Lazy Madness...

Whew.

Okay, so two week madness... sorry about the haitus... there were multiple cats involved, multiple nights of fireworks competitions, people coming, people going... my my...

So, first of all... sadness. Both Claude and Chavez have left. Claude went back to Montreal for school in the fall, first heading down to Boston to do the NACCC (North American Cycle Courier Champs), in which she did awesomely awesome, of course. They even had a pro photog taking their pics in a studio...

Very pro looking. haha.

Secondly, Chavez left on his crazy bike trip down south...

He's somewhere between here and L.A. He left last Sunday solo with a bike he souped up himself into a beautiful touring piece of machinery... Biking all the way down to L.A. where he's going to catch a flight back to Mexico. Very exciting. Before he left though, we had a lovely send-off for him. A shindig at Casa de Chavez/James. John was nice enough to sponsor some money towards a 'give Chavez a good night' fund and the rest of us pitched in and ended up with a nice bottle of tequila. Eep. Pretty funny. I ended up on a bike zooming through the suburb streets around their place, James in tow (for the record... totally lost him... haha) and then we went on an epic bike adventure to go get pizza at Fatih's then over to Kits then back to their place in East Van to check on Sheena, who had fallen asleep on the couch. Also, to make sure

there were no sketchy people left skulking around the house.

Man, there is nothing better than midnight bike rides - boo ya. My favourites are running around downtown late at night because there are enough cars to dodge around but there's no franticness to it. Buses have stopped running so they're not out to schmush you, most jerks are off the roads, pedestrians are at a minimum. It's great. The best part about the west, or at least in the city - trucks are at a minimum. I guess the hicks stay out of the downtown. Haha.

So, what do these two events mean for me? My two west best friends - gone. Sigh. haha. Also, am now senior staff at work? Somehow? Turnover at a bike shop. Go figure. But, doesn't really matter. In two weeks I'm off too. Back to Ontario for some visiting, some packing, repacking and then back out here for school.

What else? Oh, the last two weeks there's been a fireworks competition between four countries - China, the U.K., Canada, and South Africa. They each got a night (Wednesday, Saturday, Wednesday, Saturday) and shot off fireworks over English Bay and used one of the radio stations to play music as accompaniment. It was pretty cool.

Lots of pretty colours! haha

I don't know who ended up winning but really, is that the point? Someone made a comment about it and I thought it was pretty funny - something about the tourists that show up during this competition - the Celebration of Lights - must thing this the greatest city ever... I mean fireworks for no real good reason?! Yeah! haha.

I was catsitting two different sets of cats - first I got Mike from work's Ming. I forget what kind of cat she is but Michelle described her as stubby. She has a short tail and short legs and a squat body - she's quite rolly-polly. And cute. Aaaand chatty. I learned after the first couple nights to keep my door shut as she will come in at 5 am and meow and meow and meow until you do something about it. What? I don't know. I fed her, I gave her water, gave her attention, pets... geez. There was no sating the beast! The second set were Andrew (from work) and Kia's cats - Grace and Cooper. They were outdoor cats that came and went. For that one, I stayed at their place - a nice little downstairs bachelor over in Kits near Balaclava and 12th. Cooper reminded me of a panther - lithe and lanky - and Grace was a queen cat. She was one of those smokey grey sort of long haired cats who gives you lots of looks full of demands and questions and

judgement. Haha.

Last but not least... the Gastown Sprints.

Ah, the sprints. Once again I was totally nervous... I thought there would a lot more competition because the purse this time was entry into the Warrior's Race - a courier race running at the beginning of September. Unfortunately there were only 12 girls this time... Kinda sucked. And, I'm sorry to say, no one really came out of the woodwork to challenge...

Just kidding... well, sort of...

I won all my heats up until the final. Which was against Louise again. And I lost. Again. I felt very Roddick-esque again. I mean, you step on that bike, look over at her - someone who pretty much does this for a living - and you think, 'Shit. How am I going to beat Goliath/Federer/Tiger Woods/whoever...?' Which I know is an awful mentality to have. I tried. I really did. But it's that first 10 seconds that makes or breaks your race. After that, you're at your top speed and can't go any faster. You can only lose time. So, I'm ashamed to say, at the halfway mark, I gave up... yeah, I know! Just calling it in... sigh. Next time? But, shout out to Moses, who did a killer time of putting it on.

Anyway, gotta go... work time... I really need to get some weekends off... arg.