Abominable

I've been off my diet for a week, and tomorrow we're going to a Himalayan themed restaurant. The clichéd thing to say is that I've gained so much weight that I'm wearing a tent, but what if I told you, instead, that I'm wearing a yurt?

I'm Going To Use A Lot Of Exclamation Points Because I Can't Wave My Hands Around While I'm Typing!!!

This weekend, I attended all three events for our high school class' fortieth reunion. It was great; nothing at all like I remember high school. For one thing, I talked to three cheerleaders, and one of them hugged me! And that wasn't even the best part.
Our French teacher was a Holocaust survivor, She seemed to view us as soft, entitled brats, and looking back, she was probably right. She was pretty contemptuous of us, and pretty scary, what with the ear twisting, the yelling, et d'autres. But one day, she showed a movie, then asked the class what it reminded them of, and they drew a blank, except me! I answered her question. She said, "We'll make something of him if the little piggies don't eat him first." High praise, indeed, coming from her. But it's really hard to boast, "Uh huh, that's right, I answered a question in high school." But someone at the reunion remembered, and brought it up!
And other people came up to me and said nice things. I'd make them look at my name tag with my class picture on it, and they'd say, "I know who you are."
Oh, and the weather was perfect, I won a bottle of glacier water, we visited our fifth grade teacher, toured a fish hatchery, and we've got amazing house guests who are charming, brilliant, and know how to do things! I left my tool box outside their door so if they see something broken or stuck, they can just fix it as they go by. And they are!

Yo, Rug Doctor, Take A Cue From Rodney King

Rug doctor is, "Screaming mad at dirt," but  I want to know if we can't just get along. We've been working for four days to get to the point that when our guests arrive in a few hours, we can say, "Oh, sorry, we didn't have a chance to pick up around here." The truth is, four days ago, it looked like the crew from Hoarders just packed up and left. Ha, the truth is like an onion, it reveals itself in layers: four days ago, it looked like no one had ever packed up here, anything, ever.
I cleaned the carpet on our stairs, and it looks horrible; blotchy patches of clean and dirty carpet. I suppose I'm thinking about this right now because our fortieth reunion looms tomorrow. If I'd just left it alone, I could have been an iconoclast. Oh, he's a wild man, he doesn't even care how his stairs look. Freedom, man, he doesn't even care what the Man thinks. The way it turned out, I care how it looks, I'm just a nebbish that can't even pick up after himself.

Did I Just Have An Insight?

Do you think that Romney's Etch-A-Sketch approach to issues could be related to his Mormonism? Mormons believed in polygamy until they didn't anymore, and they believed that black skin was the sign of a curse  until 1978.

Last Word On The Tour

Fifty two seconds into this video that aired on KTUU, that very bemused biker is me!

Your Garden Is A Mirror Of Your Soul

If I ever write the story of our flower bed, I'll probably call it "Mulch Ado About Nothing."

The Games People Play

About the same time that we were riding the Tour up Rabbit Creek Rd this weekend, a homeowner there killed a grizzly bear that had just killed his pet llama. Fish and Game reports that three other brown bears were in the neighborhood. A friend said that unlike our encounter with a black bear*, a few years ago, people were moving too slowly up the hill to escape from a bear. That was certainly true in my case.  I might have been on a stationary bike;  you would have needed  time lapse photography to detect motion at all. I imagine a roadside observer could have easily counted the spokes in my wheels as I went by.

In other news, our routes were evaluated last week, and now we await the adjustments. This time, I think I'll tell them their "consultations" are charades, and I want to play a different game: trivial pursuit. "How many times have you paid any attention to what I tell you?"

For those of you playing along at home, the correct answer is, never.

*Not to pressure the rest of you, but the post I linked to from this post has the best comment I've ever received, maybe the best comment anyone has ever received.

I Ate A Lot Yesterday. Today, A Groaning Board

Yesterday was the Tour de Cure in Anchorage. They had a new course because some people had complained that the old 62 mile course was too easy. I was not one of those people. Over the years, I've used a lot of metaphors for steep hills, calling them ladders or some such. In this case, words fail. The ride up Rabbit Creek Rd was steep and hard, and then it became steeper and harder. I made it to the top, and then wound my way back through the mountains and the flats to the finishing arch in Mountain View. A woman sitting there asked me, "Are you the sweeper?"
"No," I said.
"Then, are you a Red Rider?" she asked.
"No, I'm old and slow, leave me alone," I explained.
Then I ate a free Subway sandwich, a peanut butter sandwich I had with me, and rode my bike home. There I ate two more sandwiches, and then we went to Don Jose's for dinner.
Today I'm back on my plan with no ill effects from food bingeing, nor the ride, except I'm stiff as a board.
Well, I'd say stiff as a board, but unlike a board, I can bend, but also unlike a board, I groan with each movement.