I posted a picture a while ago of an eviscerated pigeon, I thought it was a cat that had done it. Jim Pantekoek pointed out that it looked like peregrine falcon kill, which I figure was way cooler. I'm now pretty sure it was a Cooper's Hawk. Kat spotted one around here a year ago and this weekend I spotted one 20 meters away from me on my neighbors lawn. When it took off it had a small bird in its claws. I watched it until it landed on a telephone post, then feathers flew everywhere. Yay for natural predators! Well, yay until it attempts to drag off my dog, then boo.

There was some unfortunate news on the motorcycle front, the battery died on the BMW. Dead, just like that. No warning. Happily I am still under the 'BMW roadside assistance plan' so I got a free tow to the dealership. It was just a truck with some gear on the back, pretty cool. Initially the mechanic was trying to explain to me that if I didn't have a trickle charger on the battery it may have died from lack of use. I then told him it was ridden five days a week, 35 miles a day, and there was no way I needed a trickle charger on it.

I guess I showed that I was annoyed with the battery dying, and kudos to the dealership, they comp'd the entire thing. So tow, battery and labor was all free. Well ... built in to the cost of the bike, so not really 'free'. That happened on Wednesday evening and Kat was forced to come save me in the car. I then drove the car in to work for two days. BORING. Luckily I had Kat's iPod which had Stewart Mclean's Tales from the Vinyl Cafe on it. That makes traffic so much more bearable.

I also talked some co-workers in to going body surfing before work last Friday, so I needed the car to carry the wetsuit, flippers and other junk. In the ocean by 7AM. It was surprisingly warm. I've attempted to put it on everyone's calendar, every Friday morning for the rest of the summer, we'll see how that goes.

This is going to be a busy weekend. We have a 'Murder Mystery' fund raiser for Moxie theatre this Friday. Kat has to play a successful actress (she wanted to be the oil barren) and I have to play her successful actor husband. Uh-oh. The husband thing I figure I can do, it's the successful actor bit that has me worried. I'm thinking my character just had a recent head injury and drinking problem, I can work with that. My motivation is going to be "Who are you people, and why am I here?". You know how hard it is going to be not to ask people what my motivation is? Must. Not. Speak.

Saturday is the 4th annual Testes Toss. I'd link the wikipedia entry for that but there doesn't seem to be one. Go figure. Oh, wait, one of the folks on my soccer team just got back to me with a wikipedia entry for Ladder Golf, looks like the alternate name is mentioned down at the bottom. I'll try to remember to take pictures so you can all enjoy it vicariously.

On a completely unrelated note, I saw an advertisement for the Nissan Cube on Hulu. Wow, that car is ugly. The part that truly struck me is it said "Professional driver, closed course" but I don't think that car goes anywhere that isn't computer graphic driven, and it surely isn't getting over 40 KPH.
Kat and I got new cell phones a week ago, I'm still working my way through it. So far it is pretty damn cool. One of the guys at work also picked up the same phone, he's doing far more with it then I am. For the geeks out there, he's set up his phone so he can SSH to it. How cool is that? I'll write more about it next time. The phone is the Palm Pre.

Some updates for those of you who were worried:
-- I have a new helmet now.
-- The dog has been groomed and is no longer toxic.
-- My best of Groove Armada came in the mail, groove time baby! So far four of the songs stand out: My Friend (the reason I bought the album), Chicago, Easy and If Everybody Looked the Same. It's a win. I think that link will work, it goes to Pandora.
-- The pigeons seem to have given up. Woo!

July 4th weekend report. I was lazy and didn't do anything interesting, well not on the 4th anyway. Friday I did go surfing with Kevin, Kevin and a friend of Kevin's, Kymri. I was going to bore people about the boards I used and Kevin Six's surfing style but I'm pretty damn sure nobody cares.

Suffice it to say Kevin Six is a surfing daemon. That man can turn and catch a wave before I can get out the sentence "Oooh, that one would have been good". He even was complimented by some 12yr olds: "Look at that old guy go!". There is a backhanded compliment if I ever heard one. Kevin missed the comment so we had to make sure he heard *all* about it when he got back.

Standard San Diego weather, sunny in North Park, overcast by the beach. We surf in the evening, drive back up to North Park, it's sunny again. Some times I think living by the beach may be overrated. San Diego is the first place I've lived in where they have to give three weather forecasts, oops, just checked and there are four: Coast, Inland, Mountains and Desert. The moto ride last week differed by 12 degrees Fahrenheit, the ride Kat and I did to Anza Borrego desert went from comfortable (coast) to cold (mountain) to overly hot (desert).



Went for another Moto ride Sunday. Took the PoS GPS with me. It froze twice (as you may be able to see from the picture). It's time for me to post on the Delorme forums and see if there is some fix for this thing. I cannot believe it is so sensitive. Some very nice twisties and I'm still trying to figure out how to ride them on the BMW. It likes higher RPMs, but on the very tight corners I come out of them too slow for 2nd and have to downshift to 1st. I know you are supposed to go in to the corner in the gear you need to be in when you come out, am I supposed to downshift to first *before* the corner? Seems very wrong.

Kathleen is probably wondering why I'm doing all this riding while she is away and not while she is here. It's all about the practice. I want to make sure I know what I'm doing before I go two up on some of these roads.

Kat is still in Canada, she's back in Ottawa until Wednesday. If you want your Kat fix, and who doesn't, you've a limited time to get it. By the time I post this she'll probably be back. Too slow. I heard a group of them went to the Earl of Sussex, some things don't change. When I go back I'll make sure to head to the Manx.

I finally finished the body wash that I bought in France, no more smelling like a European for me. No, I don't know what that means, so don't ask me. The reason I mentioned it is because now I'm back to a generic body wash (whose make I cannot remember) but it smells clean. Not people clean, just clean. Who figured out what 'clean' smells like? Does it differ between cultures? I'm pretty sure a North America 'clean' isn't the same as a Japanese 'clean'. Where would you go to figure that out? How cool would a museum of smells be? -- Okay, I've thought more about that, I wouldn't go to either. -- We also have a dishwashing liquid that smells like lavender, which is something I normally associate with flowers and people. It took a little getting used to.

So I smell like clean dishes and the dishes smell like sexy people. I'm telling you, me and the kitchen are happening.

I'm posting this from the coffee shop, and some of the news is old already. I'm writing the next post and using older one. Now you know all your news isn't fresh.

**********

From the sounds coming in my back window either somebody is having epic sex, or they're cutting wood with a very dull saw. For everyones sake I hope it's the former. That's not going to upset people is it? Oh well, too late.

On to more pleasant things. The dog stinks and the cat should be bald and fat.

I pet the dog when I got home. Now I have an incense stick lit and I've washed my hands. Ugh. I fail to understand how he manages to generate that much pong by just sitting around.

Also, considering how much I feed the cat, and how much hair I find around the house, how is she not bald and fat? She's skinny and furry. I don't understand it.

I'd like to complain about a part of the health system. I can't complain about the U.S. health system in terms of availability for high cost items, they've got that covered. Back when Kathleen had inner ear issues they sent her from the specialist *directly* to the MRI. No waiting, off you go. How long is he wait for an MRI in Canada?

However, standard complaint about doctors coming up, the way they treat their patients seems far more conducive to "more money" than "preventative maintenance". To my personal doctors defense, he did tell me to wait until he got back from vacation to talk about my blood test. He mentioned that it wouldn't be analyzed very well. Kudos to him. I got a phone call on Tuesday from the receptionist that said doctor X had looked at my blood work and "avoid trans fats and exercise five times a week". Wow. He forgot to say 'eat your vegetables'. What the hell was that? Standard answer number five? Hopefully my GP will give me more useful information. I would assume that 99.9% of the U.S.A. would benefit from "avoid trans fats and exercise five times a week". Bah, humbug.

My friend Jim Collis and I went for a nice motorcycle ride last weekend. Woke early, good ride, some mistakes were made. Near the end of the ride I mentioned to Jim that I was going to run out of gas in 42 miles (yay for trip computers!). Three miles after that Jim ran out of gas. Amusing, yes.

I came to a stop, turned off the motorcycle, took the helmet and gloves off, and checked back to make sure he was okay. So there I was sitting on the bike with gloves in my left hand and my helmet in my right, next thing I realize the motorcycle is starting to roll backwards down the side of the road. I can't use my front brake because i have my helmet in my right hand, I can't use my back brake because that needs my right foot and I'm using that for balance. Down I go. So much for the new motorcycle.

Happily there was very little damage done to the motorcycle that super glue didn't fix (just the turn signal) but my helmet took a beating. Now it doesn't have a faceplate any more and the place where it is supposed to connect is broken. I put the helmet and sun glasses back on and took the highway. It took all of five minutes for a large and juicy bug to hit my cheekbone and splatter in to my eye. I can report that bug juice in the eye at 70 MPH isn't dangerous, but it is pretty damn gross.