March is nearing, time to get cracking on leg training..

The past 6 weeks of the moving sale has been a complete fail, between thieves, resellers, cold temps, and days of cold temps with high winds has turned my Moving sale into a joke..I'm sure by now people just look at the CL adds like they would look at a ad on any other page, skim right past it. It looks like I'm just going to have to wing it the best I can..As it stands now there will be no spare parts for the bike, camping supplies, and rain gear is out of the question..I must have the maps, I'll sell the $1,200 dresser chest of drawers and side table to pay for it, at a $150. I'm almost positive someone will pay $500 for it from someone else, just not me. My Brass collection is going to the scrap yard, I can get more for it than what I'm being offered for it..All in All I have over $15,000 in items I own, I'm going to be lucky if I get $1,000, and now I'm around the $425 mark. $2,800 was my goal..It would cover all the bases..Its not happening, nor will I even get close.SO I have to let it go! Its making me depressed to think about it, and when I do I get lazy, and nothing gets done, not even training or working out. SO March is leg training month, April is endurance month, I'll have to trust in the lord to provide for me while I'm on the road, cause I can't seem to get prepared on my own. I've spent, and burned all my resources to help out others in their time of need and left myself with a empty stash. I have no problem jumping in a giving what I have to other, But I can't bare asking people for something I need or want, it feels wrong to me.

No more of this..........Its time to look forward, Can't change the past, I need to focus on the road ahead of me , no pun intended..But if I keep letting the selling of my items "thats not selling for the price I need'" then I might as well give up and considered this as another failed goal in my life, as it stands the ratio of accomplished to failed. is way well, depressing. I won't stand for it on this trip..Its time to move forward.

Things are slowing down, While departure date is coming up qiuck.

The Moving sale are coming to a creeping halt, nothing is selling, and I see why. I guess I'm a trend setter. It's looking like the entire city of Greensboro is getting ready to leave, for every 10 "sales" 7 are "moving sales". I've never seen it as such and as heavy before..LOL. Jessie owns a second hand store on Spring Garden st, I guess I'll just sell everything off to him for the bottom of the barrel price, without having a lil extra for the trip, this will just purchase the needed items with enough foodies to get by for a week or two. Of course i'll search for work while on the road. The warm bed and shower might get cut down from 2 a month to once every six weeks. I'll be funkier than James brown in three weeks of riding.

The cards are done, and ..they...look sweet!. Problem is, the "donation" part on the bottom of the cards makes me feel like I'm begging. I was told by many that I should have it on there, so I put it there, now i feel a lil shameful about passing them out. On the back side of the cards I added a lil information about the route and the company Adventure cycling that keeps it together, and that also maintains the other 40,000+ mile of bike routes across the country. I also added the site that help me make up my mind about doing the trip on a bike. crazyguyonabike.com . the journals are from people that bike tour ALL over the world, at this moment there are two folks doing a world tour on a bike..Braver than I they are!. of course I'm sure they are more prepared for it and conditioned for it. Which brings me to this..I'm back and forth about the bike I using.

The bike is a 2001 Raleigh c40, the drive train has been upgraded, I've got a nice chunk of cash in the back wheel components and chain, but I keep having chain slipping and gear skipping problems when going up hill..NOT GOOD for someone thats going to be hauling a load of stuff on and behind the bike..I was looking at getting the Kona Splice, BUT its 29 wheels and disc brakes won't fit the trailer I got, then I looked at the Kona Dew, however for $500, and I'm spoiled on the front shock when I run off the road for a lil fun. the components on its drive train doesn't equal the amount I have in the derailleur alone on the c40..If I'm having problems with a $110 derailleur and $75 cassette, whats going to happen with a $13 derailleur, and a $20 cassette?.I'm going to have problems, no one has made it across without problems on their bike at one point or another..Now I'm leaning towards the Trek DS 8.2 (Gary Fisher collection). It has everything, and more, but its over a hundred more than I want to spend on a bike. but I can do off and on road..I don't know, until the sales start happening better, I'm not going to be able to afford a box of matches to start a camp fire..speaking of which, time to get back at it...

Sunday Feb,12, 2012...The sales have been going awful, people are wanting the items I'm not selling. Food in the cabinets, the computer, the tv used on the computer, the clothes I'm keeping, MY GLASSES AND CELL PHONE, helmet and yes even the bike and murph..THATS what they are wanting to buy..I had 10 up to date xbox games, a woman didn't want them..she wanted the xbox which is busted up, and needs to be broken down every week to cleaned out on the inside, in order to work properly. Things promised to people and things needed to survive now and on the road are the top things being requested..To boot, if  a box is sealed or room is off limits..THATS where they want to be..Its like dealing with unruly children.. you have to follow them and tell them no and stay out at every turn..I never in my life thought full grown adults had to be watched like children during a sale..The only things I've managed to sell so far are items I was wanting to keep..the bed, the microwave. the floor vac, and certain tools(which in turn I know I'll wind up having to buy to repair something..I have had some thing sold that I'm getting rid of, but that number is way under that of the items I have forsale..

Kevin (owner of Organized confusion on Spring garden st) has been the biggest help, he bought the xbox games, and donated $100 towards the trip, I had the money for Murphs trailer, but the phone bill and food along with business cards to pass out ate it up..badly The $10 vista cards came out to $64..even if I was to take the cards they offered at $10 it still would have cost over $30, shipping is $20... I got to rethink this, I'm spending to much time on logistics and not enough time training, the weather turned extremely cold, so bike riding has gone out the window..I have a house guest I'm having to take care due to his illness, and that to is putting me behind..I'm beginning to feel I'm having a flash back of the last time I tried to do this trip, other things are forcing me to put energy away from the trip, and forcing it to non-related events..The weight is coming back due to unhealthy eating habits..depression is setting in,I'm having to keep other people happy and putting mine on the back burner again..yep its a repeat of last year..The largest amount of  people that are closest to me have already stated that they don't want me to do this trip, where acquaintances are cheering me on, if I didn't know better I'd swear the house guest which happens to be close friends to my ex-employer (the person thats trying the hardest to keep me from leaving) had planned this up..Knowing I don't turn people away that are having harder time than myself..

I can't move forward, when being pushed backwards......

At the age of eleven, I'm laying in a hospital bed in traction looking out the window of my hospital room, thinking about how I want to see the country, and see all the places that people told me about while laying on my back. I've been in this situation for months now, no one could possible know how slow time goes in a hospital room while the seasons outside pass by so fast. "I'm going to see all those places people told me about when I get out and grow up"...Six months in traction, another four months in a full body cast..then the placement for the rod, since the leg wont heal on its own..nearly a year and a half later I'm at home.

Doctors said I would walk with a cane for the rest of my life..NOPE! never happened. doctors said the rod needed to be removed before I hit my late teens, that didn't happen either (under my own stubbornness), I didn't feel like learning to walk all over again for a third time..and so life went on. I did a MS bike-a-thon for MS when I was nine. 50 miles one way, but when I hit the end I turned around and started back, didn't quiet get 24 miles before they shut it down, it was more uphill on the way back than it was going forward..Most of the sponsors refused to pay because they didn't believe I could and did do it.. It would have put me third in the community if they paid up, but instead I got a honorable mention around 99th place in the county. out of 150..


My next big ride came from me leaving Gallipolis Ohio, on a Huffy Grand tour 10 speed. with minimal supplies. If it wasn't for a few truckers, I wouldn't have made the trip I do believe..Over a hundred miles in, and then the last 30 miles out of the trip. When I parked the bike, Gods breath must have been in the tubes.. I watch both the front tire and rear go flat at the same time..the cheap tire were bald. Thats was the last of the big bike rides, that was when I was 22.

I daily commuted for years after that, but now I'm 48 just lost my job of almost five years. The night life of Dj'ing and bartering isn't appealing to me much anymore, (for personal reasons). I'm on the edge of being homeless again, (this time not due to those personal reasons) but due to lack of jobs available..So what to do now? I know I can get my GED and get into classes..GREAT!, but wait, thats going to take a few months what of Murph E. Dog and I, we can't expect the landlord to just let us stay here rent free.. thats not going to work! now what?

While I tossed and rolled in my bed one night, I guess you can say I had a subconscious, at the edge of twilight in my sleep dream? if you will. It was me laying in bed as old man starring out a hospital window. I said to my younger self..What ever happen to the plan to see the country?..I..we? couldn't afford it, cost of gas, what if the car broke down then what? where would we have stayed being broke?.. I turned to myself..You could have rode a bike dumbass, and camped. you like doing both do we not?!!

So here I am. The plan was implemented over a year ago, but dropped out of mind after talking myself out of it, (I'm good for that). Now its on..funny thing is NOW I have other people trying to talk me out of it, saying I'm to old, I'm to out of shape, where will I sleep? what will I eat? what, what, what , what if ,what if, what if..Are you going to put me up till the economy changes?..no! I didn't think so.beside I wouldn't want you to anyway..So now I'm selling everything I own to finance the trip, I'm having a moving sale every weekend till its all gone. I have the bike, and its been upgraded but can use more better parts, I bought the LG Slate to help keep the journals and Facebook page, AND this place updated. I sold enough to buy Murph E.Dog the Ibex trailer, and the next sale will go to buying the pannier front rack and bags for the bike. After that it the general supplies to survive. maps from Adventure cycling (Trans American Trail), camping supplies, water filter/purifier, ect ect..

So this is where our new journey begins.....