And life goes on for the rest of us as well.
Fede has summed it up superbly in her blog entry "The Show Must Go On" so instead of adding my thoughts to the many already expressed, I'll just say that I agree totally with Miss FeeDee.
Also like Fede, this blog has been subject to a bit of mauling by Blogger, which has been up, down, up again, down again, not available etc for the last couple of days.
I was beginning to think that either:
a) I had broken Blogger in the same way that I broke Twitter, or
b) Blogger was getting jealous of me spending time on Twitter, and was trying to teach me a lesson.
All right Blogger, I will be faithful unto you, and will forsake Twitter. There, are we happy now?
Talking about being happy now, without in any way wanting to diminish the sadness of the tragic death of Wouter Weylandt, I am looking forward to the start of the Tour of California tomorrow, not least because Our Glorious Leader is in it. He's team leader this time, and the coveted (well, I think so) Number 6 has gone to Anders Lund:
And on a personal level I am particularly happy, as LLB gave me a present yesterday: look - socks!!!
Possibly the most expensive pair of socks I will ever own.....
And I don't even own a bicycle!!
(shock, horror, hope I don't lose most of my followers after that terrible admission.)
For anyone who is over-interested in what the boys wear on their feet, I can tell you that they are black underneath, which is very sensible, and the blue part is a lot brighter than the blue on their jerseys: and they have a mesh panel on the top, running over the tops of the toes, for added ventilation and cooling.
There, sock appreciation moment is over, hope you enjoyed it.
Leopard Trek socks! Wow!! Me wants them too!!!
ReplyDeleteYou don't even own a bicycle?!? No no no, this is no right, girl. You should immediately start saving money in order to buy one. Seriously, you can't blog about cycling if you don't even own a bike.
(Pssst, I'll tell you a secret: I don't own a proper bike either :P)
Geez, Blogger was so annoying in the last days! I had written a nice post two days ago - and now it's gone. I was so angry!
This reminds of something Dumbledore says in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, about seeing himself in the mirror of Erised, receiving "a pair of thick, woolen socks" for Christmas, as it’s meant to be a salubrious gift.
ReplyDeletePfft, when you do get yourself a bike Coug, go with one that’s comfortable. Unless you’re training for something, I don’t think the average person is going to need Shimano disk brake calipers. I’ve had the same bicycle (CCM Pursuit, yo!) since I was 11 years old. I think the bike snobs around here just take one look at my down tube, and peddle away with their noses upturned, as though I don’t belong on the same road. Of course, I have to control the impolite impulse to laugh at them for wearing professional cycling gear--Lycra jersey, Roubaix tights, and all. It is in these moments I wish a moose would come out of nowhere, and just spook them off the road, just to see their legs dangling in a comic fashion. :P
Of course, I say this as someone whose pants have a massive rip where the gear keeps getting stuck. And no, I don’t wear a helmet, because I’m forced to ride at the speed of a turtle. I find the only real enemy to cyclists, are drivers who back out of their driveway and don’t look. I’m thinking of getting a klaxon, or riding around with a bullhorn, and a recording of a sonorous voice, the kind you imagine God’s would sound like, saying something like, “I COMMAND YOU TO STOP!”
Anyway, I’m glad to see that team morale isn’t too low, and that they seem to be moving forward:
http://twitpic.com/4x5tdm
http://twitpic.com/4wtpim
Hey Fede, glad you like the socks! And no, I don't even own a bicycle. How shaming. In my defence, I would say that I used to have bicycles, in fact I used to be a member of a cycling club, but then we moved back to London where the roads were a bit too dangerous for cycling, so instead I got into motorbikes, which was probably even more dangerous. And a few years later I had a fairly serious accident and riding a bike was out of the question for many years. I guess that I "could" ride a bicycle again now, I mean I could physically do it, but the roads really aren't safe, and I'm just not into off-roading. If I'm not on a road, I'd rather be on a horse than on a push-bike.
ReplyDeleteWhat, exactly, Fede my dear, is a bike but not a proper bike? Does it have stabilisers? (little wheels on outriggers)? Is it - sharp intake of breath - pink? Does it have glittery bits dangling from the ends of the handlebars?
(*snorts of laughter at the thought of Miss FeeDee on a pink bike with glittery bits and stabilisers!*)
Yes, Blogger has been very annoying, but now it seems to be working again, and I have promised to forswear Twitter, so it won't break again.
Hey Figgy, you are quite right, socks are a very salubrious gift. And these ones are lovely! They might even oust my Lux socks as my "favourite" socks! In which case, which ones do I wear to the Tour of Britain? Oh, decisions, decisions.
I hear that my friends at Stomach of Anger have made a Wouter Weylandt memorial tee: the commentators were talking about it during the Giro coverage.
Here's the link:
http://stomachofanger.com/108.shtml
it's basically a black tee with the number 108 on the front, but the o has been turned into the Leopard logo with a line under it. Very clever!
And thanks for those links to happy smiling faces, they need to get their morale back in place as they have a race to win. Go Andy! Go Team Leopard!
You'll note that I kindly added their race numbers to their mugshots (above), to make it easier to pick them out in the peloton.
Oh, and Figgy, I love the idea of the bullhorn with the voice of God. Love it! I could do with one of those for my car - being a little "eco" car, it has a really girly hooter that doesn't scare anyone, even if I lean on it for some significant time.
(Actually I rather like the idea of the moose shooting out of the trees to scare the cycle-snobs as well.)
Let's all enjoy the first day of California!
Coug
Luckily for me, my mountain bike isn't pink - and it doesn't even have stabilisers or glittery bits anywhere.
ReplyDeleteSimply, it is a white mountain bike with very big brake problems. Every time I brake, it produces an awful noise. And every time I brake too hard, well, the brakes risk to break (my uncle once crashed against a wall after saying: 'Come on, I don't believe your bike doesn't brake!! We've just fixed it, now it should be perfect! Let me try it').
That's why I consider my bike 'not a proper bike'. But still, when I want to ride I take my uncle's bike. It is older than me and it is a mountain bike for men, but at least it brakes correctly ;)
The first day of ToC isn't off to a very smooth start, I'm afraid. Poor guys and that cold weather & snow. I hope they don't hate Cali forever and return next year. lol I know some people are surprised by snow in Cali in late May, but up there in the Sierras, there's potential for snow until the end of June. The Amgen organizers should probably rethink the route for next year. :P
ReplyDeleteThose socks are awesome!! Yay LLB!
Thanks for the rider numbers, Coug. I've been meaning to look them up for next weekend's stages.
Fede! A bike with no brakes? No! No! You must get them fixed, that's dangerous! (*wags stern finger*) I love the idea of your Uncle crashing into a wall when he didn't believe you that the brakes didn't work!
ReplyDeleteHey, Gnasher! Welcome back, and yes, we're all shocked at the concept of snow in California. There goes another illusion. I want to see sun!
Glad you liked the rider numbers, I've been struggling with them all this year and I've finally found Steephill TV, which is the best site (with the worst gui!) for start lists and bib numbers. Now I go there for every race, and get the numbers of my "pet" riders, which makes it a lot easier to impress LLB with my ability to pick out "my" riders from the bunch. Sorry, the peloton. Darn, must stop watching Tour of Turkey.
I quite liked having their numbers under their mugshots, did you?
Coug