I’m at Buffalo Lodge Bicycle Resort. Happy Hour (of course).

The live music had me laughing:

remember this guy?


Never had gin from a can before, but it seemed vegan.

I was under the impression that honey isn’t strictly vegan? Speaking as an omnivore.

I credit being over 60 and still having nearly all my own teeth to my dislike of gin.

Drew at a bike resort….catastrophic.

Very comfortable.



Tomorrow’s climb. NOT Pike’s Peak (BTDT-marathon). 1 mile up, 4 miles back down.
Getting acclimated to 6500’

A vegan I’m not. Maybe I’d eat one in a pinch. But it seemed “planty.”.

I used to be vegan, or "plant based" as its now called. Saying you're a vegan based on your diet gets you yelled at by certain people that say being a vegan means you must also be an animal rights activist. I cant keep up with the rules. I ate that way for health reasons, and I probably need to get back to it. Many will not eat honey because it comes from a bee. Also many will not eat Figs because of wasps dying inside of the fruit or something.

I wouldn't mind trying the gin in a can drink.

I was vegan, or whatever it’s called, for about 4 years and it was great! I too did it for health reasons and I lost a bunch of weight and my cholesterol dropped to a healthy level. I wasn’t mental about it. I would have the occasional burger or pizza and I had no idea about dead wasps or exploiting working class bees. Also, I never ate meat substitutes. Most of them are dreadful.

What was this thread about? I easily digress…

That's THE Drew?

I developed a taste for Gin & Tonic sometime around the time I turned 50. Now I have to have a tooth pulled. Great.

My understanding is that among cocktail type drinks the G&T is the least injurious to your teeth because the acidity and sugar content are both fairly low.
I giess if you drink enough of them you could fall down and bust your front teeth, though.

Science, schmeince. Don't go tryin' to muddy the waters with facts.

Let me preface by saying that nearly every alcoholic beverage is kinda nasty tasting. When I was in college (I was 18 - which was the legal drinking age at the time) I had my first drink - cheap, keg beer. Smelled and tasted like u-know-what, but the effect was undeniable. Inevitable experimentation followed. At the time, Vodka was "too Russian" for more than occasional consumption, and tequila was an exotic drink which came with legendary stories about worm consumption. I wasn't looking to "put hair on my chest" (despite a lifelong paucity that continues to present day), so whiskey and bourbon in the college student's budget range were rather out (had some Chevis Regal at a dinner party at a prof's place once and that was some good stuff, even if way out of budget and late in the collegiate experience) - which at the time left rum and gin. Bacardi was (and remains) rather budget friendly, and both the gold and 151 received audiences and generally positive reviews. Then there was Gin. I tried to like it. Why not? Except for the world's worst (now 2nd worst with the advent of Fireball) mouthwash - Bombay - it was very easy on the budget. The only problem was that unless you were sneaking it into Long Island Iced Teas, it was amongst the three vilest-tasting substances on the planet. The addition of tonic improved it in no way, shape or form.

None of my acquaintances had any fondness for the stuff either, and consequently Gin ranked lower on the desirability scale than 75 cent pitchers of Iron City beer (which is saying something). I tried regular gin. I tried Sloe gin. I had to resort to schnapps to get the nasty aftertaste to go away. Now this was the late 70's and into the very beginning of the 80's. Monty Python and British comedy in general could not be escaped if you were a somewhat nerdy college student. This exposure revealed a few very enlightening details about British society. Inescapable was their penchant for driving on the wrong side of the road, misusing "boot" and "rubber" and using perambulators, but also their fondness for gin (and also beer flavored with dirt - which is an entirely different essay) and the abysmal state of mens' teeth.

Coincidence? Why only the men then? Ah! When's the last time you saw a British actress drinking gin on screen. OK - so Elizabeth has been known to imbibe on occasion, but then again, she has to hold it in when dealing with Charles and Camilla - and frankly, while I admire her greatly, it's not for her pearly smile. So... therefore, it must be gin.

C&V content... I'm fairly certain I have a Carlton Corsa that was built by a chap who'd had a lunch of Beefeater's.

I think so. They exiled that bastid to Key West and he escaped to Colorado to avoid the humidity.

He had a lot of gadgets, but management assured me he doesn’t get near a hacksaw.

I used to start with Tom Collins, move to gin & tonic, then gin on ice, then give me the &$%#€ bottle.

However, one thing led to another. I embarrassed a Mississippi lass, got a ticket for going backwards thru Burger King, and woke up to find my contacts in the sink, in a fedora. On the stove was a frying pan and a raw hamburger patty. My roommate had less memory of the night than I did. That was my last time in a country bar.

Just another Tuesday night, right?

Must admit I don’t drink a lot of cocktails any more. Good craft beer is just so good, and French wine is pretty fine.
But when I do more of a dry martini guy.
Up, olive. Thanks!

Third night in a row they’ve hosted club rides, this time the Manitou Spokes. Yesterday was a Colorado Springs group; they do laps around Garden of the Gods (pretty great scenery.). They are SAG’ing the Pikes Peak Hill Climb on Saturday, went kayaking this morning at some lake by Pikes Peak.

Spoke with the owner, a firmer racer with kids in college, etc. They have a house on site for larger groups, another cottage, some larger rooms, sort of like a small adobe village, cross between a campground and a motel. We counted 9 states in the parking lot, the neighbors are from Germany (guy was proud of his new Trek.)

We watched yoga by the pool until my lady decided all that fitness was enough. (I wondered what all the men were doing by the playground.)

So, as a tourist, I bought the jersey. Triple ByPass is in 9 days, but we decided to climb up to Pike’s Peak tomorrow. The bikes were seriously out of tune, so they got the full treatment today.

In this age of redefining 2,000 year old words and renaming 200 years of 200 million year old mountains, I’ve decided shots are now cocktails.

So it’s been whiskey cocktails this week, with a napkin. Very efficient. I’m all about speeding up the process.

Good on you. Efficiency is always a time saver.
Get where you’re gonna get faster than the next guy.

It's a well known BKM to only bring highly concentrated alcohols on bike trips if you're going to be stopping away from proper beer sources.

Silly me! Based on the thread title, I was expecting to see Brendan Fraser on a bicycle....

I credit my dislike for gin on having got totally plastered for the first time on a base of Gin and Dr. Pepper (yes I was a dumb teenager)

as for the vegan thing, I kinda fell into a mostly vegan low fat eating style to avoid having to go on insulin. In 4 weeks, blood sugar has plummeted to high end of acceptable (am at 130 was running 200+)

I did the Dr. Neal Barnard / www.drmcdougall.com way of eating. I lost weight and it was the only time in my adult life when I had bloodwork in the normal range, dr said I had the lowest blood sugar of his patients. But its hard to stick to it when you have a wife and friends that want to eat at restaurants and like to cook, and it gets really boring pretty fast. Now I have high blood pressure and the weight has climbed. I guess I need to get back to it. I came across them because I was pre diabetic and the first thing they did was give me glucophage, then told me if I ate fat with it I would have diarrhea. So I cut out the fat, then I cut out the pills and stayed low fat and by searching low fat I found Dr. Barnards talk explaining that once the fat gets out of the cells they can handle the sugar. Everyone has a different diet and view of nutrition. All I know is this is the only thing that worked for me. Others work for other people. I went back on it for a few weeks and the BP dropped to high normal. I know what I have to do, doing it is the hard part.

LOL, my Dr. gave me the the Dr. Neal Barnard book. I had to try something, and so far it has been pretty easy, kind of surprising to me how easy I fell into it. I like to cook so it has become a fun challenge to come up with tasty vegan recipes. keeping low fat has been the challenge, but carbs are ok so that let's me survive

I'm glad it has helped you.

I need to start trying different recipes. I really got into it a few years back but then settled into a routine of only having a few simple things over and over(this is what mcdougall suggests) then got tired of it. Its one of those things where life is better when I do it so why don't I just do it.