Ever since I was a child I have heard music playing in my head. Constantly drumming away, mostly the same verse or phrase of a song that started the moment I woke up.(Today it's JEM's "Just a Ride")

There have been very few times in my life where I've actively noticed the music stop; like when I enjoyed my former prescription to valium, or the 3 seconds directly following a sucker punch in the face, and of course, the frozen moment in time when I realized I was about to be involved in an accident that may very well take my life.

Last week, Alan and I took the Calfee for a test ride. I arrived at the bike shop around 3, and test road a few other bikes first. I rode the Lemond Blue Sky- a steel and carbon-fibre frame with Ultrega components, I rode a titanium bike made by a company called seven with Camponile components on it, and waited patiently for Scott- the 20-something bike-salesman-mechanic guy to outfit the Calfee Luna with a water bottle cage and a comfortable seat, and I waited for Alan to show up from work, and go out with me on the test run I've been waiting for for weeks.

During my test rides I was instructed by Alan to be aware of how the bike felt on the road. Apparently to experienced road bikers, different materials, Aluminum, Carbon Fibre, Steel and Titanium all have a different resonances. All this was lost on me though.
I am coming from years of riding a so heavy, with tires so big and soft that ANYTHING I get on is going to feel stiff, bumpy, and uncomfortable.
I got on each bike and rated it by how long I think my ass would put up with it, or how the vibraton rated on my own personal rhicter scale.
Then I rode the Calfee, and I noticed something different, it felt very familiar.
It was very different from the Lemond, the Trek, the Seven, in that I felt like I was back on my hybrid, my balloon tires, my heavy steel frame. It felt natural to me.
Suddenly I realized what Jim was talking about- the Calfee was a no-brainer.
The carbon-fibre frame dampend the road noise so well, that there was virtually no learning curve for my bones to ajust to. I was simply back on my hybrid, only a lot lighter.
Since the bike weighs less than HALF of my old bike(A mere 17.5 lbs), I felt like I had super-human strength; HIlls were like flats, flats were like going downhill, and going downhill was like flying. Needless to say, I bought the bike.

I took her out for the first real ride on Saturday, and tested her on my regular route through Griffith park. It was a fast and comfortable 40 minutes that usually took a full hour plus some. I wasn't tired or bored, so I kept riding, and was totally suprised when I got home. In an hour and a half I had covered 26.7 miles, and could have gone for 40.
Another very surpising thing I noticed when I walked the bike into the house, and leaned it against the wall, was that the music in my head had stopped. It was quiet and still, and remained that way for the rest of the afternoon.

As you can imagine, I am looking at this Calfee Luna now as a lot more than a beautifully engineered Carbon-fibre toy. This pretty blue pill is quite likely my new drug, and I intend to set my own prescription, take one a day for stress and to help me sleep at night. Your results may differ.

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Luna-tic fringe

This month I have saved and saved and I am finally ready to go shopping to get myself that fabulous new bike that will launch me into the world of hardcore long-distance road riding, or at least give me a shiny new toy to show off to my friends at the teeter-totter.

I enlisted the help of my hardcore riding friends Jim and Alan, and they helped me define a list of priorities to narrow down my search for the perfect set of wheels.

They sited things like Frame size, frame materials, derailer components, brakes etc. Previously my list consisted of adjectives like "Shiny" and "Cool-looking", so as you see, I have some work to do.

Did you say Luna, or Looney?

One of Jim's adjectives seems to be "Expensive" because the
bike he's certain is perfect for me is a custom made Calfee Luna, list priced at 3K, on sale for $2,390.
'Wow" I thought, "I could get a bike for the cost of one Romanian Baby".

I recently learned that for the serious rider (yeah, right) this is a bike that falls into the category of "Middle-ground tolerable". Honestly people, it's a bike!

I'd have to ride this thing every day just to feel like I'm getting my money's worth.
That's right, two months salary for a toy that will inevitably put a callous on my perinium the size of a silver dollar. Saturday I'm doing the real shopping, and I'm taking a few models, including the Luna, out for some test rides. I'll let you know how it all went.

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It's a Miracle!!

After nearly two weeks of painful hell, Rusty has made a complete recovery, and we are all so happy.
The screaching, the limping, the worrying over tenuous bowel movements, all is in the past.

Rusty was making marked improvements with each visit to Dr. Kam (The Chiropractor), but each evening we'd see him relapse back to a weak, nervous twist of spasming dog meat. Overall his improvement ratio until Tuesday was 17%-20% at best. I was having trouble handling the stress, for every time the doorbell rang, a visitor came over, or someone stepped too close, rusty would let out a screacing howl of pain that cold go on for eons(or a minute, depending on how you saw it)

On Tuesday we saw Mathew, the acupuncturist, went home and slept the rest of the day. When Bang got home from work, Rusty was running up to greet him like nothing was ever wrong with him. He's been 100% ever since. Running, jumping on the furniture, pestering the cat, sleeping on my pillow. Back to his old, misbehaving self and I am so relieved.

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Apparently, Chinese Vets have been treating dogs with
Acupuncture for
thousands of years.,

Today Jan asked me how much money I plan to spend on Rusty's recovery.
"What's Your budget for this?" she asked, and I was a little suprised at the question. I never considered putting a financial ceiling on Rusty's healing process. I couldn't imagine I would get to a point where I would draw the line, and choose to stop funding the 'Rusty health and comfort" project.
"I'm sorry Pooter, but you've only got $5 left in your health account, so either you start feeling better, or we're feeding you to the cat!".

When I told my boss Ron that Rusty was seeing a chiropractor for his recent back problems, he thought I was kidding. "No Way Jose" he IM'd me through our instant messenger, "You must be joking". I suppose I might have suggested I ran out on thin ice to save him from drowning, he felt I was being silly. I didn't grace the conversation with an answer to that, but changed the subject.

The idea of dropping Rusty's care for financial reasons seems ridiculous to me, though it probably sounds no more ridiculous than sending your dog to the chiropractor to someone like Ron. I didn't dare mention his acupuncture appoinment scheduled for this Tuesday

To a lot of people who have dogs in their life, the idea of their pet taking on the roles of the child in their lives does not seem as crazy as it sounds. Dogs in particular get extremely emotionally attached to their owners, who are more than happy to return the favor. A vast majority of us who do not consider ourselves emotionally independant are very quick to jump on the wagon of affection when someone, or some THING starts loving us unconditionally. We see ourselves as having little choice but to love them right back, and we do, with all our hearts.

Dogs are extremely proficient at displaying the kind of behavior that we humans define as genuine loving affection. They insist on sleeping near us, and always interested in going wherever we are headed.They look at us with big sad eyes, they make high pitched whiny sounds when they really want something, and many breeds have evolved real eyebrows, to help them emotionally manipulate the human race with a greater zeal than fish, hamsters, or the common house cat could ever hope to achieve. Maybe this is why dogs have been considered our "Best" friends for as long as anyone can remember.

Rusty's recent back-trauma has put him and I under a certain amount of stress, him physically and, if animals actually do feel like so many people believe they do, emotional stress I'm sure. It's put me under some serious stress in that I worry about his comfort, his health, and his future. I long to see him running carelessly across the dog park grounds, dropping piles of used kibble in the grass, sniffing other dogs asses, and pissing indiscrimanently on anything that juts out at the proper angle.
Knowing this type of physical strain personally, I also know that it's just a matter of time before the little guy is running playfully in the garden again. We just need to be patient, and let him heal.

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The Obsession Continues . . .

I can believe anything, provided that it is quite incredible.
Oscar Wilde (1854 - 1900),

Remember that what you believe will depend very much on what you are.
Noah Porter (1811 - 1892)