pretending to vomit from having mainlined too much H. (I understand that Vancouver officials are pretty freaked about the impression that Hastings and its environs will give to visitors during the coming 2010 Winter Olympics. No Doubt.)
All righty. Enough about that. Sunday was also Fanatik team picture day, but of course I wasn't there. But here they are anyway:
Rode the Donut Ride on Saturday, the venerable early Saturday a.m. rain-or-shine ride that's been going on since the mid-80s. No phone calls or e-mails, just show up at 7:00 at Kulshan Cycles or a little after 7 pretty much anywhere along Eldridge Avenue/Marine Drive and hook on. Head up to Fernburg, across to Birch Bay, down along Red River Road and back to Bellingham. I don't ride it as much as I'd like (Bake's soccer games, chess tournaments, etc.) but most Saturdays I've ridden it, I hook up with some great people and am pleasantly surprised to have ridden 45 miles by about 9:30.
Above is Steve VanderStay, English professor at WWU, and Columbia neighborhood homey. Below is what was left of the group by the time we hit the Paris-Roubaix section, that kind of rough road behind the Cherry Point Refinery. There're only seven riders left at this point (riders peel off at various points); odd that it was such a small group. A dry, not-freezing-cold Saturday a.m. in February is rare and I thought there'd be many more taking advantage of it. Looking back is Marty Reimer, terrific triathlete and winner of the Baker's Breakfast Cookie triathlon a few years ago.
Kinda cool--I just got off the phone with Chris Carmichael, Lance's long-time coach. He's presentih' and representih' at the Seattle Bike Expo in a couple weeks and I'm writing a little thing about it for the Seattle Times. He says Lance will run the Boston and New York marathons with year, with goal times of low 2:40s and mid 2:30s respectively. Also, Lance plans to ride some ultra endurance mountain bike race this year but he doesn't know which one. I asked him if this is all leading up to an Ironman triathlon but he said no, he didn't think so. (I bet he does.)
Rode the North Shore Circuit Race (
Below, the boy Bake (at far left) keeps the beat playing a bongo drum in a terrific performance last Thursday night at his school, Cedar Tree Montessori (two s's, one r, right?). It was a full night as he also tread the boards playing a windmill in a dramatic treatment of "Don Quixote". Later, Baker played the Man of La Mancha himself in a tableaux! 
