Swan Song

Meaning
A final gesture or performance, given before dying or retirement.

Origin
This term derived from the legend that, while they are mute during the rest of their lives, swans sing beautifully and mournfully just before they die. This isn't actually the case - swans, even the inaccurately named Mute Swans, have a variety of vocal sounds and they don't sing before they die. The legend was known to be false as early as the days of ancient Rome, when Pliny the Elder refuted it in Natural History, AD 77:

If people ever did believe in the 'singing before death' story, few would now claim to do so. 'Swan-song' is now used figuratively and most commonly to refer to celebrated performers embarking on 'farewell tours' or 'final performances'. Those ironic quote marks were never more appropriate than in the case of Nellie Melba, whose swan song consisted of an eight year long string of 'final concerts' between 1920 and 1928. This led to the popular Australian phrase - 'more farewells than Nellie Melba'.

Lets go out with guns blazing...

T-Minus 7 weeks...

Seven weeks till race season for me. Sounds crazy, Right? It's only January I know, but I've been doing my prep work and things seem to be going well. Very well I must say. Without saying too much....
Right now it looks like I'll be leaving frosty New Jersey for the Grand Canyon state around the 24th of February. On the 26th I'll be opening the season at White Tanks mountain park in Waddell, Arizona (near Phoenix). The next weekend off gives me plenty of time to prep in the sun for the U.S. Cup race #1 at Bonelli park in San Dimas, California. I hope to be doing the whole triple crown thing with the XC on Saturday and the Short Track and Super D on Sunday. This being a UCI class 2 event I'm sure all the big boys will be there. Flying back from LAX should be an adventure with the U.S. cup site specifically stating that "LAX is 1 hour 15 minutes WITHOUT traffic". Did you notice the capital letters? If you know me and my love of driving at all you would guess right that I'm sure to have muttered "I could have driven to Jersey by now" sometime during this trip at least once. Getting back to Jersey will be a shock with the freezing cold still hanging around. But not to worry, Two weeks later I'll be at Michaux.....

Winter Solstice...

Shortest day of the year,
going for a ride means pulling on the winter gear...
Rush home like a jerk,
spent my whole day at work...
Railroad pays the bills, that's good for the bottom line,
but my passion is in the mountains and that's good for my mind...
Wearing lots of clothes cause it's cold outside,
I mount my steed for what should be a 2hr ride...
I little bit of road before the trails,
the wind is brutal and not at my tail...
Come Hoeferlin, Plymouth, Banker and Rock-a-dendron...
Then Cherry Ridge, Lookout and Hemlock-n-load...
I'm killing it today, just totally in the zone,
In spite of how the wind beat me on the road...
Daylight is running short, do I have time to reverse?
"Eff it! Just do it". I mumble with a curse...
Because I know without risk comes no reward,
Today I won the race against daylight, Thank you Lord...

Happy Holidays....Y'all