What a weekend!
Let’s start from the beginning, shall we?
So Friday night George and I went to see THE Aretha Franklin at the Hollywood Bowl! I love the Hollywood Bowl, they always have great artists and you can still get seats for a somewhat reasonable price. I also like that we can bring our own food and wine and just relax! I really feel like that is what the bowl is all about.
Here I am before the show, just got done with our entree that George made and moving on to cheese and crackers!
And here is one with Aretha on stage and the bowl in all its glory:
Overall the concert was good, the first half was the best because we heard all of the classics, the second half slowed down a bit, but it was still cool seeing her and just being at the bowl…although it was a tad chilly.
Then on Saturday, George and I headed out to Venice beach so that I could be a ride leader for the Urban Expeditions ride lead by C.I.C.L.E. We got there promptly at 10:15 and finally found where we needed to be. However, the ride didn’t actually get started till 11:40 so we sort of had to stand around a while in our cleats and that was a bit uncomfortable. A group of people finally showed up and we started out on the ride. I shadowed another ride leader, Shay, and she talked me through some of the protocol for being a ride leader. Pretty simple stuff, cork an intersection, move up, cork another one, repeat. And oh ya, don’t get hit by cars…well that was a bit of a fail for me. We got to one intersection and I was trying to cork it for the next group. It was very busy and they did not want to let the cyclists through. So as I was standing there this asshole guy in a Scion hit my back tire and really pissed me off! He didn’t damage my wheel, but I sure as hell hope that my tire damaged his stupid ass car (sorry for those who drive Scion boxes, this guys car was stupid because he was stupid). I just don’t understand why people have to be so aggresive and also why they cannot be patient. Breath people…deep breaths…its not that important that you get to your destination that fast.
Here is a pic of a part of the group, I believe this was before the bike car incident:
I also got to wear a cool bright yellow jersey that said “C.I.C.L.E.ista”, that was cool 
After the ride we hung out at the Venice Ecofest for a bit and checked out some of the booths. When I got home, I realized that I had forgotten to put on sunscreen and I got a nice little burn going. However, it wasn’t like a lobster burn…more of an Indian red burn. You can also see my SWEET watch tan line! I also have a nice tan line on the upper part of my arm from the jersey.
Then Sunday came around and we went to go see the Gay Men’s Chorus in “Broadway!” It was at the Alex Theater in Glendale and the show was fantastic! Later that evening we went over to the Yard House and had a “few” drinks with a tri club pal, Lenny. He is moving back to Pittsburgh and leaving us so bye Lenny, we will miss you!
So that was George and I’s busy weekend. I am looking forward to this long weekend coming up, I could sure use the time off!
Last night I went for another little run. Even though I was SUPER tired, I just got my ass out there because I knew it wasn’t a huge time investment. So I started running and was feeling really good and ended up running more than my 15 minute allotment and actually went 25 minutes and ran almost 2.5 miles…sorry Dr. Rupp! But I was feeling GREAT! My heart rate was super low (I attribute that to taking my asthma medicine before the run…who knew?) my feet felt great! And I was listening to this mix called “PodRunner” which is great because the stuff just puts you in a trance. Here I am a little bit on my run, there is this little trail and it was really nice. I wouldn’t mind finding more of these near me because it was really nice.
Also, if you have noticed an increase in pictures…it is because I got a new phone and it has this really nice camera on it (3 megapixals). It is also really easy to upload them so I have just gone picture crazy! So get used to it 
