Grow up, fans!

Had fun at the Bengals game last weekend. What a wacky game.

Amongst the usual craziness, two drunken 20-somethings a few rows ahead of me were shouting at Ross Verba during the entire game.

"Go home, Verba!"
"Verba, you SUCK!"
"Get off the bench, Verba!"
"You're such a wussy, Verba!"

In a way it was pretty funny because the hecklers were randomly picking on Verba, who was sitting only a few feet away. Verba mostly ignored the shouts, although he did turn around a time or two and smile.

Pro football players probably have thick skins for this kind of stuff anyway. On the other hand, fan and player conduct are questionable these days so why doesn't everyone just grow up?

The fans' conduct was just plain rude. I mean, here's someone doing his job. What would these guys think if Verba showed up at their workplaces and started yelling at them? NFL players can be puerile and they can be jerks, but unnecessary fan heckling just contributes to the problem.

I am short and I know it

I was reminded today while my legs were SWINGING (as in not touching the floor) as i sat upon the handicapped toilet at work.

here piggy! (reference to the socks)

as it's buying stuff season, i've been searching for biking stuff for husband.

• cars-r-coffins water bottle. check. (taken care of at some tiny bike rental shop in minneapolis this fall.)

• park workstand. let's see if his parents get it for him first...

• these socks are pretty cute. not sure if fancy socks are for him, he wears out clothes like nobody's business.

• Rollo tee shirt. Cheap and cute!
  

sofaking beautiful

i must admit that i'm dying for a Jittery Joe's jersey. great colors/design, cool team and coffee is a good thing in general. (i've never had jittery joe's but i will the next time i'm in ga.)

also, i want the jersey because there are very few jerseys that i like these days. usually, i shun the bigtime team jerseys because, well, i'm not on those teams and i don't want to be another wannabe. the plain jerseys from the catalogs are just too plain and i really dislike the cheese - Twinkee snack cake jersey comes to mind.

so i guess it all comes down to the fact that i'm just as vein as other cyclists. i'm not too vein to stop eating ice cream, mind you, but i'm not one of those out of shape jerks who rides the lance-mobile and wears postal from head to toe but has no intention of going over 10 mph. that's just dorky as hell.

People and their babies

it seems that i'm one of a dwindling few contemporaries who is babyless. i am also dogless. we, however, are not fishless.

kids are wholly life-altering and spontaniety-altering but also life affirming, or so i've heard. they're also money-parting and sleep-depriving bastards till they reach a certain age.

i'd like to take part in this baby-making, baby having and raising of young people tradition that is ingrained in our culture, but not quite yet. therefore, before this happens, i (and husband) must take part in certain things that we may not be able to take part in. namely, things that we cannot do with the monkey people. what things, i don't know, to be honest.

i admire the parents who tote their tots to other countries, and i admire the adults who one night, decide to do it - a quick but not entirely unmeditated-upon decision - and produce a baby 9 months later. children are a practically inevitable byproduct of married straight people, anyway, right?

but i must admit that i relish the communal drinking and the late nights (and the late mornings) and because i have not yet procreated, i am not constantly creeped out by the fact that in x-18 years i will have to pay for college, or in x-4 years i will have to shell out for expensive private school. (or, obviously those figures are creeping me out already.)

the turn on: i find myself desiring a small person of my own only when i am around parents who have fun and enjoy life while maintaining good parenting techniques. they have the supercool kids and enjoy the parenting bit but get to live it up and say bad words and go out sometimes too.

the turnoff: what turns me off is the parents who become babified in the most disgusting way. they live boring-ass lives and live in the burbs and only talk about strollers and shit like that. they serve as child-pleasing robots and disregard their own potentials. will i turn into one of those people anyway?

Delicious restaurant for people who can eat approximately 40 pounds of food in one sitting

I experienced the Smokey Bones BBQ chain for the first time last night. Wow, is it good and sinful. I felt like a balloon in in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade by the time I had finished stuffing my piehole.

The portions were "Amhurican" portions - that is, enough food to satiate a 400 pounder. Speaking of larger folks, there we were flanked on either side by the fattest of young families. They even had big fat toddlers with them.

Back to the meal...First, I had some stew. Very good and sugary. Some meat and corn and big stewed tomatoes too. I was already feeling a bit guilty because I could taste the molasses.

Then came the cornbread. (I didn't order this, by the way.) Holy cow...It was not a cornbread appetizer, as advertised. It was a CAKE. I'm not kidding. A huge, yellow cake still in the pan. It came with -- I'm not making this up -- ICING. Yep, there was a bowl of icing (honey vanilla walnut butter, they called it) on the side.

My pulled pork sandwich was great. They were nice enough to give me enough meat for two sandwiches - I'm sure some of their larger customers would complain if they had less dead flesh per plate. There were two types of bbq sauce - one was very good (sweet) and the other was too mustard-y.

The only thing I didn't like was my side of butter and green beans. It was so greasy that I could hardly stab the beans with my fork.

Overall, a good experience for every once in awhile.

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By the way, the demographic targeting behind this place is very exacting. It's all about southern fat people who like NASCAR.

There were TVs everywhere. You can (for free) tune in one of five TV channels, as I'm sure their target demo never has a meal/snack at home without the TV.

Then, they have the whole "southern" thing down to a t. They serve sweet tea and "homestyle" this and "down home" that and try to make themselves very southern. I already mentioned the portions. That's southern too. "Hon, don't you want more? Take some more!"

Sweet shalom bar

I keep buying Sweet Shalom bars. They're by some Christian health food company. I just love the taste and the texture. The price is a little high way too expensive. Perhaps I can figure out how to make one of these bars, they're just SO good.

New to the Internet? Call me!

I am the free Internet tutor. People call up, wanting to get to our Web page but not knowing how. I spend 10, 20 minutes helping them (while multitasking).

I'm actually quite willing to help because hopefully they'll return to our page again, since I've been such a helpful person. Maybe.

Most of my conversations go like this:

CALLER: "See, I'm on the computer now. Just tell me what to type into Microsoft Search."

Well the problem is that you are on a SEARCH page. That means that you don't have the address already. I will GIVE you the address.

"That's fine. So what should I type into the search field again?"

There's something called the address bar. Do you know what that is?

"No."

It's that long white line at the top of the page. Do you see that? That's where you type in addresses.

Long pause. "Oooooooooooooooooooooh!"

The cross is calling me

I really don't care if I am not in shape and I have some puckered fat on the backs of my legs. I really don't care if my bike is a little too road, not enough mountain. I want to enter a cyclocross race.

Lucky for me, there are a few more weekends of cyclocross races in town. Unfortunately, those weekends are booked, and my mechanic (Erik) is studying for finals so he wouldn't be able to go.

Instead of coaxing my horse over 4 foot high wooden logs at the Kentucky Horse Park, I'd be carrying my bike over the logs then hopping back on and riding some more. How fun! The courses are a mixture of road, dirt, mud and fixed "jumps". Doesn't that sound just great?

I don't care if I don't have enough time. I'll see what I can do about going to the race anyway.

bonjour!

I decided to create this blog to help me learn French.

Why French? Because I have been charged with knowing French the next time I visit France, and I'd like to go back sometime, for myself and also to show my husband, whose only European trip has been to Spain.

Is this self-mandated? Well yes and no. This was the polite half-joking request of some family friends who took me out to dinner with when I visited Paris. Yes, that dinner was close to 10 years ago, and yes, I've visited France since then, but I haven't forgotten their request.

But speaking French (and understanding spoken French) are different from writing it. I know that, thanks. I figure this blog will be a starting point only.