random action
- Geeee-tar
- More STP crap
- Website look
- Tour de France (whole lotta dopin’ goin’ on)
I play the guitar. Over the last 20 years, I’ve played maybe 5 or so Gibson Les Pauls. Every single one I’ve ever played has simply Felt Right. When I was in high school I had the chance to buy a brown one for $350. Kick myself in the nuts every time I think about that one. Add in the fact that I played the same guitar almost 10 years later, only to wish I’d bought it when I had the chance. RIGHT IN THE NUTS!
I later jammed with a guy who owned a number of Les Pauls. Over a couple years, I played his goldtop, his black beauty, and a couple others in full-band jam settings. That guitar just Feels Right.
Well, a buddy and ex co-worker recently let me know that another ex co-worker is selling a ’90 Les Paul Standard. The transaction started a month ago, and in another month or so, I’ll have my own Gibson Les Paul.
Oh shit! That’s AWESOME!
When I was growing up in AK, my dad was a teacher. He had summers off. Most of the relatives lived in MI, so to visit them on the cheap, we had a camper for the truck. Double bunk above the cab of the truck. Dining table pops down into a bed. Done deal, we ride!
Being in SE AK, we also had a boat. Double bunk in the V-berth up in the bow. Dining table pops down into a bed. Done deal, we ride!
For the STP thing, Dean borrowed a 20ft towable trailer RV thing. All the cabinetry smelled just like the boat and the camper that I remember from my youth. And it had two couch things that folded down into beds. One for Dean. One for me. Done deal, let’s sleep!
Thing is, those thin foam cushions were fine if you were in middle school and weighed less than 150lbs. I didn’t sleep for shit and my back got PISSED at me. Between that and all the bending down that I did when removing wheels and pumping up tires and everything else, my lumbar region took a major dump on me.
AND I got mosquito bites and spider bits all over my ankles and knees. YUMMY
Oh yeah, AND now I can’t find my glasses. I thought for sure I’d put them (in their case) in my bag during the day, but they ain’t there now. Hmmmm… If they’re still in the RV trailer dealy, they’re an hour away out in the boonies, cuz that’s where the owner lives. BFE. Damn.
I’m getting tired of the look of the site. It’s laid out well, but the blk/gry/wht layout is BS. Too hard to see the links at a glance, and it may be difficult for our colorblind friends to differentiate between some of the text. Using WordPress makes it really easy to change things around, but I’ll have to come up with new header images, because the headers are of different pixel dimensions. End result is that it’s gonna change when I get off my butt and alter some photos into usable headers. Give me a year or so and it’ll get done.
Where to start on this one…
The night before last year’s Tour, three of the biggest potential winners weren’t allowed to start. Jan Ullrich and Ivan Basso were booted because of their possible involvement with a big blood-doping scandal. Alexandre Vinokourov wasn’t implicated, but he wasn’t allowed to start because enough people on his team were booted so that he didn’t have enough teammates to field the minimum number required for a TdF team. OUCH.
Over the course of the last 12 months, Jan Ullrich has retired, Ivan Basso hasn’t been cleared, and Vino has bought his own team and I think he’s PISSED and wants to win big time. In addition, Floyd Landis has been under investigation over his win of last year’s Tour and a number of others have been booted or not allowed in this year’s Tour.
Okay.
So in the bike industry, it’s been a bunch of people arguing that cycling is forever tarnished, and the sport is a joke and they are done with it, and are cancelling their subscriptions to the magazines and blahblahblah.
Eat my shorts!
A recent article in one of the magazines said something to the effect that it shouldn’t be about the individual characters, rather it should be about the jerseys themselves. Don’t cheer the rider, cheer the title that they bear. THAT’S what’s important.
I tend to agree.
I don’t like doping. I think that some individuals will be singularly suited for a particular task, and that, paired with hard work, will see them through to their goals. I don’t like that you can inject a foreign substance and boost performance that you didn’t earn. That doesn’t make for a level playing field. However, I’m not going to give up on the Tour or cycling in general because whether or not you’re juiced, the fact that you’re riding your bike for 2500 miles over 3 weeks with 2 days of rest, well that’s still incredible. The drama isn’t diminished for me.
However, like I said, I DON’T LIKE DOPING. And that’s why this Tour that so many people are giving up on is so great. All these people have been kicked out and now we have a race that in its first week has brought forward many names that we haven’t heard of, and many names that we haven’t payed attention to in the past. Because many of the big names aren’t there running the show and setting the pace, it seems like the various teams aren’t as tight and cohesive as they have been in past years. That may make for a chaotic and haphazard Tour for some, but for me that makes an exciting Tour. Who’s in yellow? Who crashed? Who is attacking? Off the front? Off the back? Oh boy, we got a running of the bulls here, folks.
I could go on further, but watching the Tour is fun. I know what it’s like to think your legs are done, but you have miles to go and another hill to climb. Actually, I wonder how some of them STPers did? Some of them were doomed from the start. Yeeesh…
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