Ninja Pic

Here's what I have for the moment




More to come

Different bikes are fun!

Thursday a bunch of us were up in Dallas and a friend and brought his '01 Triumph 600TT up for use in a drama we were doing. Well he didn't want to ride it home in the dark and "cold" so I got elected to ride it home.
I was presently surprised to find that I wasn't in sever pain when I got home. my bum was quite happy. Shoulders were a bit sore on arrival, but I think that was mostly do to the immense amount of tumbling I'd done the day before on a hard surface.
Oh, that little fairing doesn't do jack. I'll happily take my VFR over that bike. Not to say that I wouldn't love one for track days though!

Friday my brother acquired a '95 Yamaha Virago 1100. He's been wanting a bike for awhile and since the one he was riding ('86 XV250) was a loaner and the owner took it back, he's REALLY been wanting one. He found this one for pretty cheap and in pretty good condition. Needs the carbs adjusted, but thats to be expected for a 12yo bike.
Since he botched his left ankle at the show Thursday night, I got elected to ride it home.
I've never ridden a cruiser so this was a new experience for me.
The seat needs to be a few inches back so I'm not leaned back, and the pegs need to be less forward. Guess I'm not prime for a cruiser huh?
Riding that bike makes me look good though, in the 10mi ride home, I drug both feet and slid the back tire twice. Yeah, I like more clearance and sticky tires.

At the risk of sounding like Squeaky, who's going to let me ride their bike next?

"I'm an evil tumbling ninja!"

This upcoming week myself and eight other members of my gymnastics team are going to be participating in the Just Claim It prayer conference in Dallas.

We are going to be performing various acrobatic, tumbling and trampoline stunts for the dramas.
Last night we finally (its a long story) got our outfits that we are going to be wearing. Full ninja outfits. so there's nine of us running around on the stage in totally black outfits being scary demons.

During a break in our rehearsal last night, Nirva, the lone female in our troup, piped up in this hilarious tone that you'd have to hear to understand and said "I'm an evil tumbling ninja!" we just about died laughing at her.

I do have to admit that its a heck of a lot of fun running around in those outfits. We even contemplated going to Wal-Mart and seeing how long it would take to get thrown out. Better judgment, lack of interest in an arrest record and the call of the bed at 0100 pervaded and we didn't go.

I'll have to get some pics of us in the outfits and post them up

Corteo

Corteo means cortege in Italian which in turn is a funeral procession. It also just happens to be the name of the most recent Cirque Du Soleil production to grace Dallas.

If you’ve never seen Cirque, your are missing out my friend.
A literal translation give Cirque Du Soleil to mean Circus of the Sun. So you might get the idea that its a circus. It is, but its so much more then just a circus. Comparing Cirque to Barnum & Bailey isn’t even close to fair for B&B. Well I guess I should say that if your not a gymnast or interested in gymnastics type things, then you may enjoy B&B just as well.

Cirque is essentially a gymnastics extravaganza coupled with great live music, an intriguing story, brilliant costumes. All combined to make a very interesting and awe inspiring production.

My family and I went to the show Tuesday evening, had a great time, and enjoyed the show. Got some crazy ideas to try for the gymnastics team and I’m sure we annoyed the folks in front of us by continually commenting on what they were doing form more then the typical “ooh, ahh” perspective.

As Cirque show’s go, it rocked, but didn’t quite stack up to the level of Vareki (which I saw live last year) and Quidom. Still 100% worth every penny.

Mountain Biking

Mom, on a whim the other day, decided that for her birth day she wanted to spend more time as a family. and that to do this we were going to go mountain biking.
so she bought us all mountain bikes. Now, let me remind you that we aren't exactly a small family. Mom, Dad, myself and three younger brothers. Thats SIX bikes.

Got them all loaded into the truck and we headed out to the state park for their first ride. well, the brothers had taken theirs onto the land and messed around on them for awhile. the rest of us hadn't had ours out yet. something about work, school and kiddos.

Hit the trails around 1130 on Saturday. Got everybody on their steeds and away we went. the first trail we took wasn't all that complex. involved a few tight spots between trees, but nothing horrible.
Pulling back onto the road, mom's chain broke. now this is the first time that bikes been ridden and, no offense, but mom isn't exactly a powerhouse. Nor was she changing gears while really cranking on the pedals. it just snapped. To say the least she was frustrated. But decided to call it (not like there was any other option). She had to leave in a few minutes anyway for a prior appointment.
Getting back I discovered that I'd run over a nice 1" thorn with the front tire. reach down to pull it out and the tire starts going flat. the thorn was holding air. so I stick it back in and continue on riding. Its still holding air this morning (Monday)

The rest of us took a longer trail after mom left. took a couple spills but nothing that damaged (seriously) the rider or bike.

Took a tiny break after that one then hit the trail again. This time dad's chain broke on a down hill. please note that mom's and dad's bikes are the same brand and model of bikes. Oddly enough, my brothers and mine are all the same brand, but different models.
Anyway, we kept riding while dad walked back to the truck.

Had a great time, but man am I outta shape for that stuff! and I'm not entirely convinced that clip on pedals are such a great idea on a MTB...

Whats with all the Birthdays?

not that its a bad thing, but there's been a whole heck of a lot of BD's lately.

Becca's was earlier this week.
Shayla's was Thursday
Bekah's was yesterday
Mom's is today, as well as Hunkin's
Brothers and cousin's are in 10days and my roommates is the day after that!

Happy Birth Day to the whole mess of you!

Flippin' Awesome!

Had a good weekend.

Friday the gymnastics team, myself included, headed off to a small academy and performed our show for them. Its the first show of the semester and our routines need some, ok a LOT, of polish. but the kids really enjoyed the show and were happy to have us there. I spent a bit of time performing, read: showing off, on the trampoline during the show. I believe it was captured on film so I"ll have to track that down and stick it online for y'all to see.

Friday evening our team held vespers for them. Did a great job and the kids came away saying they were blessed.

The coach, the bus driver and myself got to stay in a school sponsors guest house. Much to the chagrin of the team who stayed on the over-full dorm's lobby floor. The bus driver is my old coach and also coached the current coach when he was in college. We wound up acting like a trio of girls and sitting up till 1AM and swapping stories and eating ice cream. The tales we were telling were quite a bit different then I would expect from a similar gathering of females. Politics, guns, gymnastics, family, food were just a few of the subjects that were covered.

Saturday morning we got up around 0830 and headed to Sabbath School that the team (it was all my brother in this instance) lead out. Again the kids enjoyed it and came away blessed. Many gave us hugs and thanked us for coming.
The bus had to be back in town for another school function so we skipped church, ate lunch and headed home.

To shorten the trip home, I called my friends in GA. it helped but I was quite sick of the bus after 3.5hrs.

Landed back here about 1545. Got the equipment all unloaded and I landed at the apt around 1630.

Sat around not doing a whole lot till about 1800 when I met a friend and another couple for a trip to the FTW Stock Show and Rodeo. I didn't think far enough in advance and the Rodeo was sold out so we wandered the stock buildings looking at a bunch of horses.

Hit On The Border for some grub, stuffed ourselves silly, got a free brownie ice cream thingy (which is huge, but mighty tasty) for an upcoming birth day, (which reminds me, I still need to find a costume for that party...)
then headed home.
I normally hate waiting for a train, but it makes for some nice talking time!

had a great weekend and the weather is looking wonderful for the rest of the week!

Cirque

If you've never seen Cirque Du Soleil, your missing out.

Cirque is bringing their Corteo show to Dallas Feb 9 - Mar 11.

Those of you in Houston get the pleasure of seeing it as well. but you'll have to look up your own dates.

Their shows aren't cheap, but they are worth every penny.

Ah, now THATS a weekend!

Saturday I managed to get out and go for a 140mi ride on the ST1300. I managed to turn a normally 30min trip into a 2.5hr adventure! county roads are so much more fun then the highway.
By the time I got home, the temp had dropped 11*F and the wind was forcing me to lean the bike way over.

Sunday my Pathfinder club (think Royal Rangers, boy/girl scouts) went down to Carl Chandler's Law Enforcement Academy for some firearms and self-defense instruction.
We had kids ranging in age from 13-17, both boys and girls.

Started the day off with a "This is what I've done" from Carl Chandler and continued into the rules of the range.
We then took the kids down to the three (handgun, rifle and shotgun) ranges. Went over the basic rules again, showed them how to load and handle the guns and turned them "loose." (they were still under very close supervision)

They took turns with the weapons and continued rotating around to the three ranges and trying their hand at the options. We had .22LR, 9mm, .40cal, .45cal pistols. Shotguns ranged from 410 to 12ga, rifles were all .22LR. one of the instructors brought out his AR-15 for us to shoot a few rounds through. And Carl brought out his Savage 10FP .308 rifle for some of us to shoot.

Let me tell you, that Savage was VERY addicting to shoot! I only put four rounds through it and I'm really wanting one! too bad I can't afford to get it any time soon. Someday!

Kids had a great time and we brought all of them back so it was a safe day.

Productivity

Had a rather productive day today.

Arrived at work at 0830 and proceeded to solve the worlds problems, well not actually the world, but a couple various depts on campus were happy with me today.

Left work promptly at noon and had lunch with my mom and brothers.
Following this, we drove to Dallas and crashed the Apple store, where I picked up a new iPod to replace the one that died on me over Christmas.

80gb iPod in white, 2yr extended warranty, protective case, education discount, 10% off for trading in the old iPod, plus uncle sams sales tax brought the total to $461 and change.
coulda been worse and I fully expect to have over 2yrs of service out of this iPod as well.

Arrived home around 1530 and got back to work on the alternator on the 4Runner. Discovered it wouldn't quite fit so a trip to the parts house was in order for a persuasive device. some would call it a file. a few minutes later, I had the alternator bolted in place and verified to be working.
That accomplished it was time to replace the aging and no longer brilliant headlights. Got those swapped and realigned to point correctly and what do ya know, I can see!

finish the day off with mom's hot cinnamon rolls and thats what I call a good day.

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

for the love of dead alternators

The alternator died on the 4runner the other day and I started replacing it last night.
I say started, because I didn't get it finished.
of the two bolts/nuts that hold the alternator on, I dropped one of the nuts. and of course, it was never to be seen again. I spent 30min looking for the stupid thing.
it didn't go through and land on the ground.
it didn't stop in the frame anywhere.
it didn't land on the skid plate.
it didn't wind up on the axle anywhere.

It just plain vanished!

so off to the local parts house for a replacement. they were closed.
Ok, so I'll run into town and get one there.
Lowe's didn't have one, spent 20min looking.
the other parts place didn't have one
Home Depot did have one, but I had to track somebody down to find the stupid thing for me.
So I spent over an hr and a half trying to find this thing and by the time I got home, it was too dark to bother working on it. so I'll work on it this afternoon.

oh and how much did the stupid nut cost? $0.38

The ST is home

Finally made it up to Honda West to pick up the ST1300. They said they looked and performed about every test they could think of, but couldn't find the leak.

So I'll ride it and see what happens. should the leak come back up, I'll take it back.

Heated grips sure are nice!

Not good news

Got a call from mom this morning. Apparently my grandfather was scheduled to get some angioplasty done this morning. Well once he got there the Dr's decided his heart was too blocked to for angioplasty to work. So they rescheduled him for heart bypass surgery this afternoon.

Oh and come to find out that he fractured his wrist getting out of his chair late last week.

If you could keep him, and grandma, in your prayers it would be greatly appreciated.

Funny rendition of PMS

Stumbled across this on one of the motorcycle forums

PMS = Parked Motorcycle Syndrome

I know I get grumpy if my bike(s) are parked for too long!

Rollerskating

The school took all the students up to Arlington Skatium for rollerskating Saturday night.
I didn't have any specific plans to go, but a friend invited me along and she's plenty cute enough that its hard to pass on an invite. So she and another friend of mine took off to beat the buses.

got up there and missed the turn, shoulda been paying more attention to where I was going, so took the next turn into an adjacent parking lot in hopes we could cut across. well no such luck, but the grass separating the parking lots was just too inviting and I drove the 4Runner through there. I know I'm a horrible person.

Skated around for a couple hours then came home. Watched an episode of The Unit then decided that since it was after 3AM it was time to crash.

Had a good time. not enough sleep, but hey, you can sleep when your dead right?