Of Sumo Wrestlers and Panda Bears

The other day I was thinking...Who would win in a wrestling match between a Sumo wrestler and a Panda? At first I figured a Panda would win because it has claws and it probably weighs more. On second thought, however, I decided that a Sumo wrestler would win because he has experience in the subject. But then again, Pandas are so huge, the panda would just sit on his haunches chewing bamboo while the sumo guy aimlessly pushed, pulled and tugged. So, this really did not get me anywhere. (If you are still reading you are probably as bored as me).

Next I thought about whether a ninja would win against a sumo wrestler. Ninjas are so cool and fast that this one is obvious...the ninja would come out on top. Then again...the sumo wrestler is so armored in fat and grease that the ninja's kicks, punches and chops would either bounce back or slip by the slick surface of the sumo wrestler. (If you are still reading I now know that you don't have much to do or that you are really horrible at prioritizing your schedule).

The conclusion I came to is that Sumos are the best fighters from the Asian region. Of course there are tigers, but I wanted to compare animals that can sit and eat with hands or paws.

Sumos are the new Ninja!!! If you want to buy "I am Sumo!!" t-shirts, let me know!

Valentine's, Shmalentine's

"Valentine's already? I'm still sick from the super bowl!"

That is what all males are thinking right now. Some who have girlfriends might be thinking: "What? I just worked overtime all month to pay for that Christmas date I had to take girlfriend on so she wouldn't dump me!"

Unfortunately, females don't think this way. For some reason, they don't have fun cleaning up after superbowl parties and they look forward to Valentine's. They think: "Yes! A time to relax, maybe boyfriend will take me to a really fancy dinner!"


My sister is one of those female types. One problem though: she does not have a boyfriend, and I don't have a girlfriend. For the past week she has been walking around the house looking very depressed. Yesterday morning, I saw her walking down the hallway, more depressed than usual. I decided to cheer her up, so I said: "Good morning! Why don't you stop being depressed?" I immediately realized my mistake. I could imagine what was coming next.

"YOU GOOD FOR NOTHING LITTLE NOSY UNCARING WRETCH!"

Then she would proceed to thrash me into a million pieces. The only way to handle women is to compliment them. But don't get carried away. For example, if I had said "My, you look much better than usual today," she would have snapped out of depression on the spot; and started thrashing me all the same.


But my sister did nothing I expected. Instead she got all excited and yelled "thank-you, thank-you, thank-you! I'm so happy now, I could scream!" Then she screamed and busted my eardrums. Now this was a very strange reaction, so I called up a female counselor and asked what it meant. Guess what? Now I have to take my sister to the fanciest restaurant in San Francisco to keep her from becoming permanently depressed! My counselor told me that when I talked to my sister yesterday, she was so depressed she thought I asked if I could take her to dinner since she had no one else to take her. Now I walk around the house all day long, looking extremely depressed. My sister never even notices. Maybe I will let you know how the dinner goes. Then again, maybe you don't want to know.

First race of the season

I admit it, I am at a loss as to what to write. I'm sure everyone knows this feeling well.

So, for this post, I've decided to share a race report with everyone. Although a race report isn't necessarily meant for humor, most people find them to be quite interesting...however, these people are fellow cyclists so they have more of an interest in reading how my race went. I guess this is pretty much an experiment on our readers so be sure to let us know what you think about reading race reports and we will post them every once in a while. Maybe we will add some video footage of the race just to add a little twist. Here it goes!

Here are some definitions so that you can understand the cyclist language:

Tempo: The speed and intensity of a cadence.

Cadence: The number of pedal rotations per minute.

RR: Road Race, usually 50-80mi.

Crit: Criterium, a short fast race around city blocks. Races usually average 25-30mph for 40-60 minutes.

Cat (5, 4, 3, 2, or 1): The category a cyclist is in based on their ability. Cat 1's and 2's are the fast, professional cyclists.

Climb: The main steep section of a race.

Field: The group of cyclists in a race.

Distance: about 43 miles
Time: 1hr 5min.
Place: 7th

This was the first race/real ride I've done these past few months so I was pretty pessimistic coming into this race. At the start there were not very many cat. 4's so the official combined the 4's and 5's to give us a larger field. The start wasn't very cold so I did not have to wear too much; it turns out I over layered and ended up too warm on the climb. The first few miles were really windy but we were still riding at a pretty good tempo. I stayed in the front but made sure to never let myself in the wind. Once we were officially in the canyon road conditions turned really bad, lots of erosion, silt, mud, water, boulders and rocks... many riders went flat because of the rocks and such.
As we neared the climb a group from the z-team started taking control and I knew they were setting up their climbers so I prepared myself for a good ol' suffer fest up the hill. Sure enough they attacked on the climb and splintered the field, I was a little bit back from the front but I knew I wasn't too far to make up the distance so I stood up and...wait!! I've lost my legs from the end of last season, they don't want to cooperate! The acceleration I was expecting from myself dissolved into a sea of anguish as I resigned to the fact that I would have to do my best and make up the ground descending. Descending on this death trap of a road?? Yeah, right. I ended up with a group of 6 on the way back down but they were inexperienced and working with them was more work than it should have been. I worked pretty hard for a while until I realized that we weren't going to catch the leaders so I decided to rest a little and do a bit of work every now and then. It turns out that even though my group wasn't very good at working efficiently they were really strong!! And I began to feel that I was becoming more tired than they so I stopped working altogether and hoped to hang on till the end. At the end we split up on the final climb and I ended up behind them early so I rolled over the line quite a ways behind all but one.
The good thing about this race is that I finished quite a few minutes before the main field so I am happy to know that early on this season I am a little stronger than most of the field. I am hoping to get some points and upgrade to 3 ASAP so knowing that I am ahead of everyone else is encouraging.

There it is. If you did enjoy it, let us know.

An Epic Skiing Adventure, part one

Well the other day my friend jellyfish and I done went and headed up to the mountains to do a little skiing, an like jellyfish always says about me: "I ain't much of a skier, but I sure would like to think I am!" So when we got there, we past through the ski lodge like a whirling dervish in an attempt to be the first ones on the ski slopes. It ensued that we in fact were the first folks in line for the big chair lift that takes you up to the top of the mountain. However, when we got there we took tally, and discovered were short; Jellyfishes polls, chew'n gum, and right glove, and that I had left my lucky ski helmet, goggles, and pants at home and instead was wearing, my cowboy hat, sun-glasses, and fabulous electric-green Bermuda shorts! But after putting our heads together, Jellyfish and I came to the conclusion that these were only miner setbacks, and that we wouldn't want to hold up a good ski day for such vanities.

See, Jellyfish and I know each other well enough to know that nether one of us would be so foolish as to let the loss of some important safety equipment get in the way of shredding the gnar. Naw', we know'z we'z brighter 'n 'at!

Getting on the chair lift was a trifle difficult seeing as we were distracted by the ski patrol guy's gliding down the mountain and gloating at us, saying that we would never really be the first ones on the mountain. But after only three serendipities of us falling off, the lift being stopped, putting our skies back on, and trying again, we achieved our goal. During one of these attempts however, Jellyfish ended up sprawled out in such a way that overly burlesqued one of the ski parolee's near fall upon determining our identities. But after all this, we were finally on our way to the gnarly POW we'd been dreaming of for months.

Life in the Spotligh, part four

When Gore started yelling we finally woke up. He was walking calmly around the room, smashing pitchers, throwing chairs, kicking mirrors; he was amazing. I have never seen such professional fit throwing in my life! We all retreated to the bathroom and locked ourselves in. After an emergency consultation (and placing a poll on the web), we decided to come out fighting.
We threw open the door and charged out yelling with all our might. Gore glared at us and suddenly we found ourselves retreating again. Al made a pounce in our direction and then Brock whispered, "Why did you wake us up!?"



Encouraged by this, Josh yelled "WE QUIT!! HA! HA! HA! NOW WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO?" Gore lunged at us, grabbed us by the back of our necks and dumped us in a pile in the gutter. He then climbed into his tiny green tricycle car and proceeded to putt-putt down the road. 10 minutes and 3 feet later, I saw Al get out of the car, pick it up, and slam it repeatedly against a wall. Then I blacked out.


When I woke up, I was lying on the cement floor of a jail cell. Apparently the Vegas police system thought Josh, Brock and I were just a few wednesday morning drunks. After being released, we were hauled off to the Las Vegas Sanitary Facility, otherwise known as the dump. Soon all three of us had collected a few instruments and we decided to put on a show for those dull Waste Management workers.


This time, Josh had an old ukulele, Brock was on a broken piano, and I had a broom for a mic. Under the circumstances, I thought it sounded pretty good. Some guy started playing this cool beat behind us. It sounded like "beep, beep, beep, beep..." Maybe we should have got the hint, but we didn't, and the truck ran us over.


Now we are all home, separated forever. We decided being around each other gave us all bad luck. So much for my band.