Jayme and I spent a couple weeks catching up with friends and saying our goodbyes before embarking on our trip. We had the difficult task of deciding what we were keeping, giving away and leaving behind for our friends moving in.

Our free stuff table proved to be quite successful and not much was left behind. (You can see the free stuff table in the left of the picture).
We packed up and headed to New Jersey to see my mom and friends. While there, I finalized packing clothes, bike stuff and repacking the car. Went to Sushi for my birthday and stopped by some friends places. Passed on a vintige bike and great red chair to some cats down in Jersey. Repacked the car and headed south.

The plans are in place, soon we start our epic road trip across the country. Jayme and I, starting in Rhode Island and ending in sunny Las Vegas, Nevada.

The car has been in the shop for almost a week now to repair the head gaskets and the clutch. We are both in the hopes that we won't have any car problems, I really don't want to have to pay an arm and a leg for a backwoods mechanic to fix the Subaru while on the road.

After much deliberation, we have decided to take the southern route to Vegas. Firstly, we love New Orleans, it's always a great place to vacation and have fun. Second, we wanted to spend as little of the road trip driving through barren and repetitive landscapes as possible. However, we are still going to have to drive through Texas(16 hours of driving!) among other long boring states. We thought that if we take this route, we can at least visit some of Jayme's family along the way, hopefully i'll get to shoot a can off a fence.

So far our planned stops are: Bridgewater, NJ; Washington DC; Richmond, Charlotte, Augusta,  Atlanta, New Orleans, Houston, Austin, El Paso, Phoenix, then our final destination, Las Vegas.

As hard as uprooting one's life is (both physically & emotionally), It makes you appreciate the things you are leaving behind. You don't realize how close you are to people and co-workers until you tell them that you are leaving for good. For now, I'm just glad the day-to-day work schedule is on hiatus for awhile.

Providence is always going to conjure up pleasant memories of college and good times, hell I'd like to come back one day. Maybe not to live, but to at least see what the highways looks like when it's finally completed. Also, I'm going to miss the Providence community, the hipsters, the dog-walkers, the cyclists, the welders and the drunks.

I've been trying to go along with business as usual even if it means I have to clay bar my car with one arm. The entire reason behind clay baring a car is to get all the contaminants (including: glue, old layers of wax/polish) off your paint. I found that it is also great for getting the badging adhesive off my trunk.

It came out well. She's a sexy automobile. Maybe she'll be getting presents soon.

By the time my brother and I got down to the bottom, I knew something was broken, my left arm couldn't support any weight.

The video below depicts where I crashed. At 1.13 where the rider crashes, that's where I crashed as well. I don't think mine was as crazy looking however.

In this video you can see at 59 seconds where I crashed hard.

In this video, it's at the very end where I took a digger.

Now it's almost a week later. I've been reading up on how to get myself back on a bike as fast and as safely as possible. Seems like it's a common injury among downhill mountain bikers. From what I've read, it's a 6-8 week healing process and surgery probably won't be necessary. Currently, I'm wearing a sling and in a week or two, switching to a figure 8 harness. Also, I'm going to an orthopedic clinic as soon as my health insurance kicks in. Oh and no need to worry about the bottle rocket, it took the abuse better then my body did.

If anyone has any advice on what to do for a fracture of mid-clavicle with displaced fragments (non-opposition), please leave a comment.

The new drivetrain consists of: e13 lg-1 chainguide, shimano xt-shadow rear derailleur, Holzfeller OCT cranks, Shimano Dura Ace chain and an e13 guide ring. The new setup feels smoother and lighter. First time out this season was at Vietnam biketrails in mass. Biking again on trails felt good, but also realized how out of shape I am. Also, smacked the rear derailleur on a rock and now it's out of alignment. Gotta fix that, so I can test out the new knee/shins.

The Scott Voltage is still wating for an axle bolt at the local bike shop. Miss that bike, gotta get her out of the shop.

Riding Pictures soon to follow (if it ever stops raining).

Lately, my projects have been pushed onto the back burner. Not by choice, but with the inclusion of my 9 to 5 job, time is spread thin.

The Subaru went in for a checkup, apparently the head gasket is leaking and is a ticking time bomb of repair costs. Hopefully, I can finance swapping in a turbo wrx motor instead of repairing the aging 2.5l engine.

I took the subaru on a trip back to Jersey to see my mom and do the doctor/dentist catchup thing. I really began to bond with the RS, being back on those Jersey mountain roads made me realize how much fun AWD can be. For the first time, I could feel how the car corners and find it's limits. Limits in this case are defined by; rainy weather, favorite road/turn & scary understeer. Driving back home sure beats driving on the destroyed Providence streets.

I'm happy to report that I will no longer be cruising with the dull chatter of the radio in the background. The head unit's wiring comes in the mail today (hopefully) and that sucker is going in. Back to good ol' MP3 CDs again.

While back home, I grabbed my old wheels from the Jetta, which luckily have the same size tires as the Subaru stockers. The wheels are wrapped with Dunlop sport FM901's, they are some aggressive suckers. So, one of these days I have to go get the tires swapped and get the car aligned. Then I should be set till the headgasket bites the bullet.

This designs application would be a stacked modular one. I was thinking that this could be a free standing application or possibly an alley filler. Some things to notice; the deck w/ lovely charcoal grill, the pantry, stove/exhaust fan, the dining window, the dvd shelve/windows, the glass shower and bathroom.

I began on this project because of the amount of eco-friendly architects now using shipping containers to produce amazing living solutions. Also, shipping containers are readily available around the world.

Some Amazing Container Living Solutions

Getting back to providence was a quick kick into reality. Getting the car registered was not an easy ordeal, I wish four days at the dmv on no one. It's quite annoying and peculiar how Rhode Island doesn't tell you when your license is suspended and you're not allowed to register a car. No letter in the mail, just a surprise after standing in line for an hour.

The internship has been alright, being really proactive at work makes the time fly. The problem is that I do a lot of unnecessary work and data collecting that seems to be for my own learning instead of being useful. More direction would be nice but researching how to do something before doing it would also be beneficial. Another problem I'm going to have to overcome is that I like to just jump right into data collecting instead of thinking about how I’m going to organize and categorize my efforts.

On another note, the paper I wrote for my externship seemed to come out well. I hope it's graded accordingly. Trying to make the paper understandable and easy for someone who uses computers to grasp was quite difficult. I may one day put it up on this site. I think it's a pretty good place to start for someone just getting into SEO.

Either way, I’ve been having some fun doing keyword research for product lines. The tools I’ve been using consist mostly of; Google's adwords keyword tool, Google's traffic estimator, Google's search based keyword tool and spyfu. Spyfu is especially good for their kombat mode, you can place your URL vs. someone else's and see what keywords you share or don't using a Venn diagram. They've been really useful especially when exported into excel. I'm quickly realizing how powerful excel can be for data management and collection. Keyword research has actually been quite interesting but I still have trouble deciding how effective a keyword will be. The one factor I always have to keep in mind is whether I’m trying to disqualify or qualify searchers.

The jazzfest trip is really pressing me for time, but it will definetly be worth it. Hopefully member that time will keep me busy down there. The project seems like it will be successful. I would love to have whoismarckroon.com by the time I am down there.

Otherwise, bought a car yesterday. Hopefully it is as reliable as it is cool looking. GC8V bunta style. It's a 2000 Sedona red Subaru Impreza 2.5rs 4 door sedan with 100,000 miles on 'er. I hope the ol' girl can stand up to a little abuse (just a little).