I haven’t been trying to turn this into my own personal cat blog, but I can’t help but post that Rachael and I finally had to put Cedes down tonight. It’s been over three months since I thought I was going to lose her, and while she never fully recovered, she was still chucking around the house and living life. But, things had taken a turn for the worse in the last week, prompting me to make an appointment at the Vet just this past Saturday to get his opinion on what I should do. He gave me the green light to let her keep on pushing, so I was beyond psyched…then, last night, she had another episode of sort and spent all of today not moving, having seizures, and not eating. I’ve never had to put an animal down and was hoping she’d pass on her favorite spot on the bed, but it was the right thing to do. At least that’s what I’m telling myself…it’s hard thing for me to rationalize. Definitely a rough night.

To 14 years of good times, rest in peace Mercedes.

It’s raining outside, so I can’t go ride and fall down. Happy your day, all you presidents! I put a bike check for Mr. Sher. Since he pillaged all the color from my photos (I spent time on that!), here’s the images, but you have to go to Subrosabrand.com for all the info on the secret Odyssey products. Okay, they’re not a secret.

…Hasn’t been all that kind to me in the last two months. It all started when I tried to gap-to-ice this handicap rail. I expected it to loop out if anything, but it grabbed, then I caught an upright, and slid on my dome and my left hand. It took a week for me to figure it out, but I also separated my shoulder from that fall, too. So besides pedaling around, I didn’t ride for a month. Since then, every time I go ride street, I get blasted. Most notably on my hands, but pretty much everywhere. I’m short two calluses on my left hand, which I’ve been tearing open every time I ride. My right hand has been discolored and swollen from slamming it into a metal grate. And today seemed to cap it all off… While trying to manual a flat, big, round rail, I bounced my chin off it in an attempt to give it a very aggressive and violent hug. Two hours later, a fucking ice pick out of a steep wedge on a picnic-type ledge at a skatepark had me bouncing my face off the ground. I even got some top-of-the-hand scrapes for extra “yeah, I didn’t put a single fucking hand out” points.

I’m starting to think that I shouldn’t have shaved my beard…natural safety equipment. Fucking whack…if the rain holds out, I’ll see how tomorrow treats me.

Step one was the pedals. These are supposed to be fast. Thank you roomie and Tim Baver.

100% invisible to cats!

Photos that I like that I’ve shot (number one). My fourth favorite thing to do is to stroke my own immense ego (sitting, drinking, riding are in the lead?in no order). If my ego was manifested into a woman, it’d be Heidi Klumm (or my girlfriend, for when she reads this). Then I’d sleep with my ego. It would then have my superego child and we’d complete the triangle of Id, ego, and superego. As of now, I’m just Id, I believe.

A cropped version of this photo ran on the cover of Ride and a lot of kids talked shit on the quality of the photo and all that other random bullshit. What they don’t know is that at this point both my flashes had blown out and I was left to shoot ambient light only. I did my best, and I think this photo is pretty fucking sweet. Unfortunately, the composition was thrown out when it was run as a vertical photo on the cover. Which Nathan definitely deserved.

I need to get a higher quality version of this photo online. I really like this photo because there’s no one in it. It was a slow day at the great wall, so it wasn’t that hard, but when I see the framed print of this photo, it always takes a quick second to realize that I shot it.

Chase is a little bitch (hah). Always trying to act tough and won’t ever let me shoot a photo of him. Finally got one and it ran in probably the worst issue of Ride ever. The layout for the entire Local Exposure Tour fucking sucked and this photo ran small.

Adam Baker is a favorite. I shot this photo after my girlfriend and I drove across the country (from Florida and on the way to California) with everything she owned, including a cat, in a car that lost its air conditioning in 100+ degree Louisiana weather (with Texas 105 degree weather to come). Arizona was a nice break of sorts. I still owe KC for putting us up like that without even questioning it. My girl even left her bra in his room and c-blocked him from a state away, apparently. Oh, and I really like this photo?man in the woods.

I didn’t really care for this photo until my girl mentioned that there was only one road in town. Just another reminder.

Another thing that people probably don’t realize…I went six days without any flashes, clothes, or deodorant in Paris. And if that doesn’t sound bad, the only thing that saved me was getting robbed…and getting the shit kicked out of me trying to get the stuff back. While returning to the rental car place to get another navigation device (which was stolen) for our car, I wandered over to the airline kiosk to look for my lost bag. And, even though the airlines told me that it wasn’t found just four hours earlier, it happened to be sitting ten feet behind the barely-English-speaking attendant about to go back to the States. Blessing in disguise. This photo of Catfish was shot on day three on 3200 iso black and white film. Scraping.

I love cars. Any little homo leaving hate comments on the BMX vs. Cars article can tell you that bit of knowledge. I happen to think drift racing is pretty fucking gay, though. I mean, it’s awesome, but it’s retarded. Dancing with cars type shit. Either way, I went to a Red Bull drift event on a random Saturday during the latest southern California fires and it made for some sweet photos.

This ran as a spread in Ride, and I was expecting to hear some feedback about it. Some love, some hate, some “why the fuck was that two pages?” Never heard a peep, so I feel like the blown-up version of the photo never translated.

I haven’t done shit lately. Nothing worth pitching a fit about, anyway. I’ve shot some photos, went up to Santa Barbara to see all of Ian Munro’s ex girlfriends, sat around with a separated shoulder, gone to the Ride office and put on my best “I’m doing real, honest work face,” and worked on my car a lot. Shit’s status quo, really.

I did realize that only rich people run. Only the rich do it for fun. The guilty do it out of necessity. Sometimes fat people do it towards the beginning of the year because the holidays just pumped a month’s worth of over-eating and then the new year starts talking of making things better. So they jog for about three weeks, then go back to eating calzones loaded with trans fat and MSG. That’s fine, by the way.

But the rich have taken what could be the first “sport” any kid could possibly learn?beating your friend from here-to-there?and cuddled it up all their own. Do you know any kids that work at Target that enjoy a good jog? Do you ever see any construction workers go home, clean themselves up, put on their jogging shoes and lay down five miles? I’ve never seen any mechanics getting their morning run in before they go sling a wrench for eight hours. Running is left to the priviledged. The ones who sit on their ass (I do that) all day and have all this, “Man, my fucking boss doesn’t appreciate the %6 margin I gained this month” agression. People that drive BMW sport utility vehicles run marathons. People that have gym memberships but really “like the freedom of the open road” are actually out there for you (see: me) to pitch a fit about. I like for people that have the money to spend the money on expensive hobbies. Save the free shit for the people that can afford it.

I fucking hate running.

Had fleas, farted like crazy, and it has one eye for that cyclops appeal.

Official cat house.

I’ve never been one for introspection. I feel like there are far greater things to look upon, analyze, and judge than yourself. It’s probably a lot easier that way in the “life’s a picnic” type sense. Bonus info: we determined today that Jeff Z’s life is indeed just like a picnic and he wears the appropriate hat just incase his life does break into spontaneous picnic. Mine, we decided, is not. I’m not complaining. I’m a very now person, and while I wouldn’t mind a picnic to break up the day, I’m not going to plan for one. To the whole point… this whole live-in-the-now thing I have going is conflicting with the headlines. Economy this, recession that. It’s struck the very slightest chord with me, so I’ve changed my life in the following ways:

- Starbucks is obviously out. I hate to contribute to their record lows, layoffs in the 1,000’s, and store closings in the hundreds, but that vanilla latte is just a little steep unless I’m on a Ride trip. Jose’s brand Costco quantity will have to do.

- Made in China. I do love that place. Feelings aside, they’re the anti-christ of the economy. Now when my girlfriend is buying some useless trinket, I look at the back and use the “Made in China” tag as an excuse not to buy it. Buy American, or don’t buy anything at all. Fortunately, where we’z shop, we leave without buying anything at all. That’s an exaggeration; we did buy matching 500 piece puzzle sets that we’re going to use to see who’s more attentive, intuitive, and intelligent. Everything’s a competition in my life. I’ll let you know who wins.

- Well drinks. Well, fuck me. It always ended with well drinks at the end of the night anyway. Show me a person who cares about getting Tanqueray at 1am and I’ll show you a pussy.

- Used. Fuck it, man. Used turbos. Used manifolds that don’t show up 20 days after you bought them. Used video games. Used luxuries ‘n shit. You know, that stuff you don’t need that you can’t live without? That stuff. Buy it used off of craigslist. Be sure to lowball as much as possible and use the word “economy” in your excuse for offering %50 of the asking price. You never know what may come of it. True story: my girlfriend messages people that are selling things and offers to pay them absolutely nothing…but she will come get it! It’s worked.

- Contraceptive. Goodbye.

- Ride. I’m going to let you in on a little internet secret. The magazine isn’t going away. While other corporations are cutting %20 of their workforce, Transworld Media hasn’t cut a single sole. Budgets have been cut across the board by %10-15 (I really don’t pay attention), but we here at Ride have never once been over budget in the seven years I’ve been here. Hate to break it to the internet moguls.

Times are tough for everyone, but the fun parts of life have never been the most expensive.

I don’t have any sort of conclusion (I changed my mind after writing this…so deep, look above), so I’ll just leave you with a photo of Glenn Milligan a mere moment after a huge piece of bird shit missed him and a photo of my hand the day after I blammo’d it on a rail. Try writing a healthy portion of a magazine one handed. It’s a blast.

So I have one. A car. I actually have three, but one is actually my girlfriend’s car that is under my name. It’s for sale if you want to buy it. But yeah, I have two. One runs. One runs sometimes. The not-so-often one is a Volkswagen. I’m not really sure if it’s the car’s fault…it’s probably mine. I think I’m a tinker-er. Even if it’s running, I’ll just take it apart. Sometimes I think the neighbors consider me the meth-head neighbor that’s always in the garage listening to the classic rock station. Pretty accurate, minus the drugs. So I fiddle, work on the car for a couple weeks, and then I drive the piss out of it and it breaks. Case in point: I tear it apart, fix every exhaut leak, re-do every oil and coolant line going to the turbo, re-do the wastegate routing, do a full brake job, get new injectors, a new program, and put a ton of miscellaneous work into the car…drive it hard one day and blow the turbo. I had fun, by the way. The good photos are from the race day?blue BMW is Gary Young and Yellow Porsche is Jim Bauer.

But anyway, it’s not that big of a deal, but I’ve decided to switch up the entire setup, so I’m pulling the car apart again. I lost interest in this, so I’m just going to post some random car-related stuff from the last few weeks. It’s all a waste of money, eh, and if I were you, I wouldn’t care either.

And absolutely no one cared that he didn’t pull it. It must have been an awesome time, eh?