BLOGS FOR JULY 2007

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Week ending July 29th, 2007
All moved, but not moved in...

Well I spent my first night in the new "pad" this past Sunday night. Not too bad. It's quiet and the cool ocean breeze makes air conditioning unnecessary. The new surroundings are nice and I'm already liking it.

The move went relatively well. Just me and my friend John doing all the work. (Thanks again, amigo!) It took a toal of three trips using my race trailer. The biggest part was the garage, believe it or not. I'm amazed at how much "junk" I had collected. I threw out at least six 50 gallon trash bags full of things I don't want, need or use anymore (Not just the garage but the entire house). In fact, I threw out such things such as....

1. Two bass guitars (Yep!)
2. All paintings/posters, including the ones in my garage.
3. Two bags full of flight gear (compass, headset, flight calculator, etc).
4. Various CBR parts that weren't claimed on Sunday.
5. Tons, tons, tons of stuff from my past (musical, trinkets, etc).
6. An old, cheap shade I used only one time.
7. Some clothes (mine and some I am not sure where they came from)
8. A lot of my past history went (gleefully) to the dumpster. :)

My new house is clean, dust free (haha) and relatively live-able. No more rat-packing things. Most of what I kept consisted of photos, furniture, typical household items and whatnot. I just sorta dumbed things down to a point where it's simple but looks decent. I even moved my desk into the living room area so now my bedroom seems (and is) huge, with lots of space. The only bad thing is that my shelves in the garage are like, too much for the area and I had to get rid of a couple of them. The garage has my W/D and fridge in there. I am going to sell them since the new place has them and the next time I move it will be into a house. That is where I will really go crazy with new furniture and appliances.

Work is going extremely well and they are dropping more and more projects on my lap which is fine by me. The more projects I have to work on the more I learn. I truly do love my job and I'm grateful for that. So many people go to work unmotivated because they're working for a salary and not in a career they enjoy. All credit goes to God. He knew exactly what I needed and provided it right on time. His timing is always perfect. In fact, I simply do not stress or worry anymore. What a load off my shoulders :)

The only thing left to deal with right now is the trailer. I'm scrambling to find a place to store it within a 20 mile radius of home. I plan on racing in August if time permits and it's nice to have the trailer somewhere close.

That's it for now. This is the first chance I have had to sit down and write and thus the 3 day delay.

Keep 'er shiny side up and see ya next week.

Week ending July 22nd, 2007
Careful out there....

Last Wednesday as I was leaving work I decided to lane share coming up to a red light. As I got to the last set of cars the light turned green. I went ahead of the cars and, just as I got to the intersection, this white van came barreling through the red light. I don't think he even cared that he was running the light. The only saving grace was that he was in the middle of three lanes and not the lane closest to me, otherwise I wouldn't be here to write this right now. I was halfway through the first lane and he missed me by about 2 feet doing about 60 mph. Granted, I should have been more cautious crossing the intersection, I just didn't think someone would blatantly run the light. As I rode ride home I pondered what was so important to this guy that he would risk my life or someone else's...

Yesterday was my last service at Saddleback. Neither Clayton nor Derek was there to see me off but Pastor Rick (not Warren) was and he and his staff gave me a warm farewell. He suggested since I am moving to SD that I should attend the San Clemente Church. I'll have to think about it since the drive would still be pretty far. That may have to do until I find a new Church closer to home.

That reminds me! I found a condo to move into close to work and, get this: CLOSE TO THE BEACH! (WOOT!) Like in, less than a mile. It's about the same size as the place I have now except the garage is not attached but that is no big deal. Unless you go farther inland you'll not find too many places with attached garages. The best part is the rent is less than what I am paying now and is in a VERY nice part of SD so I have no complaints. On the days I don't go to the gym I was thinking about running to the beach and back to get in some cardio work. I can't wait to get moved in as 4 months of 160 mile round trip commutes was starting to wear thin. At least the Bandit makes the commute FUN :) (With great power comes great.....hooligan-ism!)

I did not make it to Laguna Seca this weekend. There was a slim chance I was going to go but things didn't pan out. It's ok though as watching the race on TV it appears I didn't miss much. Nicky got taken out by Hopkins in the first turn and never recovered. You could tell that Hayden was on a mission and it's a shame they collided. Hopkins must have been fuming that Hayden got around him (He doesn't like Nicky) and tried to stuff his bike underneath Nicky's. That never works (don't ask me how I know, I've been there). On the plus side, Roger Lee did pretty well and Miguel Duhammel...not so good. I hope Roger Lee gets a chance to ride in MotoGP next year. It'll be interesting to see if both of them go to Kawasaki since I don't think Nicky will be back with Honda.

My friend and I worked really hard on the cover song Friday night. All I have to do is redo my vocals, mix it together and upload it to the site. That will probably happen the weekend after I move. I still have too much to do and too little time to get everything rolling.

That's it for now. Hope you had a great week and keep it shiny side up (...while watching for people in a hurry barreling through your spot on the asphalt...)

Cheers!


Week ending July 15th, 2007
What's up?!

It's been an extremely interesting and busy week. Crunch time is here and I getting ready to move soon. I'll start packing next week and, depending on what a little birdie says, next weekend may be booked or not. If it is then I really have to put the hammer down to get everything done by the 28th.

Saturday we did the all-female newbie street "training" class. We had seven students and it went pretty well. One girl showed up on a brand new GSX-R600. She had roughly 300 miles on it and made noticeable improvements during the day. We talked for about an hour on some important street survival skills and then we did drills (hard braking, fast acceleration, etc). Our friend Lisle even did a stoppie testing the limits of the brakes on her GSX-R1000. I was impressed. Her riding skills have come a long way since the incident on ACH. I'm sure we'll do more in the future as it seems the students really enjoyed the class.

At work I have a ton of projects to get done. One that is super important has to be completed and working by the end of the month. It requires a lot of time in the lab so I am going to basically be living there at work for the next two weeks. That's great though because the lab is my favorite place to be :)

I still don't have the pictures from the reunion yet. As soon as I receive them I'll post them on the site.

Everything else is going great both in work and my personal life so I have no complaints. My friends think I'm up to no good because I have this constant grin on my face. What can I say? When life is good, just be thankful and enjoy it. You never know what's coming around the corner.

Depending on what happens later in the week I may not be able to update the blog until next Monday but I should be updating the site periodically throughout the week.

John -- are we ever going to get your R-Tard --- err --- Motard back together? LOL. Why do I have the feeling your bike is going to be a fixture in my garage for a long, long time? JUST KIDDING, BRO.

Off to chill with a friend. Stay safe and keep the shiny side up!

Week ending July 8th, 2007
I'm back from Florida!

The trip started out on Thursday, June 28th, when I arrived at LAX @ 8am. I checked in my bags, did the "E Ticket" thing, passed through security and waited at the gate. It was then that I looked at my ticket. It did not say "Boarding Pass" with a seat assignment. That was odd. I spoke with the agent at the gate who promptly informed me that I was on "standby" - standby for a flight I had been booked on for 2.5 months. D'OH. (FYI this was United Airlines. The worst flying experience I've ever had.)

To make a long story short, the plane left at 10:40 am -- with my bags but without me. Many calls and hours later I was booked on a flight out of San Diego the next morning at 6am -- at an additional cost of $300.00. Stuff happens but I wasn't going to let this stop me from having a great time.

I got to Florida on Friday afternoon and met up with my friends for a pre-reunion meet and greet. We hung out that night catching up and having a great time. The next morning I played Golf with a few friends, had lunch then headed home to spend the afternoon with my family. It was my niece's birthday so she had a bunch of friends over. We waited for the party to be over then hit the pool and relaxed. That evening I headed over to the official reunion. We had an awesome time and it was really great to reconnect with people I have not seen for years. Funny thing is, I did not need to wear a name tag. Everyone recognized me right away. I guess I haven't changed too much "physically" over the years (many of them mentioned that).

The next day I went to a local service with one of my friends - "Calvary Bible Church". It was pretty neat to see a new and growing Church take root back home. My friend mentioned to the Pastor that I am a member of Saddleback to which the Pastor replied "I guess I better be on my game today!" I had to chuckle at that. So many people know and respect Pastor Rick that he is known worldwide even though he likes to keep low profile. He's a very humble guy and someone I've really learned a lot from. On that note I am happy to report that I have finished reading the entire bible! To celebrate, I will start reading it all over again. :)

The rest of the week was spent fishing, swimming, taking the nieces and my nephew to the mall, hanging with my best friend from home and his family, going to dinner with my sister and bro-in-law and basically just enjoying the time with my family. We did not make it to Bush Gardens as planned but we did have a great BBQ instead! It rained every day and we had two days in a row of some pretty violent thunderstorms. I had forgotten how bad the storms could get over there. I left on the 4th in the afternoon arriving in San Diego just in time to see loads of fireworks -- from the plane. That was very cool.

All in all it was a good trip and I had a lot of fun. It's amazing to see how much my friends have changed. I come from a very small town so everyone knows everyone else and you will always bump into someone you know. No matter where I went I was greeted with a familiar, smiling and friendly face. Pics of the reunion to follow as soon as they are sent to me.

That's about it for now. No racing next weekend due to packing my pad up for the move. Too much to do and too little time to get things done. I will race again in August but will probably need to do a Sat practice to get myself back up to speed -- especially since I am going to be running the bigger 190 rear tire. I don't suspect it will be that big of a handling change but the practice time will help me get the bike set up correctly. The goal is to be smoother and faster, not necessarily to win or place.

As far as I know we're still on for the "All Female" Newbie riding class on the 21st which we'll probably do at Verizon Wireless. More info will be posted on that as soon as it's confirmed.

Have a great week!!!