JB the old man

So I've pretty much come to the conclusion that I'm an 80-year old man trapped in this 20's body. I've recently discovered the wondrous pleasures in traditional shaving. OK, for YEARS I stuck to the: Wet face, apply cheap foam, shave and rinse. It worked well for many years, but once I found a straight razor, shaving soap and a lather brush, everything changed. People always say "JB, my grandpa used to use that junk, go with evolution, don't fight it". Wrong. This combination is great. If you look around, you can find good quality stuff and it makes the mornings a little less hectic. Consider traditional shaving black. Once you do it, you'll never go back. Unless of course you're that guy in the movie "Soul Man".

I'm also one of the few people I know that still goes to a barber. And not like a great clips/Aveda school dropout, but a real old school barber. The place I go has old guys who NEVER get their haircut. They just show up, read the paper, play chess and talk about everything from the good ol' days to women. I'm a true believer in the quote "All the worlds problems can be solved in the barber shop or around a campfire". These old guys are great. They talk about the Winter of 38 and how the snow was 10 feet high. The best part is that their stories change every time they tell it....One day, I'll be that old man ranting about nothings and chasing kids off my lawn with a broom.

I'm also finding old records to be entertaining. I've always preferred records to CD's and an ipod, but now I'm ebay'n old records from Gil Scott Heron. I've also got original 12'' from Run DMC and Al Green. I need to find a bigger closet for my records because the one I currently use is filled up.....

I'm really not looking forward to teaching this fall. I enjoy my days to write, flick and bike--now I need to focused on kids education.

So I rebuke my previous rant on the Olympics. I caught Shawn Johnson and in about 5 years, she'll be pretty fly. I also watched the volleyball matches.....I guess there was nothing else on TV at that time.

And the great Minnesota get together is going on. I'll probably go and hit up the State Fair and have my fill of food on a stick. I also dig the animal barns (I'm not sure why). And it doesn't matter what time of the day/night you go, the beer gardens are ALWAYS packed with drunk farmers. It's hilarious.

Well, I'm off to try to nap before work. The past 3 nights I've had the song "Angel Dust" stuck in my head.....damn soul music.

Dear Summer/I guess I'm un-American

So I got a ton of nasty looks the day while in Barnes and Noble. I was perusing through books looking for the new book by Jack Pendarvis called Awesome. OK, any book named Awesome is more then enough to get my attention. I find the book (the last one) and go through my ritual of "should I buy this novel or not". That usually consists of re-reading the first paragraph a few times and then jump to the middle and read some excerpts. You see, most writers will spend the most time on the first sentence and last paragraph over any other part of the book. The first paragraph was talking about some guy who found a derby and was convinced it was the coolest thing of ALL TIME. Right away I assumed this guy was a lot like me. Needless to say I was laughing out loud during my reading and some book snobbers gave me the stinky eyes. In the end, I didn't buy the book. Instead, I decided to rekindle my vow from when I was 16 years old...To finish Ulysses by James Joyce. I still can only muster 30 pages before I get lost. The book is INSANELY good, but a little different from others from the same time period.

And on my un-American tandem, I can't stand the Olympics. EVERYONE is like "JB, how can you dislike the Olympics"??? Simple, the sports being televised are boring. I said it, boring. The only thing I can watch is basketball, which is pretty much lame because Steve Nash, Shawn Kemp and Christian Laettner aren't playing. But, unknown to me, Alicia Sacramone is a hottie. So I watched the gymnastics routine (where she fell twice ((maybe because she's a tad top heavy). Anyway, she gets my vote for "most likely to end up in Playboy". I'd watch tennis, but it has yet to be shown. Is BMX really an Olympic sport?? and beach volleyball? I can't imagine the ancient Greeks who began this competition were thinking "You know, the track and field stuff is good, but we REALLY need Zack Morris out here playing volleyball on some sand".

And summer is pretty much winding down in Minneapolis. We drudge on for 9 months out of the year for the glorious 3 month span of heaven. Speaking of spans, way to go Dernard. It is supposed to be a great week of weather, and next week I get to look forward to school again......Thankfully, it's the last semster (hopefully).

And because the Republican National Convention is here in the Twin Cities in a few weeks, anti-GOP graffiti has been popping up everywhere......

Get Out Phascists on Highway 280












Greed Over People on Univeristy Ave in Dinkytown

Get out Phascists on the Grain Belt sign in downtown.









And in case you haven't heard, Where The Wild Things movie comes out next year. I'm quite pumped.

That's about it. It's off to write a paper.

Rocky Mountain High

So this past week, Kristen and I went out to Colorado to spend some time in the Mountains. If I get a free round trip anywhere, Colorado would be up there on places to visit. The oddest thing is that there are mountains EVERYWHERE. If you look out your bathroom window, BOOM! Mountains....The first day we got there, we went to Garden of the Gods. This is the picture of "The Kissing Camel".






And nothing special, just a picture of one of the rocks and the foothills in the background.












The following day, we decided to go biking through the mountains. Now hills around Minneapolis are one thing. Biking over 4 miles in a general uphill grade is painstaking. Going back down them is easy as can be though. The side effect of normally being on a fixies is that when I'm on a gear bike, I forget to either change gears at all, or continually pedal (even downhill). My Surly and me.





Kris lucked out and got the trill Bianchi. They didn't have one that fit my size, so I couldn't sport the green.....











There is a path from Frisco to Breckenridge, but I got us lost and blew about a half hour looking for it.....












Once we reached Breckenridge, we stopped to flick some mountains and streams. One thing I plan to do when I get back there is to whitewater raft, and fly fish.










On Saturday we met up with my aunt and uncle and got lunch and hung out downtown. We then went to the Rockies/Padres game. Coors field is great. I can't wait until the Twins get the outside field (well, except the first month and a half of the season--snow and cold). We got free tickets from my uncle and we sat in the "club seats". Apparently that means we get plush seats, carpeted floors, near-private bathrooms and a personal server (In case walking to get a beer/hotdog is too much work for me). It is by far the best seats I've ever had for a game. It is the only way to go....









Being a Cubs fan, I had to take of flick of the now-Padres-pitcher, Greg Maddux. There was a guy in the level above us who would yell "Go Maddux"! every 2 minutes. He became my new friend.









Then one day we decided to drive up to Mount Evans. Driving up a mountain should be easy right? Hell no. As you can see in this flick, there is about 2 feet to the side of you before you reach a 500 foot-straight-down drop. I'm not all that scared of heights, but I got REAL nervous towards the top. There is barely enough room for a 2-way road, and every time a truck came towards us, we both had to stop and creep past one another. I had no intention of cliff diving..



The drive from bottom to top is about an hour and a half. Once we reached Summit Lake (pictured here), the sun came out and it warmed from 39 to about 50 degrees. Being from Minnesota, shorts and a T-shirt were ok for 39 degrees and climbing mountains......









Kristen and me at Summit lake. It's a glacial lake that is about 75% of the way up the mountain. Right before we reached the lake, there was a sign that read "Danger: Extreme road damage ahead". Great, just what I needed while I drive like a 90 year old man up these skinny roads.














I wish I could post my film pictures on here (they capture it better), but these mountains go on for as far as you can see. It's amazing. You could walk for days on end and still not get to the other side. From what I understand, the continental divide is in the background. You can't tell, but it's about 600 feet straight down behind me....







At the top of the mountain. As you can see, we're actually above the clouds. It's very strange to be standing on land, and looking down at clouds....Now I'm a pretty atheletic person, but walking at a brisk pace up here is quite a bit harder due to the lack of air. There were a ton of old people who didn't get out of their cars due to the lack of oxygen.
And yes, that is a Brad Radke jersey.




So we took about 300 pictures and video. I can't post them all, but I'll try to get the good ones up. It was by far, one of the best trips I've ever taken.

For the rest of my vacation, I've been golfing. Yes, golfing. I hate golf, and golfers. But somehow, I find myself on the course hitting the stress out. But I make the game worse for EVERYONE else. I'm horrible, so I hit the ball into other fields and piss off the other players. They yell at me and I argue back. 70 year old guys get really pissed off at a kid in a Shawn Kemp jersey messing up their game.

Since the weather is nice out today, I'll be jogging around the lakes. I'm aiming for the Nokomis-to-Harriet-to-Calhoun and around them. I think it's about 15 miles or so. If I get tired, I'll just do 2 of them.

Bernie Mac and Issac Hayes both died. It was a sad weekend.......

So the American women lost the gold in gymnastics. They blamed a time delay by the olympic officials on Alicia Sacramone (i.e. one good looking lady) falling. I should be an olympian. But in something cool like 4-square......

I'm not sure why, but I'm really caught up in Lisey's Story by Stephen King.

I wish there was more news to talk about, but I gotta go and enjoy this perfect-weather-day!

Round out the Tank

So this past weekend was a busy one. Friday started out with the Uptown Art Fair. All in all, it's probably the best art showing in Minneapolis. The best part is that it's during the summer. I had to go on Friday because if you get there any other time during the weekend, it's shoulder to shoulder.

There's usually some really good art, but also some really bad crafts. If I had the $$ I would probably buy some of the works....

This is always one of my favorite stands. I forgot her name, buy she makes these chrome and metal eggs....

And of course, Saturday was the wedding of Damien and Jessica. It was one of the better weddings I've ever been to. Here are the Brides maids...Emily, Rachael, Hilary and two girls I don't know.

Damien (not in the blue), Ritchie, Josh, Sir Mike McCabe, a guy I don't know, and Trevor. A few people made the comment that the fellow in the blue coat resembled Colonel Sanders....I guess a bit. It was quite a good ceremony though.

This was the end of the ceremony (obviously). I wish I would have gotten a flick of the bike they rode off on. It was genius! Thanks to these two, I have the song "Another First Kiss" still stuck in my head.....










The best part of this flick is that Ryan Ritchie is staring off into the middle of nowhere thinking about Meatballs 4, or maybe Ben Afflecks role in Phantoms (where he was indeed the bomb). And oddly enough, Mike and me don't go anywhere without our bags.








Jason, Mike and Josh the photobomber!


















Ryan giving the best man speech. As he's bringing tears to everyone in the room, someone goes "Where's Mike"? That's a good question.....Then someone says "I think he's snoozing in the bushes". I couldn't believe it, so I had to check it out....










Sure enough, Mike was out cold at the bottom of a huge, steep hill. As I'm taking this picture, people next to me are talking about it.
Guy 1 "That guy must have started drinking EARLY"!
Guy 2 "Well, you know what they say? You can't drink all day unless you start in the morning"!
Girl "Should we maybe wake him up or something"?
Guy 1 "Nah, the mosquito's will get to him eventually".

Video of Mike snoozin.

Dancing to Al Green......It was nice to see a live band at a wedding instead of just a DJ.

And a little Blistering in the sun....

Well, nothing but vacation for the next two weeks....I will surely be hitting the mountains in Colorado for a little biking and climbing....
And a word to the wise, while taking college courses, make sure to meet the physical fitness portion of it. There's nothing worse then getting ready to graduate and hearing "Oh, by the way, your missing a 1-credit course in P.E"......