today the rain stopped and allowed us to get out on a nice ride. here are the boys waiting to get out.

marco models the shabby chic cyclist look and is trying to bring back the use of safety pins as accessories. he got sick of pinning his numbers for races and just left the pins on there. interesting approach.

view from the road above our house. six more days until we leave, and i am getting bummed. i love riding my bike here!

thanks to our I.T. guys at camp we finally have wireless internet and aren't all crammed at the country casual chicken themed dining room waiting for a wall connection. here is a sampling of some of the (for lack of a better word) chicken themed items...

two ceramic hens minding their own business.

coffee cups (the second one from the right is mine)

my personal favorite, the lamp.

anyone have the time?

one more hen at the kitchen sink. let's hope the decorators got these ceramic beauties at the dollar store.

camp #2 came in today (all guys, and i feel like i am living in a frat house). from left to right around the table are: coach jon, marco, andy, collin, and brad. andy and collin have a blog, so you can follow their side of the camp too. (you can check them by clicking on their names)

today was our first day of rain, and i actually went out in it this morning for about 45 minutes. looks like rain tomorrow too and then it will clear up for a little bit. i feel bad for camp #2 because they have yet to see the sun in santa barbara.

8 p.m. we've got a camper (andy) asleep and snoring 10 minutes into the movie, emmanuel's gift, narrated by our montecito neighbor, oprah.

day off...jon and i go to malibu...

jon took me to pt. dume where he proposed to me last january. he even paid the $6.00 to park at the beach just so we could go back to the exact spot. then he took me to taverna tony's where we ate with james cameron(director of titanic/terminator I and 2), well not really, but he was a down a couple of five tables.

up at the pepperdine law school with the sweet towers in the background where i spent my sophomore year. good times.

we met up with erin and mike mand. i have known erin since cy creek high school days in houston where we had typing class together (we are excellent typists). then we ended up going to pep together after graduation. it is always fun to see these two. they are so with it. they know all about famous people, red bull and purina dog chow. they are soon to be parents too... of a dog.

some fun things we saw on our day. the kids playing in the reclaimed poop water at alumni park at pep.

this "look at me" chicken car that was rollin' around malibu and givin' me an ozzy rock n' roll sign.

we also went back to the pool and snapped a pic of where i spent most of my time, and some of the best times of my college life.

rode up gibralter today, here is a shot of what we went up. what you can't see are the huge pot holes you have to deal with when decending the road.

here is one of the worst stretches of pavement on the ride.

a self-portrait

we went to the top of the cliff drive in santa barbara to watch stage 5 of the tour DE california yesterday, here are some pics.

jon looking for the break coming up the hill and the rest of the campers enjoying the sun.

picture of one of the MANY groups working hard to get to the finish.
j.j. haedo chatting with a healthnet rider like he is having a double espresso, and not in the middle of a 7 day race.

this woman is all about georgie. she is advertising good junk in the trunk. um, insert joke here.

jon yelling at the baj (his teammate on vitamin cottage last year) he get's the point acknowledgement from andy and then the next pic is jon telling him to get his butt moving.

anne pulled me home up the hill to the car (on my longboard). this only lasted a couple feet though before she got sick of it.

we went on a ride to ventura/ojai and went around lake casitas today with the campers.

happy campers.

this is coach jon and the campers before he hit a large bird which got the poop knocked out of it... literally.

see, poop on jon's lens.

headed to the barn, these four rotated and i just sat in their draft for the ride. i love getting a good draft. good times.

happy birthday gracen. you're six, straight up.

went for an easy spin with the gang. here we are along shoreline drive (cabrillo) where the tour of california will have their stage 5 finish. anne and i wish basso was racing, but no luck.

here are some signs around town. both of these signs are on 192 which is the main road we are off of in montecito.

pic of my bud gord on this sign. which is facing the wrong way on the street by our rental so the riders will never see their welcome sign. (unless they are looking backwards)

other fun things we saw on our ride today was this crazy van. i can't even imagine the amount of time that it took to make the outside of this van look like a mobile craptacular.
yesterday this dude asked us if we were with the tour of cali race and beat everyone else. when he walked out of the bakery i whispered, isn't that dude in movies or something, i've seen him before. anne proceeds to scream, WHO'S IN MOVIES. (note to self: don't say something when someone famous is in the room to anne) anyway, anne later randomly comes up with the name timothy bottoms, and i said, yep that's his name. he was in last picture show, texasville, and more recently on comedy centrals, that's my bush as george bush.

the biggest stop sign in santa barbara, which we ignore and go up the road that says road closed. last year there was a big mudslide here which you can see on the side of the hill. we kinda booked it through this part and made sure we didn't cough or make any sudden movements.

eric and i (giving it my all face) climbing up to the gibralter and east moutain road in santa barbara.

brent ertz at the crossroads sign where the fun climbing begins.

jon climbin' like a goat up to la cumbre peak.

me and crazy anne lannan (the most entertaining training partner a girl could have).

it is pictures like this that make vitamin cottage real nervous about the sports garage rio grande divas. red crocs, adidas pants, white fruit of the loomer, and a backwards aero helmet on kenny make a lethal combination.

campers arrive

anne lannan, always doing business even when she get's off the plane... and unpacking her bike, and making breakfast, and during pee breaks while we ride.

brent ertz and a big chair. he watches his calorie intake so much that he has shrunk into an incredibly small size.

pic during our ride today. it was a very pretty day. a little cold and windy, but nothing compared to colorado riding right now.

more babies!!!! here are good friends sydney and jason with new baby maia elizabeth. jill, sydney and margell were all due about the same time during the wedding and they all had babies within two weeks of one another.

margell and brian had their baby girl haydn last week. vin is loving his new sister with a slighly forced smile.