There is a Santa Claus!

[Kevan]

Weather report for Christmas eve here in the NY metro area: 50 degrees!

[sellsworth]

And here in Reno we have record warm temperatures and rain up to 8000 feet in the mountains. Mother Nature is a mad scientist.

[fiamme red]

Weather report for Christmas eve here in the NY metro area: 50 degrees!In L.A. the forecast is for 80 degrees. :cool:

[dirtdigger88]

yup- I am headed to my parents for 4 day- it is going to be in the 50's there as well-

mrs dirt said there was no room in the van for the Kirk to come along for christmas- :crap:

I called the LBS- they are holding a complete roof rack for me as we speak- Im thinking Im going to be in trouble when I get home- but at least I will have my bike with me on Christmas

Jason

[William]

No, you all don't get it. After all the single digit temps we've had, 50 degrees feels like a heat wave. :banana:


William ;)

[JohnS]

No, you all don't get it. After all the single digit temps we've had, 50 degrees feels like a heat wave. :banana:


William ;)
People in CA are wimps. :)

[Bud]

I went skiing at Araphoe Basin yesterday- it was great skiing weather (cold but not too cold and lots of new snow). Today I woke to 57 degrees here in Boulder county- a great day for a ride. I love where I live! Change elevation, change climate- ski at 10,000+ and ride at 5,600.

Hope everyone has a great holiday

[manet]

yup- I am headed to my parents for 4 day- it is going to be in the 50's there as well-

mrs dirt said there was no room in the van for the Kirk to come along for christmas- :crap:

I called the LBS- they are holding a complete roof rack for me as we speak- Im thinking Im going to be in trouble when I get home- but at least I will have my bike with me on Christmas

Jason

ha ha:

http://www.usaid.gov/gn/infotechnology/news/991010_secondarycities/boyoncar.jpg

[spiderlake]

It is freakin' raining here with 12 inches of snow on the ground. My entire 4 day weekend was planned around cross-country skiing in Traverse City. Grrrrr....... gotta love ice..... could be worse but I was really hoping to get a lot of miles (ok, kilometers since we're talkin' nordic) in during the next few days.

Trail report still looks good for the VASA so maybe all is not lost:

http://www.vasa.org/report.php

Santa - please bring more snow, cooler temps and groomed trails! : )

[sellsworth]

It is freakin' raining here with 12 inches of snow on the ground. My entire 4 day weekend was planned around cross-country skiing in Traverse City. Grrrrr....... gotta love ice..... could be worse but I was really hoping to get a lot of miles (ok, kilometers since we're talkin' nordic) in during the next few days.

Trail report still looks good for the VASA so maybe all is not lost:

http://www.vasa.org/report.php

Santa - please bring more snow, cooler temps and groomed trails! : )

I grew up in Traverse City. It seems to me that winters are much more mild in Northern Michingan now than they were in the 70s and 80s. I remember delivering newspapers in -36 degree weather with no wind chill - it was hard to breathe while I was tossing the papers from my bike.

I'd love to come back and do the VASA trail one of these years.

[Kevan]

of a two day ride.

47 miles with pal Mikemets. Temps were in the 40's and the in-town traffic was a bit hairy. Something tells us those cars in town aren't watching out for cyclists. Why here in Chappaqua, Mike aptly called it Time Square, it was like riding through Macy's during their holiday 25% off on all purses sale.

YIKES!

Can't wait for tomorrow's romp. Cars will will be like sharks during a frenzy. Should be fun.

[Grant McLean]

It's been unseasonably cold in Toronto for the entire month of December.
Generally, there is about a 50/50 chance of having any real snow around for
christmas. I flew home to Toronto Dec 1, after spending Thanksgiving in Florida,
coming home to snow on the ground, which had not melted.... until
today. It's raining now, and forcast to be 35' tomorrow and Christmas.

24hrs ago I would have bet on a white Christmas, given you long odds, and said you
were crazy to suggest that there would be no snow...now? Mother Nature
is an unpredictible lady indeed!

_Gee

[gary135r]

No, you all don't get it. After all the single digit temps we've had, 50 degrees feels like a heat wave. :banana:


William ;)
True,
hear in Maine it has been arround zero in the morning and near 20 during the day. only expected to get to 40 but now that feels balmy. Merry Christmas y'all :beer:

[Jeff Weir]

Kevan,
If you don't mind, can I have your exact course and departure time for tomorrows ride. I'll be in my car and i'd love to run into you......

[gary135r]

It's been unseasonably cold in Toronto for the entire month of December.
Generally, there is about a 50/50 chance of having any real snow around for
christmas. I flew home to Toronto Dec 1, after spending Thanksgiving in Florida,
coming home to snow on the ground, which had not melted.... until
today. It's raining now, and forcast to be 35' tomorrow and Christmas.

24hrs ago I would have bet on a white Christmas, given you long odds, and said you
were crazy to suggest that there would be no snow...now? Mother Nature
is an unpredictible lady indeed!

_Gee
White Christmas here. it is pretty. :)

[Kevan]

but are you sure you can keep up? We should be in your hood is my guess. Maybe we can meet at Burying Hill Rd. That way its convenient.


Mikemets, I forgot to mention... that guy we saw zippin' down my street was doing hill repeats, the whipper-snapper! Yeah... but did he do 47 miles worth?

[Serpico]

http://www.ldnews.com/fastsearchresults/ci_3334327


Grinchy remark sends kids home in tears


By Rory Schuler

Jamey Schaeffer stretched her mouth open wide, showing off a pair of twin gaps in her smile. With a mouthful of fingers, she said she has no interest in two front teeth for Christmas.
Instead, she’d like a Barbie doll from Santa Claus — and Santa Claus only.

But a substitute music teacher almost came between the 6-year-old and a Christmas Eve spent dancing cheek to cheek with sugar plums.

Theresa Farrisi stood in for Schaeffer’s regular music teacher one day last week. One of her assignments was to read Clement C. Moore’s famous poem, “A Visit from Saint Nicholas” to a first-grade class at Lickdale Elementary School.

“The poem has great literary value, but it goes against my conscience to teach something which I know to be false to children, who are impressionable,” said Farrisi, 43, of Myerstown. “It’s a story. I taught it as a story. There’s no real person called Santa Claus living at the North Pole.”

Farrisi doesn’t believe in Santa Claus, and she doesn’t think anyone else should, either. She made her feelings clear to the classroom full of 6- and 7-year-olds, some of whom went home crying.

Schaeffer got off the school bus later that day, dragging her backpack in the mud, tears in her angry little eyes.

“She yelled at me, ‘Why did you lie?’” recalled Jamey’s mother, Elizabeth. “‘Why didn’t you tell me Santa Claus died?’”

Elizabeth Schaeffer said she was appalled by Farrisi’s bluntness.

“I had to call the school,” said Schaeffer, a part-time custodial employee for the school district who is on temporary leave after complications from her last child’s birth. “I had to do something.”

Meanwhile, Farrisi, who is well versed on the history of “Santa Claus” — the traditional and literary figure — clarified her comments.

“I did not tell the students Santa Claus was dead,” she explained. “I said there was a man named Nickolas of Myrna who died in 343 A.D., upon whom the Santa Claus myth (is based).”

On Monday night, Jamey started to recite Moore’s famous poem while sitting on a couch next to a freshly cut tree, trimmed in tinsel and topped with a golden star: “’Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house. No creatures stirred.”

She paused, looked up, and said that’s when the teacher interjected, just a few lines before the verse that announces the arrival of “a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer.”

“The teacher stopped reading and told us no one comes down the chimney,” Jamey said, curling into a ball on the couch, bracing her chin on her knees, her voice shrinking away like melting ice cream. “She said our parents buy the presents, not Santa.”

Sharing in the belief of Santa Claus is a very special event in the Schaeffer home. Jamey’s the second youngest of five children. The three oldest have already grown up and left the family nest. Only Jamey and her 18-month-old sister, Amanda, remain.

Last year, Elizabeth Schaeffer recalled, Santa left a trail of boot prints in charred ashes from his feet-first landing in the fireplace. And this year, the family will continue their tradition of leaving him a plate of cookies, a tall glass of milk and a ripe, shaved carrot for Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer.

The Schaeffer family wasn’t the only one taken aback by Farrisi’s approach to Santa.

Tim and Beth Rittle said they found their 7-year-old daughter, Holly, in tears in the back seat of their car after they picked her up from school that day.

“All of a sudden, Holly just started crying,” Beth Rittle said. “She said she had a substitute in music class, and she told the class there’s no such thing as Santa Claus.”

Schaeffer and Rittle both called Northern Lebanon School District Superintendent Don L. Bell.

Since the issue involves personnel, Bell said Monday, there is little he can say about the incident, adding that it has not been determined if any disciplinary action is warranted against Farrisi.

Bell said he was aware that several parents have expressed concerns about the incident.

He also noted that the handling of Santa Claus isn’t covered in the school code.

“We do not have a Santa Claus policy,” he said. “It’s unfortunate, but I really can’t say anything about it.”

Farrisi said she considered approaching the school’s administration with her concerns about how to handle Santa Claus in class. Instead, she said, she decided to add a disclaimer to her lesson.

“Those same children are going to know someday that what their parents taught them is false,” she ex-plained. “There is no Santa Claus.”

Meanwhile, Elizabeth Schaeffer was carefully thinking about her next step. She decided to make a photocopy of editor Francis P. Church’s famous response to a little girl, who wrote to The New York Sun many decades ago, asking the same question Schaeffer’s daughter struggled with last week.

“I mailed (Farrisi) a copy of ‘Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus,’” she said, giggling with satisfaction. “I wish I could be there when she opens it.”

As for Jamey, in an attempt to reaffirm her spot on Santa’s nice list, she drew up a new letter in bright red magic marker, a message destined for the Santa she refuses to abandon.

“Dear Santa ... How is the North Pole?” she said, reading her letter loudly and proudly. “How is Mrs. Claus? You are Great. From Jamey.”

[davids]

Since we're Jewish, our daughter never believed in Santa Claus. But we told her, before she started pre-school, that this was a story that many of her friends wanted to believe. And if the subject should come up, the polite, kind thing to do was to not say a word. She never did.

And now, Merry Christmas to all who celebrate!

Here's to a better world. :beer:

[Kevan]

with something like 45 miles to our route. Thank you Santa Claus, today's ride was fantastic! Umm... would you have spare elf to help me clean off the bike, lots of schmootz is covering it. Snow melt, you know.

Jeff, hung out briefly at the top of Burying Hill, ridng along Round Hill Rd. I looked for the red Volvo, but no show.

[manet]

anyone see the rockslide, serious friggin rockslide, on river road up
towards the police station?

[nobrakes]

Between wrapping my wife's presents and household maintainance, I was able to get out on my Colorado II fixie for a pleasant little spin. Weather was, I swear, shirtsleeve warm, bluish-grey sky overhead made for a fun ride. This is good riding, for me, as my transport all last summer was a wheelchair.

[ericspin]

I enjoyed a nice 40 miler today with a group of my best friends today. The ride started out a little cool at about 8:00am but ended in the mid 60's with a little overcast. This ride has become a tradition on Christmas Eve and New Years Eve. We turn the intensity down just a bit and just enjoy each others company. We took a break about midway through the ride to discuss a cycling vacation we are planning to take to Spain next September. We stopped at the end of rarely traveled road and sat at a picnic table and watched kids fishing. This really does make up for those days during hurricane season when we live on the edge of our seats waiting for the next storm. This is the time of year I love to ride the most. Typically here in Tampa you learn to get out real early in the day to avoid the heat. But this time of year we can ride at any time of day. Gotta love it.

[Tailwinds]

Greetings from snowy Denver -- NOT!!!

Got out for a nice 45-mile ride w/Team Evergreen today. We enjoyed temp's near 60 w/plenty of sunshine and fantastic Rocky Mountain scenery. It's cool to be able to admire huge, red rock formations jutting up toward the intensely blue sky while you're at your regrouping point.

Supposed to be 65 tomorrow -- a fine, not-white Christmas!

[vaxn8r]

People in CA are wimps. :)
I'm in SoCal now. Went for a ride yesterday, probably close to 70 deg. Wore shorts, short sleeve jersey for the first time in months. Every other cyclist I saw was in full on winter wear, jackets, tights, gloves. Everyone. I guess the Californians never get to wear their winter stuff so if it drops below 70 you just have to.

[Kevan]

the kids are still asleep. The sky is grey, but air is warm. There would be absolutely no traffic out there... you know what I'm thinking.

Just a 'round-the-blocker. 45 minutes tops. All I have to do is get past "She who must be obeyed".

Ah, heck... might as well go back to bed.

[Sandy]

the kids are still asleep. The sky is grey, but air is warm. There would be absolutely no traffic out there... you know what I'm thinking.

Just a 'round-the-blocker. 45 minutes tops. All I have to do is get past "She who must be obeyed".

Ah, heck... might as well go back to bed.

You can get all the way around the block in just 45 minutes?? :rolleyes:


Merry Christmas to you!

Are your gifts for me under your Christmas tree?? :)


Sandy

[Kevan]

horn-swoggled! She let me go out for a ride! The kids are STILL asleep and I got my 'round-the-block ride in... yes Sandy... in 45 minutes. That's over 100 miles for this short Christmas break. I probably won't see such mileage again until May. In the excitment of getting out I forgot my helmet. Got near to the halfway point when I discovered my goof. What a knucklehead.

Sandy,

Yes, your gift is here, but Chris won't let me put it under the tree. She says the iron maiden detracts from the Christmas tree. Go figure. You'll have to come up here with your bike to retrieve it.

Happy Hanukkah to you and yours and may you have the best for the coming new year.

Best Regards,

Kevan

[bostondrunk]

I'm in SoCal now. Went for a ride yesterday, probably close to 70 deg. Wore shorts, short sleeve jersey for the first time in months. Every other cyclist I saw was in full on winter wear, jackets, tights, gloves. Everyone. I guess the Californians never get to wear their winter stuff so if it drops below 70 you just have to.


OK, thats sick. 70 where I live is like beach weather!!!

[davids]

It's holding in the mid-40s here. We were going to do a family ride today, but my daughter's finally outgrown her 24" bike to the point where she says her back hurt after riding it, and my wife's saying, "It's only 43. I thought it was going to be 50..." It appears I'm on my own. No plans until we head out to Chef Chang's mid-afternoon, so I'm going to take a nice recovery ride!

Hope all you Christians are enjoying your Christmas!

And now I can say Happy Chanukah to my landsman!