spokesNspin

I am getting threatening phone calls several times a day warning me of imminent danger.  My mail box is full everyday of terrifying warnings.   Is it Halloween pranksters?  No!  It’s the General Presidential Election.

Today I present the confusion of the season in my neighborhood.  I live in a battleground state that is up for grabs.  I have been getting several robocalls a day for a week.  My mailbox is full every day.  Almost 100 percent are filled with fear mongering rhetoric. 

I am terrified and confused.  What should I do?

The military should protect me but they are as confused as I am?

There are the Obama girls and the McCain girls.  Based on the videos I know who I would vote for.

Can’t these women make up their minds?

Should I listen to my mother?

Bicyclists believe they know!

These people are more confused than I am.  They don’t even know who is at the top of the ticket.

This poor family is conflicted and confused.

Seems like I actually live in the state of confusion.

But if you need a break and good laugh. Go here to see what life would be like if sports used political attack ads.

But most importantly  just remember two things. 

Get out and vote and by next Friday Foto Fiesta it will all be over.  We can only hope.

BREAKING NEWS UPDATE!

This post is really just a way to get a mass message out to my family.  The message of course is really good for anyone so feel free to read.

You may not read all the links in my blogroll.  I don’t even read all of them every day.  But today you should go read fatcyclist.  Read the posts from 10/28 and 10/29 in the order they were written.

There is some good food for thought and action there. 

I forewarn you that these are emotionally powerful posts.

It’s been said that statistics are like a string bikini. What they reveal is interesting but what they conceal is vital.

Here are results from different surveys that are both interesting and in some ways seem contradictory or maybe confusing.

According to this survey conservatives are happier than liberals.  And this article says that conservatives are generally more fearful and less rational than liberals.  They are also less traveled and read less.

Maybe ignorance is bliss after all.

But then you have this survey that indicates that those socialist Danes are the happiest people on earth.  I would attribute that not to their left leaning nature but to their tendency towards riding bicycles.

Yes there are interesting statistics on all types of things out there.  I should know, I do it for a living. Everybody is trying to measure something. 

I give up on trying to makes sense of all the statistics.  Just pass me the SI Swimsuit edition. 

Now that is interesting.

Do remember when you were a kid and old enough to really take advantage of the freedom of your bicycle?

My first real non-hand-me-down bicycle was a single speed Huffy Eldorado.  Spandex hadn’t been invented yet.  My brother and I rode all over the rural roads of our farming community on our bikes. 

We rode in our jeans and sneakers.  Nobody used helmets.  Hell we didn’t even use brakes. We could stop by putting our feet down on the gravel and skid to a stop in a cloud of dust. I think I could do things then I wouldn’t even dream of doing now.

One annual tradition was to ride our bikes the six miles  from the farm to school on the last day of the year.  School was out by noon that day.  We would spend a few hours in town riding around engaged in squirt gun fights with other kids and basically terrorizing the town.

Freedom at last and no school for three months.

My bicycling gradually evolved.  Now I have clipless pedals and a drawer full of spandex.  The money I have spent on bicycle related gear would have been considered a sin in my younger days.

A year or so ago I started on a path to get back to the simplicity of the bicycle.   Gradually I got back to doing some cycling in regular clothes.  I started riding now and then on flat pedals with ordinary shoes.  I admit that sometimes I even ride sans helmet if I am riding the mile and a half to the store.

If you haven’t ridden on flat pedals in awhile I suggest you get out and try it.  Ignore you bicycle computer and just relax.

Be a kid again.  I think you might surprised at how fun it is to get back to basics.

Doonesbury can be pretty funny sometimes.  Check out this one from yesterday.