My wife is a total hottie

I met this beautiful woman, Frances England, at a Halloween party in 1996 in Atlanta, and fell in love.

Then we got married and moved to SF ('98), got a dog (2000), had a kid (2002), she made a children's CD and had another kid (2006), made another CD (2008), and went a few places and did a whole lot of stuff in-between.

Anyhow, I was strolling down memory lane the other day and then I looked at some new pictures from a recent photo shoot, and I realized, wow, Fran is like...a total hottie.

I'm sure I'm supposed to be aware of this 24/7 and tell her that she's beautiful all the time but I realized that not only is she gorgeous, but she's like 10X more gorgeous than when we met - I didn't think this was possible and I don't have a clue how it all happened.


Maybe it has something to do with "finding herself" as she has with her music, or maybe she's just a late bloomer, but either way, I gotta keep an eye on that one...

because I just look old.

I thought 8-speed was enough

I've never been one to stay up-to-date with the latest bike technology. I won my first race on a $300 Centurion that had been welded back together at the bottom bracket by a friend - so...from early-on I figured, what's the point? This year I will begrudgingly upgrade my cross bikes to 10-speed. I've held out as long as I could...but my new bike will have 10sp D/A which means the pit bike needs it too. I absolutely despise this trend of ridiculous planned obsolescence, and for some reason I was naive enough to think it may end with 10-speed.


But nooooooooo...leave it to Campagnolo to one-up us all. The announcement of an 11-speed rear cluster has awakened me from my post-less stupor. The Spinal Tap references are waay too easy, so I'll barely even go there...


Ugh, I'd LOVE a pledge from Shimano not to follow suit...but that would just be wishful thinking - they're probably already dreaming of the 12-sp 12-23 straight-block cassette...