not racing doesn't mean not riding

On non-racing weekends, I've made a promise to myself that I will take Stompy out and play in the mud for an hour or two. Fortunately, there was almost enough mud and wet grass today to make me mostly happy.

The goal is not to ride myself into the ground; the goal is just to ride around and try out various techniques, including wobbling my back end through deep mud puddles and then riding it out without falling down; dismounts (easy); mounts (hard and yes, I still suck at them -- not sure how to remedy that except maybe with more heavily-padded shorts and maybe a shot of Novocaine in my, um nether-regions -- NOT); and lots of off-camber stuff that I achieved by picking crazy lines through the deserted playground, which is set in the bottom of a grassy "bowl" with tons of off-camber possibilities. After an hour, I felt like I'd done enough, and headed home muddy and happy.