Congratulations to George Hincapie!!!

First off, I had to tape the Tour de France on Sunday as I had church and then I was supposed to go to my OS's house to discuss the graduation party for YS and then from there it was on to Grandma's for my cousin's 12th birthday party. I didn't get a chance to watch it until yesterday when I decided it was much more important than me wasting time and effort at the freaking gym to lose nothing. So, without further ado, CONGRATULATIONS, GEORGE HINCAPIE on a magnificent Stage 15 win!!!!! It was BRILLIANT and incredibly well-deserved. After spending the last 10 years playing domestique to Lance, he got a chance to show that he too is a great bike rider. Being a domestique means that you ride for your leader. You are there to do what you can to make sure the leader has his chance to win. Bike riding at the professional level in huge tours is not an individual sport, contrary to popular thought. It's a team sport and each member of each team is picked for his specialty and his ability to protect the leader. Since 1999 when Lance won his first Tour, no other member of his team has ever won a stage because the bigger goal was the overall victory. Lance may get the official credit for the wins and it's his name that is remembered, but he would be the first to admit that his team plays a huge part and that w/o people like George Hincapie, he wouldn't have six Tour de France wins and be on his way to a possible (very possible) seventh.

Now back to my regularly scheduled boring post about the weekend:

Friday night I waited up way past my bedtime and went off to Borders around 11:30 to buy my pre-ordered copies of the latest Harry Potter book forgetting completely that last time I had driven there around 9:00 p.m. to get a number and then went back. Which meant that I got #492 and 493 and would be called around 1:00/1:15. ARGH!!! Dammit, but I hate it when I'm stupid. I thought about going home and just coming back the next morning, but decided that since I was there I'd just stay.

I had, of course, brought nothing with me to keep me out of trouble for an hour and a half. I tried calling my brother in California since at midnight EDT there weren't a lot of people I could call. Unfortunately, LB was still at work and couldn't talk. I leafed through a couple of knitting magazines and then a vegetarian news magazine, but I'm really not a magazine person. I need more than a page of text about something or other to hold my interest.

I then made my way to the sports aisle and was going to looking for a mountain climbing book that I didn't have, but I didn't get that far. I spotted Lance Armstrong's It's Not About The Bike and started reading that. By the time numbers 400-500 were called and I got to the front of the line I had read 64 pages (I'm sure I could have read more if the teenaged girls behind me in line weren't incredibly loud, obnoxious, stupid and annoying). I got my two HP6 books and the Lance book and went home practically running to my car so that I wouldn't become the old cranky adult and inform the teenagers that they were beyond stupid.

(Example: One of the girls was looking at the DVD of Hitch for $23 and made a comment that she got it cheaper somewhere else. Another of the girls said, "I wouldn't buy it at all. I'd just rent it and copy it." It was all I could do not to turn around and inform her that the FBI warning at the beginning was a clear indication that that behavior was illegal. I knew she'd just laugh at me and call me a stick-in-the-mud or whatever the 2005 equivalent is. She then went on to say that she didn't understand why there wasn't a CD renting store. She figures they'd make a lot of money. And I believe it was this same brain surgeon who asked her friend "What does that mean?" when we had turned the corner and the registers were in sight and the friend said, "We're in the home stretch." ARGH!!!)

I did NOT start to read the book when I got home (it was 1:30 a.m. and I had been up for 21 hours at this point). I slept in like I said (12:44 p.m.) and would have been upset about missing prime sitting in the sun and maintaining my tan time, if it hadn't been raining. The rain stopped and I sat outside for a whopping hour before it started up again. My plan of finishing the book on Saturday was not realised as I *had* to finish watching Friday's stage of the Tour de France and then watch Saturday's as well. I can't help it, I’m completely addicted to the Tour. In fact, while watching I made all sorts of notes to blog about, so that I can bore every single one of my readers who just don't give a shit. But I'll save that for a bit later. Right now, I'm DESPERATE to find someone who has finished The Half Blood Prince because I have and I need to talk to someone!!!!!! Anyone! It's killing me not being able to talk to someone about it. Write to me, please, if you have finished it and wish to have a Harry Potter nerd conversation.

Saturday night I went out for a beer and some bar food with DWD up at Cheli's Chili Bar. They have the BEST nachos ever. I had a great time. DWD always makes me laugh and Saturday night was no different. The boy is just hilarious. I remember way back when when we were going to the bar dancing every Tuesday night (Miss Anne, DWD and me) and we would take turns driving, so that one of us was always the Designated Driver. It didn't matter if he were drunk or sober, he would make me laugh so damn hard that I would practically drive off the road while stone sober or I would be crying.

We watched the Tigers game, the Tour de France and I occasionally glanced at the evil IRL's race, so that I could make rude comments about Danica. DWD was telling me to give Danica a break and I asked why I should. Anybody who treats a four-year-old Downs syndrome boy badly doesn't deserve a break. He asked me where I had heard she had done this. I told him that I hadn't heard it, I had witnessed it with my own eyes, while I was holding said Downs syndrome boy. He backed off then, but not before I asked the guy sitting near me if he thought that anybody who dissed a four-year-old Down Syndrome was a fucking asshole. The guy agreed w/o knowing about whom I was referring. So, there ya go.

And apparently, it's not natural to have an opinion on everything, or so I've been told. I can't help it, but I do love and hate things at equal measures. I happen to LOVE Paul Sherwen and Phil Ligget's coverage of the Tour de France (which is why I tape the morning show and not the evening extended coverage show which features Al Trautwig – who is fine – and Bob Roll – who drives me up a freaking wall with his Tour Day France and ridiculous hand movements). And I love the Tigers and hate the Yankees. I'm sure other people have strong opinions about things, don't they? I'm not the only one. And I don’t think I'm opinionated about everything, just the things that matter to me. You know, like I love Joy Division, but hate the band that they became after Ian Curtis killed himself, New Order. I hate the company for which I worked in SF, but loved my boss there. I love the University where I worked before I moved to SF, but hated one of my bosses there who had made my life a living hell. I love SF as a city to visit, but didn't really care for living there – see, I didn't say HATE. It just wasn't for me.

I do not like Impressionism and I firmly believe it's because when I take off my glasses or take out my contacts, that is exactly how I view the world, and I don't really like it all that much. On the other hand, I completely get surrealism and find it utterly fascinating and much more interesting than Renaissance art which bores me to tears.

I hate my headphones which seem to have a loose wire and cut out quite often. I love Iggy and The Stooges. I despise people who buy a six-pack of something, but decide they want to make up their own six-pack, so that when I come along and buy the six-pack of Mike's Hard Lime and get home and take one out only to discover it's a Mike's Hard Lemonade and look more closely to see that I have three Limes and three Lemonades. Fucker. Buy two six-packs if you can't make up your freaking mind.

Remember, please, if you have finished HP6 (or are reading it), please e-mail me. I need to talk to someone before I explode!!!