Monday, September 29, 2008

Bailout fails

Looks like McCain's bid to save the day has failed miserably. The bailout failed to pass in the house 228-205. The stock market has taken a MAJOR nosedive.

Two thirds of the Republican's voted "no" but they have the balls to say it was Pelosi's fault because of a speech she gave! Do they honestly expect people to believe the BS that they routinely spew?

Part of me is glad it failed and part of me is terrified about the consequences that may result. The Dow dropped a stunning 778 points. The largest drop in history.

Fasten your seatbelts folks-we are in for a bumpy ride.

Weekend wrap up



Do I have a bad case of the Mondays? Not any more than usual. We had a weekend filled with fun things like eye surgery, vicoden, dog urine, a Presidential debate, and the Vikes and Twins losing. Yippeee!!

The wife had Lasik surgery a while back. On Friday she had an adjustment to fine tune one of her eyes. I am not sure what is technically involved with this "tweak", but the idea of having one's eyeball sliced open and "adjusted" is enough to send a little chill down my spine. And to think this is the third time she has gone through this-the initial Lasik, then having each eye adjusted. I don't think I could handle that. Especially the aftermath-A few days of stabbing pain in your eye! What a hoot! Fortunately she got a scrip for Vicoden which is extra effective on her. She slept a lot this weekend. If it was me, I would want to sleep the ENTIRE weekend-wake me up when the pain is gone.




Watched the debate on Friday night (surprise). Some thoughts:

Obama held his own on the night's topic (foreign policy) but I don't think he "won". But here is the thing, he didn't need to win this one. He just needed to be standing relatively unscathed at the end of this round, which he did. When the next debates hit on domestic policy Obama will wipe the floor with McCain.

McCain came across as a condescending dick.

I hope this is the last debate that Jim Lehrer moderates. He let McCain interupt Obama more than once and never gave Obama any kind of "make up" time for the interruption.

Where was McCain's flag pin?

Biden and Palin on Thursday. THAT should be entertaining

I went biking at Theodore Wirth for the first time since I crashed about six weeks ago. Took it nice and slow. It is a little disturbing to me how the crash has really robbed me of a lot of confidence on the bike. The second lap was a bit better, but still much slower than my normal lap time. Maybe next time I will push it a little

I found the spot where I crashed and located the branch that reached out and grabbed my handlebar. I think that branch was in "Evil Dead" I swear it moved!

On Sunday I watched the suck ass Vikings game. What a mess!!!! The Vikings did everything in their power to lose that game and the succeeded. One thing, the Titans got a flag for roughing the passer. Gus Frerotte was rolling around on the ground in obvious pain. The replays showed why. I hope I never have to witness another helmet to nuts tackle again. It hurts just thinking about it.

Went for a short ride around the neighborhood after the game. I spent a lot of time going in circles practicing dropping off of a ledge. The people in the park must of thought I was a bit off. During the ride I paused to take a pic of a slightly beat up, but very cool Mustang Mach I.





Well, that about wraps up this post-bored yet?

Thursday, September 25, 2008

Random thoughts and observations

All right, its been a while since I posted anything so here we go...

The pup is exhausting. I forgot what a handful a 13lb furball can be. I forgot about the super sharp puppy teeth. Thank god we have Coda to help wear Surly out. They play pretty much constantly from 7ish to 10ish. Tired dogs are good dogs.

The Star Tribune has a nice article on local bike parts powerhouse QBP. Home of Surly and Salsa-so you know they are cool

Fortuitous timing: Last night the wife and I had just finished watching a bad movie so I decided to check the score of the Twins game. I tuned in to see Joe Nathan pitching in the 9th. Twinks up 3-2 with two outs. Always nice to stumble upon the most exciting part of a game. The crowd was on their feet screaming as the Twins tried to take another step in snatching first place away from division rival White Sox. Nathan got the save. Tonight's game decides who is in first.

Politics, politics....

McCain is losing it. The results of rampant deregulation, a Republican linchpin, have come home to roost. McCain went from saying the fundamentals of our economy are strong to suspending his campaign to rush in and save the day from this crisis. Make no mistake, this is nothing but a cynical stunt by a man sinking steadily in the polls. As the results of policies he champions become painfully clear to the American public, his poll numbers have began to nosedive. The man who has missed almost EVERY vote this year is going to rush in and save the day. And the funny thing is-He isn't needed!

“I’m glad the president said what he said,” Frank said. “It’s not that making the speech was going to help, but failure to make a speech was probably hurting. In America, if you don’t hear from the president, it’s not a crisis.”

Frank says that House and Senate Democrats have agreed upon what should be in the Wall Street bailout legislation. This morning Frank, his Senate counterpart -- Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, D-Conn. -- and top Republicans will meet to try to hammer out a final agreement. He was optimistic.

“All of a sudden, now that we’re on the verge of making a deal, John McCain drops himself in to make a deal," Frank said. "I really worry about this politicization of it."

"Frankly, we’re going to have to interrupt a negotiating session tomorrow between the Democrats and Republicans on a bill, where I think we’re getting pretty close, and troop down to the White House for their photo-op, and then come back and get on to it," Frank said.

“We’re trying to rescue the economy, not the McCain campaign,” he added.


Paraphrase of a quote I liked. "Those who want English as the official language seem to not trust leaders who speak it fluently"

Thursday, September 18, 2008

Saturday, September 6, 2008

New addition



Before we got the puppy we had already been thinking of names and had it narrowed down to two. After spending a day and a half with him, "Horton", just didn't seem to fit. So folks, let me introduce you to....

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Long Weekend

The wife, hound and I headed up to the family cabin on Friday. We could not have asked for a more beautiful holiday weekend. My friend Jay and his family joined us late Friday night. Boat rides, drinks, "camp" fires, drinks, marathon Wii sesions, drinks....

Sunday my "cousin" Chip and I climbed on our road bikes and took a spin around the lake. All went well until we rounded a bend and were hit square in the face by a 20 mph headwind. Man o man did that section turn into a suckfest. Later on that day my allergies really started to bug me, so I took one of the wife's Alegra D pills. After a while I felt like I had two or three pots of coffee and generally felt "off". Barely slept that night.

On Monday Chip and I headed out for another ride around the lake. This time I was riding my Dad's custom Waterford instead of my 23 year old Trek. Big mistake. On the 12 speed Trek I shift as little as possible since the shifters are on the downtube. I primarily ride my MTB with all the shifting at my fingertips. Because of that I have an aversion to taking my hands off of the bars, so when riding the Trek I will tough it out using the wrong gear unless I absolutely must shift. My Dad's 20 speed Waterford, on the other hand, has a full Campy Record group with shifting integrated with the brake levers/hoods-not to mention it is about two pounds lighter. This bike was a dream to ride! On a base level it is similar to the Trek in that it is a lugged steel frame. But instead of 23 year old components it has five year old top of the line Campy group and a sweet Rolf wheelset. The bike was smooth, fast and a blast on fast downhills. Stomping on the pedals resulted in an instant surge forward instead of the Trek's steady but slow acceleration. The ability to shift easily and fine tune my cadence made a HUGE difference for this rider.

Why was riding this a "big mistake"? Because when I get back on the Trek I am going to be depressed.

We came home later that day and that evening allergies decided to completely kick my ass. I didn't want to take another Alegra, but the sneezing every two minutes, burning eyeballs, and copious amounts of snot dictated otherwise. Result-No sleep what so ever. I called in sick to work the next morning due to essentially not sleeping for two days. That pseudoephedrine just sends me for a loop. I picked up some plain old Claritan yesterday and that seems to be agreeing with my system a little more. At least I was able to sleep well last night.

Until next time....