Musical Youth!

A girl just badgered me into burning a CD for her. She said she wanted to hear something different, and if you heard me and Riley get into it about music, you'd know I listen to some non-lemur music. At first I tried to beg off. I was afraid to reveal my audio inclinations to this girl. But then she threatened my manhood with references to TNKOTB. I was forced into action. Yes, my manhood is tiny and fragile.

Anyway, since Photobucket is down and I can't work on the other blog I wanted, I guess I'll surf YouTube and post some songs that I enjoy.

Real Life: Send Me an Angel


Sugar Ray: Someday


Eddie Money: Take Me Home Tonight


Pet Shop Boys: West End Girls


Foreigner: I Want to Know What Love Is


Icehouse: Electric Blue


Meatloaf: I'd Do Anything For Love (But I won't Do That)


Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers: Mary Jane's Last Dance


The Cranberries: Dreams


Vanilla Ice: Ice Ice Baby (hehe)


Deee-Lite: Groove is in the Heart


Heart: These Dreams


BoA: Milky Way


Psy: Champion


Fatboy Slim: Right Here Right Now


Alan Kuo: Ling


Nickelback: Photograph


Orange Range: Shanghai Honey


Roxette: Joyride


Weezer: Buddy Holly


Lisa Loeb: Stay


LEN: Steal My Sunshine


Journey: Open Arms


Maxi Priest and Roberta Flack: Set the Night to Music


Timmy T: One More Try


Fine Young Cannibals: She Drives Me Crazy


Groove Coverage: Poison


Human League: Don't You Want Me Baby


Men Without Hats: Pop Goes the World


Baltimora: Tarzan Boy


Breathe: How Can I Fall


That should tide you over for a while.

Waimea Canyon Run

My legs were really tired after filming this.

Art on the GSX-R750
Me on the SV650S
Shige on the R6

More Wood References

My brother and I were out riding our mountain bikes this afternoon. We were just getting some exercise. Normally Riley would be with us, but he had to go see about a girl.

As we rode, we shot the shit. It's just a normal routine. We're usually laughing at something. So I smiled.



That's when my brother hit me with the bad news.

K: Your teeth are really yellow.



K: Looks almost like your teeth are made of wood.



Great. So now I'm self-conscious about my smile. Once we get back to my brother's work place, I check my teeth in my car's mirror. Ack! He was right! My teeth are horrible! I never noticed since my bathroom light isn't really white. I have an Austin Power's smile.



My teeth are more stained now than when I smoked. They're so stained that people must think I still smoke or chew tobacco. sniffle.



I think what happened is that I stained my teeth with too much soda. After I quit smoking, I picked up another addiction. Diet Pepsi. If I'm left unattended, I can drink a 12 pack a day easy. All that acid and caramel did a number on my pearly yellows.



So off to Walmart we went. I picked up some whitening strips. The box says I should see results in three days.



Guess I will see in three days.

Singularity

Well, it's Spring Break, and I got two weeks off from school. This gives me lots of time to look at porn and learn things from the internet.



I got to learn something special about my body's health. I was perusing a mountain biking forum when I came upon a discussion about bike saddles. The original poster was looking for a more comfortable saddle for long distance rides. Someone replied with a link to a study on saddle designs.



It turns out that many bike saddles are poorly designed. The bulk of your bulk when seated rest squarely on your perineum. My seat is similar to this picture. Don't know what a perineum is?



This is it. It's that spot between the recreation area and the dump. Having the seat pressing against this area cuts off blood flow to the pecker. Over time, it could cause damage. Your wang can get out of whack, making it hard to whack. Women don't have wangs, but the pressure of the seat could cause discomfort. Or comfort. Whatever. A wangless friend once told me that she could get off driving with tight jeans. But I digress.

I went out and bought this saddle.



It has gel material which is nice. It also has a "comfort channel" that moves the pressure points off of the peepee anchor. I didn't get a chance to try it out yet, but I'm hoping it will work to stop the head numbing, errr... numbing.



And since this is a new month, I stopped by Borders Books to pick up some magazines.



Hehe. Not that kind. I picked up Superbike and Sport Rider. I also picked up Rocky Balboa and Casino Royale. Then I waited in the queue.

There were only two cashiers and a line was starting to form. So another salesperson opened her register for me. She had a pierced nose and two lip rings. She dressed in black and had dark features. I wouldn't describe her as goth though. Maybe more bohemian. I know she wasn't northern European nor Asian. But she was pretty.



She vaguely looked like Caterina Murino (she was in Casino Royale. Coinkidink!), so I guess she was a Mediterranean breed.

Bohemian Chick: Do you have a Rewards Card?

(I whip it out)

BC: It looks like you have a personal shopper day. Would you like to use it?

(At this point, she could have told me my hair was on fire and I wouldn't have heard a word. I just stood there with my mouth agape.)

BC: You don't know what that is, right? (long explanation that gave me time to look at her some more.)

Me: Are you always so polite and cheerful? I only ask because you are seriously making me feel really special here.

Now here's the rub. I can think that kind of stuff, but I can never say it. Now I would have loved to give her that line, but all I could manage was some incomprehensible murmur of acknowledgment.



I was Helen Keller. Wah-ter! Wah-ter! I couldn't speak in anything other than non-human grunts. I also misspelled my name when I signed the credit card slip. Luckily I played it off by pretending that my pen was dry. But it just goes to show you:

THAT IS WHY I AM STILL SINGLE!!!

Fuck. At least this time it wasn't a shemale.

Arthur and Shige: Together Again

Ran into these guys on the mountain today. Slapped the camcorder on Shige's bike and let them loose.

Dendrophilia

This morning I woke up a bit earlier than I planned.



Since I was up, I figured I would turn on the computer and convert some J-drama files from softsub to hardsub. If I didn't mention it earlier, I love watching TV shows from Japan.

Once my computer booted up, my Windows Messenger activated. I didn't even realize it was set on automatic. I was immediately nailed by an IM from a XX friend.

XX: Hi!

Me: Hi. Sorry. Just woke up.

XX: Morning wood?



Funny she should ask. She hit the nail on the head. I explained the whole story.

I was planning on sleeping in late since it's Sunday, and my noisy neighbors haven't been running the welders in the mornings lately. However, I had to wake up at 7 AM to pee. Since it was still early, I crawled back into bed to go back to sleep.

Then it happened.



Morning wood.

I figured I would just fall asleep and everything would be normal. I was wrong. I must have been thinking of something good because this sucker would just not go away. Now any post-puberty male can tell you that a boner, if left untreated, will cause aches and pains. So after 90 minutes, I gave up trying to sleep and got out of bed. I figured doing the file conversions would be non-sexual enough to ease the swelling.



No, it wasn't blueballs.



XX: Ninety minutes?!?

Me: Yeah. But I had worse.

Remember Virginia? The Eastern Unintelligentsia?



Well, there was an incident where she came into my room and woke me up at the crack of noon. Luckily Hilo can be a chilly place, and I was snug under the blankets.



She couldn't see that I was hiding yet another incident of MWS, Morning Wood Syndrome.



It wasn't the typical case of MWS. This one was bad. It was like someone took off the pressure regulator. Mini-me felt like it was going to explode. To top it off, I had to pee. Bad.



So there I was, wearing only boxers, hiding my manhood under a blanket, holding in my pee, with a cute girl sitting on my bed next to me. Sometimes I wish I was an extrovert.

A Different XX Friend Sometime Later: You should have just whipped it out and taken care of it. Tell her if she didn't like it, she could leave.



Like I said, "sometimes I wish I was an extrovert."

I couldn't do it. All I could do was chat and hide for what felt like an eternity. Virginia eventually left, but the wood remained.



I had to bend and contort into several different angles to get a flow going. It was the hardest time I had peeing. Pardon the pun.

Back in the Saddle

Where have I been? Welp, for a month, I haven't been riding my mountain bike in Waimea Canyon. Today was my first day in a month. It felt sketchy at first since I've knocked myself unconscious and ripped a chunk out of my chin, but in the end, it was a good exercise day.

I already showed the main features of our downhill rides in previous videos, so no point in showing them again. However, today we came across a newly built section of trail.

Here's a link to Riley's blog. I was the camera man.

MTB

Hawaii History Day: District Event

OK, so lately I've been stuck trying to find good topics to write about. It doesn't help that I've been busy with serious work during the week, as opposed to my usual goofing off. Although I have had a bunch of little mini-topics, such as Valtrex, come to mind, I couldn't find one nice, juicy topic to really sink my teeth into.

And that was a lot of commas.

Oh well. I guess since I don't have the big hits, I should write some little ones to keep you two entertained.



Today was our district's History Day contest. History Day is an annual contest that revolves around large, involved research projects. Students choose a topic that relates to a given theme and create a project based on what they learned.

There are essay categories.



Multimedia.



Performances.



And display exhibits.



So students pick something they want to learn more about. They sift through secondary and primary sources. They learn the techniques of historians, or they at least learn some skills that would come in handy in college.

That's what the brochure says.

The reality is a bit different. You get a bunch of whiny kids who have to be forced into this assignment. You pull your hair out because students can't seem to connect two and two together and can't pick a topic that actually relates to the theme.

"You mean marijuana can't be a triumph in history?"

You also get frustrated since students can't even use an encyclopedia. They lack the wherewithal to even find secondary sources. You get blue in the face explaining what a primary source is, but they still draw a blank since it wasn't on MTV (a crap station geared solely to sell crap to teens).

You give them a couple of months to collect primary sources since none are available on this island. You explain to them that they will need to request some sources by mail, and it could take weeks. In the end, your students wait until the last few days to do the project. This is even after you set up deadlines for each part of the project.

But, you can't fault the students for being late. In today's fucking hippie tree-hugging-equivalent world of education, due dates aren't important so long as the kids get the point. You gotta accept the late work with a smile even though we're supposed to be creating self directed learners according to the state's education policy.



In the end, I found four projects that were acceptable. With some extra work, they could end up being very competitive. I spoke with the students and explained the changes they would have to make. Of the four, only one made the changes. Two waited until the night before the event. The fourth didn't even want to make the changes so they decided they didn't want to participate anymore.

One of the projects still had the glaring error of stating that two atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima. Sigh.

But once again, crazy policies win. Our district is allowed to send three projects in our age group to the state event. Yay for celebrating and rewarding mediocrity.



Aha! But what did I see? One of the judges from a different category came over to speak with some of my students. It seems the judges were interested in the topic my students chose. So while we were waiting for their parents...

Kids: They really liked our project.

Me: Those judges see hundreds of projects each year. There are tons of projects about Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima. The USS Indianapolis is a bit unique.

Kids: Yeah! Woohoo!

Me: How did you guys pick that topic anyway?

Kids: You told us. But we didn't tell the judges that.

Me: What? I thought you guys found it yourselves.

Kids: No.

Me: You sure? I thought you guys found it on the internet.

Kids: That was after you told us about it.

Me: Oh... No wonder you guys had a good topic.

And that was my day. How was yours? Don't need to answer that. I really don't care.

Wedge: The Proper Noun

Over the past couple of weeks, HBO has been showing the original Star Wars Trilogy (movies 4, 5, 6). I hadn't watched these movies in many, many years, so when I was able to, I turned on the tube. I watched A New Hope and Return, but missed Empire. I was impressed once again at how good those movies were. They really made the first three movies look like crap.

Then it hit me. I realized that there was one hero whose abilities in the cockpit was greater than anyone else, but he received no recognition at all.



It wasn't Anakin Skywalker, aka Darth Vader. Although Obi Wan claims Anakin was the greatest pilot he ever saw, Anakin wasn't all that. His first victory came by pure luck. With sheer crappy acting, he bungled his way onto a fighter and accidentally destroyed a battleship. He got his kills defending the first Death Star with the aid of two wingmen.



It wasn't Han Solo. He might be a cool leader, but in the cockpit, he scored little kills. His best kill during major combat came when he shot one of Darth Vader's wingmen. That's it.



Not Luke either. Yeah, he rocks in Beggar's Canyon, but he got shot down on Hoth. And if it wasn't for Han blindsiding Darth Vader, Luke would have been space dust. Luke is over rated because he dropped some acid and thought he heard his dead teacher's voice telling him how to blow up the Death Star.



It wasn't the generic Tie Fighter pilot either, even though he scored like a hundred Rebel kills.



It was Wedge Antilles. If you never heard of him, don't worry. He's not out for fortune or fame. He's just out to do his job. Although he is pure kick ass, he never bothered to have crazy ceremonies with vestal virgins giving him Olympic medals.



Wedge was instrumental in destroying the first Death Star. He covered Luke's butt, even eating bullets for him. In the end, Wedge kept Luke alive long enough for Luke to kill steal the Death Star.



Wedge also was the first to take down an AT-AT on Hoth. That kill required Wedge to do some fancy flying, while under fire, to tangle the AT-AT legs with a tow cable.



Guess who led the attack on the second Death Star. Yup. Wedge did. He out-piloted Lando through the tunnels heading into the power core. Lando almost flew his ship into a wall. Wedge also destroyed the power regulator which allowed Lando to get a shot at the power core.



And he also killed a shitload of Tie Fighters.

So when you find some geeks talking about Star Wars, you can approach them and say that the greatest character in the series was Wedge Antilles.

And these aren't the droids you're looking for.

Zero MPH Crash

How can someone have an ER inducing crash at zero miles per hour? Easy. If they have the walrus-like dexterity of Nonwheezer, they can pull it off no problem.



Last Wednesday, I decided to continue using these pedals. They're called "clipless." It sounds like a misnomer, but if you knew the history behind this type of pedals, the name would make sense. The original forms had a "clip," that went over the foot. This ones remove the clip and replaces it with a special clamp. The clamp matches a bracket that is mounted to biking shoes. Once you are clamped in, your foot is stuck to the pedal.

The benefit of such a pedal set up is that you can use full power throughout the entire pedal-stroke. With regular platform pedals, you can only push down. With the clipless, you can also pull up. This adds to your pedalling efficiency.

The downside is that if you're not careful, you can fall with your feet locked into the pedals. That's what happened to me. I had a minor knee-scraping fall in the parking lot before our ride. Unfortunately, my handlebar hit the ground, and my chin hit the handlebar. When I picked myself up, my friend noticed I was injured. I felt nothing except the blood dripping off my chin.



So off to the ER we went. Another ride cut short by my mad skillz.

Nurse: Wow! How did you manage to do that?

Nonwheezer: Um... sheer stupidity?

Nurse: Yeah, that will get you all the time.

Both the nurse and the doctor were very pretty blonde women.

I was in the ER for about 2 and a half hours. There were other emergencies, so my injury had to wait. It was ok though. I think I fell asleep. I know I felt surprisingly refreshed by the time the doctor started to stitch me up.



It turns out that my injury was a bit more complicated than a deep laceration. The end of the handlebar actually gouged out a bit of flesh. The doctor tried her best, but all she could do was sew up the edges to help close the wound a bit. It couldn't be sewn completely.

Nonwheezer: ...

Doc: You were going to say something? (with needle and suture in hand)

Nonwheezer: Yeah. I now have an embroidered chin. hehe.



I finally got out and headed home. I hadn't stopped bleeding since the crash, so I was concerned that bath time would be torture. But for some reason, my wound doesn't hurt. If it weren't for the tension of the sutures and bandaids, I would forget I have this injury.

Shaving was scary though. Fate played a stupid trick on me. For about 2 weeks I let my goatee grow. Now I had to spend a fair amount of time trying to remove as much facial hair as I could so my bandages would stick. I was afraid I would damage the sutures or reopen the wound, but I eventually completed the task ok.



And this is with me cleaned up and with part of the gash stitched.

Of course, Riley had to keep ragging me about the crash. He told everyone he knew about the ER visit. On and on he went.

But the Japanese believe in bachi. What goes around, comes around. Early Thursday morning, the abrasive Riley was goofing off while riding a MTB. He took a pedal to the shin. And that specific pedal had really long gripping pegs. He ended up with some nice holes in his leg.