I’m writing this while Dale, Jenette and I are listening to a Kiwi band waiting for our team to rally for breakfast and it’s past noon.  Some announcement was just calling for our attention over some loud speaker outside our room and we couldn’t be bothered to stop the music to hear them blast the announcement.  I hope whatever they had to say doesn’t disrupt our breaky because we just woke up and are mighty hungry.

We’re in Savannah for the day to take in some sights on our race day off.  I’ve already seen what looks like the backs of my eyelids. Very nice.

Racing has been tough.  Athens was weird.  I had always wanted to take part in that race, as it seems like it would be right up my alley, but it wasn’t.  The NASCAR mentality that caused 40,000 people, give or take, to CHEER while my teammates, and later the entire guys’ field lay splayed out in the barriers and onto the road really made my stomach turn.  It was wild.  I remember, distinctly, coming around the corner to see Dale and Jenette, and several others down, having somehow squeeked through, and then Krystal, who was behind me hit the pile. The crowd didn’t do the collaborative ‘Gasp!’ but cheers and shouts of “YEAH!!!!”.  Ick.  I had reached my limit of drunk men who all look the same and  obliterated women who all teetered around on stillettos wandering around spilling drinks on me.  Then, of course, the oddities of the men’s race. The crashes get me on edge anyway. The wondering who of my friends might be hurt badly thenadd that to the facination of the crowd.  Plus, I always hate those races that have the race to the race start line.  They make for some bad, bad moves early on. After, I was just mumbling, “it’s all just too much”. I don’t think Athens Twilight is for me.

…The breakfast bus is leaving.

We’re off to Beaufort tomorrow.

BB

Don’t forget the pink with the black stripe for Anna Nicole Smith.

And the invisible colored ribbon I’d like to propose to raise awareness about how ridiculous the American Awareness Ribbon Phenomenon is.

BB

I’ve been watching a lot of TV lately and have noticed many people blathering on about things with the title under thier names, “Social Activist“.  I like to think of myself as a Social Commentator, or InActivist, if you will, because I don’t do anything but comment.

That said, let me begin. I retreated north to check out in Canyon Country for a couple of great rides/days on Sunday and Monday. This is how I do it: this city, this life, all of it.  Need to fill the tank to empty it. Guess we all have our ways.

This Virginia Guy. We’ve had theories, including the Chicken Theory.  Chicken Theory is that he was a son of a poor Chinese Chicken Farmer who sold all their chickens and sent themselves into severe, more severe poverty in order to send thier son to an American college to attain prosperiety . He, then. was flunking out and bending (breaking) under the pressure of it.  Could be, especially after the espousement of the manifesto against rich people. We’ve revised it to being South Korean chicken farming, and, having been an angstful English student myself at one point, I recognized that all you need to do is go to class to not fail.  He seemingly went to class in order to work on his thoeries.  Shoots holes in our theory of him, pardon the pun.

Theory Two: He was a spoiled American student, rich enough that he was allowed all the luxuries of violent influence. And Guns. And….he just plain hated people. And….he was prolly sexually abused.

K.

Soapbox.

The manifesto.  The NBC submission.  The incessant pandering of our media and spiral into his frenzy.  He shot ‘em up in the am.  Sent a proclamation via vid to NBC in NYC, then went on about his thing.  Look, Mr. Angst.  We all feel it. 

How he pertains to me, by Becky Broeder.  I think we should think of things like this.  The fact that he is sharing headlines with Sanjaya says something.  I don’t know what, but maybe it has something to say about this lil’ screwhead’s point?  Whatever.  You don’t like it, leave.  Don’t ruin families, communities, societies.  I’m bored with angst.  I think I’ll go and read some Maya Angelou “AND STILL I RISE“.  ‘Cuz we are just plain better.

BB

Orchid may have already had its last gasp, as it took on a wicked sunburn, and, as I was running thru Elesian Park (Dodger’s Stadium) the  other night, a lame-o bum on a rickety mountain bike-like contraption blurted out to me “…with thighs like that, you outta try the biking thing” as he rumbled past.  No kidding.

hahahahaha…wise one.

‘K, Thanks!’

BB

This week a client, a melancholy, seemingly lonely guy whom I initially thought ‘creepy’, had me assess his living situtation in his loft downtown.  He grows orchids as a hobby and has a strong liking for Art Deco.  In his obscurity, he gave me an orchid and told me that the soil is from New Zealand.  I was to look up the variety online because it is more high-maintanence than some others.  I am not to kill it. And I won’t because now I think the guy is kinda like an orchid. The best light I can find for my new creature is in the front seat of my car.  Orchid is my co-pilot for now.  I look over at it and want to seatbelt it in.  I even chat with it. (more…)

http://www.cyclingnews.com/photos.php?id=/photos/2007/apr07/lemire07/4_jlm_crit_56

I am dating myself here, but, I loved that band.  And, being a nutter, I have been intrigued by the actual Skid Row ever since that Sabastian Bach guy, with what was once deliciously huge hair, sang about “the youth gone wild” and “18 and Life” and “I remember you”. 

I opened up the Downtown News on the Metro yesterday and read about how ‘celebrities and volunteers will be feeding soup to Skid Row on 5th outside of the Los Angeles Mission on Good Friday’.  I thought about it because Skid Row is a mere 5-6 blocks from my office and my boss has been engaged in the clean up of downtown for decades.  Fateful, at best, I go home and read my email only to find an announcement in my inbox for a STOP HUNGER scholarship for $4000.  “Must prove a commitment to fighting hunger in your community”.  Perfect.  I could now see what Skid Row was like by not only participating, but maybe benefiting from said participation (c’mon, it’s LA.  You think the ‘celebrities’ are doing this to be nice?).  My intrigue would make for a great story and the scholarship, along with the humanitarian aid…I suppose… would provide the impetus.

I scoped it out today on my way back from a meeting in Burbank, so that I wouldn’t just be walking around downtown looking for the Mission, like every other bum in LA.  Then, I turned a corner and found it.  Absolute mayhem.  I can’t even describe what LA’s Skid Row is like, other than to say it’s RAW.  Hundreds of people milling everywhere, no teeth, talking and screaming to the cosmos and to me in my car, walking in traffic, laying, picking, sifting through stuff, fighting.  I looked to the left to a COMPLETELY filled park. To the brim.  There was not a square inch that was not inhabited by either a person, by their shopping cart, or by a ghetto blaster.  It was all sorts of jacked up and busted.  I think when they ‘cleaned up’ the downtown, they put every single schizophrenic, homeless, crackhead into two square blocks. I locked the doors and proceeded to roll to my corner of downtown, where it’s only semi-raw and semi-jacked up and busted, and where I actually breathed a sigh of relief in my semi-nonsafety.

I drove away thinking, “F#*% THAT”.

I believe I will cancel the photoshoot I was going to have at Skid Row tomorrow and continue to fight hunger the way I am familiar with: by feeding my own piehole.

Happy Good Friday (that’s a little weird),

BB

I had the day off of work yesterday, so I rode up the PCH and into those canyons.  Sweet.  Along the way and when I got back, I made some discoveries.  I can’t just have a normal day, because that would truly be abnormal.

Having passed this dude on the PCH, which, by the way, is truly like running the gauntlet.  I think you should have to have some sort of special category upgrade for riding there: surfers, possible doorings, traffic at 90 mph double sometimes triple wide and about 3 inches of space to work with. It’s fine-tuning my crit skills because it’s like sensory overload with no let up.  Back to the dude.  I pass him and he tags on, but I couldn’t hear him back there.  Without warning, he attacks me before he flips a ‘U’ (in possibly the worst traffic in the nation).  This is when I recognize that it is, indeed, the LA version of the Grey Wolf.  He was about 30 pounds heavier (muscle, of course), slightly more stylish than Gary, and otherwise, exactly the same in looks and style.  I couldn’t believe it.

Next stop: I’m rolling through the neighborhood of Santa Monica in my car, on my way to Sweet Lady Jane’s Cake Shoppe (something my friend raved about so I had to get her a birthday cake).  At the four-way stop rolls up a Toyota United kit and the smile that could only belong to one star: Stevic.  I look over and raise my arms in the “what the ???” and pull over to be greeted by one of my very favorite dudes in our sport.  This guy is a good soul. He was rolling through the neighborhood looking at things because he’s leaving soon and ‘doesn’t want to miss anything’.  I can relate to that.

On to the cake shop: The guy helping me shouts over my shoulder to the guy working there behind me and says, “did you just say, ‘what can I do ya for?!?!’”.  Then proceeds to announce that “those were among the lines I had in Groundhog’s Day..blah blah….my character was someone everyone related to..blah..blah..”.  My favorite part of this moment was the little starlett in the bakeshop looking at the 50-some year-old like she would suddenly now screw him, batting her eyes and saying, “Wooooowww. You were in Groundhog’s Day???”.  I was thinking something along the lines of, ‘wow. bakeshop guy is gonna get some tail’.

The cake was good though,

BB

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2007/apr07/apr01newsspecial

But…it’s my birthday!

Happy Birthday, Rin.  I’m getting you a brothel.

BB

April Fools! I raced my bike! 

It’s been awhile. 

My friends think I’m nuts when I say that I’m not fit.  Especially since they see me running and riding every day, sometimes both in a day.  Yet, still, I’m not training.

I started the Garrett Lemire Grand Prix in Ojai today. I decided to start last night after many pints of Guinness and several plates of the tastiest South African chicken wings I have ever had.  I don’t want to train, at all. It’s just another stress in a long line of stresses right now.  So, since I’d still like to race, that leaves only one way to do it: race into shape.  I just don’t see any other alternative.  I mentioned this to a few people today and those that have done exactly this, no cheating, like really starting with nothing and jumping into NRC racing, get how awful it is. And, humilitating.  I’m not naming names, but several girls and guys got it while the others looked at me like I was giving excuses, cuz, I mean, who the heck ever gets unfit at this level?!?!! Those of us that aren’t natural monsters sometimes do and it shows…

It wasn’t all bad, since my aerobic system is okay.  Thing is, having no fast twitch muscles to begin with, when I run like I have been then jump into a race with surges, breaking and gunning it, and sprinting up climbs, it’s clear really quickly that muscles can’t just do what you tell them to.  They get tired.

This may come as a shock to some, or none, but I don’t race to win. Never have.    I sometimes race so my teammates win.  I sometimes get lucky when I solo in on what started to me as some foolish experiment.  It’s becoming clear to me that I race for reasons other than most of the people there.  I wonder if that is bad..but, I admit I have never dreamt of the Olympics or Worlds.  Today, I raced to ride.  I raced because I know Ryan Yee and I know how much this race and Garrett meant to him and I respect that immensely. I raced to see what the heck I’m made of, a constant process and am most often unsatisfied with the answer. I raced to see a whole bunch of people I deeply care about.  I raced because I couldn’t stand not racing.  And I raced because the US women’s pro peloton is, by and large, a group of supportive, enthusiastic, safe and positive people who understand what it’s like to try and make the most.

I appreciate a lot of things a lot.

Thanks to Dave, Cycling’s best voice, for the shoutout.

Next time,

BB