My exercise routine

I thought you guys would get a kick out of this.

In addition to going to the gym almost every day for strength training, my cardio workout every day is:

Ride my bicycle to Bass Pro (even though I kind of hate them). Buy 1 box of ammo. Put it in my backpack and ride back to the house.

Total distance, 24.3 miles (bike has a Cateye brand cycle computer onboard to measure).

Getting thin and building my ammo collection at the same time. How could I go wrong?

Pretty good.

Whatta ya gonna do when they have a big sale?

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Why, I'm sure he'll use the bike with the basket an' tassles on the handlebars that day.

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Nahh. I'd just fill up the backpack and do 2 trips on the bike in the same day. I don't anticipate Bass Pro having a sale that is that good any time soon though.

I'm thinking one of these days I might start early in the morning on a Saturday and try going to the Miami Bass Pro. It's 30.8 miles away according to Google Maps. So it would be a 61.6 mile ride total. I'm not sure if I could do it just yet, but maybe I'll work my way up to being able to do it.

I've done 30 miles before, so I know I could get there in about 4 hours max assuming I get stuck at plenty of pedestrian crossing lights (I tend to go about 13-20 mph on the bike). It's getting back that would be the trick.

since I like riding at night, I added some more lights.

I had 3 before. Now I have this (the 3 I had are included). I went overboard, but I've been almost hit 3 times now.

4 of these, 2 in front on the front fork with the red caps on, 2 in the back in white. They all flash.


2 of these on the handle bars steady on to illuminate the street:


8 of these, 2 on the handle bars, 6 on the front wheel fork. They all flash.


3 of these mounted on top of each other on the seat post. They all flash and can do various patterns.


6 of these, 2 mounted pointing to the side on the front fork for side visibility, 4 on the rear wheel fork:


Ordered one of these. A 105 db horn that runs on a 9v battery:


Video/audio of it:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=V5Rz6i_Okw0

I think I'll get some 5.11 underwear/athletic wear to go with this. Or UnderArmour brand.

Some have asked what ammo I'm buying via PM. I'm getting Winchester 5.56 mm Q3131. I will be ordering a case too, but I figure a little more can't hurt. It's a good incentive for riding.

Now I'm a little nervous with all these red and white flashing lights and the horn that perhaps I might get in some trouble. It's for safety's sake, but I realized when I rode tonight, it looks like an emergency vehicle.

feels good. I've lost 50 lbs since January 29 and with the strength training I'm getting stronger. I can bench almost 200 lbs, and on my legs I can do 765 lbs on the incline leg press. My legs are power houses, it's my upper body I'm primarily working on now. I'm building muscle though, it's definitely showing. I'm going to look like Chuck Norris in no time. I guess I'm starting to look good enough that my (female) personal trainer asked me out on a date the other day. That was pretty unexpected.

Unfortunately, I had an accident during my ride tonight. I lost control on some gravel going about 20 mph.

My knee is a little hurt and pretty scraped, but that will heal in a day or two. The only real damage was a $21 white light that was totaled. Everything else somehow seems unscathed. I'll replace it tomorrow and be back to my pedaling ASAP.

Probably just a day or two of letting the knee heal. It would probably be 1 day for most people, but I heal slower due to auto-immune issues from a condition I have (not AIDS or anything like that - I have Crohns disease).

The SHTF first aid kit I built came in handy though. I had everything I needed. I'll be fine. Still got at least 20 miles of riding in before the accident though. I forgot to reset the odometer, so I can't be sure exactly how much, but at least 20.

Lesson learned - when taking a new route, drive it first so you know of any sidewalks that are being redone, or are missing (just gravel).

Won't make that mistake again.

C'mon .cheese just how many lights do you REALLY have? 23? and more than half of them flash? Must look kind of like Christmas. Can we see a photo or a video? This is starting to sound kind of like Gecko 45. Oh, and BTW are you stashing or shooting all that ammo.

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hmm. I haven't counted. I replaced the broken light and if Cateye can send me a plastic bottom half (just the molded plastic) I can fix the previous light to have as a backup in case anything else unexpected happens.

But let's see. 6 white flashers on the front wheel fork, 2 red flashers on it. That's 8. 2 white flashers on the handlebars, 2 steady on lights on the handlebars, that's 12. 4 red flashers on the back wheel fork, that's 16, 2 red flashers that were on the seat post, but are now on the rear Topeak MTX pack I installed on the bike today (I was lucky they came with clothing clips that worked with the bag's light hooks), so that's 18. There were 5 others, but I didn't like having to undo the straps for 4 of them every time I'd get off the bike (they don't click and unclick on and off their brackets like the others), so I took them off and put them on my father's new bike). The one extra seat post light I had (my old Cateye LD1000) I also removed because it was hitting my leg when I pedaled. It also went on my father's bike. So I now have 18 lights on my bike, and he now has 5. There were 23. You are correct.

As for the ammo, as of the moment, I've been putting it in a can, but I would like to go to the range soon, so a bunch of it will get used. Especially since I'm just going to buy a case of it in the next day or two to stash away. I'm paying about $11 a box. I'm making up for it by not smoking though, which used to cost me about $6 a day. So in reality, it's just $5 a day more than I used to spend.

The bike looks weird, I'll admit. When I was riding (day of the accident), I felt kind of goofy with all of them as I knew people were looking and laughing, but at the same time it achieved what it was meant to achieve - they saw me, and therefore didn't hit me.

Unfortunately, there were some people that still didn't see me because of bushes or fence-walls blocking their view. Mainly this was people who were supposed to stop at a stop sign, or a red light right turn, but decided to do a roll through (I guess that's why it's illegal). Fortunately, in a few days the 105 db horn should be here, so that will help.

Doctor says I'm not supposed to ride the bike for 10 days (9 now I guess). I have to take Celebrex and use a cane for a while to walk, but I'm going to try to ride again in 2 days (I don't want to lose momentum). It didn't hurt too bad immediately, but the next day my knee was hurting like heck and swollen. I guess I banged it pretty hard.

So, yeah, the bike looks ridiculous. Either a Christmas tree or a space ship, I don't know which. However, after this one injury, I'm all the more insistent on avoiding another, so I feel it was worth it. What I learned was that just when I thought I was in the clear safety-wise, I had an accident that was totally non-car related. So, I need to plan out my trips to avoid gravel or anything else that could cause a problem.

apparently Bass Pro won't give discounts if you buy by the case.

I called earlier tonight before they closed and spoke to the manager.

Now that I have the Topeak pack on my bike, I figured I could probably bring 1,000 rounds of 5.56 home on the bike when my knee is better (it'd be a heck of a workout pedaling with that kind of weight, plus I'm not sure my tires would like it). According to them, 1,000 rounds is too small to get any discount. Regular per box price stands.

They told me that they have people come in and buy 10,000 rounds of ammo, and they only get a small discount.

Geesh. With today's ammo prices, if somebody came in to buy 10,000 rounds, I'd imagine that a plaque should be made in their honor and placed upon the front door.