story time

A month ago last sunday i went for a ride. Quite a ride it would turn out to be. I packed the not so trusty KTM and headed east. I said hello to a few friends in the California Valley and then onward to the bustling center of the arts know as Bakersfield. Managed to make it out of there alive and rendezvoused with non other than Peter Nesbitt. Me and the pete struck out together across the lower portion of the country seeing places such as Parker, Phoenix, Tuscon, Road Forks, El Paso, and finally Austin. Austin in fact was the destination of the ride. We spent a few days celebrating the Christmas with my mother, sister, brother in law, and the two recent Costello additions Ruby and Oliver. A good time was had by all but the ride needed to continue. The lone star state was chilly as was its western neighbors. No more. I couldn't take it. South. I had to get a bit warmer. Our NAFTA partner to the south opened her arms wide. I was quite pleased to buy petrol from state owned gas stations, use pesos, and eat food from street vendors that was but guaranteed to make me ill. A welcome change indeed. I was witness to chaotic border towns, vast deserts, humbling mountains and even got a chance to see my old friend the pacific. Just about the time that i said farwell to the southernmost point of my ride i was confronted with quite the dilemma: a buggered gearbox. Solution: hang out in an allegedly unsavory city that was also home to some of the kindest, most hospitable strangers that I have encountered in recent memory. So there it was New Year's Eve. Alone. Culiacan (reportedly third largest drug center in Mexico). I was lulled to sleep by the sound of jubilant semi-automatic gunfire for two nights and then I got the itch to get moving yet again. Off I went without a moto. 30 hour bus ride to Tijuana and then a short two hour jaunt up to Orange County to spend a day with a dear friend before he two left on an a little walkabout of his own. Farwell at the airport and off to yet another bus station. 8 hours later and I am home, in a manner of speaking. There you have it. a story. 

Pictures = Words

I've heard it said that a picture is worth a thousand words. Here's a couple thousand. Details to follow.

merton strikes again (apologies for the pun)

Very often people object that nonviolence seems to imply passive acceptance of injustice and evil and therefore that it is a kind of cooperation with evil. Not at all. The genuine concept of nonviolence implies not only active and effective resistance to evil but in fact a more effective resistance... But the resistance which is taught in the Gospel is aimed not at the evil-doer but at evil in its source.

- Thomas Mertonfrom Passion For Peace

All...

"All must be friends
All must be loved,
All must be held dear,
All must be helped."

- Teresa of Avila
The Way of Perfection

men can't multi task

So here is a example of my inability to multi-task, you decide whether this should apply to the rest of my gender as well. So I was running a little late to school this morning. I mount up on the simoncini (my fixed gear bicycle) with messenger bag and new chain bike lock in place. I am also equipped with a tasty americano (of my own crafting) in my favorite Ti coffee mug. Everything was going fine down Madonna road. Sure i got a few funny looks from the death monster (automobiles) drivers but that happens alot. Sometimes its the brakeless bright red and yellow fixie, or perhaps the safety orange chain bike lock, or the sweater i am wearing that looks it was stolen from the Monterey county jail. All this aside i was having a somewhat normal ride to school for about two blocks. It wasn't until I rode away from the light at Madonna and Los Osos Valley Road that things began to get interesting. I was having a rather difficult time getting my feet into my toe baskets. Not a big problem. It happens. I finally get my left foot into the basket and then look up to realize that i am about to ride off the sidewalk down a small drop into a flower bed. I panic. I blurt out a few awkward expletives and proceed to flail wildly till my bike is laying in the flower bed, my coffee is all over me, my bike and the sidewalk and there is dirt and bark strewn every which way. All this to say i and perhaps a few of my fellow males are quite terrible at balancing even a few seemingly simple tasks. To all of my brethren reading this who are trying to fight the facts, I have this to say : Stop living a lie; you probably can't tie your shoes and chew gum at the same time, and you know it.

my mind has taken to wandering....

In the past few months my mind has been ceaselessly crafting plans for trips to far off lands, trips with no real destination just a goal of seeing, experiencing, and being. Here is the next trip on which i shall depart.

back to school

I can hardly believe that i just started my fifth and final year of my cal poly college career. I feel so old. I just bumped into a fellow fifth year, quite a treat for college students of our advanced years, and we both remarked on the nuances of being a fifth year geezer. On the bright side i am running out of classes to take so i only have 8 units this quartere which means lots of blogging! Peace my people.