Day 25
   
   5/22/01
   Mile 2504
   Calgary, AB
   
   On the western horizon lay the jagged, snowy peaks of the Rockies.
   I'll be paralleling them for several hundred miles before turning west to
   and crossing over them.
   
   I arrived in Calgary, one of my favorite cities, about 5pm.  I stopped
   at a bike shop to get the chain degreased and headed over the the
   house of my good friend and sometimes-boss, Jim Thom.  I'd been to Calgary
   several other times to work at his office, which is another branch of
   the company I work at in Houston, Jason Geosystems.  Jim had invited me to
   stay the night at his place and visit.  He's always been helpful when
   it came to my outdoor shenanigans.
   
   I got to take a shower, and then checked myself on the scales.
   Regrettably, I'd lost 5 pounds, even though I'd been eating like a pig
   for the purpose of NOT loosing weight - darn the luck!.  Tongue-in-cheek
   humor aside, I'd need the reserves and bulk on the mountain next month.
   Mike Wood had told me he'd read in a runner's magazine that 1 mile of
   running was equivalent to 4 miles of biking.  That always seemed too
   generous to me; I would have guessed a higher ratio.  But it was probably
   more true with the weight and winds I'd been dealing with - if so, I'd been
   running the equivalent of a marathon every day for over 3 weeks.
   
   So, what better place for Jim and I to eat at than my favorite local
   restaurant, Marathon Ethiopian.  If you've never tried Ethiopian food,
   don't be scared; it has an Indian influence and the spongy flatbread
   is to die for.  Chances are, you won't be able to pronounce anything on
   the menu, however.  I certainly couldn't.
   
   Back at Jim's house, there was work to do; laundry, and something else
   that had begun to creep up on me.  My shoes, which after constant use
   for a month, were on the verge of developing the power of independent
   motion.  If I didn't give them a good Clorox soak now, I'd soon need
   a how-to book on do-it-yourself exorcisms.
   
   It had just snowed here a few days ago.  I was riding just behind (and
   partly through) the tail end of the season, so it may not have made
   much sense to leave from Texas very much earlier than I did.

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