Probably until I feel like designing another website.

In the meantime, check out my latest website for The Wahine Project. A great group sharing the stoke with at risk girls. Awesome stuff.

Okay, totally corny, but the first time I saw the ocean, I cried.

And I don’t cry.

I was about 11 years old. We had just moved to Seaside from Munich. For whatever strange reason, we landed in NYC and drove across the country. I don’t remember much from the back seat of that Dodge Polara. Just a bunch of cornfields and nothingness and Holiday Inns.

But I do remember very clearly the first time we drove down Highway 1 and the Pacific Ocean came into view.

I remember it was sparkly. And it stretched to forever. And it was the most magnificent thing I had ever seen. And when I realized that I was going to be living near it, I was so overwhelmed that I started to cry.

To this day I have no idea where those feelings came from. I don’t believe in past lives or anything, but something inside my little 11 year old soul felt like it was coming home.

~

I have been following Fat Cyclist’s blog for several years now. He has an honest, refreshing, self deprecating and joyful way of writing about his passion for mountain biking that make his blog a fun read.

Almost two year’s ago, his wife’s breast cancer came back.

Elden continued to write, but more and more often, the stories were about his wife’s fight. They were written with the same easy style and candor, except this time the words were not for the love for his bike, but the love for his wife and the concern for his children.

And we knew when he was overwhelmed, frustrated, relieved, and angry.

I screamed “fuck cancer!” with him.

I cried.

I donated.

Somehow, across the country, I and many more like me were touched by Elden’s passion.

Yesterday night, Susan died.

Yesterday night, I giggled like a 6 year old down some sweet illegal singletrack.

Win, Susan.

Come on! It does not get any cuter than this! Seriously.

Filmed just a few hundred feet offshore from Cowell’s Beach in Santa Cruz. These guys were mating and could have cared less about anything else….

When Jens Voigt crashed in yesterday’s tour stage, there was a collective gasp heard on the twittering and facebooking streams. OH NO Jens Crashed!!! No, not JENS!!

When I visited the Davis stop of the Tour of California this winter, I saw a big crowd of people over by what I thought was the Rock Racing bus. So, I wandered over to see what all the fuss was about. Well, the fuss was not about Rock Racing at all, it was for the Saxo Bank bus. Ahh, so the fuss is about the current world champ, Fabian Cancellara (Fabian wants to kiss me too by the way). But no. It was when Jens Voigt walked out and the crowd went wild (I only went a little wild, screaming something ridiculous in German to him) that I realized who the real rock star was.

And it struck me. Here in the US, where cycling is a niche sport and Lance fans are the norm, there was a crowd of fans standing in the rain outside a nondescript bus waiting for a German rider who doesn’t win the big tours.

So what was the allure? Why do we love Jens?

He’s a tough guy and lots of us fans love the tough guy. Like we used to love Johan Museeuw before he made his drug use more obvious than his hair plugs. But its something more than just being the tough guy.

Its that something inside him that makes him go hard in the front just because he can. That makes him attack just because it feels good. To make every single person in the peloton wince in pain, and then smile and giggle after the race.

I think we all just get the feeling that win, lose, job, doping scandals, television and popularity aside, he finds great joy in simply racing his bike.

Mwah!

There is that moment when deer-eyed confusion gives way to narrow-eyed understanding.

And that moment is almost overwhelming in its ability to shatter everything you thought you knew while simultaneously answering all your questions.

But if you hang on tight to who you are, there is peace on the other side.

I had a race report written up.

My intention was to write something inspirational, because I really was inspired.  However, I don’t write that stuff so well. It came off all schlocky, self involved, and whiny. And I deleted it. Suffice it to know that the XTerra was one of the hardest races for me to finish, even though it was only 2 hours and some change.  And the fact that I drove up there and did it and finished, makes me feel pretty damn pleased with myself. We’ll just leave that at that for now.

So, I must revert to what I know how to write about. Men racing bicycles.

What the hell is going on at the tour right now? I love it. The women are in Italy , facing long transfers, cramped hotels and racing in your face aggressively, and the men are twittering around the roads of France in Rock Star buses racing passive agressively.

To start it off, Lance is late for the start because he is pal-ing around with movie stars. I’m sure the French love a snub like that. Especially dressed like this.

Then, High Road gets their panties in a bunch because no one will help out the strongest sprint team. And instead of taking their namesake, they give a screw you to the peloton and spit out all of the GC contenders except for Lance.

And with his teammate and team leader, Contador, caught in the group behind, what does Lance do? He motions for the two teammates who did make the split with him, to get to the front and drill it. Oh, hell yeah. This is going to be a good tour.

And who decided to dress Thor in white?

I go here

http://www.swobo.com/htatbl/

And read stuff and giggle at things that I may not admit in public to giggling to.

And then I steal something for my own blog.

Another from the crackberry taken this spring and i am finally getting around to posting it.

This one is my backdrop on the phone. It makes me happy. It also makes me happy to be posting photos again.

Might even revive the old blog and fire up the printer.

I mean, I am feeling a little frisky…

I said earlier that you can tell I am getting fit, by the sorry condition of my house and car.

I guess I can add the state of my blog to that as well.

It sure is getting harder to juggle everything. When I really focus on work, exercise suffers, when I stop exercising, the house is better, but I am unhappy. Well, whatchya gonna do?

And it doesn’t help that I have added two more sports to my life. I currently have 4 backpacks rolling around in my car: cycling clothes, swim thiingies, gym clothes and camera stuff. Needless to say, my car looks like crap and the chaos freaks me out sometimes.

But I rode in the sun today, and will bust a lung in swimming tonight and maybe take another 5 seconds off my 100 time. I am stretching enough that I can finally touch my toes. I am up to 20 pushups and can probably crack walnuts with my abs.

So there.