Maybe some day there will be a St. MacGowan's Day

I'll warn you right now. This one's gonna be a doozy. And a bit mushy too.

So it's St. Patrick's Day. Well, every day is Patty's Day as far as I'm concerned. I was going to let it go with a simple photo or 2, but then a friend from work sent me something that inspired me to write about what I've failed to write about recently. Below is what the lass Erin O'Donnell sent me, and below that, I continue my 20-plus year unhealthy fascination, addiction, and obession to all things Shane MacGowan. What? You're surprised?

Brilliant.


It's 1987 and I'm in my bedroom sitting on my black beanbag listening to KUCR on my Magnavox sterio when they play a couple tracks off of Rum, Sodomy and the Lash. I honestly don't remember which songs they were, but it was angry enough and fast enough and the music was awesome and Shane was awesome and I was immediately hooked on the Pogues. I later had a hard time smuggling the actual cassette into the house because my mom wouldn't let me buy an album with such a filthy title. And that just made me like the Pogues even more. Good work mom.

Before the Pogues, Shane was already a teenage star after some chick (it's always a chick) cut his head with a broken bottle at a Clash show in '77 or '78. There was blood everywhere, and a photo of it ended up on the cover of a London Newspaper with a headline that read something like, "Punk Savages Take Over London." A little irony is that in the early '90s when Shane was kicked out of the band, Joe Strummer actually stepped in as the lead singer during live shows. But you probably already knew that.

There is a lot of Shane-inspired art in the world today. I like this one because he's wearing a top hat, 'a la two of my other heros, Lincoln and Bob Dylan.

Never the poster boy for sobriety. I don't know why Shane bothers wearing a watch. He's seldom on time. When Denise & I saw the Pogues at the House of Blues, they came on stage so late that the audience started to think Shane was passed out drunk back stage. Actually, that's always a worry at a Pogues show.

I'm not sure when this photo was taken, but it looks pre-Pogues. Probably in the late '70s when Shane was the front man for the Nipple Erectors or the Nips. Before that he wrote, published, and printed his own punk rock magazine. There once was a time when I wanted to do the same.

Shane & the Pogues have a loyal fan base all over the world. The first time I saw them, I felt like I was at a B-list Hollywood premier.

Shane too suffers for his people.

This is a great book. Dictated, then printed by his on-again, off-again girlfriend Victoria, it's full of stories from the early days of English punk rock, soul, and reggae, all the way to the present. He even talks about his teeth, or lack thereof.

The men (and woman) they couldn't hang.

On Wednesday, October 18, 2006, I saw the Pogues at the Wiltern for the first time. It was their first west coast appearance with Shane as the frontman in over 15 years. I had an extra ticket because Denise couldn't go, so originally I was just going to give it away at the door because I didn't want to "babysit" someone who wouldn't appreciate the show as much as me. A couple days before the show, my mom called and asked if she could go.

When we got there it was an all-ages show. The kids to my left had X's printed on their hands and the people to my right were eligible for social security. As we waited for them to take stage, the Clash's Straight To Hell played in the background as a tribute to the late Joe Strummer (that song means so much more to me now and whenever I hear it, it makes me tingle). Just before the song was about to end, the lights dimmed, they took the Wiltern's Ornate stage and broke into If I Should Fall From Grace with God. No lie, I began to weep.

Shane and the Pogues can kick you in the brains, plus they're beautiful and here's why:

"I could have been someone

Well so could anyone

You took my dreams from me

When I first found you

I kept them with me babe

I put them with my own

Can´t make it out alone

I´ve built my dreams around you"

- Fairytale of New York

"And now I'm lying here I've had too much booze

I've been shat on and spat on and raped and abused

I know that I am dying and I wish I could beg

For some money to take me from the old main drag"

-The Old Main Drag

"This morning on the harbour

When I said goodbye to you

I remember how I swore

That I'd come back to you one day

And as the sunset came to meet

The evening on the hillI told you

I'd always love

I always did and I always will

He fought the champ in pittsburgh

And he slashed him to the ground

He took on tiny tartanella

And it only went one round

He never had no time for reds

For drink or dice or whoresAnd he never threw a fight

Unless the fight was rightSo they sent him to the war"

- The Body of an American

"I've been loving you a long time

Down all the years, down all the days

And I've cried for all your troubles

Smiled at your funny little ways

We watched our friends grow up together

And we saw them as they fell

Some of them fell into Heaven

Some of them fell into Hell

I took shelter from a shower

And I stepped into your arms

On a rainy night in Soho

The wind was whistling all it's charms

I sang you all my sorrows

You told me all your joys

Whatever happened to that old song

To all those little girls and boys

Sometimes I wake up in the morning

The gingerlady by my bed

Covered in a cloak of silence

I hear you talking in my head

I'm not singing for the future

I'm not dreaming of the past

I'm not talking of the fist time

I never think about the last"

- A Rainy Night in Soho

"A curse on the judges, the coppers and screws

Who tortured the innocent, wrongly accused

For the price of promotionAnd justice to sell

May the judged be their judges when they rot down in hell

May the whores of the empire lie awake in their beds

And sweat as they count out the sins on their heads

While over in Ireland eight more men lie deadKicked down and shot in the back of the head"

-Streets of Sorrow/Birmingham Six

"And in the euston tavern you screamed it was your shout

But they wouldn't give you service so you kicked the windows out

They took you out into the street and kicked you in the brains

So you walked back in through a bolted door and did it all again

At the sick bed of cuchulainn we'll kneel and say a prayer

And the ghosts are rattling at the door and the devil's in the chair"

- The Sick Bed of Cuchulainn

"Well Jimmy played harmonica in the pub where I was born

He played it from the night time to the peaceful early morn

He soothed the souls of psychos and the men who had the horn

And they all looked very happy in the morning"

- Sally MacLennane

How about filling some of those pot holes instead?

Everywhere I go in town they're ripping up the roads. What's going on? Texas, ripped up. Redlands Blvd, ripped up. Eureka, ripped up. Stuart, ripped up. Oriental Ave, ripped up. While they're at it, they should probaby change that street name to Asian Ave just to be PC. You can't swing a dead cat without hitting a detour sign. Now they've ripped up Mariposa or Dwight or whatever the hell it's called there at Caroline Park. The Obama Infrastructure Plan has wasted little time in leaving broken pieces of asphalt in it's wake. I was out on a ride today and I could figure out if I was in Redlands or Beirut.

With all the road work near Caroline Park, tomorrow night's ride should be interesting. Hopefully no one comes flying around the corner on Mariposa, sticks it into the broken asphalt and dies. That would be bad for business.

We're getting the band back together

The GMR to Baldy Village Reunion Tour

Thanks to Facebook and the big mouth of some people, within the time span of a day and a half, Adam, Joy, & Krista threw together an outlaw short track race at Hulda Crook on Thursday night. More than 10 people showed up for 20 minutes plus 3 laps of pain and suffering. The death-defying figure-eight course was even marked with cones and environmentally hazardous paint that were "borrowed" from a nearby school.


Half way through the first lap I did my best Tree Farm impersionation and took a flyer, only instead of going it alone, I took Robert Bender & Adam with me. Eventually it was just Bender & I and going into the last lap he stuck it to me pretty good, gapping me on the downhill & then drilling it on the following climb.

Willem even talked one of his friends into walking out to the course to hold up lap cards.

Afterward we all stood around and talked about how much we suffered and how much fun it was and how cool bikes are.

Then some of use rode up to the Jedi and back down to the park before it got dark.


It's a damn shame there are no more short tracks, with the exception of Sea Otter. We'll probably keep it up until Sea Otter, until the heat comes and shuts us down, or until someone keels over and dies.

Anyway, if you have a mountain bike, you like to suffer, and you don't want to go around in circles at an industrial park crit practice, come on out and try not to get taken out on our figure-eight short track. We can use the bodies.

I’m suffering from some serious writer’s block on this blog and even worse at work. I don’t know what the deal is, but the deal isn’t good. When life hands me lemons, I do what most of you would do. I Google lemons to figure out what the hell I’m supposed to do with these lemons. If you haven’t figured it out already, a lemon in this case is a metaphor for writer’s block.

Google gives me 8,810,000 entries for "writer’s block". It starts with Wikipedia’s entry for writer’s block, which is defined as, "a phenomenon involving temporary loss of ability to continue writing, usually due to lack of inspiration or creativity". No shit. I already know that. Now, how do I cure it?

Ah, here it is. Practical Tips for Beating Writer’s Block. I click on it and it gives me an article on About.com titled, Top 10 Tips for Overcoming Writer’s Block. Of course, there are 10 tips, which actually tells me only about 7 or 8 are useful tips and the other few are useless bullshit made up to complete the list at 10. I’ll go back to Google and see if someone has the integrity to publish a Top 4 Tips for Curing Writer’s Block.

No such luck, but here’s something much more interesting and related to my love for the liquor.

Top 15 Great Alcoholic Writers.
15. Hunter Thompson
14. Raymond Chandler
13. John Cheever
12. O. Henry
11. Tennessee Williams
10. Dylan Thomas
9. Dorothy Parker
8. Edgar Allan Poe
7. Truman Capote
6. Jack Kerouac
5. William Faulkner
4. Charles Bukowski
3. F. Scott Fitzgerald
2. James Joyce
1. Ernest Hemingway

According to this list, my options are to die young, go gay, or grow old and crazy and and shoot myself. Nope.

Back to Google. Here’s a link to Brainy Quotes from Hemingway. I’m a sucker for quotes. What does our old drunk suicidal friend have to say?

“I learned never to empty the well of my writing, but always to stop when there was still something there in the deep part of the well, and let it refill at night from the springs that fed it.”

Brilliant. That solves it. Tonight I’m going to fill the well with a bike ride and a drink (or four).

I just thought of something kind of funny. What if I went to Google and typed in "writer’s block" and instead of 8-million entries it pulled up zero entries? I deserve a fifth drink tonight just for that brainy thought.

“Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go on an overnight drunk, and in 10 days I'm going to set out to find the shark that ate my friend and destroy it. Anyone who wants to tag along is more than welcome.” – Steven Zissou

If you're not against mini bikes, don't cross this line. If yes, do.

Every year at this time, the time of Bike Week in Daytona, I actually do miss the motorcycle biz. Bike Week is/was a lot of fun. Ryder & I went to Mer & Joey's last night to watch the Supercross. Turned out to be a good race. Sounds like the 200 was a different story. Leave it to the AMA to take a good idea, like running the 200 under the lights, and still managing to find a way to screw it up.

In my never-ending quest to get faster, I did a Southridge race yesterday. It went much better than last weekend. That's for sure. I'm still not ready to go full-throttle, but Sean Donovan and youngsters Trevor Downing, & Adam Snyder are (Fort Lewis' spring break is an early one apprently). They drilled it from the word go and I hung on to that train as long as I could before coming off. It's a work in progress. By the Nat'l at the end of this month, things should be better.

I saw Adam Spik at the race yesterday. I haven't seen him in years. He's a fire fighter now and has two kids. While on his sweet Phil Wood single-speed, he made a comment about still reading my blog when I actually update it. He's right, I suck at this blogging thing now. For example, all I have to say are single-sentence statements.

Friday night Ryder asked Denise & I if he could have a treat for finishing his bowl of ice cream.

I'm selling my TT bike and a bunch of other brand new bike parts so if you need anything email me.

Today I'm going out to ride Glendora Mountain Road in preparation for San Dimas Stage Race.

Since Joy and Monique are involved in the Southern California High School Mountain Bike League, I feel like I should get involved too.

I hope Joey remembered the time change last night since he's supposed to be in Long Beach today for a 7:15 AM crit.

Today is Jeannie and Christie's birthdays.

Poor Josh has to go to Disneyland with Jeannie, so I'm wondering what Christie is sticking Greg with today.

Johnson was hanging out with Ben Harper and Lance Armstrong last night.

Between a muscian and a 7-time TdF winner, I bet you can score some pretty good drugs.

Just kidding.

I still can't believe the federal gov't has banned the sale of mini bikes.

At least there is no ban on the sale of Steve Zissou artwork.

"If you're not against me, don't cross this line! If yes, do." - Steve Zissou

At least I got to see the intersection where Tupac was shot.

There are two things for certain. In the beginning of every of year, I always find myself doing business travel, no matter what line of business I’m in at the time. And, at the beginning of every year, it takes me 2, or more, MTB races to learn how to suffer again. It doesn’t matter how much training I’ve done or how many road races I’ve done prior, nothing mimics the real thing. The first few MTB races always hurt like hell. If you could ride a bike in the fetal position, that’s how I would have been riding last Sunday at round 1 of the Kenda Cup West, also known as Recession Series.

It didn’t help that only a few days before, I spent 3 days in Salt Lake City followed by 3 days in Vegas. Eating a lot, drinking a little, sitting a ton, standing too much, not sleeping at all, and exercising nil: the good old American sedentary lifestyle does not bode well for good bike racing results. I’m not making excuses. It is what it is.



This is the Vegas I know. It's not slot machines or card tables. It's conference halls and glad handing. Since it was the day before Fat Tuesday, the welcome dinner had a Mardi Gras theme. I got some beads for asking a question in one of the technical sessions.


Vegas was the second stop on our two-part conference tour of the American Southwest. The tarot cards told me I wasn't going to make it home alive.


Before leaving town we had to stop at the karaoke bar in Harrah's so Donny could do a chilling redenetion of Bon Jovi's Wanted Dead or Alive. I was glad he didn't do a Stevie Ray Vaughan song since Donny is from Texas. I hate Stevie Ray Vaughan's music.

Back at Mardi Gras, Donny and this incredibly bored girl paid to stand around and look Mardi Gra-esque posed for a picture.

To get a little exercise in SLC, I considered swimming a mile in the hotel pool, but then I thought, to hell with it. The thought of trying to count that high just made my head hurt even more.

Vegas didn't kill me, but the race on Sunday nearly did.

I was in Salt Lake City over the weekend

But I much rather would have been at the Party on Palomar.

The Facts Pour In: Redlands Triathlon linked to Parking Scandal

Some investigative journalism on behalf of the Redlands Daily Facts prior to posting random letters such as Ms. West’s would clarify that the Mentone resident was referring to the road closures due to the 10th Annual Redlands Triathlon/Duathlon, which took place on Sunday, February 8 at Redlands East Valley High School.

The incident was not due to a group of renegade cyclists as Ms. West's letter and the Redlands Daily Facts led the public to believe.

When reached for comment, a representative of the Redlands Daily Facts said, “Oh.”

The event, which was held in rainy conditions attracted hundreds of competitors and was won by Kyle Simmons of Redlands. The 17-year old finished the 3.1-mile run, 10-mile bike portion, and 100-yard swim in a time of 45:30. Winning the Female division was 38-year old Polly Crawford of Temecula with a time of 53:26.

Justin Ogan, a sophomore from Yorba Linda, who was using the event as a training race rated the course and overall venue as average. When asked if he’d compete in the event again next year, Ogan said, "Probably."

Just the Facts

Dear Ms. West,
I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt here and assume that the Redlands Daily Facts somehow managed to screw up your letter to the editor during the editing process, or didn’t live up to its title and check the facts before publishing your letter because your letter makes no sense whatsoever based on the following actual facts:

1. Colton Ave in Mentone is about as wide as the 10 Freeway. The umbrella carrying friend could have parked across the street from Ms. West’s house without interfering with traffic, instead of parking a quarter of a mile down the street. Parking is legal on the north and south sides of Colton Ave in Mentone except for one stretch of road on the south side just east of Crafton Ave; however there are no houses on the north side of the street unless Ms. West’s present address is a fenced-in power transformer.

2. A quarter mile is 1,320 feet. The average bicycle is 4 feet in length. If Ms. West’s friend had to park a quarter of a mile away, that means there must have been about 330 cyclists parked single-file west of Ms. West's home and 330 cyclists parked east of her home on Colton Ave. 660 cyclists is one hell of a lot of bicycles. Why don’t I know about this group ride of 660 apparent a-holes that aren’t willing to move for a car trying to park and why doesn't the friend have a functioning horn?

3. If Ms. West had to walk a quarter of a mile in the rain to her friend’s car, does that mean that these 660 cyclists were themselves sitting on the side of the road in the rain? The plot thickens.

I have a suggestion for Ms. West that could help her with some of her problems. Stop reading or relying on the Redlands Daily Facts for your source of news! Its title alone is false representation of a newspaper and a form of false advertising. I suggest she read VeloNews or Cyclingnews.com.

Good thing this Graham Watson photo taken at the ToC didn't occur outside of Ms. West's house...

Although it very well could happen because these scantily clad cavaliers happen to live in the Redlands/Mentone/Loma Linda area and that's a fact.

Vans, Bike Racing & Punk Rock. Oi!

The last page of the March VeloNews is a piece written by road racer Adam Myerson titled “Get in the Van.” After only reading the title, I’m already intrigued because, A; I love vans, and B; the illustration that accompanies the editorial is of a van with a Black Flag sticker on the rear window, and by now you know that I’m fascinated with the history of punk rock. In fact, I consider myself the Shelby Foote of punk rock, and when I say punk rock, I mean as in a lifestyle, not as in a form of music. Most music that gets that label, especially in the last 20 years is garbage. And let’s face it, most of the original stuff was trash too, but the way in which it was produced is significant.

In "Get in the Van", Myerson draws a parallel between the early do-it-yourself days of punk rock and the shoe-string-budget lifestyle of a bike racer. Both of these labors of love lifestyles are spent living day to day and enjoying every miserable minute of it. There are no team buses, no airplanes, and no big-money rider contracts. Just a van, a hotel room floor to sleep on, and a community pool of prize (or gig) money. It’s all about sacrifice, racing, and doing what it takes to get from one race to the next and with good enough form to make an impact. As a motivation message to his Mountain Khakis pro team teammates, veteran racer Myerson, pledges to rekindle the bike racing fire that originally started for him in 1987, and he asks them to do the same.

I am Adam Myerson. In fact, when Denise read his open letter to his teammates, she said it was if I wrote it myself. Starting first with motorcycle racing and now with bike racing, I have spent a good part of my life making the same sacrifices: sleeping in the back of trucks or on hotel floors; spending countless hours training or working on machinery instead of doing all the leisurely things that most people do; pining over parts, pieces, and components; fretting over food; living paycheck to paycheck so I could make it to one race after the next; sacrificing. Sure, there have been times when things have come easy, but those times are the result of all the sacrifice.

The old saying, "Misery loves company" applies well to this scenario. All of this suffering is much easier to cope with and more enjoyable if you have someone or a group of someones who can appreciate the lifestyle or lives it themselves. In this case, opposites don't attract. My best friends have been people just like me. These people aren’t always easy to come by and many aren’t always willing to stick around once they’ve gotten a real taste. They have to want to drink from the same bottle, and so does your family if they are going to support you. The reality of it is, if I’m sacrificing so much, then so are Denise and Ryder. You know what they say; addiction affects family and friends, which is why I don’t plan on doing this to them for too much longer.

A lot of times when I’m sitting around thinking, I think about how nice it will be to someday feel like I can actually sit around. Instead of it being bikes and racing, it will be rocking chairs, porches, patios, and beaches. It’s warm out, it’s clear, and The Clash’s "Straight to Hell" is playing in the background at a conversational volume. Unless of course, any of this rubs off on Ryder and then it will be bikes and racing and Richard Hell’s "Blank Generation" cranked up to 10 all over again.

I believe there are two kinds of people: Those who have great ambition, take chances, suffer a little bit, and experience youthful angst that soothes as they age; or those who experience great bitterness when they’re old because they sat around, developed a dormant existence, never got in the van, and let life pass them by. The latter is no way to live.

High score goes to the gallows

There are an alarming number of people in my office (three, so far) who never got the opportunity to see Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln at Disneyland before the final curtain fell on the awe-inspiring attraction in February of 2005. On that cold winter day, Honest Abe was impeached and then replaced by Disneyland: The First 50 Magical Years. Some of my fondest Disneyland memories are from sitting through Animatronic Abe’s speech, watching Mathew Brady’s Civil War paintings change in the background, and wondering what it would have been like to have bayoneted a Confederate in the face or have served under General Sherman’s army as it so gloriously burned Atlanta to the ground.

I have a love-hate relationship with the Disney. I love Disneyland, due mostly to nostalgia, but hate the Disney Corporation for their excessive commercialism. Upon exiting the Jungle Cruise, you can’t even buy a rubber snake anymore without mouse ears on it and you sure as hell aren’t going to find anything in the Pirates of the Caribbean gift shop without Jack Sparrow’s likeness shouting out at you. And now it’s been announced that they’ve “tastefully” placed Disney characters inside It’s A Small World, and even integrated music from Disney films with the original music from the ride. What’s next, replacing the life-like animals on the Jungle Cruise with characters like Dumbo & Tigger?

I have the feeling that Lincoln was removed from Disneyland because the attraction didn’t sell any merchandise. You never saw anyone walking around the park wearing a fake beard or a top hat that they’d purchased after watching electric Lincoln site the Gettysburg Address. Personally, I would have sported both, just as long as they didn’t come with mouse ears attached.

But don’t despair. We may be in luck. There are rumors that The First 50 Magic Years will soon suffer its own assassination and be replaced by The Walt Disney Story Featuring Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln. I wouldn’t be surprised if everyone who enters is handed a Buzz Lightyear Astro Blaster, ‘a la John Wilkes Booth.

So I rode my trainer for almost 2 hours instead

Every now and then I'm actually glad that racing my bike isn't my job. For example, on Saturday I went to the Boulevard Road Race (a.k.a. Tour of California Prologue).

About an hour before my race, it began to snow.

About 45 minutes before my race, it began snowing real hard. At that, I said, screw this. This isn't my job. Plus I'm allergic to snow, rain, and the cold in general. I went home instead.

Sooner or later, my season is actually going to start.

It’s supposed to rain tomorrow and through the weekend. What’s the deal with that? The last few days have been rad, but no such luck for the road race this weekend. Just when I had my bike all dialed and ready to go I’m going to have to swap out the cork brake pads and carbon wheels. Or I could just live dangerously…

Last Friday night I hem and hawed around about doing the crit down in Imperial or doing the road race up around Solvang on Saturday. As it turns out, I did neither. I figured why start racing so early when I don’t need to, but now I kind of wish I would have gone to Imperial. Between Norm, Craig, Miller, Padgett, & Manning, they came away with a couple of wins and a pair of seconds. Woulda been fun to contribute to that.

I still got two good days of training in. On Saturday, Joey, Jamie, & I rode up to Angelus Oaks where there are still patches of snow on the side of the road. Then we came down and shot across Yucaipa so we could do Wildwood. I put in some pretty big efforts on both climbs, so when I hit San Timoteo Canyon solo and there was a headwind, I was pretty much hating life.

I figured the Sunday ride would be super casual since most everyone went racing on Saturday, but that wasn’t the case at all. Fresh off of two race wins, Norm was riding angry so that splintered the group into just 6 of us. Between the weight lifting workouts and Saturday’s ride, Sunday did me in. It was only about a 3-hour affair, but I still limped back to Mentone. I just gotta keep reminding myself that I’m supposed to feel like hell right now if I want to feel good when the MTB season is in full swing.

Last night they had a fund raiser dinner for the Redlands Bicycle Classic at Mikan and it was a pretty good time. I was a little disappointed in the turn-out. I expected more. I had raw fish and Denise had a teriyaki New York steak that was one of the best I’ve tasted in a long time. How’s that for a restaurant plug? I also had 3 pints of the Hangar 24 Orange Wheat, which made it just that more difficult to get up at 5 AM this morning to meet Kelly from work to ride Crafton. It was worth it though. I don’t do that ride enough and every time I do, I rediscover how great an area it is.

I just remembered that yesterday Ryder told me I smelled like a dog.


The trend lately in blogging is to post photos of food or post food and drink recipes on your blog. Here's my contribution.

Eat, Drink & Be Merry because you can

Come eat raw fish next Tuesday night so the Redlands Bicycle Classic doesn't go belly up like Pool Gel went belly up.



Okay, let's talk about how lame this is. As part of their team camp, and I suppose as a team building exercise, the Kelly Benefits Strategies Medifast guys went skiing. IN THEIR TEAM JACKETS! Somewhere there's a PR hack that is hated by the entire Kelly Benefits team now because he or she made those guys pose for pictures half kitted up. Lucky for those gusy, their team camp wasn't somewhere south of the Equator. The PR photo would have been of them swimming, surfing, or snorkeling in their team bibs.

Back to reality. On a more serious note, I found out about this today - from the District 37 web site:

"It is with a great deal of sadness, that I report that we lost a fellow racer Sunday night. Jimmy Finerty, an Expert Open racer, did not survive surgery for a crushed lung and torn aorta. Jimmy had a high speed crash some where around check one of the Desert MC National Hare & Hound, and was hit by his bike. He was able to get up and ride back to camp, where his family took him to Rescue-3. Jimmy was transported by medivac to the hospital. He passed during the operation. Jimmy had taken the last year off from racing, and the DMC National was his return to racing. Previously, he had raced the National Hare and Hound Series for 6 years. He leaves behind a wife, Kacey, a son, and parents. All of DMC is very distraught over this unfortunate turn of events. Our heart felt condolences to the Finerty family, we all feel the loss. May Godspeed Jimmy."

Now, I'm not gonna go on and on about how precious life is, or about how he died doing what he enjoyed, or even about how although I didn't know this guy, I feel a strange connection because we shared the same love for desert racing. None of that is important because the real tragedy is that he left behind a young son.

On a daily basis, armed with a double-edged sword, I fight with myself over the topic of motorycle racing. I've seen way too many people killed and put in wheel chairs so most of the time I'm relieved to have put that life behind me. Yet, other times I struggle with the thought of Ryder not getting the opportunity to experience life growing up on a motorcycle. I don't know if it's because we've had rain recently, or if it's because it's the start of a new motorcycle racing season, or if it's because Ryder is getting closer to the age where he can ride, or if it's because I'm just getting old and tired of wrining myself out on the bicycle week after week, but dirt bikes have been on my mind a lot lately, and in a big way. And then I read something like above and I'm back to thinking that life for he and I could still be pretty good if we just stick to pedal bikes. Even though it still has its harzards that I'm well aware of, Denise & I could probably give Ryder a similar experience through a childhood of bicycle racing.

That said, I still miss things like riding a special test in Wickenburg, chasing ribbon through Cougar Buttes, leap-frogging from pit to pit on Hwy 95 in Nevada, overlooking the Mojave at sunset, and the smell of creosote bushes after a good rain. But I know missing all of that stuff is much better than missing a family member. I feel very bad for Jimmy Finerty's wife and young son.

Social networking or social regression?

Your immature, naïve, inexperienced, pimply-faced adolescent past confirmed you as a friend on Facebook.

Now I’ll never have to attend a high school reunion. Brilliant.

This pretty much sums it up

What happens from 9:50 AM until you're back safe at home is a completely different chart and somewhat of your own problem.


The calm before the storm...

This painting has nothing to do with anything I have to say. I just figured it’s been far too long since I’ve posted any fine art. Plus, I don’t actually have much to say anyway. It’s a painting depicting a scene from one of my favorite movies.

I’ve been watching the half-hour updates on the Tour Down Under every night and it’s just making me wish it were summer. It’s been in 90s down there each day. I’m over winter. Last weekend that fickle bitch Mother Nature teased us with summer-like weather. Even down in Laguna Beach where Denise & I stayed and rode, it was up to the 80s by mid-morning. You can’t ask for better beach weather any time of the year. This weekend it’s going to feel like we live in dreary old England. It will probably warm up for Super Bowl weekend and then be cold as hell for the weekend of Boulevard Road Race. That’s usually her M.O.

Speaking of football what’s the deal with Tim Tebow and some of these other dudes deciding to stick around and play another year of amateur football? What a bunch of freaking idiots. That’s like having a winning lottery ticket, but not cashing it in. I never thought I’d commend anything USC, but at least Mark Sanchez isn’t afraid to move out of the amateur ranks. Or maybe no one wants to go into the 2009 NFL draft because they’re likely to get picked up by Detroit. That’s kind of like amateur football too I suppose.

What else do I have to rant about? I know. How about all the time I’ve wasted recently on Facebook, or Spacebook, or My Face, whatever it’s called. I think after staying up until 11 pm last night, I’m finally over it. At least I hope so. It seems super cool once you start, but on mornings like this when you wake up with a Facebook hangover, you regret every minute of it. Somehow I still managed to get up and get myself on the trainer this morning, but it wasn’t easy. Speaking of Facebook and trainers, Adam Hart posted a 20 second video of himself riding the trainer. There’s only one thing less exciting than riding the trainer and that’s watching someone else rider the trainer. Sorry Adam. I’m just saying.

What else? Gran Torino got zero Oscar nominations. Are you kidding me? If you ask me, members of the Academy are just asking for Clint to walk into the Kodak Theatre guns a’ blazing. Instead of Clint, they’re either going to give the best actor award to a guy who played a dead guy (Sean Penn or Frank Langella), a guy whose character is heading in the opposite direction of dying (Brad Pitt), or a guy who I thought was already dead, but actually isn’t (Mickey Rourke). I should sell that joke to Letterman.

I’m not the only one in the family who’s funny.

Denise: When are you going to start dressing yourself?
Ryder: When I’m 10.

And finally, I’m selling my TT bike. It’s a 56cm aluminum Trek Equinox 9 with Dura Ace brakes, Ultegra derailleurs, Bontrager RaceXLite cranks, handlebar, and saddle, and carbon fiber Profile Designs sticks and brake levers. The Mavic wheels aren’t anything special which is why I’m willing to part ways with this red rocket ship for the low price of one thousand U.S. dollars. I probably have less than 10 hours on the thing because I hate time trials and time trials hate me, but don’t let that stop you from becoming the next Fabian Cancellera or even Kristen Armstrong.

I guess I did have plenty to say...

I’d rather be full of myself than full of excuses

These long base mile days are getting harder and harder the older I get. Yesterday it took every ounce of energy and willpower in my body to turn the pedals over for a complete 5 hours. And even then, the last hour was futile.

Actually, all 5 hours were futile. I knew I was in trouble in the first hour as I climbed to the base of Oak Glen from home and my legs just wouldn’t respond. I thought they’d eventually get into the groove, but it never happened. Maybe that’s what sets us apart from everyone else. Even on those days when riding our bike is the last thing we feel like doing, we do it anyway. And we do it for 5 hours, in the wind.

If it’s hard for you to understand just how bad it was yesterday and how hard it was to overcome the boredom and discomfort, here’s an example: My legs were as full of aches and pains yesterday as I am full of myself today. Now you get it.

How do you like them apples?

Yesterday I went into Stater’s on Brookside & Alabama to buy some apples and because I have a weak bladder I had to step up to the urinal before stepping into the produce section. I’m just standing there doing my deal when a Stater Bros employee exits a stall, passes the sink, and goes straight out the bathroom door with filth on his hands. I hope he works in the bakery and not the produce section.

BTW, I just decided that's the story I'd tell Alex after the first commercial break if I ever make it to Jeopardy.