Mustache May for Multiple Sclerosis.

There is a woman in my life that has treated me like her son for years. Patricia Payne was once a stepmother of mine, but she will always be a part of my family. She was the first person to show me (and my father) that family is important.
Pattie has Multiple sclerosis. Multiple sclerosis (or MS) is a chronic, often disabling disease that attacks the central nervous system (CNS), which is made up of the brain, spinal cord, and optic nerves. Symptoms may be mild, such as numbness in the limbs, or severe, such as paralysis or loss of vision. The progress, severity, and specific symptoms of MS are unpredictable and vary from one person to another. Today, new treatments and advances in research are giving new hope to people affected by the disease. Pattie has never let it slow her down.
For May, I am growing a mustache, raising money, and promoting awareness of Multiple sclerosis. I will give all of the money that I raise to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society or directly to Pattie to pay for her medical bills.
So here is day 1: Clean.

If you can help me spread the word, please pass this on to anyone and everyone. Thank you.

High flows, high peaks, low productivity.

This is not a good thing to see. It is the flows for Boulder Creek. It has turned into Boulder River. The water is the color of chocolate milk. I can't see the fish. Who knows what is going on below the surface. It is giving me lots of time to tie more flies and read fishing blogs. Of course there is a bit of work, getting Ben a cool new race suit, and CTT stuff always to be done.

I love colorado.

Coach Mark and I got a short hike up to Brainard Lake yesterday. It is an amazing place to camp, hike, hang out, and hopefully fish this summer. It was still snowy and the lake was frozen, but we saw very few people and were able to wear the dogs out.

They like the mountains.

First hike of the season.

I was thrilled to be outside.

What a view!

Coach Mark and I went for a hike starting at Moffatt Tunnel. The tunnel is an impressive 10 km long through the Rockies. It really amazes me that it was completed before 1930. We were able to bring the dogs and thoroughly wear everyone else. We made it above the tree line for lunch and hustled back before the summertime like thunderstorms rolled in.

They eat better than I do sometimes.

Then I started making food for the dogs. Turkey, rice, broccoli, and carrots in this batch. They seem to love it. Now it is cold and rainy and the runoff is making the water fast and murky. I knew the fishing would be on hold, but I love getting my tri training done outside. Looks like today will be a treadmill run. I will also be racing the Summer Open sprint triathlon in about a month. I am excited to get racing again this season. It has been wonderful having a coach. I don't have to think about anything except doing my workouts. Now it's time to run and swim!

What a day.

Looks like this is turning into a fishing blog. I woke up exhausted this morning. I moped around not wanting to do anything. I was going to go for a run, but took a nap instead. Poor me with too much time on my hands. I finally decided to leave the house, but only to go fishing. The grocery list can wait. As can the exercising. I headed up Boulder Canyon to see what it was like. I have never fished up very far as it looks pretty steep and too fast for the fish. The few good areas were all taken by people fishing. I thought that it being pretty cold (50 degrees), cloudy, and a Friday afternoon, people would have better things to do. I finally found a place that looked decent and pulled over. The water was fast, but I spotted a couple of small fish and pulled one out. That really made me happy. It is exhilarating fishing a new area and landing a fish. I tied on new leader and tippet, so all my knots held (ok it was a 7 inch fish). The hole was small and I spooked the rest when I caught the first, so I moved on up the canyon. I was close to Nederland and it was getting colder. The creek flattened out and I had to keep the dogs from running upstream while trying to spot the easily spooked fish. I was staying back and peering to where I thought that they should be. Finally I saw one and made a couple of casts to him. He went for it, but I missed it. I thought that he moved up a bit so I snuck up and made another cast. Wham! A fish came out of nowhere and hammered my fly. I was startled long enough to wait until she ate it before setting the hook. When I landed her, I was surprised how big she was!

So it turned out to be a good trip. Then I mustered the courage to go and get my run done. I ran to the track to throw down some 400s, but it was full of kids. (I was at their high school.) I ran around for a bit until they were all gone and got my track splits faster than I thought I could. That also felt good. Then we ate a lot and I finished today's swim session. I feel so accomplished for a day that started off very slowly.

A couple of days ago we hit up the Big Thompson for some fishing. It was our first time there, but we landed a few fish. Mojdeh got her first Brown Trout as well as her first fish on a fly that she tied herself. I also have been teaching Lando about fishing.

Today, I also won my first Twitter contest. Thanks to Splish for hooking me up! They asked for someone to take a picture of themselves in their Splish suit at a historical national monument. Apparently Chautauqua Park is one so I threw on a Splish suit and drove there, Moj took a pic, and I sent it to them. Now I can expect a prize in the mail! Time to put the dogs to bed.

Parachute Adams.

3 of 6 today.

Today I got my run done early which left me time to fish before the next session of dog training. Yesterday, I went on a fish recon mission which proved that Eben G. Fine park is one of the best places to fish in Boulder. Sure the fish are small, but they are hungry and love to eat dry flies. I tied two parachutes and two foam elk hair caddis. The fish were rising aggressively which always makes for some fun fishing! The biggest issue that I am having is the trout's teeth are tearing the hackle on my parachutes. So my third fish tore the hackle off. I had given the other parachute to my friend and he gave it to a tree. Now it was time for the caddis. I have had good luck with green foam, but made another with orange foam. Orange to a trout is like red to a bull. Except the trout want to eat the orange objects. When fishing the St. Joe river in Idaho, the cutthroats would try to eat my orange indicator.
In the end I landed a couple with the green foam, but didn't try the all orange foam elk hair caddis. Tonight, I have swimming and indoor soccer. What a great day off. Life is good.

Shoe chew.

Lando has begun chewing. He has munched Wii remotes, helmets, gloves, DVDs, fly tying material, shoes, boxes, tape, anything that he can find. We have been setting up a webcam and watching from outside. He gets zapped and has no idea where it is coming from. We are still working with Sit Means Sit dog training and things are going well otherwise.
The weather is getting better and yesterday we went to Vail. We heard that it would be windy, it wasn't. The signs said that there were huge delays on the highway, there weren't any. The forecast was for a high of 32, it felt like 60. Add over 2 feet of powder and we had a pretty amazing day.

Tea.

I have been working a lot. It is a bit surreal. There was a time recently where I thought that I wouldn't be waiting tables any more.
More importantly, I have enlisted the help of MarkyV. For the first time in my life, I have a triathlon coach. I am excited to work with him. I know that he has high expectations and that thrills me. He will push me much harder than I will push myself. He also loves being outside as much as I do.
Off to work...