Archive for May, 2006

American Management Techniques

Wednesday, May 31st, 2006

Another beaut from the esteemed Cheesehead Todd whose Wisconsin Badgers are still looking for that elusive College Football Championship after 75 years.

Does this ring any bells?

A Japanese company (Toyota) and an American company
(General Motors) decided to have a canoe race on the Missouri River.
Both teams practiced long and hard to reach their peak performance before the race.

On the big day, the Japanese team won by a mile..

The Americans, very discouraged and depressed, decided to
investigate the reason for the crushing defeat.
A management team made up of senior management was
formed to investigate and recommend appropriate action.
Their conclusion was the Japanese team had 8 people
rowing and 1 person steering, while the American team had 8
people steering and 1 person rowing.

So American management hired a consulting company and paid them a large amount of
money for a second opinion.
They advised that too many people were steering the boat,
while not enough people were rowing. To prevent another loss
to the Japanese, the American’s rowing team’s
management structure was totally reorganized to 4 steering supervisors,
3 area steering superintendents and 1 assistant superintendent
steering manager. They also implemented a new performance
system that would give the 1 person rowing the boat
greater incentive to work harder.
It was called the “Rowing Team Quality First Program”, with meetings,
dinners and free pens for the rower.

There was discussion of getting new paddles,
canoes and other equipment, extra vacation days for
practices and bonuses.

The next year the Japanese won by two miles.

Humiliated, the American management laid off the
rower for poor performance, halted development of a new
canoe, sold the paddles, and canceled all capital investments for
new equipment. The money saved was distributed to the
Senior Executives as bonuses and the next year’s racing
team was outsourced to India!!!!

I know all about it. I lived it, learned it and growing to hate it.

Another futile attempt at a traffic inducer courtesy of OTB.

Reach the Beach Photos

Tuesday, May 30th, 2006

Unfortunately, we forgot to use the digital camera for this but it’s better than nothing. I’ve cropped these to eliminate the unnecessary background noise. But here’s one of me crossing the finish line triumphantly. rtb.finish.jpg
This one is from about halfway through the ride. I still had to climb those mountains you see in the background.
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This is a view from the road.

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OTB…OTB….OTB…..OTB!

Barlow Trail Century

Sunday, May 28th, 2006

The wife and I have signed up for the Barlow Trail Century  sponsored by RiverCity Bicyles on June 25th. Since the most miles my wife has ridden at one time is 35 miles we are going to do the 40 miler together. That’s right, TOGETHER!

I’ve also signed up for the Summit to Surf ride over the Cascade range past Mount Hood and down to Hood River on the Columbia. This is another sponsorship ride so if you want to sponsor me, send me an email to thekaostheory2005@gmail.com with “Summit to Surf” in the subject box and I’ll give you the particulars. This ride has about 4,475 feet of climb throughout the 54 miles so I’ll need your support big time.

Jonesing for a ride

Friday, May 26th, 2006

I finally pulled the trigger on getting a new drive train for the Merckx. The current version is vintage 1992 Campy put together by my brother. Well to say it’s worn out is an understatement and since I’m running a 53/38 with the shifters on the downtube, it’s about time to upgrade. I decide on the Campy Centaur Gruppo. I kept the Chorus cantilever brakes I already have and got some new wheels. A cool thing about the new gruppo is the compact crankset allowing for a wide range of gear ratios with only 2 main front sprockets. I think the guy said it gave me the range of a 50/29. That should help on the hills. The only bad thing is I won’t get it back until next friday, so I’m jonesing for a ride. Which brings me to what I was going to originall talk about. You see I haven’t ridden the Kona Mountain bike since last summer so I decide to take it down from the rack and give it a spin. Well what do you know, no air in the back tire. I pump it up and go off to do some errands for the wife. Lo and behold when I got back the damn thing was flat again. Somewhere in my garage there are two replacement tubes, at least they were there before my wife did a spring cleaning of said garage. I searched everywhere but couldn’t find them. No problem, I’ve got a patch kit. I’ll just patch the sucker up and be done with it. I filled the tube with air and a bucket with water. I methodically dunked and checked the entire tube but I couldn’t find the leak. Damn thing was mocking me big time. Now you can guess where I’m going at lunch?  Two extra tubes for the mountain bike and “Eddie”.

Tour of California

Wednesday, May 24th, 2006

I was going through my email trying to delete some of the old stuff when I came across a couple of pics my brother shot while watching the Tour of California. These were shot across from Point Lobos where my friend Matt is a Park Ranger. Thanks Bro!
Here’s George Hincapie. **Update** My bro emailed me and reminded me to point out Levi is the second rider behind Georgie.
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And here’s Floyd Landis(in gold jersey on the right side of the pic)
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My only and last American Idol post

Wednesday, May 24th, 2006

Who wrote those god awful last songs for them? If these are the songs they think Kat and Taylor should be singing, I feel sorry for the winner. The powers that be should have let them sing songs that they WANT to sing not some contrived “Dream” song. UGH!

Reach the Beach Ride Stats

Monday, May 22nd, 2006

Well the day finally came to ride the fund raiser for the American Lung Association, Reach The Beach 2006. I decide to ride the 55 mile route from Amity to the finish line at Cape Kiwanda/Pacific City. Once again I had trouble sleeping before the ride, not that the ride was overly difficult, I just get too damn excited. So I awoke at 4:30, showered and gathered all my gear together. When I say all my gear, I mean EVERYTHING. A few rides back I forgot my rain jacket and of course it rained and I was miserable. If it snowed, I was prepared. I rallied the family together, wife, daughter and the 2 dogs and loaded them all into the SUV and headed off south to the starting line. The reason everybody was coming on this trip was because we were planning on staying a couple of days at the beach after the ride. That’s another post entirely.

The weather report indicated rain showers in the morning and a high around 60. One thing I’ve learned about the weather prognosticators in this area is they don’t know their ass from a teacup when it comes to forcasting. Before we left I checked the radar map at weather.com and saw that most of the precipitation had already moved east. We left at 7:30am and made good time. Parked at the drop off zone, unloaded the bike and dressed. The weather was perfect, some high clouds but no rain and no wind. I got my bib, kissed the wife and kid, petted the dogs and I was off. This ride didn’t use Dan Henry markers painted on the road but yellow arrows attached to trees and stop signs or anything they could find. Luck for me I hooked up with 3 other riders right at the beginning who kept the same tempo as I did. I have to say that was the best riding if done in a rally yet. Each of us would take a turn at the front for awhile and then peel off and take a spot at the back. We were hauling ass, passing people like they were standing still. All of this without killing ourselves. We worked like that for the whole first leg the the town of Sheridan. We averaged over 17 mph for the first 15 miles. For me this was a good sign because as always my goal is to average at least 15 mph for the race and there were the coastal range to climb before the day was done. I was ahead of the game. I ate some grub and talked to my wife who was waiting with the entourage at the rest stop. At this point I lost all three of my riding buddies, they had either left in a hurry, ran off to the john or something else. Slightly bummed, I set off solo. I knew this next section had a few more hills but I had good legs and attitude. I passed many riders(this was a first) and had not been passed since about the first mile. I used other riders in front of me like a carrot on a stick. I’d see them up in front of me and dug down to try to catch them. This was cool, I kept passing these riders who had left several minutes in front of me. About 5 miles from the next stop I caught and passed one of the original three riders. I was expecting and hoping he’d latch on to my wheel so we could team up the rest of the way but my pace was too much for him(I don’t get to say that very much). I cruised to the stop still keeping my overall average at 16.1.

The next section of the route was going to be the most difficult based on the profile. It was uphill over the coastal range for about 15 miles. It wasn’t super steep but it was up, with false flats and some minor downhills. Compared to some of the other rides like the Daffodil Classic, my legs were in much better shape, couple this with the fact that I hadn’t changed out of my 53 for the whole ride, I felt real good. Most road bike now adays are geared like mountain bikes with 27 speeds. Well, I have 18 and it shows on the hills. This is where I was starting to get passed. At one point I looked back to see if there was anybody gaining on me and i couldn’t see a soul. Next thing I know a group of 4 riders ripped past me like I was standing still. Any kind of Mojo I had went by the wayside. I plodded along trying to keep my speed up knowing that at some point the road would point down. This is where I met a guy named Darren. All of a sudden this voice comes from behind me and says “I think I’ll just sit behind you for awhile”. At first this kind of pissed me off. I’m struggling up the hill and this guy wants to ride MY wheel? He rode behind me and finally passed me and started to leave me but turned and said “no problem, I’ll lower the pace”. That was cool. I give him a lot of respect for that. He slowed and I picked up the pace so I could get on his wheel. He pulled me up a good portion of the hills. Very cool. We rode together for 7 or 8 miles talikng about different rides we’ve done and things like that. We even pulled over to help a girl who had problems pumping up her newly fied flat. Darren got out his 9 dollar pump and finished it off for her. His karma points went over the maximum for that gesture alone.

Finally we started on downhill portion to the coast and I knew the rest was mostly flat except for one hill. This hill was so steep ther were cyclist littered all up and down it in various forms of pushing theirs bikes. This is where Darren and I parted ways, I knew I couldn’t keep his pace up ths hill so I bode him farewell and put the Eddie in the granny gear and ground out the mile or so. Once at the top I felt a great sense of relief, the hardest part was behind me so I thought. After you crest the range and get closer to the beach, the wind changes significantly. It becomes a steady on-shore headwind that would slow you down so much on the downhills you’d have to peddle like you were on the flats. The last ten miles were like that. Then the evil signs began to appear. “10 miles to go, you can do it” or something like that. “9 miles to go, heart, mind and soul” Arrrrrgh, they were pissing me off. They made each mile seem like they were taking FOREVER. At this point my legs were tiring and didn’t need this pseudo self help BS at every mile. Finally I crossed highway 101 and I knew I was almost done. I knew my legs were. I’d gone out real fast for the first 2 and 1/2 legs and now my legs were feeling it. At this point I really couldn’t care what my average speed was, I just wanted to get to the finish line. The road just seemd to keep going and going, I couldn’t see the end. Just like that, I emerged from behind some beach houses to see a whole group of people clapping and cheering on my efforts. This made the last few miles melt away in my mind and I was full of piss and vinegar again. I crossed the finish line with my arms extended high in the sky like I’d won a stage on one of the grand tours. I spotted my family grinning and clapping my arrival, all was good again.

Ride stats: 55 miles in 3 hour 45 minutes, averaging 14.6 mph. Pics to follow.

Trojan Implosion

Monday, May 22nd, 2006

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Here’s are some clips of the Trojan Nuclear plant cooling tower being demo’d. This thing was just up the road from my house and I always used it as a milepost on how close I was home on trips down from Seattle. Click the image and go down to “Watch this story”. Enjoy!

**Conspiracy Wingnut Update**

After watching the video over and over while drinking triple shots of espresso, chain smoking unfilterd Camel lights, making sure my tinfoil hat is tuned to juuuustt the right frequency, I could swear that looked just like how the WTC went down. I mean it soooo obvious, you know, except for the 2 airplanes going 400 mph full of kerosene smashing directly into it on live television for billions to see thingy
Please visit Outside the Beltway, it’s for your own good! Go Already!

Photo Gallery Updated

Monday, May 22nd, 2006

Just got back from the coast this morning and I’ve added some new photos to the gallery.  I’ll have some more when I get the disposible camera back from the developer. The reason we were at the coast is because this weekend was the Reach The Beach ride.  We decide to stay an extra day and chill out.  I’ll have a complete recap when I can get my thoughts together in the mean time check out the gallery.

Bollywood Movie

Thursday, May 18th, 2006

I’ve created my first Bollywood movies. If you dare, you can view them here or here.

I couldn’t help myself so I did another and another(only Brian “I’m a fighter, Man!” will get this).

I………can’t………..stop………please……….help…….

Who said this?

Tuesday, May 16th, 2006

“When a rattlesnake is poised to strike you, do not wait until he has struck before you crush him”. Don’t cheat and google it, take a guess and leave your response in the comments. I’ll provide the answer soon.

Thanks to Outside the Beltway for the round up!

**Update**

Well it appears nobody got the answer correct. Only because nobody tried.  The author of said utterance is none other than that chickenhawk neocon bloodthirsty warmonger for oil….Franklin Delano Roosevelt. If you want to get a feel for what he would have gone through if the MSM of today were covering him read Victor Davis Hanson’s wicked spoof.

Send a Brick!

Monday, May 15th, 2006

My brother “The Shah” sent me the link for this. I think it’s a great idea. Click here to see what you need to do to send a brick and click here to see what some people have done and what they’re going through. SPEAK TRUTH TO POWER!. LOL.  Build it already!

Caption This!

Saturday, May 13th, 2006

I’ve decide to get into the caption contest nonsense, I thought it could be fun. So here’s the first of hopefully many.r1136642950.jpg

One for the Outside the Beltway Caption Jam.

Siskel and Ebert Unhinged

Saturday, May 13th, 2006

I remember when I was younger watching these guys give their takes on the movies of the day. What I didn’t realize is how much these guys seemed to dislike each other. It’s palpable. If Siskel hadn’t died of cancer, I believe Ebert would have killed him eventually. Watch them duke it out here.

h/t Ann Althouse

Update**

According to Siskel(Jew) and Ebert(Catholic) it’s those pesky Protestants that are the problem. “Never got on their knees unless it was to change the channel on the TV.” WOW.

Backyardigans

Friday, May 12th, 2006

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New Banner(s)

Friday, May 12th, 2006

I’ve been monkeying around with Photoshop to create new banners for the Blog. What do you think? I’ve heard of plug ins you can use make your banners change each time you visit or hit reload. I’ll need to do some more googling to find the code. Unless any one of the three regular visitors has any ideas?

Update**

I found a plugin that allows for random banners to be displayed. So if you hit reload you will see them. There six of them I create with photoshop. I can tell you it’s easier to modify WordPress than Blogger eventhough I don’t know much about php. Which one do you think is the best and maybe I’ll keep jus that one.

Kill 2 Birds with One Stone

Thursday, May 11th, 2006
Another email from Brian  "I'm a Fighter, Man!". His solution to both the immigration
and gas problem plagueing the world.
My mailbox is being flooded with e-mails concerning gas prices and illegal
immigrants. To boycott oil companies or not; to provide amnesty to illegal
immigrants or not, etc.

Since I have become jaded to the various solutions proposed by the
Republicans, Democrats, Sierra Club, ACLU, etc. I have elected to solve the
problems as they affect me. It solves both my gas and illegal immigrant
problems.

I have hired illegal immigrants to push my car.  They're plentiful and
cheaper than buying gas.

How to Destroy America

Thursday, May 11th, 2006

My friend Brian “I’m a Fighter, Man” sent this to me. I was a little skeptical of the veracity of the email so I did some googling and found this at Snopes. Apparently it is a true story. It still pisses me off because I see it happening bit by bit everyday. As they say, read the whole thing. I tried to cut and paste it from my email by the formatting was all screwed up so I borrowed it from the Snopes site.

We all know Dick Lamm as the former Governor of Colorado. In that context his thoughts are particularly poignant. Last week there was an immigration-overpopulation conference in Washington, DC, filled to capacity by many of American’s finest minds and leaders. A brilliant college professor named Victor Hansen Davis talked about his latest book, “Mexifornia,” explaining how immigration — both legal and illegal — was destroying the entire state of California. He said it would march across the country until it destroyed all vestiges of The American Dream.

Moments later, former Colorado Governor Richard D. Lamm stood up and gave a stunning speech on how to destroy America. The audience sat spellbound as he described eight methods for the destruction of the United States. He said, “If you believe that America is too smug, too self-satisfied, too rich, then let’s destroy America. It is not that hard to do. No nation in history has survived the ravages of time. Arnold Toynbee observed that all great civilizations rise and fall and that ‘An autopsy of history would show that all great nations commit suicide.’”

“Here is how they do it,” Lamm said: First to destroy America, “Turn America into a bilingual or multi-lingual and bicultural country. History shows that no nation can survive the tension, conflict, and antagonism of two or more competing languages and cultures. It is a blessing for an individual to be bilingual; however, it is a curse for a society to be bilingual. The historical scholar Seymour Lipset put it this way: ‘The histories of bilingual and bi-cultural societies that do not assimilate are histories of turmoil, tension, and tragedy. Canada, Belgium, Malaysia, Lebanon all face crises of national existence in which minorities press for autonomy, if not independence. Pakistan and Cyprus have divided. Nigeria suppressed an ethnic rebellion. France faces difficulties with Basques, Bretons, and Corsicans.”

Lamm went on: Second, to destroy America, “Invent ‘multiculturalism’ and encourage immigrants to maintain their culture. I would make it an article of belief that all cultures are equal. That there are no cultural differences. I would make it an article of faith that the Black and Hispanic dropout rates are due to prejudice and discrimination by the majority. Every other explanation is out of bounds.

Third, “We could make the United States a ‘Hispanic Quebec’ without much effort. The key is to celebrate diversity rather than unity. As Benjamin Schwarz said in the Atlantic Monthly recently: ‘The apparent success of our own multiethnic and multicultural experiment might have been achieved! Not by tolerance but by hegemony. Without the dominance that once dictated ethnocentrically and what it meant to be an American, we are left with only tolerance and pluralism to hold us together.’”

Lamm said, “I would encourage all immigrants to keep their own language and culture. I would replace the melting pot metaphor with the salad bowl metaphor. It is important to ensure that we have various cultural subgroups living in America reinforcing their differences rather than as Americans, emphasizing their similarities.”

“Fourth, I would make our fastest growing demographic group the least educated. I would add a second underclass, unassimilated, undereducated, and antagonistic to our population. I would have this second underclass have a 50% dropout rate from high school.”

“My fifth point for destroying America would be to get big foundations and business to give these efforts lots of money. I would invest in ethnic identity, and I would establish the cult of ‘Victimology.’ I would get all minorities to think their lack of success was the fault of the majority. I would start a grievance industry blaming all minority failure on the majority population.”

“My sixth plan for America’s downfall would include dual citizenship and promote divided loyalties. I would celebrate diversity over unity. I would stress differences rather than similarities. Diverse people worldwide are mostly engaged in hating each other – that is, when they are not killing each other. A diverse, peaceful, or stable society is against most historical precedent. People undervalue the unity! Unity is what it takes to keep a nation together. Look at the ancient Greeks. The Greeks believed that they belonged to the same race; they possessed a common language and literature; and they worshiped the same gods. All Greece took part in the Olympic Games.

A common enemy Persia threatened their liberty. Yet all these bonds were not strong enough to over come two factors: local patriotism and geographical conditions that nurtured political divisions. Greece fell.

“E. Pluribus Unum” — From many, one. In that historical reality, if we put the emphasis on the ‘pluribus’ instead of the ‘Unum,’ we can balkanize America as surely as Kosovo.”

“Next to last, I would place all subjects off limits ~ make it taboo to talk about anything against the cult of ‘diversity.’ I would find a word similar to ‘heretic’ in the 16th century – that stopped discussion and paralyzed thinking. Words like ‘racist’ or ‘x! xenophobes’ halt discussion and debate.”

“Having made America a bilingual/bicultural country, having established multi-culturism, having the large foundations fund the doctrine of ‘Victimology,’ I would next make it impossible to enforce our immigration laws. I would develop a mantra: That because immigration has been good for America, it must always be good. I would make every individual immigrant symmetric and ignore the cumulative impact of millions of them.”

In the last minute of his speech, Governor Lamm wiped his brow. Profound silence followed. Finally he said, “Lastly, I would censor Victor Hanson Davis’s book Mexifornia. His book is dangerous. It exposes the plan to destroy America. If you feel America deserves to be destroyed, don’t read that book.”

There was no applause.

A chilling fear quietly rose like an ominous cloud above every attendee at the conference. Every American in that room knew that everything Lamm enumerated was proceeding methodically, quietly, darkly, yet pervasively across the United States today. Every discussion is being suppressed. Over 100 languages are ripping the foundation of our educational system and national cohesiveness. Barbaric cultures that practice female genital mutilation are growing as we celebrate ‘diversity.’ American jobs are vanishing into the Third World as corporations create a Third World in America — take note of California and other states — to date, ten million illegal aliens and growing fast. It is reminiscent of George Orwell’s book “1984.” In that story, three slogans are engraved in the Ministry of Truth building: “War is peace,” “Freedom is slavery,” and “Ignorance is strength.”

Governor Lamm walked back to his seat. It dawned on everyone at the conference that our nation and the future of this great democracy are deeply in trouble and worsening fast. If we don’t get this immigration monster stopped within three years, it will rage like a California wildfire and destroy everything in its path, especially The American Dream.

Welcome those from Outside the Beltway, peek around you just might find something you like.

Face

Wednesday, May 10th, 2006

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How much is your Blog worth?

Wednesday, May 10th, 2006

Compared to before, it’s a marked improvement. It comes out to about 5 bucks a post. At this rate, I’ll never be able to retire.


My blog is worth $564.54.


How much is your blog worth?

Blogroll

Tuesday, May 9th, 2006

It was alot harder than I thought but I had to manually enter all my links because I 1) couldn’t figure out how to do it and 2) I couldn’t find out where anybody else did either.

Moved to WordPress

Tuesday, May 9th, 2006

I was having nothing but trouble with my Blogger account. Basically I was unable to post anything and their customer service is nothing but a computer generated email which just pissed me off more and more. So I was looking through my hosting services pages and I found that they had WordPress already as an option. So after many attempts I finally imported all my posts from blogger to this new site.

Union Station

Saturday, May 6th, 2006


Cinco de Mayo

Friday, May 5th, 2006

I vow never to celebrate this trully American Holiday any longer. I have nothing against Mexicans in general, it just the ones flaunting the law. Go through the legal channels like millions of others have over the last 225+ years. But walking around waving your flag, advocating the Reconquista and saying you were here first does not endear your cause to my heart. In fact I get the exact opposite feeling. If a backlash happens, don’t come running to me for help amigo, it ain’t gonna happen. I think we should have a day similar to the boycott that happend on May 1st. On this day, if you can’t provide proof of citizenship/birth certificate at an emergency room, tough shit sherlock. If you’re due to recieve some sort of government handout and you can’t provide proof of citizenship/birth certificate , tough shit sherlock. If you’re incacerated in one of the many fine prisons where you get 4 squares, a bed, cable tv and you can’t provide proof of citizenship/birth certificate, tough shit sherlock. We’ll send you down to Maricopa County and have Joe make sure everything is all right on the chain gang. Hell, we should just make this a whole month.

This rant provide by me, whose father jumped through hoops for 15 years to get his citizenship the right way. All I can say to you is, Cinco de Fuck You! I think I’m gonna get some T-shirts made with CFY on them with little tiny type underneath expalining what it means.

Hello to all from Outside the Beltway!

Cake Or Death?: A Train Wreck…. With A Melody That Haunts You

Thursday, May 4th, 2006

Go here and watch, Cake Or Death?: A Train Wreck…. With A Melody That Haunts You

There are two reactions you will get from watching this. One, you can’t stop watching it and humming the damn tune. Two, you get the distinct urge to scratch you eyes out with ground glass. You decide. Don’t forget, I warned you.

h/t It comes in pints.
Thanks for visiting from Outside the Beltway!

Caught in the Act

Wednesday, May 3rd, 2006

Since I’m a site meter junkie, I’m always checking to see where people are coming from and what their looking for. Well, looks like I caught somebody at the LA Unified School District using a MSN search for “celebrities wardrobe malfucntion” and they happened to stop at the ol’ Kaostheory for a peak of somebody’s naughty parts. Which of course there are none to be found. I know it could be some student in the library fooling around but my bet is on one of the “Social Science” teachers doing some class research.

Monster Cookie Metric Century Redux

Monday, May 1st, 2006

Another weekend and another great ride, the Monster Cookie Metric Century, put on by the Salem Bicycle Club. Salem is 45 miles from our humble abode and to be able to get there for an early start I wanted to leave the house no later than 7:30am. Of course I was awake at 4:30 giving me plenty of time to get ready. Unfortunately, we had to wait for the babysitters. They(2 teenagers from the neighborhood) didn’t get to the house until after my scheduled departure time but my wife made up the time on the road. The weather was cool and partly cloudy but was expected to warm up to 65 degrees, so I decide on shorts instead of long-johns for the ride. This was my sixth rally I’ve participated in but it was my wife’s first. She was clearly nervous about the ride because should had never been on the bike for more than 15 miles at one time. It appeared to me the topo map intimidated her. I reassured her that the ride was mostly flat and she would do just fine. We got to the start line around 8:30am, signed in and got our ride packet. While waiting in the queue for the bathroom I struck a conversation with the gent in front of me. I asked him if he’d done this ride before and he indicated he had. This gave me an opportunity to once agin placate the demons tormenting my wife. I tried to get info from him about the ride profile and to my relief he exclaimed “it’s basically flat, the only difficulty came from a headwind on the return trip of the loop. My wife was definitely a happier camper. We’ll we started off from the front steps of the Capitol building and preceded through the city streets out of town and into the country. I kept the pace down to allow for her to become more familiar with riding amongst others. She was doing quite well for a nubie. At first she thought she’d be able to finish the entire 62 miles but after about 12 miles she indicated she was getting winded. At that point we decide that she could take the return route after the first rest stop and she agreed. With an average speed while riding with my wife at 12 mph, I was getting a little anxious to get going. At this rate I’d be in the saddle all day, something I didn’t want to do. So she gave me the go ahead to ride at my own pace and we’d meet up at the rest stop.

This rally is quite popular here in Oregon attracting about 1500 riders of all abilities including a subset of cyclist I call the “Groupies”. Groupies are identified by their attitude and attire. Their attitude is smug and elitist. I don’t know if it is because they all where the same team jerseys representing the cycling club they belong to or what but something about them pisses me off. My goal as always is to average at least 15 mph for the duration but at the beginning I felt there would be no way I’d be able to accomplish this. Remember the guy I was talking to? Remember the headwind was supposed to get you on the return trip? Well he was wrong, the head wind was in my face. I knew the only way I could make the goal was to latch on the back of a group and let them drag me around. Riding into a headwind by yourself is not a good thing. I was getting frustrated because I would latch on to 3 or four riders and get on their tails and try to keep their tempo only to be dropped after a few miles. Then I’d catch up to another group and do the same thing only to find their pace was too slow. This seemed to happen over and over. Finally, I found somebody riding the same tempo as me, Russell and Rebecca. They were very nice and talkative which is something the “Groupies” fail at miserably. As we were riding, off in the distance you could hear the dragsters at the Woodburn dragstrip. I piped up and said “Cool dragsters”. This set Russell off. Best I could tell was he was a big motorhead. He talked on and on about his trip to see the Long Beach Grand Prix and his day trip to see the open wheel guys at Portland International Raceway for testing. Evidently while we were talking we had inadvertently dropped Rebecca so Russell pulled over to wait and I wave bye-bye and kept on going. As I got closer to Champoeg(pronounced shampoo-ee) where the halfway point was the headwind abated so I could ride at my own pace without the aid of others. I took a 10 minute rest, ate some food at the park and headed back. Once I got back on the road, the headwind had changed direction. Once again it was in my face.

My legs felt good but for some reason I didn’t feel comfortable in the saddle. I couldn’t find a happy medium. I think some of this had to do with me tinkering with my seat recently to relieve a problem I had with the little general wanting to take a nap during my rides. Any ideas out there? On the return trip I came across a 2 riders going just the speed for me. Next thing I know we’re going 19 mph with no problems at all. We keep this pace up for several miles before I tired a bit and pulled down the tempo and was dropped. For the rest of the ride I was basically solo. Overall, I was quite surprised at my final average time, exactly 15 mph over 62.2 miles in 3:58 minutes. I remember and email exchange I had with Dr. KBJ last summer stating that riding on mostly flat roads can be just as hard as riding some hill and rollers. I wholeheartedly agree. When riding hills you at least get the chance to recooperate on the down hils but on flats there is no such luxury. BTW, the wife, in her first rally managed 34.8 miles averging 12.7 mph. Awesome stuff girl! The only downside was while waiting for me in the car, the wife killed the battery, this amounted to an extra few bucks for the babysitters. Oh well. All and all a good day. Another aside, this was my first metric century, a full two months before I thought I’d try one. Next on the agenda is the Reach the Beach on May 20th, but I suspect I’ll sneak another rally in before then.

Ironic, Isn’t it?

Monday, May 1st, 2006

Today is the one year anniversary of being “Reduced in Force” by my former employer. After which I enjoyed 6 months off to retool, retrain and recharge for the next step in my career. Back in November 2005 I was offered a contract position at the same company, I accepted it and have been working there ever since. Well the irony is dripping like butter off a giant stack of flap jacks because the same company offered me a full time spot effective today. This means I still get to keep all my seniority, vacation accruals and vestedness(?) as if I had never been reduced.