Category Archives: Personal stuff

Not the post I was expecting to make

Personal stuff

Normally I’d be posting about this morning’s ride, about Kevin, Kevin & Karen (I’m outnumbered by the K’s!), about hopefully the last time I’ll see temps dip into the 30s for a very long while. About feeling a bit better than expected, and how may Sunday’s harsh ride up Redwood Gulch might have been good for me.

Zoe-Zoe guarding her turf.
But all of that got overshadowed by a phone call this afternoon. Staff was properly screening the call, since someone was looking for “the owner” (and most such calls are cold-call salespeople I don’t have time for). But with a bit of a twist; it was an important call concerning a former employee. Well, that turned out to be true. It was the sister of Mike Flaherty, a young man that worked with us for a number of years, becoming our service manager in Redwood City. I’m not sure exactly how long he stayed with us, but at the time, it was longer than anywhere he’d worked previously. Michael was a bit of a character, sometimes a bit impulsive, but a pretty good guy. He eventually left to work for another shop in Burlingame, where the structure was a bit less formal and more to his liking. He could be his own boss there, something that’s tougher to do at Chain Reaction when you have so many family members running the show!

Not too long before he left us, his living situation changed and he could no longer take care of his cat, which we adopted. We called her Zoe-Zoe (not sure where she got that name), and she was an interesting animal. Quite independent, didn’t really want to be around people much. She would lash out at anyone trying to touch her, much less pet her or pick her up. She’d crawl into things and dare you to disturb her. But somehow she clicked with me. I managed to tame her, get her to not literally bite the hand that feeds her, bring her out into the open. It was really frustrating to Becky (my daughter and resident cat person) that I, a person who really didn’t care that much for cats, was the only person who Zoe-Zoe got along with.

Our cats, at that time, were allowed outside during the day, and they’d come home at dark for food. But one day Zoe-Zoe left in the morning and didn’t come back. Lots of frantic searching and no sign of Zoe-Zoe. After a few days, we assumed she was gone, perhaps taken by a predator, run over by a car, a sad fate of some sort. We all missed her greatly, even though it gave most of the household time for their shredded (clawed) arms to heal. And I’m sitting at my computer, just like I am now, same room, at almost 1am and I glance down to the right of where I’m sitting and there she is, looking up at me. Zoe-Zoe. Gone six days. I mean, what sort of cat disappears for six days and returns home. Zoe-zoe did.

Zoe-Zoe’s been gone for years, and today we found out that Michael is gone as well. We don’t know what happened to Michael; I didn’t ask when his sister called. She just knew he’d spoken of me from time to time and that I should know he’d passed a few days ago. He was probably in his mid-30s. Michael and Zoe-Zoe were both enigmas that I could never really figure out, but I’m glad I knew them.

Started out feeling, well, you know… but good ride in the end. But am I Russian, Ukrainian or Polish?

Personal stuff, Ride reports (not Tu/Th)

The plan was what used to be “the usual” but hasn’t been all that “usual” lately. And it didn’t turn out as “the usual” today either. Instead of heading over Old LaHonda to Pescadero, we cut it short, heading directly out to the coast via San Gregorio. Kevin was actually feeling pretty darned good up Old LaHonda, but the hill was getting the best of me today, putting me in a pretty dark place. I was wondering, heading up, why I could feel so much better lately on Kings than Old LaHonda. Don’t have a good answer to that.

The nice thing about heading out to the coast via San Gregorio vs Pescadero is the ability to draft someone into the usual headwind, and I took full advantage of that today. I lead the first mile or so, then followed Kevin’s wheel the next 8. Can’t do that climbing Haskins or Stage!

The new routine at San Gregorio is coffee and a “Miami-style” pastry. Not as many calories as the half-sandwich plus pastry plus coke if we go through Pescadero, but 10 fewer miles probably makes up for the difference in calories. Then we had a slight change in the “new usual” routing, heading out to Highway 1 instead of Stage Road, on our way to Tunitas Creek. There’s no difference in climbing; either way you end up at the top of Highway 1 prior to the descent towards Kings, but just felt nice to not immediately have to climb Stage after eating.

Tunitas was, well, Tunitas. We weren’t fast, but not quite as slow as I thought I might be either. Found a pair of sunglasses in the middle of the road on the way up and actually found the guy they belonged to at the top!

Oh, that Russian/Ukrainian/Polish thing. My last name is Russian (Jacoubowsky) based on what I know of family history and the name ending with a “y” instead of an “i” (the latter being typically Polish). But I’ve taken a bit more interest in the family history with what’s going on in Ukraine, and my 23 & Me ancestry info… says the family genes trace back to Poland, not Russia. Well, sorta. Did some digging around and learned a couple of things. What you quickly discover is that country names are just lines on a map, and those lines are in different places at different times. 23 & Me gives you the past 200 years, and for half of that, from around 1800 to 1917 or so, there was no “Poland.” It was part of Russia. And in fact, some of the area was actually Ukriane at one time. So, I’m not just American Mutt; the slavic part of me is “Mutt” as well.