Chip’s Blog

Did you hear the one about the Librarian with Tourette’s? How about the one about the librarian who could bend nails? Or the one about the librarian with a funny smart unique point of view who  can make you think about the way you perceive things and that maybe you too can be a better person in spite of yourself.

Josh Hanagarne is the World’s Strongest Librarian. He is funny and smart and his struggles with Tourette’s have helped him become a living metaphor for succeeding in spite of oneself. I often berate myself for being my own worst stumbling block but can you image hitting yourself in the face so hard that it hurts? Then doing it again? And the whole time is happening you are talking about helping people with “real” disabilities.

His blog will help you be a better person, and you should go read it right now.

I wasn’t too sure how I felt about turning 40. On one hand, I’m a reasonably healthy, smart, quick thinking (sometimes) fella. On the other hand I tend to squander my health on beer and hamburgers and my smarts on finding the best, cheapest, or closest beer and/or hamburger joints. Part of me feels like I could be doing more, but part of me just wants a nice cold one and a bacon cheeseburger. So I was conflicted.

I decided that what I really needed was a nice reasonable adventure, and since I like bikes, and have a couple of them I decided I’d go for a nice long ride. I talked to Andrea who was immediately up for it, then logged onto mapmyride.com and planned out a nice route. Malibu to Ventura and back, a hundred miles give or take a few, and plenty of places to find food along the way.

I know people train for things like this, plan out their calories for the day, have contingency plans and all that. Our plan was to drive to Malibu, get on our bikes and ride until we hit the sand in Ventura. Sometimes planning is overated anyway.

I fueled up the night before with a nice plate of pasta and meat sauce and a couple of cold beers. "Carbo-loading" we used to call it - but the truth is that I just like pasta and beer.

We started the day with a quick stop at Jack in the Box. Andrea feuled up with a cheeseburger and hashbrowns while I went for the sourdough breakfast jack. Mmmmmm Hammmmmm.

Why do adventures always have to start while its still dark outside?

Sunrise, time to hit the road.

Andrea leads down the PCH just North of Pepperdine.

Who knows, next year I may even buy proper cycling attire.

No, Chip, we are not stopping for a snack!

Happy bike riders, about 20 miles into the day.

Pacific Coast Highway.

As we approached Oxnard by Port Hueneme we turned inland for a few miles of farm country.

You want summa dis?

If its ten a.m. it must be time for beer. We found this great little taco place along the way and got a couple of fresh, piping hot Al Pastor tacos and some nice cold beer.

I can't tell you all the reasons I like riding bikes with Andrea, but this is one of them.

Time to get back on the road. Thanks Taqueria Caporales!

Apparently there is more to Oxnard than farmland.

On the Beach in Ventura. We were a little shy of the 50 mile point here, so we kept riding up the sidewalk that runs along the beach until...

Halfway there! along with our beer and tacos we had been drinking plenty of Gatorade, and munching on gels, cliff's Shot Blocks, and pretzels and banana chips. I was a little surprised at how good we felt here and stoked about the rest of the ride.

While we were taking this pic a lady said "Are you guys riding your bikes to all the In-N-Out burgers in California or something?" Andrea and I looked at each other and said "Not today, but that's a pretty great idea!"

Ride to eat: Eat to ride

My friend Mong once said "Dude, most people plan their meals around the trip, but I think you actually plan your trips around where you want to eat." Mong is very perceptive.

Andrea got her drink to go...

Back by Port Hueneme again we stopped for a break at the missle park. Riding through Oxnard at midday was hot and we were glad to be back down by the ocean.

Probably a good description of people who go for long bike rides with minimal preparation.

Missile park sights

Bananas and pretzels: the secret ingredient!

I was just cresting a hill on the PCH just north of Malibu when I felt the back tire get mushy. Bummer man, “We’re gonna have to stop” I said to Andrea, “I’ve got a flat.”

“OK” she said in her usual cheery tone and as we rolled to a stop she was already on the phone making business calls. I checked the computer – 81 miles – took a long drink of Gatorade, and yanked the offending wheel off the frame. When you are riding beside the ocean with a great friend on a gorgeous fall day even a flat tire can’t bring you down.

Back on the road just a few miles out.

OK, the odometer shows 95.5 miles. The car is just down the road, but Malibu Seafod has got some tasty fish and chips and I haven't eaten there in years. Do we stop and enjoy the afternoon or "finish strong"?

Did I mention that I really like the fish and chips?

a couple of detours back in Oxnard chopped some distance and left us at 98.7 miles so we rode around Malibu for a few minutes just to put the ticker over a hundred. Next time I'll take andrea up on the offer of some sunscreen.

“You think you can win on talent alone? You don’t have enough talent…to win on talent alone…Again.”

Words are frightening to those who wish to hold power over you. The last week in September is national banned book week. Read something you shouldn’t. Because if someone is afraid that what you read will weaken their hold on you then perhaps their argument deserves a little more scrutiny.

Find what they don’t what you to read, then read it.

Find out the questions they don’t want you to ask. And ask them.

Because the only thing worse than not getting an answer to your question

is not having the courage to ask it.

A thin trickle of piss from some unknown bum has seeped in under the door in the parking garage, and now fills the hall with its stink. I fiddle with my MP3 player while John Prine sings about the glory of true love. It’s hot outside, and I’ve waited too long to run today.

I put a hand on the door. Feel the heat – crap. This is gonna suck.

And I push it open.

Three fat brown kids and a pasty white hipster couple buy ice cream from an old man with a pushcart, I jostle past them and a large family with two strollers. Two more steps and I’m momentarily free of the crowd. “Shot through the heart!” Screams Jon Bon Jovi in my ear, “and you’re to blame…” The air fills with the smell of onions and peppers, bacon and hotdogs, pulled pork and burned cheese. A man shaves ice from a huge block and mixes it in cups with a variety of brightly colored heavily sugared syrups. A small crowd waits to get theirs and I slow for a second to wait for the light.

It turns green before I get there.

I cut the corner, hit my stride, and head down 6^th street into the heart of skid row.

It’s mid-afternoon. The cool air of morning is gone, and the ocean breeze has yet to make it this far east. The homeless move about like a flock of birds – following the shade in the summer and the sun in the winter. Today they fill the spaces in what little shade there is and so I run on the sunny side of the street where I am clear of the aimless shufflers that mix with the crowd who sit waiting patiently for evening. It’s hot, and the smell of human necessity seeps from the alleys.

The road is blocked off down by the mission – apparently there was a festival of some sort earlier – and a man walks down sixth singing a baseball bat wildly. No one stops him. I stay to the sidewalk for a few more blocks, make a left at Alameda and run through the warehouse district. Past that place where the crazy guy beat that girl to death in her moms Volvo, over the freeway full of jammed up traffic headed into Hollywood, past the tourists at Olvera street, past Union station, past china town, and onto the open road along side cornfield park.

I cross the river on the Spring street bridge, take off my shirt, make a left at Avenue 20/San Fernando road and feel the sun bake my skin. The sky is brown up by Pasadena, and somewhere a fire is still burning.

I pass the hardware store. Most of the day workers have gone home and the few who remain sit at the tables taking long drinks from bottles of Gatorade. A tractor-trailer rushes by, followed by a swirling cloud of road gook that sticks to my skin and makes it all prickly.

The soccer fields are full of tan men wearing bright clothes battling it out while pretty girls and moms with babies wait under the few trees the line the edges of the park.

Two girls stand on the street corner angrily texting someone who obviously isn’t responding appropriately. They fill the sidewalk and I glare at them as I approach until they begrudge me my space and I pass between them without breaking my stride.

A man tends a fire in a big metal trough; his van parked close by. Its cargo door is open and coolers full of something fleshy sit inside sweating under the hot sun.

Farther up the road, I run beside a long row of low buildings that crowd the sidewalk. The acoustics are weird here and it always sounds like I hear footsteps running right behind me.

But then, sometimes I hear footsteps even when I’m not running.

I turn around at the edge of the avenues where the police raids mopped up 44 drug dealers, gang bangers, and cop killers last week. Stop for a minute in the shade under the 2 freeway while cars buzz overhead, put on some new tunes and head home.

The breeze has finally made it over from the ocean, and I settle into a good rhythm, making time back along San Fernando road. A truck full of girls drives past, they whoop and yell at my white skin, and I laugh.

The man with the fire has set up grates on it and filled them with chicken. His wife stands at a small table and lays out tortillas, onions, and cilantro; and more than anything I wish I had brought five dollars with me.

Back and Back and Back and Back. Over the river and into downtown dodging oblivious drivers and magically hitting the lights just right. Back on Main less than a mile out, I blow through a film shoot – running faster now that I’m almost home. I catch the door of the building just as a family comes out then run and catch the elevator too. Six floors up and 127 steps to my door.

The dogs look up from the couch to see if I brought them a treat. I didn’t so they stay there.

A quart of water is gone in less than two minutes and I’m reaching back into the fridge for a beer when I see a leftover fruit cup from breakfast at the sandwich shop across the street. I leave the Hefe and take the fresh fruit into the shower where I stand under the icy blast and pour huge chunks of watermelon and cantaloupe into my mouth.

The Cat Piano from PRA on Vimeo.

Walking toward Metropolis Books I happened upon a great moment at the corner of 5th and main. A frazzled old lady was pushing a frazzled old man across the street in his wheel chair. As they got closer I could hear their conversation.
Lady: yeah but you know you can push with your arms right?
Man: huh?
Lady: your arms. You can push the chair yourself with them right?
Man: (slightly agitated) what?!
Lady: (exasperated) you can help push the chair with your arms!
Man: why would I do that when I’ve got you?
Lady: (walking away leaving him stranded at the corner) oh no! Hell n hell no hell no!
Man: (pushing his chair himself) baby wait! Baby come back. Baby wait!

Photo on the left taken from the 9th floor of the Pacific Electric Building; on the right is at the corner of 6th and Broadway in downtown Los Angeles. August 31, 2009

Quinn is back for a visit this month. YAY Quinn!

I’ve always been a runner as far back as I can remember. When I was a kid I go out for a run and when I got home my mom would inevitably ask, “How was your run?” and being young and cranky I’d get more irritated at the question than I should have. The truth is I didn’t know how to answer it. How was the run? it was nice and anoying and happy and hot and cold and windy and sometimes surreal. I never knew how to answer the question until today when I saw this video. So, if you want to know how the run was, it was like this. (I especially like the realism at 2:02 and the “runners high” that starts at about 3:12) enjoy the video, then go do something.

I cross the road at the Riverside Dr/Glendale blvd intersection and cruise along the sidewalk; careful to avoid the broken glass and smashed up bits of who knows what that lie under the overpass.

“On your right” I say to an old guy on a beat up mountain bike. He glides to the left and I squeeze past.

I make a left onto the narrow path and spin a little faster.

The gate is open and I blow through it already shifting as I drop into the bike lane running along the concrete banks of the LA River. I-5 hums on my left while on my right herons and geese and ducks bob about the water looking for lunch.

energy and ambition roar past on the left, peace and tranquility on the right, and with the wind at my back, I ride right through the middle of it. Whipping through my own little patch of the world and grinning like a madman at the wild wonder of it all.

We’ve had the best weather this spring. Weeks on end of nice 70-75 degree days, beautiful mornings -a few clouds, even a few sprinkles of rain – and nice cool evenings. I know I’ll think back on these nice spring days when the blast furnace months of August/September roll around.

Recently, I re-connected with an old friend from the bad old days back in Pensacola. I haven’t talked to her in years, but we were both amazed at how our lives have taken wildly different, and yet oddly parallel routes.

She’s a professional photographer, just like I am occasionally, she’s married now for almost 20 years, and her husband is from the same area as my sister’s husband, She lives north of Seattle close to the area where I used to live when I was up in the northwest, etc. etc.

One really strange coincidence is that she was living in Ventura, CA at the same time that I was up in Santa Barbara, and very nearly went to Brooks Institute at the same time that I was there – now that would have been a crazy meeting!

I tend to try not to revisit my past too often, but every now and then you get a real surprise and find that old friends can be new friends too. Of course none of that has anything to do with the sign in this picture – I just liked the way the light was falling on Casey’s sandwhich board, and I’d have to agree, it is a beautiful day for a beer.

Thanks for contacting me Becca, its good to know you again after all this time.