Against the Wind

So, as Fred alludes to in his prior post, I went to see Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band at Madison Square Garden in Manhattan last night. Now, before I answer the most pressing of your question ("why the fuck would you do that Al?!"), let me tell you a bit about NYC lately. Folks, it is colder than a witch's tit in a brass bra doin' push ups in the snow in the middle of Antarctica! I walked to a restaurant about 2 avenues away from the station (meeting my brother, Willy Bangorhard, for dinner before our show). Afterwards, I thought I might have hypothermia.

Back to the question at hand, ("why the fuck would you do that Al?!"):

Al was remembering those Hollywood Nights, his big two wheeler, those dark haired beauties, Betty Lou and the way she'd get down, those trips to K-k-k-k-k-Kathmandu. Al was hoping to see Bob belting it out. Al was hoping for the legions of Harley chicks that used to follow the Silver Bullet band around. But....




Well, let's just say that things were not as Al would have wanted them.



And Bob, well, he still sound pretty good. But he ain't what he once was.




But then again, who is?

Hey Al...

Have you seen old Rosie?
Is she lookin' mighty fine?

How 'bout hot Nancy?
Is she steppin' right on time?

Yoga Wreckage

As faithful followers of Moveitfred know, Monday is yoga night for the lanky and uncoordinated one. This is the night Moveitfred aligns his chakras and heals his hamsas. Tonight the Mrs. was across town at a meeting and planned to meet Moveitfred at the studio, however the high school sitter got all caught up in some riveting discussion at the drama club meeting and arrived late to send Moveitfred on his way.

Since Moveitfred can't stand cracking open the squeaky door and tip-toeing into the room after class starts only to inevitably get that last spot right up front, Moveitfred gave the sitter a sharp spank on the patookus and sent her on her way.

No studio yoga for freddo tonight.

Situations like this force fred into a home practice of his asanas, and so Moveitfred pulled up one of his fav home yoga tapes and got in a little darshana here at home.

Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm...

fred in the woods

Moveitfred brokered a deal with the Mrs. over breakfast this morning (you go to yoga with the girlfriend first thing, Moveitfred will pick up kids, when you get home Moveitfred is out the door to the woods...) and put in a good two hours on the mountain bike over at the Cathedral Pines trail.


As Al pointed out earlier, pretty cold mofo today. Not, of course, KL training center north cold, however quite nippy in the 20's nonetheless. No wind in the woods, however, so conditions were very bearable. In fact, chilly Moveitfred was quite toasty with a few thin layers on. The fahking water bottle was the problem. Froze up on Moveitfred forcing him to circle back to the car for a beverage after one lap of the trail.


Trail was in good shape, bone dry and frozen solid. Only rough spots were the deep ruts that the douchebags carved out in the muddy sections after our recent rains. Moveitfred tackled his arch nemesis today: the log piles. After a breezy warmup lap Moveitfred went out of his way to circle through a few black diamond sections in order to climb the wood. Moveitfred was quite successful in getting over a few new piles without digging the chainring into the timbers and going ass over teakettle.


Back to the factory tomorrow for the start of a new production season with Moveitfred's ol' pal Al. The next few months should be filled with merrymaking and buffoonery as fred and Al try to exact some revelry out of the drudgery of assembly line work. Are you ready Al?

Eat Bush

Ok, I rarely speak about professional football. It just isn't important enough to take up space usually. But this evening offers me an opportunity to rant a bit. And here it is:

This whole culture of personality, this "I, I, Me, Me, My" mentality is just killing the essence of team sport. Here' s a perfect example. The Saints, playing for a decimated city, playing to continue the season, playing for a place in the Superbowl are down by 8. At no point have they led. Then the momentum seems to be shifting. Reggie Bush--admittedly, an incredibly talented player--makes a great play and outruns the defense, including Uhrlacher, to score a TD. As he approaches the endzone, he points in Uhrlacher's face to taunt him, then does a showboat somersault into the endzone.

Forget that the TD did NOT give the Saints the lead nor bring them even. Forget that the Saints went on to get stomped by the Bears. Just focus on this "move." It speaks to everything that is wrong with professional team sports these days--specifically baseball, football, basketball. It seems like players have lost all sense of team and are only playing for themselves. They've no respect for coaches, no respect for senior players, no sense of paying their dues, no sense of playing only to better their organizations.

And, even worse, crowds and commentators seem to eat the theatrics and trash talking and victory dances well before victory up. Am I completely alone here? Did no one else want Bush to land on his head and paralyze himself?

Ok, forget the paralysis thing. Just give me a moment to send Reggie a note:
Dear Reggie: You lost, big time. You got your ass stomped. You looked like a stupid fag flipping through the air and dancing afterwards when your team is still down by 2 and playing for their lives. You're an ass and your season is done. Fuck you.

Transmitt-AL

So, for those of you still with us after the Nod-Of The-Living Dead-Cast, here is the update on this morning's Manhattan 1/2:

• First, let me say this about the 15 degree and 10-20 mph wind pre-race/start: FUCK IT WAS COLD. For anyone who missed that, FUCK IT WAS COLD!!! I had layers of shit clothes that I peeled and tossed, a bunch of garbage bags all around me, but still I shivered my ass off. The only thing that sucked close to this was the mile jog back to the car post race. Brrrrrrrr.

• The start was, as is typical, a cluster fuck. New York Road Runners has been talking about doing wave starts for a while. It was mentioned by the prez of NYRR today again during the pre race speech. BUT IT DIDN'T HAPPEN. The problem: All these dicks ignore the time per mile markers and line up WAY AHEAD of their paces. So it takes a year and a day to get through the start gate and the first mile 'cause you're pushing past slow assholes who enjoy, it seems, being shouldered out of the way. As an example of this, I lined up by the 8 minute per mile marker at the start--only about 100 yards back of the start. But it took me a full 1:10 to get to the start line and then I spent the first mile weaving around and bumping past fuckers.

• Ice. The course was a bit treacherous. All the water stops were ice rinks and there were a lot of patches of black ice. NYRR worked hard to combat this with ice melt. But it was a losing battle. Saw a couple of runners go down hard.
  
  
• Pace: Really quite happy with my run today. I wanted to do 8 minute miles. Then I got a little freaked with the weather and the course yesterday. I gave it a "we'll see" prediction. In the end, I finished with a 1:44.03 total. This translates to a 7:57 minute per mile pace. Here's the breakdown (with commentary, of course): 1= 8:50 (really a 7:40 as it took 1:10 to get to the start line), 2= 7:55.18, 3= 7:45.65, 4= 7:53.42, 5= 8:27.82 (had to stop at the port o john...revenge of the oatmeal), 6 = 8:24.01 (had to stop again...let's just say "haste makes more waste"), 7= 7:33.34 (pissed about shit), 8= 7:50.05, 9= 7:56.47, 10= 7.55.35, 11= 7:42.08, 12= 7:35.95, 13= 7:28.04. 13.1=1:44.03.

Now I'm off to eat myself silly, lick my wounds, and drink copious amounts of homebrew (I have a crop of lager that is just now "mature," and I am psyched...post race carbo load y'all).


--Bangorhard Out!

Ps: A parting shot for you Slow Break

Fat Tire Vids

Some cool trailers here.

Heywood, time to start building in that forest out back...