Ended up with a Gary Fisher Wahoo. Surprisingly, there really weren’t a lot of options in the $500-$600 range for bikes. I don’t know why it surprised me, my bridgestone that I bought back in college was $550. And it didn’t have a front fork and definitely didn’t have disc brakes.

Having ridden it for just a bit (once to work and back, approx. 8 miles) a couple of observations. The frame is a lot lighter than I remember bike frames. Aluminum for frames was at the high end back in the day, so it caught me off guard that most everything is now. Which, and maybe this in my head, makes the bikes I tested feel a bit strange. It feels like the heaviest parts of the bike are the extremities. Also feels like just about everything on this bike, except for the frame and rear derailer, is pretty low end. Hopefully it holds up to a bit of abuse. I don’t want to go back to Heather for money to upgrade parts for a year or two if I can help it. The front fork has a lock out on it, which the other bikes I looked at didn’t have. That being said, the front fork bottoms out easy. Then again, I’m not going to pounding it all that hard anyway. The disc brakes seem to be more gimmick than useful; the other bikes I looked it with standard rim clamp brakes stopped much better. Sales person told me they’d bed in and start working much better; hasn’t happened yet, doubting it ever will.

Now I just need to work on upgrading the legs so hills don’t kill me, and need to man up and get a set of clipless pedals. I was all set and then my neighbor busted his leg when him and his bike went separate directions but his cleat didn’t release.

In the vein of ‘1001 rules for my unborn son‘, I want to lay down some things for Logan. Some will be taken almost directly, some will come from me, and some will come from things my Dad passed to me. Some I don’t practice what I preach; I know I should though.

This will always be a work in progress.

1. Learn to throw a football/baseball/frisbee. You don’t have to be great at it, just get the basics.
2. If someone is required to carry a firearm professionally, they deserve your respect. They’ve sacrificed more for you than you want to know.
3. Nobody likes a know-it-all.
4. Sometimes, what someone doesn’t say is more important than what they are saying.
5. If you’re afraid to try something, force yourself to do it as soon as you can; reality is never as hard, or scary, as you’ve built it up in your head.
6. Over tip breakfast waitresses.
7. Always smile at a pretty girl. You never know.
8. Never side against your sister in a fight.
9. Nobody ever wished on their death bed that they’d spent more time at work.
10. College is a controlled environment where you learn to be an adult. Mistakes are tolerated there, make the most of it.
11. If I ever act like something else is more important to me than you, you have my permission to set me straight without repercussions.
12. Some people love to tell you that there is never a reason for fighting (especially school faculty). This isn’t true; if it was there wouldn’t be any war. Just make sure you’re prepared to own up the consequences.
13. Admit when you’re wrong; it’s not a sign of weakness.
14. As you get older, time goes by faster. Ironically, your brain will have a hard time perceiving itself as any older than 10-15yrs younger than you really are. Point is, don’t be in such a rush to grow up.
15. Always try to see things from someone else’s point of view. People aren’t complicated, you just have to figure out their motivation.
16. Stand up to the bully. No matter how bad you get beat, you’ll only have to do it once.
17. Learn to tie a couple of good knots.
18. Learn to drive a manual transmission
19. Wear sunscreen.
20. Remind me to teach you how to tie a double windsor. Ties probably won’t be fashionable anymore when you’re old enough to wear one, but it won’t hurt to know how.
21. Don’t go looking for a fight, but if there’s absolutely no avoiding it, instead of being afraid hit first and hit hard. Aim for the nose. And even if you get your ass kicked, make sure they never want to try picking another fight with you.
22. (This one is going to sound counter-intuitive coming from me) Don’t have a girlfriend in college. Ask me why when you get older.
23. Never talk during a movie in a movie theater; nobody paid to hear your crap.
24. Women find confidence sexy; some women mistake not caring for confidence.
25. Mark Twain: Courage isn’t the lack of fear; it’s acting in spite of it.
26. Learn to pace yourself when you drink.
27. Travel. You’ll discover the world is much more beautiful place than they show on television. Always keep that in mind when you watch the news.
28. Avoid gossip at all costs. Even a friendship.
29. Know how to change a tire and the oil; understand how all the systems of a car works so that when you take it to the shop you can be explicit in describing what’s not working. It’s rare to find a ‘mechanic’, they’re all ‘technicians’ now. The difference is one, fixes things, the other replaces things. I’m sure it’ll be even more so when you get older.
30. Never be afraid to ask a girl out, no matter how much better looking than you she might be. Worst she can say is no.
31. Never lead a girl on; things will end badly. For you.
32. Just raise your glass, no need to clink.
33. When you marry a girl, you marry her whole family. If you don’t like them while you’re dating you’ll like them half as much once you’re married and half as much again when you have kids. The inverse is also true.
34. Never, ever, under any circumstances, even if it’s completely obvious, assume a woman is pregnant. Never ask when she’s due. If she’s pregnant and it comes up, she’ll probably volunteer that info.
35. Always pay for everything on a first date. If the girl protests, and wants to pay for something, say that you asked her out so you’re paying. If she asked you out, tell her she asked you out so it’s your turn. If you don’t have much money, it’s up to you to come up with something inventive to do that you can afford. Good luck. I got lucky on that one.
36. Exception to above: if you don’t care about the girl much, then getting drunk on cheap booze, hanging out and seeing what happens is perfectly acceptable. (Make sure to reference ‘never lead a girl on’ rule for how well that’s going to work out for you though.)
37. Unless you’re 100% certain she’s a world champion boozer, never give a girl more than two mixed drinks. Holding hair at the end of evening isn’t what you had in mind.
38. Learn to put everything in perspective. Worrying about something never changed anything.
39. Sometimes sweating the details can make all the difference between mediocre and spectacular.
40. If you catch yourself whining; suck it up.
41. Learn how to make fire without matches.
42. As cheesy as it sounds, you’ll never really know what love is until you have your first child. (Yeah, that’s you, home slice.)
43. Give credit when it’s due; take the blame when it’s yours. You’ll get more respect by owning up to it than you will if you try to pass it off.
44. Never underestimate your fertility. Treat it like an infectious disease.
45. Don’t try to avoid the bully by befriending him; you’ll end up doing what he does.
46. Take pictures at family events; but don’t let the pictures become the event.
47. Your birthday is a big event for your Mom and Dad too.
48. Better to be quiet and let everyone assume you’re smart instead of opening your mouth and proving that you’re not.
49. If the teacher forgets to assign homework, keep quiet.
50. Don’t ask somebody to do something you’re not willing to do yourself.
51. Identify your most commonly used word or phrase, and work at eliminating it.
52. Don’t bite your fingernails.
53. If you can’t think of anything to give a woman, flowers will do. But go to a florist and give some thought to what you send. Women know when you’ve phoned it in.
54. Get to know as many people as you can professionally. Half of your success will come from who you know.
55. Nothing brings people together like adversity; think about joining a fraternity in college.
56. Always be discreet about your love life.
57. Paul Newman: if you look around the poker table and you can’t tell who the sucker is, it’s you.
58. Have a passport and keep it current.
59. When listening to other’s stories, resist the urge to answer with one of your own.

At some point last summer, Heather and Logan were out of town and I was home working on the house. I was getting ready to start an all day trim caulking project (all the cold weather split most of my joints this winter, so I’ll be redoing it all over again soon), that I still haven’t painted, and I needed something for background noise. Turned past USAHD, and the Burn Notice intro was playing and it caught my eye. So I sat down and watched part of the episode and kind of kept it on in the background. Ended up being a Burn Notice marathon leading up to the season finale so I left it on all day and I’ve been hooked ever since.

Next up is the couch to 5k program (yeah, that’ll happen).

I’m curious if I can adapt the pushup program to crunches …

Everywhere on the net, it’s $50-$60 so I’m sure somebody screwed up the decimal. Not that an r/c motorcycle was really what I wanted, but even if it doesn’t work great, $6.80 is cheap enough that I don’t really care.

We’re taking a cruise this year; we laid down a 5hr flight radius and it was either this or Hawaii. We figured this would be cheaper, but the little stuff is adding up quick and now I’m not so sure.

So some tips, that I’m recording for myself more than anything, for cruise planning. Use these questions to gauge the real cost of the cruise above and beyond the advertised price.

1) Can you fly directly into the port city?

In our case, sadly no. We have about an hour between Houston and Galveston. Which means either rent a car for the week, leave it at the hotel all week (we’re flying in a day early) or get shuttle/limo service. Add $300 round trip.

2) Do discount carriers fly directly into the city?

Again, no. Not without a transfer another 1:30 of travel time, which doesn’t factor well into the 5hr max flying time of a 3yr old. At least we’ve got a direct on Northwest. And, admittedly, it really wasn’t much more expensive than going with Southwest/Frontier/Sky Blue.

3) Do you drink heavily when on vacation?

If so use your room rate as a the budget for your bar tab. Booze on cruises is exploitative unless you buy at port and smuggle it back on, or buy a couple of fifths during ‘sea days’.

4) Do you like to go and sit in one place for vacation?

That one seems obvious. This is a moving hotel. It’s pretty cheap considering your food is included, but you give up some choice and you give up time to just sit and relax. There’s plenty of that on the boat, but off of it, it’s a scramble to go do something and make it back to the ship in time. In that sense, if you want to just go sit on a beach and relax, cruising’s not a very good deal.

5) Excursions = extra cost.

Speaking of doing things off the boat; because time is tight they organize activities that they call excursions and they cost dearly. Unless you want to go through the effort of researching them independently ahead of time and taking the risk that they don’t pan out or don’t get you back to the ship on time.

I think it was about a grand a person for Heather and I and then five something for Logan. And then airfare was, I think around three hundred a person. Then the transportation from Houston to Galveston, and my drinking, plus excursions I think we spent about the same as if we’d got the time share condo from Heather’s Mom and gone to Hawaii.

As much as I like to bitch, it should be fun. Heather’s Aunt and Grandmother are going with us (still don’t know how we pulled off that con) so I’ll have somebody to talk to when Heather hits the deck chair and goes comatose.

There are still two vacations that I want to do in my life, and then the rest can be whatever. First, when Logan’s old enough to ride all the rides, but not yet old enough to not want to be around us, I want to spend a week to ten days at Disney World and then take a Disney cruise for a few days before going home. And then second, once Logan’s old enough that he doesn’t want to go on vacation with us anymore (and would rather we left so that he can throw a house party, drink all the booze in the cupboard, have his buddies pass out on the bathroom floor and destroy at least one of his Mom’s nice without her noticing for a few weeks …. like Father, like son) I want to go to Vegas for a week, spend all day laying by the pool hung-over and all night getting ripped so that I can sit by the pool the next day hung-over. But by the time I’m that old, a week might turn into a long weekend.

Unfortunately there’s no real way of authenticating that this is a great white except to take his word for it. Well. That, and the thing is monsterous. I don’t care what kind of shark it is, the guy has big balls. Big brass balls.