Our Thursday

Cycling in Britain: Riding the White Wash

Published by Luke on September 20, 2009

I absolutely adore aggressive city cycling. I am not talking about the usual getting from point A to point B, although that is the main objective for me. I am talking about a heart pounding, flat out effort across town running every red light you can find, even red lights that you do not have to go through. A balls to the wall sprint with your head band on to keep the sweat out of the eyes. Malicious pedals dragging on small dogs as you go the opposite direction on the side walks to avoid a particularly heavy chunk of road traffic. Simply, whatever it takes to beat your cousin going from South West London to central North in Camden. I have mentioned in the past my love of the Argentine system for making sure that this would not even be a contest. Well London is a little different and let me explain.

My Thoughts On Language Learning

Published by Luke on September 17, 2009

I grew up in Southern California. Current statistics show that the majority of inhabitants in this part of the world speak Spanish before they speak English. In high school, all students are required to take some form of language learning and I chose Spanish being the practical minded person that I was. However, I treated Spanish with the same sort of attention I have been giving my latest cycling injury, couldn’t care less. My worst grades were in Spanish. I can remember Mrs. Contreras calling on me always right when I was in the middle of goofing off with Matt Comeux, and I would always respond with a barely intelligible combination of badly ordered pronouns and horribly conjugated verbs. In university I avoided further Spanish training by taking a multi-cultural class which taught me all sorts about seven different religions, but no language. But then 18 months ago I decided that it was absolutely critical for me to learn a new language to move forward on my quest of becoming a renaissance man.

My First Love

Published by DEWA69 on September 13, 2009

“Are you prude?”

This immature, awkward, and offensive question was unfortunately the line I gave before I got my first kiss. Coming from a 7th grade boy who had never heard the word prude until about an hour ago, and didn’t really know what it meant, this might have seemed cute. My girlfriend who stood about an inch or two taller than me leaned over and planted one right on my lips. It was in the B quad of Valley View Jr High School during our 5-minute break between classes. I turned around and strutted to my next class while the Bee Gees hit song Stayin Alive played in my head. ” We’ll you can tell by the way I use my walk I’m a woman’s man no time to talk . . .”

Turkish Travel Blog

Published by Luke on September 10, 2009

From Argentina, I went to California for two weeks thinking that was enough time to settle my life in that continent before heading off to England. The complexities of “settling my life” in that continent will be saved for another entry. Two days after arriving in England, I boarded a plane to Istanbul. In Istanbul I had enough time to buy a bottle of fine tequila and then get on another plane for Izmir where my good friend and fellow blog author is currently living. I spent two weeks in Turkey with three days on some Greek islands where I learned about the intense problem of middle eastern immigrants trying to get into Europe and the idea that certain generations of people just simply hate each other regardless of any sort of reason. But I will not pass judgement on some of the things that they had to go through. Charles was a fantastic host as always and a play by play of the trip should be given to give him full respect but instead I will go through a tattered page of my journal that I found with a bullet point list of things I needed to remember. In order as I wrote them and to the best of my memory.

My Thoughts on Leg Shaving

Published by Luke on September 5, 2009

I have the second to last race of the regular season in about 3.5 hours and one of the major sponsors of our team is going to be there. I need 22 more points to move to the category 2 level and to be honest, I am pretty freaking excited. Category 2 was described to me by a friend in California as the point when the only way to do better is to start taking drugs. No drugs yet but this sponsor does load me up on protein shake which I guzzle down regularly so I feel obligated to show my respects. Pre race preparation involves me standing naked in my shower and shaving almost all of the hair off my body. I particularly enjoy this to be honest but I get a lot of people doubting my methods and habits. So here is my reply.

My Wonky Left Eye

Published by Luke on September 2, 2009

While growing up, my parents (or at least my mother and her family) would always say how my mom prayed before I was born that at the very least I would get my mother’s eyes. My mom was pretty hot so I wish she had asked for more. In the end, I was my mother from the tip of the nose to the top of my head and my father for the rest. So the almighty had answered her prayers but she was not explicit enough and although my eyes look like my mother’s, they functioned like the 143 year old eye balls that my dad uses on a daily basis. I had an astygmatism and very bad short sightedness. Then I got laser surgery and it was all solved.

The Incident

Published by DEWA69 on August 24, 2009

Last Thursday I attended the Downtown Los Angeles Artwalk. Every month the galleries in the neighborhood open their doors late at night for pedestrians to come in and enjoy the new art exhibits. The streets and sidewalks are packed with an eclectic mix of people. There are punk rockers, suites, bums, cops, hot chics, old chics, chics that are really dudes. There’s live music and tiny food vendors selling things like home made cookies with names such as ‘Your Mother’. So one might try a sample and then look to their friend and say, ” Mmmmm your mother is goood!”

English and their Weather

Published by Luke on August 13, 2009

If you plan on sharing a conversation with anyone in England, you better be prepared to discuss the weather. Without fail, it will be the second thing talked about regardless of the encounter you find yourself in. For example:

“You alright?” (Equivalent to ‘how are you doing’ often said without the ‘You’.)

“Ya, excellent|lovely|not bad.” (excellent is heavily used here and on par with ‘like’)

“So how ’bout that weather?|What crap weather.|Beautiful day we are having.|Absolutely pissing down.|…” (many more but all roughly the same)

The other person will usually take a long hard look into the sky, and then agree with the given conclusion.

Last night, apparently there was one of the most visible meteor showers of the year in the northern hemisphere. I was meandering down a very dark lane blasting my iPod to “The great gig in the sky” and gazing upwards into the lightly misting rain wishing the cloud cover would move. It got me thinking…

The Wheelchair Bicycle

Published by DEWA69 on August 10, 2009

Out of the 26 years I’ve spent on this earth, year 15 was the worst. You’re old enough to drive, but not without an adult in the car. You can’t do anything fun because you don’t have any money. You can’t get any money because you can’t get a job. You’re too old to build little ramps for your bike and skateboard. You’re too old to have sleepovers and make little forts where no parents are allowed. Thus, you’re left with very few things to do.

One summer, between 9th and 10th grade, I found something particularly unusual to occupy my time. For two weeks, I volunteered at a wheelchair sports camp. It was run by my church and my parents strongly encouraged me to do it. “It will help you get work next year when you’re looking for a job, and it will look great on your college application” they explained. Which as it turns out couldn’t have been more right, McDonalds and Moorpark Community College were very impressed with my resume.

Things I Remember From the Dorms

Published by Luke on August 7, 2009

Moving to University and staying in the dorms will be a requirement for my child(ren). Take a developing teenager and remove their parents and support lines and stick them in an over crowded arena full of other people in the same situation. At eighteen, the dorms had a strong influence on the development of my character that you may know today! I thought I would go through some of the memories that I remember from the dorms so you can have a little insight as to how I became who I am.

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