Content-type: text/html Ray Manning

Monday, March 3, 2003 7:35 AM

First Weekend in March Already?


On Saturday I'm up at 6:15am in order to prime the dining room for subsequent painting. All goes according to plan and I comfortably make the 9am deadline.

At 9am an ex-neighbor comes and visits and we go for a good bicycle ride. We used to ride together regularly until he moved away and now we stay in touch occasionally. We go for the approximately 30 mile ride and have fun. There's a good pull towards the end of the ride as we rush to beat the string of lights on Del Amo on the way home.

The roses are tended to and the very first bloom of "Color Magic" has appeared - almost exactly 60 days from the time they were bare root and first laid into the ground. See the updated pictures

Later on Saturday afternoon Person T* and I make it to the house-warming party for the boss. There are many NPOESS and Northrop Grumman people there and the boss shares with me some of his motorcycle racing stories and events. I'm seeing Person T* out of the door of my house near 8pm as I start returning telephone calls.

Saturday night I join Joe at Club Asia. Joe brings Person H_V that Brandon and I partied with a few months back. Person H_V has moved to Long Beach from Atlanta and is now looking for a job. Also at Club Asia are Person Ray, Person D_V, Person T_U, and a few other less well known acquaintances. The evening is progressing nicely. Until Person Dao walks in with Person W_V. I introduce the two to Joe and Person H_V and hope that Person W_V does not remember me. If he does he doesn't say anything because there is no need for security guards to come and monitor the situation tonight. (Though the security guards from this club don't know me....yet.) After I give Joe and Mario their Christmas presents and Joe and Person H_V leave, I hang out with Person Dao and Person W_V and refuse a few offers until it is time to go home. I'm putting my head on the pillow as the clocks strike 2am on Sunday morning.

I'm up on Sunday and out the door for a 20 mile bicycle ride before doing some shopping, reading the newspaper, and watching a race on television. I attempt the London call again and only get a machine, so I promise to call back later.

I head for Jax Bicycle shop and make my list of demands known to the salesman - it actually isn't a difficult list. Before you know it I'm test riding a mountain bicycle and continuing the negotiations during the test ride (as they have the salesman ride a bicycle with you to answer questions and to make sure that you don't ride off with the bicycle). Shortly thereafter I'm pulling out the credit card with the instructions, "Bicycle, light, cage, shock, higher pressure tires, Presta valve. I'll be back in two hours to pick it up after I finish skating."

I'm out the door of the bike shop and down near the ocean. I make headway against a constant headwind for 25 minutes as I work on the power stride. Today, against my better judgement, I decide to skate the extra distance along ChiChi Ridge. (So named by me because the trail folds back towards the Queen Mary and all of the visiting tourists walk here to get their pictures with the Queen Mary in the background.) As I'm skating out I notice a ChiChi sitting alone on a bench enjoying the sunshine and the sights. We make eye contact but I keep going approximately to the turnaround point. As I return I make my fatal mistake - I stop, sit on the bench next to the ChiChi, and ask him, "Where are you from?" And I violate the primary emotional safety rule - Don't look directly into the eyes of a ChiChi.

The ChiChi, hereafter designated Person R_J, says three magic syllables in response to my question. The three syllables are pronounced exactly as I've pronounced them to other people. When the ChiChi says the thee magic syllables I have to keep myself from laughing out loud because they were so unexpected. The ChiChi says, "Osaka".

We have a good conversation about school, languages, pop music, jpop music, travels, Los Angeles, Japan, inline skating, and other things. The ChiChi...um...Person R_J has a number of electronic gadgets that he shows me including a cool minidisc player for music as well as a digital camera that he insists he uses on me to capture my image. I ask Person R_J about streaks in his hair and he pulls out an electronic translator and we punch up "streaks" on it to find the Japanese equivalent. He gets enthusiastic when he sees the Japanese equivalent and shows me his driver's license picture to which I emphatically respond, "That's a jpop thing - both the color and the style". And we have a great laugh over this! Person R_J now has my phone numbers and may or may not use them before his trip to New York or when he returns to Los Angeles. It doesn't matter - I brightened up his day when he said that he was feeling low due to missing his girlfriend, Iko.

I go back and pick up my new bicycle ( ) and take it home. Now I just need to skelotonize the old bike to get the new one how I want it. ("Cannibalize" sounds so harsh and permanant. "Skelotonize" sounds a bit less instrusive.) The bar ends, the rack, the saddle bag, and the cyclocomputer will have to be transferred over. The first ride of the new bicycle is scheduled for a bicycle commute to Northrop Grumman on Tuesday, 3/4/2003.

The London call takes place near 4pm on Sunday (near midnight in London). We discuss the travel plans as well as many other things. I'm still nervous about traveling to the prime partner of the USA against Iraq at this time. But we'll see what happens.

Within 5 minutes of the old, broken frame mountain bicycle being skeletonized of parts, it is being moved out to the garage. The poor mountain bicycle that served me so well for more than 13 years is tossed into the scrap heap as soon as the last bits of life are extracted from it for use on a newer model. Poor mountain bicycle.

The weekend comes to a close with a winning lottery ticket. I match three numbers leading to a $9 jackpot. Is this enough to retire on?