Happy Holidays!

Woo Hoo! I'm home for the holidays. My family is pretty much the bomb so i'm really looking forward to some R&R. un-lucky for me it was a whopping -20 with windchill yesterday, and it doesn't show promises of warming up much. Lucky for me i got a week trial gym membership, some good books to read, plus all the digital entertainment my heart could desire here @ home, so i'm prepared to weather this out...

On tap for the vacation:
-Quality Time with the Fam
-A family trip to Chicago
-Always some Illinois Basketball games (My dad and brother are HUGE fans)
-some spin classes (to keep my legs in shape)
-Plenty of food for eating
-and a trip to S.C. to watch Walt and Haley get hitched.

I'll be back in CO in the new year, I hope everybody has a restful and meaningful holiday season!
Peace.
mike

P.S. if you're on facebook you should check out our sweet hike we did on Friday

Before and After

Yo blog-o-sphere

So i got this bike off of Craigslist for $20 with the original intention of giving it to my bro for Christmas; but i found out it was too small and it'd be pretty expensive to ship it to Illinois.. So instead i fixed it up for a friend who had her bike stolen a couple of months ago. I'm pretty proud of how it turned out. Special thanks to sean for showing me how to re-build the headset and bottom bracket, william for teaching me how to draw flames, and jessie for helping me choose colors, and iris for getting the sweet basket!


I feel like this is where most people can stop reading, but if you ever care to try a project like this here's what I did and what I learned:

1. First i stripped the bike of all its parts and threw them in a big box. You'll need special tools to remove the bottom bracket and headset or you might damage them. My friend sean at the bike shop helped me with this for free.


2. I sanded the frame, primed it, and painted it. I put the flames on my covering the frame in masking tape and then cutting out where i wanted to paint flames. I finished the paint job with a protective enamel clear coat


3. Now comes the rebuild. For a singlespeed or fixed gear, you have two options:
   1. You can try keeping the old wheel, remove the cassette, and put spacers and a single cog on there (i did this on my singlespeed, and it works fine)
   
   
   2. Or you can get a new wheelset, either singlespeed of fixed gear. This is the route i went with this bike because the old wheelset was shot
   
   
   
   
4. It's important that you have good chainline and chain tension. the chain tension on this bike was easy because of the horizontal dropouts. If you don't have horizontal dropouts, you can play with gear ratios and use a "half link" to try to get the tension right. For chainline, you might have to change the bottom bracket you're using. I got lucky and was able to get by by shifting the large chainring from the outside to the inside of the crank bolts.


5. I also replaced some clutch parts (seatpost, grips, added the basket, and threw on a set of old mtn tires i had laying in the garage).

and Whamo, a finished bike! i'm a little jellous i can't cruise around on this baby!

Today in Pictures

Today in the Congo people line up as they are displaced from the fighting. In India, Troops line around the Taj Mahal Palace hotel hotel as the battle rages for the hostages still inside. In America, people line up and the battle rages for $400 dollar tv's. The death toll is already up as people are injured and store workers are crushed to death from crazed shoppers.





happy holidays.
-mike

2000 miles to New Orleans

What if I got in a boat in central park, here in boulder? What would i see, where would I go?

I looked on google maps and it looks like i'd float through Greeley, through Nebraska before joining the Missouri in omaha. From there I'd cut down to Kansas City, through my childhood home of central Missouri to St. Louis and then south, through memphas and eventually to the gulf.

I'm sure there are more scenic stretches of river, I've been on a lot of rivers, but there's something about just heading out my door and ending up in the gulf. I've gotta think that the trek would take close 3 months to complete... but there's something slightly appealing to me of living a couple of months on the river.

I think i need a straw brim hat first. and a fishing pole.
Peace.
mike

a good weekend

This weekend was fun. Also, I didn't tell you this but i got a digital camera for my birthday. That means I can blog, and post pictures too!

First off, I went to velo swap and scored a new bike. It's a red Felt, and its soo fast. For you bike nerds out there, its a custom built felt with a carbon fork, carbon stays, and a full dura-ace group on it. I took it for a spin saturday and had a personal best on one of the little local climbs.

After the ride, my friend Shannon came in town with her puppy. We had a good time hanging out on the roof, watching an awesome Boulder sunset! Sunday, we went to my church, which is amazing, and went on a little hike with the puppy. Shannon left this morning, which is sad because she won't be close by anymore.

Anyhow it's getting cold out, and it won't be long till the snows arrive! I'll keep you posted!
Peace.
mike

Cool!

I was reading Alieen's blog the other day and found this. It's super sweet, especially for those of us who are graphically stimulated.

pretty much, it reads my blogs, picks out 150 words (i think their size is based on how much they're used) and makes a sweet graphic.

My amazing friends

So before you read this post, if you're not an avid reader of my blog, you should back up and skim the last two for some background.

So tonight I'm sitting in the living room with Josh and William, we're making some homemade pizza (if you've never made your own pizza, let me know and I'll send you the recipe, its easy and delicious!)

Anyhow, the doorbell rings and I yell "Come In!" then there's another knock, and I realize I'm going to have to get up and get the door because Josh and William weren't phased. When I open the door, there's a crowd of maybe 20 people with balloons and a giant check for a new bike! Apparently a ton of my friends rallied together and all chipped in a couple bucks, to raise $760 to replace my broken bike! (the check was made before the last few donations were counted)


So a very special thanks to all the unknown people who donated to help me get back on the road! Thanks to Andrew Adare for talking me out of buying that $100 beater bike I was looking at yesterday, and thanks to Laura and William for masterminding the operation. This is a perfect example of the amazing un-intentional community I've found myself in here in Boulder.
I love you all.

Peace.
Mike

Hit by a car

I keep getting asked to tell this story, so I figure I'll just blog it for posterity.

Friday night i was hanging out with my good friend Matt D. We were on our way home, riding down the Broadway bike path.

At Broadway and Euclid, i had the walk sign and there was a car stopped at the light. I entered the intersection when the car gunned it making a right hand turn, t-boning me. I flipped over the hood and landed on the other side of the car, watching it drive off. Immediately tonnes of slightly intoxicated college girls came to my rescue, but were a little helpless as far as identifying the car that hit me. I did a little self examination, and when i felt i was ok i got up and with a shoulder to lean on walked over and sat by the side of the road.

The police and the ambulance were there pretty quickly. They asked me a lot of questions at once, and it took some convincing to the paramedics that Yes, i was OK, and NO, i did not want to ride the ambulance. I didn't get a good look at my bike, the police took it in as "evidence" but i did see that the fork was in 3 distinct pieces, and I'm assuming both wheels are done for.

I caught a ride to the hospital, where i was in a bed between two drunken college girls. After my x-ray i opted to leave the emergency room and told the doc i could be found in the more peaceful waiting room.

The x-ray's showed no bad news, (my left knee was really swollen). I also when to a physical therapist who said my knee was bruised but in really good condition.

I'm glad I'm OK! And I'm really thankful for all the supportive calls and e-mails I've gotten. I'm especially appreciative of everybody who's offered to let me borrow a bike or help me fix my old one. My plan of action is to get my bike back from the 5-0 and see what Trek will do for me (they sounded hopeful that they might be able to do me some sort of favor). If the frame and components are salvageable, I'll start from there. If not, i might be in the market for a new bike.

Oh, and as far as the car that hit me goes: I didn't get a good look at it as i was flipping over the hood, but I do know that it was a sedan, and it was dark colored (Black, or maybe dark green or blue). Some at the scene thought it was a Volkswagen but based on the hood ordainment (the one part of the car i did get a glance at) I'm thinking it was more like a Dodge or a Pontiac. At any rate, if you see a car driving around boulder with a mike shaped dent in the hood, take a picture or write down the license plate #.

Peace.
mike

Un-intentional Community

A "hot topic" in modern-day Christianity is "Intentional Community." I'm not an expert on this whole I.C. idea, but I'll give you a rundown of what I know about it. I.C. is living together with the purpose of seeking a shared vision, also sharing responsibilities and resources. Christian I.C. is based on the latter portion of Acts 2:

They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.

There are also a lot of mainstream books on this idea of intentional community. One really good book is "irresistible revolution" by Shane Claiborne. Although not strictly about intentional community, Shane exhibits a great example of a working community. I'd highly' recommend the book.

With all that said, I'm all about Community. I think Bonhoeffer in "Life Together" and Merton in "No man is an Island" both do a fantastic job of going through scripture and showing how necessary it is for the Christian to live life with the support of a community, and if you don't like the idea of community you should grace yourself with these fantastic reads.

But this "Intentional Community" thing is, in my opinion, an extremely dangerous trend for Christians. Here's the bottom line:

Our Intention is not Community, our Intention is Christ. Once we start living selfless lives reflecting Christ's love the community can't help but follow. It can't help overflowing. But, if we shift our gaze from Christ to some ideal way we should be living, we've lost sight of the goal. We've substituted something we can do on our own for what Christ has already done for us. We're seeking an ideal over the Ideal.

I have been a part of fantastic communities both in Clemson and here in Boulder. I love my roommates, all solid christian men, and can go to them with any need. Spreading larger I have amazing friends, brothers and sisters, to lean on. Larger than that is my Church, which is a body of Christians whom I love each dearly. This fantastic network of support, this amazing community which I've fond myself flourishing in, its of no work of my hand. It was completely Un-intentional. A gift from Christ. For this gift, I could not be more grateful! Thanks be to God.

Would you try to build something with your hands with the assumption that you could do it better than Christ? Would you dare?

-mike

Riddle me this:

If McCain wins, he'll be the oldest president in U.S. History. Now, he might be in pretty good health now, but Old people have this bad habit of dying sometimes.

If McCain kick's the bucket, do we want a woman with 2 years of political experience governing a state about the same population as Charlotte or Memphis running our country?

Do we want a President who picks his running mate not by experience or what he/she can add to the party, but by the potential demographic of voters he (or she) can pick up?

Work?

Sorry i haven't been blogging much. I've been having a super fun time at work doing some really exciting stuff. The sad part is, i can't show you my exciting stuff until I publish it! (It's never been done before!). The reason I'm blogging today is because I did some rough new experiments which also promise to lead to a pretty sweet paper! I'm super stoaked, I love what I do (even if it makes me a geek). In case you haven't seen it, you should check out my advisors page with info about the lab i work at!

To offset my geekyness, I've been spending my free time doing a lot of biking and hiking. Even though its been hot here, there's just soo much to do! Since I last blogged I climbed another 14er (quandary), and the 3 prominate peaks of boulder (Green, Bear, and S. Boulder). I've also been spending a lot of time with konisha (My mtn bike).

Up and Comming: I'm headed to Mexico! My cousin Natalie called me up and needed an "adult" to go with her and her team doing a week trip with casas por cristo. I'll let you know how it went when I get back!

thats all i've got! peace and love!
-mike

The Physics and Art of Fluid Flow

So a lot of times people ask me what I do, and I tell them: "I am developing a new flow visualization system to study the mixing of two scalars in a fluid flow." That is usually followed with a blank look, and then: "Cool, why? What's that good for."

Usually in conversation I don't have a good answer, but I can tell you that understanding fluid physics and turbulent flows is REALLY important. Nobel Prize winner Richard Freeman stated "Turbulence is the most important unsolved problem of classical physics." But I don't think that's what drew me to studying fluid flows. I think my reasoning might be more similar to the reason that Leonardo da Vinci studied it... That is, its beautiful.

So, you can imagine my excitement when I came across this course offering at University of Colorado: The Physics and Art of Fluid Flow. I'd encourage you to go and look at some of the galleries, and maybe you too will enjoy the beauty of one of the most complicated and misunderstood physical problems we know of.

Peace.
Mike

Brother Graduated, Back in CO!

So my brother graduated. I'm super pumped for him, and hope his college experience is a good one. I'm back in Colorado and it feels good to be back in the cool, dry, mountain air, but man, i miss all the trees...

I had an interesting conversation about hope for our generation, and our future tonight which made me realize that I probably sound like a pessimist a lot of the time. I will say this, I have little hope in our generation, or the next, to make the world a better place. I have little hope in the good in mankind, because we are sinful and destructive beings. I have little motivation to share in the ambition of environmentalists, because ultimately the earth is going to get destroyed.

I have one hope, and that is Christ. That is where all my Optimism lies. I feel like my lack of hope in mankind isn't pessimism, its just biblically based truth. In all end times prophecy, when Christ comes again, the worlds morals will be in shambles, and the world will be quite literally falling apart: earthquakes, natural disasters, the whole lot. To place your hope in mankind is to place your hope in an idol. That idol is yourself, your kind.

I do want to say that I don't mean I don't think we shouldn't try. We're called to be stewards of the environment, to seek justice for widows and orphans. To be generous with our money and to spread the name of Christ. But that's just it, in the end He should be our Hope and the world's, Not ourselves.

that's all I've got to say about that.

WE did it!

So we biked the blue ridge parkway. I'll have pictures to come, but i don't think they can show how beautiful and fun the ride was. Absolutely a fantastic vacation. When i get some time, i might make a website about it in case anybody else out there ever wants to try it! We all averaged around 275 biking miles and roughly 90 driving miles. We had to skip about 90 miles due to bad weather and detours, but i still think i can officially check that off my bucket list.

Now I'm at home in springfield for a week with the fam. I've been sleeping and eating a lot, which is fantastic. My family is cool, and we've been enjoying nice weather here in Springfield. My mom and I went for a cruiser ride around town, my brother and I went to the driving range, and my dad and I played some awesome disc golf. I've also gotten to see my grandparents, who are cool.

Anyhow, thats it for now. I'll holler when there are some pictures up.
Peace.
mike

We're Here

After 2 SOLID days of driving (and a tonne of pretzles) we have made it to VA. We're meeting up with Jessie this morning and starting our first day of riding. On the plate:
today: Mile 0-75

I wish i could post pictures to show ya'll how pretty it is out here. The weather's looking to be pretty nice for the first couple of days. It's iffy if we're going to get a campsite tonight (memorial day weekend), but I'll post next chance I get!
-mike

I did it!

For those of you who do not know, I plan on setting out in less than a week on one of my life goals: cycling the blue ridge parkway. I'll be headed out with Matt D, Jessie F, and Brittany T. It's going to be a blast, I've been training for the trip this winter and into the summer, and yesterday I hit the milestone i was aiming for in my preparation:

I biked from Boulder to Estes Park and back! The trip was beautiful, the weather was perfect. Its about 83 miles round trip, and involved over 3000 feet of elevation gain. No major snags were involved in the ride, except 1 flat tire which was an easy fix.

In other news, last week was loads of fun, with another year of school over we had tonnes of friends from Clemson come to visit including Kelly Young, Kelly Simpson, Aileen, Shannon, Jenny, Chris, Jad, Stephanie, and some more that i'm forgetting (no hurt feelings please!)

We did some beautiful hiking up in Estes park, and around boulder. This week the plan is to ROCK OUT some work in the lab so i will have some data to look at on our road trip. I'm going to try and keep this thing updated throughout the trip, and more frequently, so keep checking back!

A thorn in my flesh and a plank in my eye

I think we all tend to think pretty highly of ourselves. If you don't, then you're lying. I was reading an article online that says in on survey, a large number of high-school seniors were asked how they get along with others. Less than 1% ranked themselves below average and 60% ranked them selves in the top 10%.
How and why is it that we become so good with covering our many inequities with our few assets? It is written "the weak will become strong" and I don't think thats just a metaphor. Knowing where you are below averages gives you a better view of your abilities and where you need improvement.
Sometimes I feel like some of the best way's to see our shortcomings is find what shortcomings stand out most to us in others. I don't think my roommates (who I love) read my blog, which is fine because it gives me a chance to pull examples from my own life. I have this one roommate and he bugs the mess out of me with his persistence to be right all of the time. If I step back, I realize a lot of the time he is right, and the reason it bugs me so much is it because it points out when I am wrong. One more example: I have a friend who is incredibly spendthrifty. He buys expensive things at impulse, a lot. I immediately find myself thinking highly of my self when I compare myself to him because I live on a budget. This is kind of funny because what it means is money is my idol, not his. I think about my money way too much, and even though I budget it, I still spend it on stuff that I don't need... I just have places in the budget for it.
Last time I checked, there were 6.5 billion people on the earth, and if I'm say I'm doing better than average, thats 3.25 billion people who probably disagree with me. It's a humbling thought, or it should be.
Peace.
mike

Love your neighbor?

What Does it mean to "Love our Neighbors"? I feel like in today's society we shut ourselves down to the idea of the other. Especially strangers. I've never been much of a city person, but it seems like the more people you're around, the more you put on the blinders and completely ignore your neighbors. Why? Because to notice people will slow you down, make you feel guilty, and if you started caring for your neighbors, you'd never get to your destination at all!

Here's how it looks for me: Each morning i hop on my bike and ride in to work. I pass people at the bus-stops along the way. They look bored and lonely with their iPods in and their glazed stares awaiting the bus, but I've got no time for that. Plus, it'd be weird just to stop and talk to them, and what in the world would I talk about? The weather? Then, as I cross the major road between my neighborhood and campus, I usually pass one or two homeless people with their cardboard signs explaining their troubles and asking for help. "Lazy homeless people" I think, "why don't they get a job." Plus, I usually figure if I gave them money, they'd just use it at the liqueur store at that intersection. Then the real onslaught of neighbors begins once i'm on campus. I fly past a broken world just trying not to hit any of them. Some of them are in failing relationships, are struggling in school, are struggling with addictions, or just don't know True Joy.

I wonder what Jesus must have felt as he walked the earth 2000 years ago. Did his heart break for every sad soul he laid eyes on? If he truly Loved people, and knew each and every heart, it seems that the sadness would be nearly unbearable for anybody but God. Are our hearts so hard that we've trained ourselves to ignore everyday tragedy?

I think the clearest struggle for me is Giving to the needy. As a Christian, I am called to do so. Indeed, I'm also called not to judge others (mt 7), but at the same time to be wise with what I have been given (Mt 25:14-30). Normally, I use the homeless man's sin (or even the possibility that he is a sinner) as an excuse not to love him at all. This clearly shows two shortcomings (which are really, one and the same) I have as a christian: 1) My pride in myself and 2) My lack of faith in Christ. Lack in faith that He can use my gift or gesture for good. Faith that my abstinence from certain sinful acts makes me more worthy of His blessings.

I don't know if I have a summary or a conclusion for this entry, just something i wanted to get down on paper. (or i guess, down as a string of 1's and 0's floating around somewhere in a box in California)

Thanks for reading,
peace
mike

I take that back...

So, 2 blog posts ago i promised to post bi-weekly about a subject. As it turns out: I'm just not that organized. After reading some other blogs, and talking to my roommate, William, I decided that a) thats not the point of blogs and b) who cares?

So I'm scratching that and This blog is just going to be about what ever I feel like.

I think this blog will be about why I love my church! So, right when I started attending All Souls, the pastor sat me down to talk about my passions and skills. I feel like in most churches where I come from, this is where the conversation would have ended. But the pastor got really pumped when I told him about myself, challenged me to make something happen, and gave me funding to start action. A couple of months later Boulder297 is now officially up and running! We had our first project this past weekend, and i'm really excited to see where it goes!

Also, its getting warm enough to mountain bike again, which has me super stoaked. Having a winter was nice, but i'm ready to put on shorts!

well, that's a breif update, better than none at all!
Peace and love,
mike