What Good is a Used Tire Tube?

I had an old chest pull exerciser that was getting too loose and no longer gave me the kind of resistance I craved. I bought some latex resistance bands a while back but they also turned out to be a disappointment. An idea popped in my head so yesterday I went on an excursion to Bob’s Cycle Shop in Fair Oaks and asked the cashier what they did with old bicycle tubes from changing flat tires.  He replied that they recycle them and if I wanted to bring my old tubes over they would gladly recycle them for me. I surprised him a little when I said I am interested in taking some of their old tubes. He told me to wait a minute and disappeared behind the bike repair area.  A couple minutes later he returned with a handful of tubes of all sizes. I was ecstatic at the sight of all those different size tire tubes. I ran like a gazelle back home. No, not quite. It was actually 100 degrees outside so I more or less trudged back home, over the Fair Oaks bridge, crossing the bike trail and finally back home nearly an hour later. At home I immediately got to work. First, I removed all the old resistance bands from the chest pull. Next, I cut a tire tube in half and threaded it through each end of the chest pull handles. Finally, I tied the tube together, tested the resistance, made it a little tighter and voila! I now have a really incredible chest pull with hundreds of pounds of resistance to pull and push against. When pumpkin came home, she got excited too. We spent a half hour together doing pushups, pull ups and I let her try out the chest pull. By the way, those old tire tubes are great for tying trees down. They don’t dig into the tree’s bark and are incredibly strong.

Fluffy - the newest addition to our family

Wow, what a day! Started early this morning at 9 AM with Creek Week trash pickup. We went to Folsom and picked up some trash around Blue Ravine near the Winco. Not too much trash to pick up but discovered a nice walk along abandoned railroad tracks. Went back to BT Collins Park to eat a free lunch. Then over to Winco to buy some groceries. After we got home, we went to see the newest addition to our family - Fluffy!Fluffy is an abandoned lab/retriever mix that one of Cindy's coworkers found. We went to pick her up this afternoon and now she is with us. What a bundle of energy she is. Her sole purpose in life it seems from the limited time she has been with us is to simply play ball. Where's the ball? Go get the ball! Give me the ball. That must be the extent of the interaction she had with her previous owner. Monday morning is a free exam by Dr. Bindra. If all checks out, we are going to keep her. The only problem is that Meow Meow our cat has all but disappeared. She may have decided that one large puppy is one too many for her.

Why I am a free thinker

How us free thinkers look at religion.  I am transcribing here a letter from Richard Dawkins, a famous free thinker and humanist:

Dear Friend:

If you live in America, the chances are good that your next door neighbours believe the following:  the Inventor of the laws of physics and Programmer of the DNA code decided to enter the uterus of a Jewish virgin, got himself born, then deliberately had himself tortured and executed because he couldn t think of a better way to forgive the theft of an apple, committed at the instigation of a talking snake. As Creator of the majestically expanding universe, he not only understands relativistic gravity and quantum mechanics but actually designed them. Yet what he really cares about is sin, abortion, how often you go to church, and whether gay people should marry.Statiscally, the chances are that your neighbors believe all that - and they can vote.

In other parts of the world, there is a good chance that your neighbours believe you should be beheaded if you draw a cartoon of a desert warlord who copulated with a child and flew into the sky on a winged horse. In other places, there's a good chance that your neighbours think their wishes will be granted if they pray to a human figure with an elephant's trunk.
Even if your neighbours don' t hold any of those mutually contradictory beliefs, they probably take it for granted that we should unquestioningly.

Prop 8 Upheld by California Supreme Court

Today was a sad day for those that believe in equal rights under the law. The question is does this set a precedent where other rights could be taken away by simple majority vote? I hope not. Hate and fear have triumphed against reason and logic. I am not gay nor do I know anyone who is gay. However, who am I to tell anyone what kind of lifestyle choice they should make? Furthermore, the other side has not produced a sound, rational argument for denying gays the right to marry. To simply say that marriage is between a man and a woman because the Bible says so is about the weakest argument I have ever encountered and yet a majority of people agreed. I watched some of the commercials and they disgusted me with their scare tactics about how children will be forced to learn about the gay lifestyle.

It seems to me that people tend to have very short memories. There was a time when couples of different races couldn't marry. That was written into the books. There was a time when Chinese couldn't own property; a time when Japanese were sent off to live in the desert; a time when blacks were treated like animals. Remember Prop 187 where illegal immigrants were denied health care, social services and education? In each case, the oppressed minority eventually achieved equal rights and the corresponding offensive law was overturned. Yet in this case, the opposite has occurred. A law that denies rights to a group has been upheld, not overturned.

I challenge anyone to present one shred of scientific evidence that gay marriage would either destroy the institution of marriage, threaten the moral fabric of our society or pollute our children's minds. The burden of proof falls on those who insist that it has no place in our society.

Last night dreams

First dream was a hike with Melody, Nelson, the pumpkin and wifey. Came upon a big mud pit. Everyone was able to avoid it except for me. I jumped in and was covered from head to toe in mud. Got out, had to take off my clothes and we ended up at the trail head with about 50 other people with me in just underwear.

Second dream was a drive on the freeway and we stopped at a rest stop. I got out and a caravan of large, black Mercedes with dark tinted glass pulled up. Some Middle Eastern looking men wearing black leather jackets got out of their cars. One of them came up to me and invited me to go for a ride with Sheik Muhammed Al Gari. I agreed and the door of a 30 foot long black limousine opened up. I got in and sat about 10 feet across from a little boy. A man next to me whispered, "I think he likes you." Then the little boy reached into a box next to him and offered a gift to me. I expected something expensive like some diamonds and rubies but when I opened up the box, all that was in it was a small, toy car.

Moving to New Office

It's been a while since I have blogged and it being a Sunday night with pumpkin in bed reading with mommy, I can have a little free time. The economy of course is down the toilet and that has affected Custom Development. So much so that we are now forced to move. Yep, the landlord wants us out as in GTFO. And who can blame them? We haven't paid the rent in months. No, I take that back. We have paid the rent but only 1/2 and that has been pissing off the landlord in a big way. I guess he just snapped. The bad news is that business is so crappy we can only afford a tiny little space in the back of a light industrial park. The good news is that it is just around the corner from where I live. No more long bike commutes through the streets of Rancho Cordova.  I was riding on the bike trail but the truth is that although it has some great views of the American River, I just couldn't stand some of the asshole riders wearing their Italian bike gear who came up quickly behind me and then warned me with their condescending "On your left" notification. Sorry, I don't need that kind of unpleasantness to disturb me while I think. Yes, I like to think while I ride and by the way, I always rode on the far right. I never hogged the trail like some of the others I have seen. So the perfunctory "On your left" warnings started to irritate me very early on as I view them as totally and completely unnecessary. That unpleasantness drove me to look for a new route to follow to work. I was pleasantly surprised and delighted to discover a route with zero other bike riders and practically no cars that was actually faster than going through the bike trail. Reason why is because it was a more direct route. Much nicer, quiet and fast.

Life at the Gym

Since I am no longer riding my bike, I spend a lot of time at the gym and the closest one to home is CFF (California Family Fitness) at Sunrise/50. I either go in the afternoon around 4 before the herd of cattle come in after work or I go at night at about 8:30 - 9. Favorite activities are stairclimbing and eliptical and weightlifting. And no, I have not seen that woman with the grandma perfume. She just made a one time appearance, thank goodness! As for how I pass the time away while climbing stairs, I don't want to listen to music because the ear buds keep falling out and watching TV from three rows back is not enjoyable. That leaves people watching and believe me there is a lot to see, some pleasant and some not so pleasant. Among the interesting people are a couple I call Kitty and Beefcake. She is Kitty because of a small tattoo of a Kitty on her right ankle. I know Kitty lives in Gold River because I was standing behind her once at the Bel-Air market on Sunrise. Beefcake is her boyfriend or husband. Kitty could be Hispanic. I can't tell but she is very attractive, probably early twenties with long, dark hair and dark eyes. Beefcake is, well a beefcake. Short blond hair and just generally thick all around. The fun is when they work out together on the cardio machines. The truth of the matter is that Beefcake can't keep up with Kitty who has tremendous stamina. He can usually last around 20 minutes before he peters out while Kitty is still going strong. She sometimes teases him about it which I imagine he probably doesn't like but that's what happens when you focus too much on heaving weights up and down and don't spend enough time working up an aerobic sweat.

As for me, I usually get drenched and that is how I like it. Others don't seem too enthused when I head over to another machine dripping but I am diligent about cleaning my mess up.
Usually when I go there I really have no interest in conversation. I just do my thing, sweat, change my shirt and exit stage left. Last few weeks have had more social interaction. For example, I met Ortega Rodriguez from Durango, Mexico while playing with pumpkin in the pool. Nice guy. Likes to joke and I have someone I can talk to in Spanish. Oh yea, last night I was in the locker room, a place where I have even less interest in talking to anyone when a stocky Russian guy next to me holds up his smelly, sweaty shirt and proclaims in a thick Russian accent that his shirt is too sweaty. I look at him and then hold up my dripping shirt. I thought I had him beat but he hadn't even started working out yet. Yecch! I am out of here!

That's all for now. Tomorrow is wedding in Bay Area.