Frenchy's Rant

I’ve found something easily as addictive as crack. And I’m hooked.

Facebook.

I always thought it was for kids, pedophiles and other assorted losers. And it is, for sure. But it’s also my latest way to be completely and totally non-productive. I’m not sure what that says about me.

Within minutes of signing up, I had people from my long-ago, entirely forgotten past suddenly reappearing. People from high school, waaay back in the BF (Before Frenchy) days, when I was just a long haired wanna be rock star, are now getting back in contact.

And the more I look, the more people I find. Seems NOT being on Facebook is for losers.

I don’t even know how it happened, but that’s what addiction is all about. Just like my other addiction, Bejeweled, it snuck up on me, bit by bit, until what I though I could control is now controlling me.

Now, I can, at any time of day, see what other bored FB addicts are doing. And I do it! All the time! Sounds ridiculous, and it is ridiculous, but addicting all the same.

Friends right now are singing, annoyed, procrastinating and unhappy. And, thanks to this addiction, I KNOW ALL ABOUT IT!

I’m sure like Bejeweled, Pandora internet radio and most of my other addictions, interest in this fad will fade, and I’ll be right back where I was before.

And everyone on Facebook will know all about it.

Election day. Again. And I’m watching the results trickle in from deep within the bowels of a TV truck. Again.

My thought on the election so far? CNN has really cool maps. But, how they can call a state red or blue when one percent of the votes have been counted is beyond me.

I’ve been struggling all day to write something about the elections, but all I’ve managed to do is send a bunch of brain vomit, including a not-quite-good election day haiku and several witty but useless post titles to Blogger.com’s virtual “Bad Blog’ dumpster.

Why?

I don’t care about the election.

Why not?

The Kingdom of Rhode Island, a hotly contested battleground state, has an enormous and extremely valuable four Electoral College votes up for grabs. Four. Seriously. For comparison sake, California, my adopted second home, has fifty-five. My ballot, an absentee sheet that looked more like a menu for Chinese take out than an official document, had to be cast two weeks ago, because the Kingdom of Rhode Island isn’t yet advanced enough to have early voting. Where is that ballot/menu now? Most likely in the bottom of a dumpster behind a Chinese restaurant. As a state, we just don’t matter, even though I did my best to bolster our tiny Kingdom’s population all summer long.

But at least I voted. Might not have anything interesting or enlightening to write about it, but Frenchy’s die has officially been cast. Somebody will win, and inherit the second worst job in the world, and a big mess. Good luck with all that.

In less interesting news, November is the start of ‘Stupid Season’, the season of super-ridiculous travel. That’s probably another reason for my distinct lack of blogging verve. This travel is mostly work related, though I will try and fit in some malted beverage time too. In the next four weeks I’ll cover at least half the planet, and enjoy toasting the ‘Best Day Ever’ in five distinct time zones in four weeks.

Then the holidays will grind to a merciful end, and riding season will begin again.

At least there’s light at the end of the tunnel. Hopefully there are some inspired posts there too.

Being somewhat of a smart-ass, it’s a very rare occasion that I’m rendered speechless. After last night, the US Airways Arena in Phoenix will forever be remembered as one place where I was.

Cyber Sunday, what seems like the WWE’s thousandth or so Pay-Per-View of 2008 was all over except for strike, the time we put away all the toys we used during the show, pack it all up in trucks and get ready to go do it all over again somewhere far, far away.

I was wrapping cables running from the TV truck into the arena in an almost completely empty parking area. I say almost, because there was exactly one car, a shiny new Mustang convertible still parked nearby. One of the crew, who shall remain nameless, somehow managed to push a loaded cart right into that one remaining car. There was no apparent damage, but that didn’t stop me for harassing him.

“Oh man, what the fuck!” I shouted in mock anger. “You plowed into the only car in the entire lot! Nice job, you… dickhole!” I had a little giggle to myself, thinking, “Wow. Dickhole! Now that’s pretty original!” It was the highlight of my day.

That highlight only lasted for a minute or so, then I felt bad. Not for insulting the guy, we do that as a matter of course around here. It helps keep crew morale nice and low. What I felt bad about was the fact that a girl, not part of our tight knit crew, just an innocent civilian that happened to be walking by at the time, overheard me giving the guy grief with my clever insult.

I quickly started apologizing, saying to her, “I’m really sorry you had to hear that.”

She turned to me and her quick response rendered me speechless.

“That’s OK. Dickhole was my nickname in high school!”

There’s a rock out in Morro Bay, and it’s pretty famous. Fiona and I arrived in the tiny seaside town just in time to watch the fog completely envelop the top of that famous rock, and watched as it rapidly encompassed the surrounding harbor.

Though it was a Friday night, we had little problem finding a room at the Breaker’s Motel, and while it was a bit on the pricey side for what can only be termed ‘a dump’, at least the room had a fireplace and a small balcony.

The balcony view promised to be impressive, assuming the fog lifted by morning.

Fiona and I went out on the town that night. After a fantastic meal we stopped off at The Otter Rock cafe to hear some good live music. The drinks started flowing, and the night started getting a bit… shall we say… foggy. I know I was in bad shape because at one point I got up and danced, something that I only do when I don’t know better anymore. I know I stunned everyone with my awesome repertoire of moves, including “Shakin’ The Dice”, “Stirrin’ The Pot” and my latest “The Bouncin’ Frenchy” – a move best described as mimicking (poorly) a toddler learning to walk. I remember slurring away at the guitarist, a nice guy who turned out to be a fellow New Englander, I remember walking in on a girl in a red shirt washing her hands in the men’s room, I remember noise and colors, lots of laughing, settling a big bar tab, and very few other specific details.

One other detail I do remember is a few people ending up on our balcony at the Breakers, including Little Miss Red Shirt and her strange, silent boyfriend that drove six hours from San Diego to meet her. I tried to take a picture of Rain Cloud Follows from three stories up:

I recall at some point, much later in the night, our merry band of revelers being threatened by a gigantic, overweight Swedish woman in a fuzzy white robe that the manager would be called if we didn’t ‘Shooot The Fooock Oooop Right Now!‘ Then, I sorta remember being called ‘assholes’ by this rotund mound of foreign flesh, but by then then my world view was getting pretty dim.

One thing I do know for certain. It was the Best Night Ever. I know this because I toasted and toasted and toasted away until the Macallan flask was empty.

The next morning I woke up feeling fuzzy. “Uhh… What happened?’ I wasn’t too sure. At least I was in a hotel room. So was Fiona. OK. So far, so good. A quick headcount brought immediate relief. While we may have made some new friends the night before, they didn’t become CLOSE friends. I don’t know where the others ended up, but thankfully it was somewhere else.

I looked out the window, and saw that the sun was up, and it was a bright, clear and beautiful day.

Then, snippets of the previous night started percolating in my head. I grabbed my camera and immediately deleted any and all evidence of the previous night. No sense in saving incriminating evidence, is there? No. Then, noticing my previous night’s attempted Rain Cloud picture, I decided to test my ‘morning after’ photographic ability.

Not bad. If my hands were steady enough to take this picture, I felt like I’d be able to make it through the day.

The fog free view from the balcony was stunning. After a quick breakfast of Advil and water, Sleeping Beauty and I decided to head over and explore The Rock.

Pretty cool. For some reason, we didn’t feel too much like exploring that day, and decided to jump on the 101 and head straight home.

We stopped in the little town of Los Alamos for food and fuel, and had another bizarre road encounter. I pulled up to the middle pump, and before I even got off the bike, a guy pulled up next to me in a little black Mini Cooper clown car. “Hey! I was in line and you cut in front of me!”

I didn’t believe what I just heard. First off, Mr. Clown Car driver pulled in after me, I saw him in my mirror. Secondly, the pump in front of me was available, so why bother saying anything? Third, what the hell are we, in Kindergarten or something?

“What?” I wanted to make sure I heard him correctly.

He whined his same clown complaint at me again.

“What??” Now I knew I’d heard him, but I wanted to make him repeat himself a third time, in hopes he’d realize what a completely unreasonable douchebag he sounded like.

“YOU CUT ME!”

OK. Play time is over. “Are you here to get gas? OK!” I pointed to the vacant pump in front of me. “Then GET YOUR FUCKING GAS, CLOWN!”

He glared at me the whole time he filled his little two gallon tank. Though I don’t suffer stupidity lightly, I’m mostly non-violent. However, I will admit the idea of pulling the nozzle out of my tank, hosing this little shit and his clown car down with fresh hi-test, then asking for a match crossed my mind.

I managed to keep my inner arson in check, but this clown encounter really put a damper on the day. We took exactly three more pictures on the trip.

Three Of My Favorite Things

It took a while, but eventually we were laughing about the guy, and in fact, the experiences of the entire trip. Through the remaining five hour ride, Sleeping Beauty managed to get in an hour nap, but only whacked me with her head twice on the way home.

Our Two Day, 544 Mile Route

With a bunch of non-motorcycle travel coming up for work and the holidays, this most likely will be the last ride of 2008. We’ll take some time to do some holiday motorcycle shopping for Sleeping Beauty, and of course, start planning for the 2009 riding season, which is already shaping up to be the Best Season Ever!