• The first ride

    It started innocently.

    “Beth, I’m not sure you should ride your bike until I can tighten those training wheels, unless of course you want me to take them off?”

    “Alright dad, take them off.”

    Fifteen minutes later we were together on the sidewalk; father, daughter, and bicycle. The father was standing behind it all, grasping the seat. The daughter was astride the bike, imploring the father not to let go. The bicycle was just sitting there, oblivious to it all.

    After running along side for about thirty feet, Beth tells me to stop.

    “Dad, I’d like to try it on my own now.”

    I was ready to indulge her, and she rewarded my faith. She struggled unassisted, feet on the pedals, for about ten feet. That’s where she stopped, feet on the ground, bike still upright. Her very first solo attempt was a success!

    Naturally I hoped, hollered, and generally carried on like an English soccer fan. (Beth thought my chanting strut down the sidewalk was a bit much.) Then I ran inside to grab the camera to record the second unassisted ride. It was the best thing to happen to our house since Adam first slept through the night.

    Next thing I know Beth is asking to ride to her school with a group of friends (it’s a mile and a half away, but it’s practically inside our neighborhood and you don’t have to cross any busy streets). She came home thirty minutes later and collapsed. Apparently there are some things about bicycling that can’t be learned.

  • Abandoned by good sense

    Me and good sense haven’t been on speaking terms since the whole diet thing started; and it’s too bad to, because I really could have used her advice last night. It was six o’clock and I was preparing for a hair appointment that I was about to be late for. I was rooting through the pantry looking for something both quick and nutritional to snack on in the car. It’s too bad for me that “quick” and “nutritional” don’t often hang out together. The long and short of it is, I narrowed my choices to a Pop Tart toaster pastry (unheated) and a half-cup of pistachios.

    That’s right, I picked the pistachios.

    There are two things you should not do when you’re tired and hungry: drive, and pick a drive time snack. Now picture the scene on the road last night in my manual transmission Civic, with a cup of shells between my legs, a bag of nuts in the center console, and a nut-eating fiend hurriedly popping pistachios at every red light.

    Well folks, that’s as good as it gets.

    And Cheryl was worried about me riding my bike to work,

  • Never met a cynic I didn’t like

    Let’s start with the premise that people are stupid and work backwards from there. On my way to work I had a lot of time to think. That’s what happens when I ride my bike, lots of time to think. This morning I was playing the role of sore loser. Yes, I was thinking about politics again. A lot of ink has been used to discuss the “moral majority” and it’s role in last year’s elections. (I guess the term “moral majority” hasn’t really been used in a while, but I like it so I’m using it.) I began to wonder where the “moral majority’s” other political beliefs lie, other than the narrow channel of social issues that seem to be the focus. Where do they stand on the economy? On business regulation? On tax policy? On foreign policy? On Federalism? On the “Constitution in exile” school of thought?

    Say conservative judges are appointed who feel the court overstepped it’s bounds on Rowe? Say they apply this strict (“constructionist”) interpretation of the Constitution to legislation passed by congress in this century, that could similarly be dismissed as overstepping it’s bounds (based on a narrow interpretation of how the Federal government may regulate the states). I’ve read that civil rights, work place protections, regulations regarding overtime pay and a minimum wage, and environmental laws COULD go by the wayside under such an interpretation.

    What of this notion that people are stupid? I’ve heard it suggested that the south was solid “blue” following reconstruction, until civil rights. I’ve heard it pointed out that the only Democrats elected president since Kennedy (and civil rights) were from the south. I’ve heard it suggested that certain western states voted “blue” until the Rowe decision. All of these things suggest (to me) that many of us really do vote based on a single issue. To be fair, if you believe that abortion is a life and death issue, then there’s no better issue to pick as a single issue litmus test for candidates. After all, what trumps life and death as an issue? Too bad they take a pass on the death penalty issue.

    After thinking about all of this, the question on my mind is: are all of these folks, who are hoping to use the courts as a means to further their one issue, prepared for the possible consequences outside their one issue? What would happen to the defense of marriage act for goodness sakes?

    American values? Is there really such a thing? Or, are we just a bunch of single issue voters who rationalize the rest of our guy’s platform? I present to you: bigotry, regionalism, and abortion, the holy trinity of single issue politics. I guess taxes should go in there somewhere, but it didn’t fit with the rest of my entry. Who needs accuracy when you’re on a roll? Hey, no one said I was any smarter,.

    This message was sponsored, in part, by the RNC; “We’ve got your (censored) foreign policy right here!”