26 June, 2007

When Good Grouse Go Bad!


jeez! today, cycling mount falcon, i got attacked by a fowl creature. namely a grouse! it all started by doing a 2 hour ride (it turned out to to be 1h 50 min actually) at falcon. billy told me a target time to the top-ladies and gentlemen that's what's called an alliteration-(to gauge/compare my fitness with one of our acquaintances) of 37 mins so i based my perceived work efforts on that. busted a sub-37 without redlining because i wanted to get in a climbing/power workout today. usually if it's hot, i die; but today was nice and cold so i was powering up pretty good. at the top i keep riding towards parmalee trail, do that in the middle ring, get to the top and do the ute trail. when we first moved to colorado, sweet melissa pronounced ute, "ooo-tay". it's actually pronounced "yoot" from a proper noun referring to a native american tribe. whenever i see that sign that's what always pops into my cerebral cortex and i smile-anyhoo, it's on ute where i get attacked. ute is cool because there's a couple or so technical uphill parts that you have to power/finesse through to clear it. after the techy stuff i see this healthy looking grouse to my left. being the animal lover that i am i slow down to give it the right-of-way. well, this beeyatch slows down too. then i speed up. this fowl creature speeds up too. this punk muh-fuh was sizing me up for an attack. so before i could get off the bike to use the bike as an over sized bat to bust a home run on this puffer fish wannabee freak, it propels itself, all puffer fished bloated with feathers all outstretched, beak first a la hostile projectile at my thoracic/facial area. whereupon survival instincts take place and i turn my head sideways and bust out a kung-fu hand buzzsaw routine david carradine would've been proud of. needless to say it hit my manly pectorals and i shriek out a string of f-bombs and other useful expletives in its name. hominid vs a wannabe chicken. what a nutty encounter. adrenaline's flowing and i rock the tower trail, granite steps and all. other than this close encounter with a freak grouse, the ride's pretty successful...

1 comment:

Ken said...

Dayauuum dood. Good thing that grouse wasn't as big as one of those Turkey's we see up there sometimes. Thats almost as scary as my mountain lion encounter.