Day 3- Warren, MI

Demo today. I just couldn't get excited about it. The weight of the economic impact on the US auto industry weighs heavily on this place. There are dozens of factories devoted to making cars and car parts. All of them look either desolate, or slowed down, or shut altogether. The feeling is accute. It's probably the hardest hit area in the entire country.

I found myself having a hard time being 'professional' today. Or maybe the better way to say it is that I was a consummate professional; providing a high level of service even though I was really having a hard time finding the motivation. I just didn't want to talk to people, mostly. But, I had to. So I did.

Random helped at the demo, even when a guy who just wanted to ask the same questions over and over again to whomever would listen, started asking him about 29ers vs. 26ers. This was one of those 3 day shoppers who just comes in for days to talk about the same things, but just can't commit to the purchase.

We were both more tired at the end than we expected, and plans to head north along the lake were scuppered from a combination of fatique and not finding a place that we were excited about for accommodation. We're back at the same hotel after a nice Italian meal at a local place, complete with Geezers Playing Poorly But Really Getting Into It.

Frazier enjoyed being outside all day, and he is now passed out on the floor.

Day 2-Buffalo, NY to Warren, MI, or How A Day Of Driving Can Still Be Crappy

The first half of my day wasn't so ideal. Last night I picked out a spot that looked like it might be a nice place to take Frazier to the lakeshore for a swim. Conneaut, Ohio was the destination. Right over the Ohio State line, and a couple of hours after we set off. Just the right amount of time to drive before a pit stop.

The park was gorgeous, and had a really long beach to access the water. I descended the steps down the very steep embankment and started the walk along the long, wooden planks to the water's edge. There was a man off in the distance, probably two hundred yards away, moving debris from the beach with a tractor. I started to cut left along the beach, and noticed that he was driving towards me. He then pulls up alongside me to tell me that dogs aren't allowed. Shit. He suggests I go 'over there', but that they'll want F to be on a leash. Pfft.

I went 'over there', and Frazier somehow managed to lose a ball while pestering some Canada Geese. Crap. We left Conneaut after the dog had a chance to splash around some, and headed west along the lake towards Ashtabula. The coastline is pretty high, so there were few places to access the shore. I found another gorgeous park 8 miles down the road with prominent signs saying 'NO DOGS ALLOWED'. Thanks, Ohio. I gave up and continued back to the highway.

I feel like I am constantly battling Frazier's travel water bowl. I had it sitting on the arm rest of the truck, and at some point forgot it was there and knocked it over. It spilled out into my half-open messenger back. There wasn't much water in there, but enough to soak some mail, a bar of chocolate, and a few other things that could get wet and survive. The cleanup was a bit of a hassle, but what really made it go south was the bottle of ibuprofen that somehow managed to open while I was sopping up water, and of course most of the bottle spilled into the puddle at the bottom of the bag. I finally got off at the next exit to deal with the mess. Every time I put my hand in the bag my fingers took on a Moab-red color from the coating on the stupid tables. Shite.

I finally made it through the maze of highway closures to my stop for the evening: Warren, MI. Along the way I passed Eminem's hood 8 Mile. Wow. Scary!

The Random Canadian drove over from Canadia to spend the weekend with me. We had Thai food. The day ended better than it started.

Day 1-Departure

I left home on a gorgeous, 75 degree day. I would rather have been riding my bike. The drive was pretty uneventful, other than driving into rain somewhere along the way. I stayed overnight just outside of Buffalo.

Nothing out of the ordinary, nothing remarkable. Oh, there was one fender bender in Albany that caused a bit of a slow down. Frazier stuck his head out the window a few times during the drive. Those are about the most exciting things to happen the whole day.

Appreciating What You've Got, When You've Got It.

So I finally did my first road ride of the year at home today. I've got this little 12 and a half mile loop that's got some nice rollers in it. It takes about 45 minutes to ride it, or, it takes longer than that and I'm not as unfit as I thought I was.

Anyhizzle...It was the first hilly ride I've done this year. I've been riding around my parents' house, on the flats with constant headwinds for all of my rides so far. Now that I'm back home, I've decided that maybe I've missed the hills after all. It's not that my legs and lungs missed them, but the variety makes a nice change.

I got to thinking about the good and bad parts of riding in mountains vs. sea level along the coast. I realized that fighting those persistent headwinds in every direction, on roads with no topographical variation whatsoever, is probably pretty good for the pedal stroke. There's no real place to stop pedaling at the shore. There aren't any hills to power up, with descents to coast down. You aren't really resting. Ever. All you can do is vary your speed, depending on how aggressive against the wind you feel like being. Never, in my case. Except in 10 second bursts of 'Oh yeah wind!? Is that the best you got!!?', followed by a return to my senses, or a feeling of breathlessness.

Now that I'm back in the hills, I am enjoying that approach-to-anaerobic feeling, followed by the brief recovery period that follows on the downhill side. It makes a nice change of pace, literally and figuratively. I was thinking about some of the loops around here, and how much I dread the thought of going up some of the hills. But at least I have hills to dread here. And quite roads that provide periods of great views and heart rate increases.

I may sound like I'm slagging off riding at the shore. I am and I'm not. I love riding over to the coast and taking in the salt air. How could I not love the mid-ride stops at Mack & Manco's for a slice and a birch beer? And I do appreciate the end result of the strength I gain from the wind and the flats, even though it feels like the life is being sucked out of me during those rides.

It's hard to say what type of terrain I like better. I'm no great climber. I'm quite bad at it, actually. But I don't have the fitness right now to maintain a high pace on a 40 mile flat ride, either. At the end of the day, both types of riding have their place. And either type is better than no riding at all.

WIHP: The Catholic Edition

Alright, at the risk of inciting violence, I'm going to go ahead and write this post because I just can't take it anymore.

As I was driving to North Jersey for a day of shop visits this morning, I was tuned in to NPR. It was the BBC News Hour, and the subject du jour was Catholicism in Africa: How Prayer and Denial Will End The AIDS Crisis, Honest*. I guess Pope Benny XV(%&@!^I is about to make his first trip to Africa to go visit the converted.

The Pope stated on the way over that the distribution of condoms is not a solution to the AIDS problem in Africa. Yet, the Catholic Church is at the forefront of the AIDS battle, and preaches that abstinence is the way to stop the spread of the disease.

Ok seriously, how can people believe this shite!? How can human beings still be so completely brainwashed and gullible that they are actually buying into the notion that the best way to prevent the spread of a sexually transmitted disease is to teach people to not engage in sex, and even WORSE, expect THOSE people to actually listen!? When is the Church going to wake up and face the reality that this method has never worked, not for the oh I don't know, 15 or 20 years that they have been telling the people of Africa crap that is going in one ear and out the other?

I am gobsmacked, again. It simply adds fuel to my ire, and convinces me that the Catholic Church is perhaps one of the most hypocritical and corrupt institutions on the face of the planet. It's ok to molest and abuse little boys, but you are absolutely not allowed to use a condom in the process, oh no. And people actually believe that if they don't follow Catholic doctrine, that the salvation of their souls is doomed to purgatory for eternity.

You know what? I'm going to go ahead and support the idea of condom distribution in Africa, if for no other reason than it might relieve some of the hell on EARTH that those people are living in in *this* life. I am so, so incredibly happy that I am not Catholic.



*May not have been the actual title of the story.

Let the Wonkiness Commence!

Chipps is on deadline this week, which of course means he's looking out for anything non-magazine related to distract him from his deadlining duties. Out of such distractions usually come things like new guitar purchases, and moustache growing. But TONIGHT he presented me with the best news I've heard this month; this YEAR, I daresay!

He found this little tidbit:


From this blog post:

Lambs! Lambs! Ok, just one lamb. But still!

That's right, folks. The lambs are a'rriving. Spring is certainly on the way, and soon there will be fields of the cutest things you've ever seen, frolicking and trying to learn the ropes of those leg things, to see and 'aww' at.

Pictures, please!

And a heartfelt THANK EWE to Chipps.

10 Observations

What did we do before the advent of cell phones, blogs, instant messengers, and social networking sites?

People did things like make the movie 10.

Now, depending on how you feel about that film, you may feel that cell phones, et al, are the best things ever. I happen to really love the film, as I think it is the best example of the comedic brilliance-nay GENIUS- of Sir Dudley Moore. For that reason, I can appreciate a time when we didn't have what we probably now look at as basic necessities for work and play. How DID we ever survive back then!?

A movie like 10 couldn't have been possible if cell phones and Facebook existed in 1979. All the missed calls, busy signals, one person hanging up while the other is picking up, constant ringing, and the worry over not being able to get in touch are now a thing of the past in this world of instant communication between the masses and you. The story line wouldn't make sense in this modern world. People who don't remember the days before we had the ability to update everyone on our comings and goings in 140 characters or less, probably wouldn't find this movie funny if they saw it for the first time in 2009 instead of '79, or even '89.

Now that I think about it, there is still worry over not being able to get in touch with someone. Maybe that worry is actually worse now, since if you can't get in touch with someone within minutes, something is obviously wrong.

Do we think things are better now? Has our ability to keep in touch every second of the day, from any location in the world, made things better? Or, have we lost some of the simplicity that existed when writing love letters gave people something to look forward to in the mail? I'm not talking on some grand, existential level here. Certainly many things are improved by advancements in technology. We clearly survived without these things, though. And many others.

So I'm very happy that the beach running scene exists. Not because I'm hot for Bo Derek, but because of the many other funny things that not having a cell phone made possible.