and It Burns, Burns, Burns

I have a friend that recently opined on the overexposure of Johnny Cash these days. I tend to agree, but this is freaking hilarious.

Preparation H made a bid to use Johnny Cash's Ring of Fire to sell the hemorrhoid cream. Cash's daughter, singer- songwriter Rosanne Cash, refused to allow it and told Advertising Age magazine the idea was "moronic."

Oh the pain of the Ol' ring of fire.

Happy Fucking Thanksgiving

I would like to wish a Happy Thanksgiving to my family back in Georgia that understood why I needed to move to Colorado. They understood so very well that they stopped talking to me. I think we are going on 4 years now. Thanks family. I'll always remember you.

Yeah. Sarcasm, but really dough, it was a good thanksgiving. I cooked my first turkey. A 14 lbs. honker. It turned out really well. I surprised myself. Me and my boy C-Dog pulled of a traditional meal. Turkey, mashed taters, green bean casserole, dressing (from scratch beeatch), and a lot of booze. If I say so myself, it was pretty damn good.

C-dog and I went out last night to the Larimer Lounge to catch a couple of bands. I wore my Dopers Suck t-shirt out. That usually gets A LOT of funny looks and a few odd comments. Most people don't understand the meaning behind the shirt. A cycling brotha from Boulder started the theme. He doesn't know me, but I appreciate what he does within the community.

Back to the show. We saw Born Under the Flood and Munly & The Lee Lewis Harlots. Both very good bands seen at a lo lo price. I love the Larimer Lounge and haven't been there in about a year. It was a lot more smoky this time around, but that's a small price to pay. After C-dog and I were done with the music, we called the 7s and the 3s. Those are the local cabbies. They never showed up, and we ended up taking a hike about 10 blocks away. Let me tell you, it wasn't warm.

By the time we caught a cab, we had both decided it was time to hit the Denver Diner. As you can guess, it was time for a nice greasy breakfast. I had the Ranch Breakfast. I won't go into the details, but it was hell of a lot of food for a low price. The result of the late night breakfast was getting bed at 3:30 and waking up at 9:30. That's a late start on today's meal, but we pulled it off. We even managed to fit in a 3.5 mile jog. We also hit the trifecta. Liquor, wine, and beer. All good shit.

Thanksgiving is my absolute favorite holiday, so I would really like to send a word of appreciation out to my true friends, which, are my true family. I hope you all had a good one. I did. Too bad I have to go to work tomorrow, but if tradition holds true, it should be slow and we'll watch a little college pigskin.

I feel like I had a lot more to say, but I guess I'll leave it at that.

Racing

Can I just say that I love racing? I know that sounds stupid, but I really do. Even when I suck ass at the discipline I'm participating in. There is just something about feeling that pain. Wondering why you are putting yourself through said pain. Putting yourself through more pain to sprint it out for higher a mid-pack place. Then, you finish and you absolutely know why you do it. You can't explain it but you feel it.

Can you guess that I raced today?

I got an e-mail from my Dad today. A bunch of gibberish about Liberals vs. Conservatives. I believe in good arguments about the virtues of each side left or right, but this "joke" just pissed me off to be honest with you. I let my Dad know how I felt about his e-mail. He said he read it as a joke. I said I think the people that send it along believe it to an extent. I think I pissed him off.

Well, I ended up watching Dateline AGAIN last night. Somehow I get sucked into that on Friday nights when I have neither the physical nor the mental energy to do anything else but watch TV. I guess I end up on Dateline because I don't have cable, so I only have 4 channels to choose from.

It was, however, a pretty interesting show. It was about Mark Chapman. You know, the guy that gunned down John Lennon. There were people on there that were arguing that he wasn't really off his rocker. That he did it for attention. HELLOOOOOOO. If you do that kind of thing for fame, I think you are off your rocker.

I learned a lot about Mr. Chapman and a few things about Lennon, but this thing dragged on forever. Forever I say. 2 freaking hours, but my ass was too tired to pull myself off the couch. Now, I don't know if you have watched any of those "TV magazine" shows where they only have a story and don't have any video footage to show you, but shit, I saw the same fucking five pictures of Mark Chapman at least 20 times. Every possible angle, again 20 times, of The Dakota, which is the building in which John, Yoko, and Sean lived. Same pictures of Mark Chapman again. The cover of The Catcher In The Rye at least 20 times. I guess ol' Markie boy had more than one obsession. The obsession with The Catcher supposedly planted the murder idea in his head, and believe now I know what the cover looks like. There had to be at least 15 minutes of shots of the cover taking up the 120 minutes contributed to the show.

Enough ranting. Like I said, it was pretty good, but it could have been wrapped up in an hour.

I don't know if I have disclosed this before, but I'm a Bama fan. Yes, they got their asses handed to them. Yes, it was by Auburn. No, I didn't go to Alabama, but a lot of my family did. I was on my way there, but I guess I didn't have the right people (or anyone) guiding me along. You would think with a family full of Alabama fans there would have been a little encouragement for me to go to Tuscaloosa. Every once and a while, I have a regret or two about that, but I probably wouldn't be out here if I had gone there.

I need another beer.

It's almost time to start skate skiing. In fact, I bet the mountains got enough snow this past week for some of the nordic centers to start opening. We'll see how the upper body holds up this year since I decided to forgo the weight room this fall.

I was in Urban Outfitters a couple of weeks ago and stumbled across a nice stainless steel flask. I flip it over and it has a picture of Jesus. Under the picture it reads, "What Wouldn't Jesus Do?" It made me laugh out loud in the store for about 5 minutes, so obviously I had to waste $14 on it. I filled it up with a Macallan 12 (probably a 14 or 15 by now) today and took it to the races. Took it with me out to watch the races after mine, but never took a nip. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe on Thanksgiving. To be honest with you, I thought it said, "What Would Jesus Do?" That's what really made me laugh. That makes more sense to my sarcastic mind, but it still makes me laugh now.

I'm going to get that beer. Later aight.

This Guy Must Be A Terrorist

Maybe W can get ahold of him and teach him a thing or two about how we do things here in 'Mercia. Who is this commy liberal? He clearly knows nothing about our country.

"I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it." - Thomas Jefferson

TV melts the brain

How much time do I waste staring at the TV. I'm sitting here trying to think of something to contribute to the blog, but the boob tube has sucked out what little brain power I had.

I stumbled across this site the other day. It's called chattablogs.com. It's a free blog host for Chattanooga residents I think. Except, I stumbled across one where all the references were to Chicago locales. I went to school in Chattavegas, and I keep expecting to stumble across a blog of someone I know, but it seems to be mostly the musings of your typical southern religious folks. I seem some pictures of the town and miss it, but then I read some of the religious blogs and it makes me glad I don't have to deal with those people anymore. Some of the posts are really quite amusing.

It looks like Mr. Bush and the republicans are under the gun after yesterday's elections. Maybe that is a sign of things to come.

Speaking of religion and politics, there was a piece on Dateline a couple of weeks ago about how much political power the evangelical christians are wielding these days. It was a little disturbing to be honest with you. Why do these people insist on imposing there "moral values" on the rest of us? What happened to freedom of religion? Go read your history books people.

On to a lighter subject. I did another cross race this past weekend. Had a very tiny bit of go left at the end of the race. I usually just get passed during the entire thing, but I was actually passing people at the end of this one. That was nice for a change, but I still wasn't happy with the results. It's amazing how much fitness I lose in a short amount of time. Guys that I could keep up with in a mountain bike race make me look like I'm pedaling with one leg. Trust me, it's not as fast as this guy. Maybe it's all the booze I shove down my gullet for the months after my last mountain bike race.

Well, I'll try to hit it again this weekend. Maybe I'll do better if I don't drink a six pack the night before. The odds of either of those happening are pretty minimal.

That's it for tonight.

WINDY

WINDY as hell today. Doesn't make for a fun ride. Neither does the fact that I'm only good for about 2 hours right now. Pretty sad state of affaris.

I stumbled across this link at the Drunk Cyclist blog. Pretty good article about the war and media coverage.
http://nitpicker.blogspot.com/2005/10/soul-of-victor-davis-hanson.html
It's long, but some good stuff. Especially the E.B. White quote.

Excuse Me?

Ah, the sound of rain while lying in bed. A beautiful thing it is. Very relaxing, or if you have cyclocross race on the schedule the next day, very exciting.

I rolled out of bed at around 7:30. Much earlier that I had wanted due to the fact that my race wasn't until 1:20, but that's happens when you are a loser and go to bed at 9 on a Friday night. Anyway, I decided to get up and have my espresso. Pre-race caffeine buzzes are great. A plus is that they help other things get going too.

Since I had plenty of time to kill, I pop open the ol' laptop to do a little surfing. I don't know what universal force guided me over to the ACA website, but I'm glad it did. There is big bold letters was,"Due to last night weather conditions, today's (Nov 5th) . . . venue is unridable. The race has been postponed till Nov 27th- venue to be determined."

now I can't get this stupid bold shit off.

I sit there and stare at this interesting statement. I think to myself, "I thought it was fall and I thought this was a cross race." When you start talking mud, rain, snow, etc, most cyclocrossers get a big stiffie. While I don't consider myself a cross racer, I love those conditions. I don't necessarily like them when I have to get on my road bike or mountain bike, but for cross, it's a blast. Not rideable is ok because a typical cross race includes you getting of your bike, shouldering it, and running. A little more won't hurt.

It didn't rain that much last night, and it's been dry as hell around here for the last month. I would think the small amount of rain we got last night would get soaked right up. I e-mailed the race promoter a nice e-mail. I didn't criticize him, but asked for the reasoning. I'm guessing it was the property owner's call. They had the state championships out there last year, and it was a snowy muddy mess.

Oh well. In the words of Mr. Bertuzzi, "it is what is. It is what it is. It is what it is." However, I did skip BEER last night, and I'm angry about that.

In other news, I don't think I ever mentioned on this very popular blog that I was growing a mustache. I know I know. Mustaches are way too cool for a person of my lowly stature, but I was doing it for charity. I manage to raise a bit of money, but the best part was the inclusion of the 'stache in my Halloween costume. Rachel and I went as Officers Johnson and Dangle from Reno 911. Yes, I wore the short shorts. Yes, we had pictures taken. No, the weren't full body shots. Only from the waist up. One's mind doesn't conjure such brilliant ideas when you're pouring Everclear down your throat. The point being, maybe I'll have some pics up in the next day or so.