Holiday Parties- What NOT to do

Well, I spent part of the weekend at a very nice Halloween party thrown by friends, and it was a wonderful gathering. I've been at this bicycling thing for two years, and a few people who hadn't seen me in that same amount of time commented on my weight loss, and how much different I looked.

I should make it clear here that I don't mind standing out in a crowd, just about any crowd. My costume this year consisted of a vintage Nashbar Skinsuit, rainbow striped on the sides, and bright blue over the chest and back, and then I used an old helmet that had been altered with a claw hammer, and broke a pair of badly scratched sunglasses, then placed a 700 tire between my legs and up over my shoulder. I went as a post crash cyclist, oh, and the best part of that story is that a close freind of mine was at the party, and had been clocked by a car about a month before. So, to save explaining I just told everyone I went as him. He found it immensely amusing (he's got a good sense of humor) and a good laugh was had by all. But I digress...

So, I arrive at the party, with goodies in hand, and see many other goodies there as well, yum, I'm going to have just a little of this and that, but my intentions are to watch a bit so I don't slide back down the slope I did last year and put on 23lbs over the winter. I start with a beer, and a nice sandwich (sloppy joe of some sort, quite good). Then another beer, and I think another, and another, then it's time to sample some more food, and then another beer, and well, some more food, and on and on as the night progressed. My lovely wife was dressed as quite a sexy nurse, and she was there to care for me, but she was indulging as well so we kind of slid down the path of poor eating together (she's sweet that way sometimes :) ) Sometime around 11 or midnight someone said "shots upstairs" and I was just buzzed enough to think "ohhh, shots, they are lower in calories!" :) Well, at least we had a good time, and being up in weight on Sunday morning came as no surprise.

The good part of this story is, I took my car to the friends house who had wrecked the month before, we had to do some furniture moving Saturday before the party, and we borrowed his truck to do so, well, I left the car there, on purpose, so my only mode of transportation this week to and from work was the bike. It's amazing how much easier it is to decide to pedal to work when the other option is not going to work. I'm glad I did it, and I plan to carry that mentality though the rest of the winter. It was 33 degrees two mornings in a row, and I have found that the gear I currently have will handle that without issue, so bring on the cold!

Happy pedaling!