Thinking

Been doing a lot of that lately...as is usual for me, I found a quote I rather liked...

"You are a story in the making, and no one can predict what the next chapter, the next day, the next moment, will bring. No matter how dark it may seem, whatever the pain or emptiness we feel - the sense of despair, the loss of hope or meaning - our dark night will be followed by a new dawn if we just endure. So take no desperate action; face the fear. Let the ego die, but protect the body. Allow this "death" to become a rebirth. And as day follows night, the dark tunnel will lead to a greater light."

~ Dan Millman (from Wisdom of the Peaceful Warrior)

Thank You

I just want to drop a heartfelt thank you to my family and friends.

I 'm not really known as a person that shares a whole lot about myself and my feelings with those around me, but I am actively working on changing that and many other things.

My guard is coming down and my horizons are expanding...thanks for being there with me.

You

Post deleted.

County Line

So you're thinking, "It's time to ride my SS, where should I go?..."single track is always nice, some climbing is OK,the woods, mountains". It never really crossed my mind that 40 miles on Hwy 1, railroad tracks and sand would be ideal, and it isn't, but damn if I didn't have fun! what's it called? County Line.

My inability to ask questions beyond, "sounds good-let's do it", led me into this one. The whole time, up to the night before, I assumed it was alike a mass "ride" of SS'ers, spending the day riding in less than ideal conditions. Well, the night before, I clarified with Curtis that it was more like a race and he let me know I wouldn't be seeing him or the other folks I headed down with-but not to worry as long as I heeded several warnings ... things like;

bring extra socks
watch out in bum alley
look out for poison oak somewhere around the 4th bluff
and make sure you head to the beach when the train racks start to slightly bend away from the beach somewhere outside of Santa Cruz beach boardwalk

So I was a little freaked as I do not race, but I was going and I went. What can I say? It was hella™ hard. There was like 60-70 riders (maybe more),I believe we did something like 12-15 miles on RR track gravel (not the packed kind either), like 10+ miles on the sand and the balance on the shoulder of HWY 1. Good thing I listened and geared up--normally running 2:1 (32:16), I swapped out to 36:16 and being so flat it worked out great_I don't htink I stopped pedaling for the whole 3 hours.

Finished the ride/race in 3 hours, headed to Hunter Cycles shop for food, fun and new friends. To say I was cracked was an understatement. During the post-ride party, I began to have the cold sweats, felt like puking and Mitzi said I was pretty pale white. It passed and so did the ride home.

Overall a great day (wish I could say the same about my late night at home) and I look forward to putting myself through it again next year.

8AM we leave to pick up Jeff

Mitzi and Max...Mitzi was a life saver-driving the course so we didn't have to shuttle

Last time I saw Curtis and Jeff until the end of ride...I actually broke my chain 100 yards from start and was saved by a powerlink from another rider

Group Start HWY 1

Riding HWY 1

Riding above RR tracks--the only way to go, when you could!

The beach...I was solo on her for an hour at least

The line up out side of Rick Hunter's shop

**No RR track pics as there was no way to shoot while riding...

Commute-ed Sentence

So I have been at my new job over 2 months and love the fact I work so close to home (9 miles away by bike), can see my family before 8PM and can ride my bike into work. I picked up a Surly Steamroller from Andrew and dialed it in for my daily commuter (one issue, I need to replace the rear cog on it, gearing is too hard ...44/14, me not strong enough. I mistakenly thought the new cog was the same 16T I had on old wheelset...oops. Not to mention Andrew used the strength of 10 baboons to afix 16T to old wheel. It will be swapped soon).

I have been fortunate enough to get 2 back to back days on it, so almost 40 miles on a fixed gear (bringing grand total to like 55 miles).

Likes? Silence, simplicity, cost, Inglis fork, brown paint, riding into and from work.

Dislikes? If I had to list any they would be short; gearing is too tall for me (my mistake), the 2 miles on highway is freaky (folks preoccupied with either going to or coming from work), and today -the wind! It was howling, right in my face...coupled with gear choice it hurt bad. I made lemonade though, shot a bunch of pics (see my flicker page) and just enjoyed being out.

Here's my cheesy video to show you the river trail and fog I enjoyed this AM...



In other news, I have to calm down on my eBay spending. I resolved, after missing my opportunity to attend the NAHBS, to use the money I would have spent getting there and at the event on new cycling gear. My secondary justification was to use one month's ferry pass money (which I no longer pay--yee haaa!) for said endeavour.

What did I get?
New Swobo knickers ---damn fine gear, really heavy material, comfy and just warm enough, plus they're wool
A Rapha Winter Jersey---no way I could afford "new", found a slightly used one on eBay and snapped it up buy-it-now style. It's like a slice of heaven on my top. I wish it wasn't made in China, but I must say, they have some great 6 year olds sewing this stuff.
Twin Six Wool Sox--Like this brand, like that the socks have pink on them
A couple of t-shirts to wear off the bike
A cheapo wheelset for the fixed gear---all black, laced in USA

Anyway, I am done with the eBay, freaky how it creeps up in my life and dominates---too easy to find anything you want. Now my money goes to family, yard improvement and new Retrotec SS...

OK, a little more

I am enjoying the online discussion between my good friend and I, it's refreshing to be able to have different views and be able to freely express them.

My sources on the last post came from a 15 minute web crawl, as I mentioned my research is heavily influenced by my feelings, not my experience or understanding of the system.

A strong word of caution on sources though, Wikipedia is probably the last place I would go for truly credible accounts. To many times it has been shown to be wrong (the price to pay for community involvement/information sharing)---many times the sources are incorrect or misleading...Update: Nature Magazine found the scientific articles reasonable accurate-which was soon disputed by Britannica on BBC (see below), but I still caution single resources, biased or not.

Looky:

Nature Article references from BBC

Wiki Accuracy 1

Wiki Accuracy 2

I'll give you my POV and that will help determine where I am heading socially, politically and personally...

+ I have a family including a 5 year old son whom I love more than anything. Given my current circumstances, they are a primary focus. The fact I could lose them makes it all that more important.

+ I am a graphic designer by trade-not quite an artist, but inclined toward it and very appreciative of the arts

+ I am heavily involved in the outdoors--cycling in any shape, kayaking, hiking, camping---my "religion" if you will, my closest moment to a higher power, comes when I am outdoors, usually alone, but always outdoors. It is when I am the most clear headed, calm and thoughtful.

+ I am working on be a healthier individual, including eating better, understanding my impact on the world and environment, including how my actions influence the world around me both intimately and from afar.

+ A consumer at heart, I find my desires lend themselves to the following: bikes, music, shoes, jackets and more bike related stuff. Toss in a new Mac every 4 years and that covers my compu-side. I look at HDTV's, even want one, but find my money goes to bikes, coffee or clothes (after bills and family fun). My turning point has been paying off my credit cards and living more within (still a WIP) my means. Quite the contrary to the American standard, whether individual or as shown by our own government (deficit spending, borrowing from other nations, the feeling like you are owed an SUV or HDTV, instead of the FACT it is a privilege---NOT a right).

There's so much more, but my point (if there is one) is the parts of me described above, help build the person I am and how I look toward leadership, choices and decisions and the future.

The major problems I see are the usual; the rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer and more widespread (as the middle class begins to be absorbed into the classification), special interests (generally spearheaded by the ultra rich in my opinion) gaining favor and influence (yes, that includes BIG oil as they influence so much of what we do everyday), and a general disregard for personal responsibility and understanding of yourself and fellow man, woman and child.

Problems, blogging, chatting are all fine to ponder, my next step, albeit a very tough one, is figuring out what I can do at even a small scale to make a difference...and that my friend will be a life long endeavor.

Mo' Politiking

A bit more on last post and in response to you K to the Irby...

As far as research goes, I have not even scratched the surface, way below less than 5%. My opinion is heavily based on feeling and loose understanding...in no way shape or form am I versed enough...but I'm going to keep reading (multiple sources) and listening...

Concerning congressional approval, it's understandable-Dubya holds the record for NOT veto'ing anything...interestingly enough for the 6 years his republican party held control...check it out:

NY Times article on Bush Record

Things changed with the new democratically controlled congress, bi-partisanship again took precedence (in my opinion at least) over what was actually good for the people...

Huffington News Post on Congress

As far as congressional approval, it's like Mark Twain said, " There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics". Approval is all of what you make of it, and the record doesn't show the approval ever really high, for EITHER party (although the republican held version did suffer from seriously low ratings).

I looked up congressional approval and found this site (among many):

Democratic Polling Report

And more...

Currently, 32% of Americans approve of the job Bush is doing as president, a far cry from the record-high 90% he received in September 2001. Bush's current job approval rating is just three percentage points above his lowest.

There was a slight interruption in the downward trend in congressional approval ratings at the beginning of this year when party control changed hands from the Republicans to the Democrats following last fall's midterm elections. In January 2007, 35% of Americans approved of Congress, a significant increase from the 21% who approved of Congress in December 2006. That December rating tied the lowest in the 12 years the Republicans controlled Congress from 1995 to 2006.

But that "honeymoon" period for the new Democratically controlled Congress was brief, as its job ratings dropped below 30% in March 2007 and have now fallen below where they were just before the Democrats took over.

Dependence on oil is too huge for this post, but put it this way, dependence on corn=dependence on oil as the crop requires more oil to produce than any other (fertilizer, transportation, refinement...)...to me it's a sham and REAL thinking needs to be introduced NOW to work on this issue.

Socialized health care...I know nothing about, guess I have more reading to do...I do know insurance is beyond my families reach (if it were not provided for by our employers, we'd have none).

I am mainly focused on what we are doing now as a society and how messed up it is going to be for my son, your daughters and many others---a lot sooner than we think.