Grab bag

The 4th was good--did the tower ride with good company.

Freezing at the top.

KDAY found a machete on the way down--he did a machete wheelie.

And in Tour news...Lance is riding for himself and High Rode is B-A-D.

I Salute You

I went up to Hill Air Force Base to watch the planes. On a bluff just east of the runway I got a few shots...

Garden Creek Gap

If I'm going to pick someone for tomorrow's win, it would have to be Krieg.

Location? Who knows...

I had to work to get to this--scratched legs, thorns in hands, wet feet, etc...--and so I'm somewhat proud of it.

Antelope Isla RR

Sometimes you want to look fast but you end up looking tweaked. So I present to you my "collage of tweak" p/b rain and wind.

Here we go again

Layne inspired me with one of his posts. And so I'm going to write on my blog more. I'm not that big of a Facebook person, although I won't say anything bad about it. It's fun. But on the other hand, I don't care if someone, even a close friend of mine, decides to become a fan of Nutella--or if he is most like Spiderman, according to a quiz. There is so much trivialness around us that it saddens me. Here is a good example of where we are as a society: The other day as I was just a few minutes from the end of my drive home and flipping through some channels, (by the way, I had just finished one of the cd's of a book I'm listening to, and figured it was a good place to stop) I heard something that bothered me. I guess I should say it saddened me. The D.J. was taking a call for a contest, and in his super animated voice, "According to a survey, what percentage of Americans said they could not live without their Microwave--fifty percent, sixty-five percent, or seventy-five percent?..." Wow, I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I have always known that we as a society value complete stupidity and trivialness, and yet I needed to hear something like that to really drive it home. Why couldn't the D.J. have asked a question like, "Name the closest star to our Sun--Proxima Centauri, Sirius A, or Sirius B?" Yea, it may not matter to most, but as a student I value learning, and there is nothing trivial about learning about the world around us (I'm not even an astronomer--I study finance). And then maybe the D.J. could add in a little note that "proxima" is Latin meaning, "next to" or "nearest to." Would people stop calling in to win free tickets? Probably. But therein lies the whole problem with most all people--we find entertainment in learning that our neighbor is going to be bent out of shape because he can't pop his Orville Redenbacher. (And I don't even want to begin the discussion of how flawed a survey like that is. "Um, according to a survey, how many Americans say that they would not like to crash their car into a cement barrier?" My guess would be 100% of Americans.) Yes, I do believe, after careful thought and analysis, that I do indeed benefit from having a microwave. So can I just leave it at that?

Well, without getting further into this, I will just say that yes I am going to write more blog posts. And yes, I am going to spend more time online by doing this. But it isn't trivial. They are posts for myself more than they are posts for anyone else (if they are reading). You can call it my journal of eventful events. And in case you are wondering, I become a better person when I see pictures or read about my friend's recent ascent up Ben Lomond, or his lunch-break-date with some singletrack. These people are sharing what meaningful things they do with their lives, and I think we can all benefit from that. Let me repeat: we can all benefit from that.

Now, I can't guarantee that I will post often, but feel free to listen in from time to time.

Watson, Dec 16, 1995--Mar 16, 2009

See you in another life buddy...