The Second Half

Just say no to sex with pro-lifers…

One of the greatest bumper stickers I have ever seen. It’s on a beater truck down the street and I would imagine that the guy has endured everything short of a car bombing for displaying that sticker and his other one “Aren’t 6 billion miracles enough already?”

I love my neighborhood because it’s the furthest thing from a homeowner’s association you can find. Trashed out rentals, overbuilt white-collar homes, yard sales that go on for weeks, and even one guy who sells tacos and fry bread every weekend – and gets away with it with no permit because he has one card table with three old wife beater shirts and a clock radio for sale as part of a ‘garage sale’. There are dogs barking all the time, including ours, and for Lyza – a crapload of kids her age to rule the streets with.

We’ve got Obama signs, a few McCain signs, as well as plenty of signs that mock both.

Last weekend brought out three fun bike rides, one in which had D and I were duking it out up Snowbowl road. That little bulldog won’t quit and since I won’t either we beat the crap out of each other for 39 minutes and 30 seconds over the 10K climb. She’s determined to beat me up that climb and the truth be told I was riding scared the whole time with her breathing down my back anywhere from 10-50 yards back the whole way. I have a hard time racing uber-efficient road riders because they capitalize on any of my cement-head MTB brained mistakes. I have to really concentrate and push hard to stay ahead of her. Sunday brought out some free riding, as I went looking for all of the nasty ledge drops and steep slopes I could find. One particularly nasty drop called Lost Burrito put a puncture in my sidewall that ended the life of a new tire with only 30 miles on it. That cost me $1.17 per mile – f*ck. I also used an entire Big Air Co2 cartridge to get home, but damn those things are great in place of a pump. At least I didn’t puncture anything like a lung, so I have that going for me, which is nice.

Palin speaks tonight. I’m excited to hear her spew forth about faith, guns, abortion, war, offshore drilling in the refuge, and morals. It’ll make or break the convention – oh and why the hell are they meeting in MPLS? Why not just meet in Madison, WI and have 1,456,987 protestors there? Who selected the convention site? Fer crissakes, at least use your home field advantage and choose Arizona .