How could it possibly go wrong?

Went to the Cherry Creek Arts Fest and beat the meat of the storm back to the house by about a minute and a half. I did get a bit soaked, but it’s a duck-drowner out there right now.

My favorite at the festival?  Not sure, one thing is for sure, a lot of the stuff I did like cost more than every bike and bike part I’ve ever bought. I really liked some of the stuff Stephen Hayes, out of Ontario, had on display. I would have snapped some shots, but it was elbow to elbow.

Bike season is well underway here in the Front Range. My headaches are back with a vengeance.

I’ve been back to the doctor and had some tests scheduled. I wanted symptoms to be present for the tests, so I went and did everything I know will kick them off. Wheelie drops, bunny hopping, taking air and hard landings where ever possible. And, it worked. The monkey on my back has been here for almost three weeks now.

The test results? The big one has been cancelled… by my insurance company.

So, I turn myself into a near vegetable so I can possibly get to the bottom of this and clear the way for me to do what I do, what keeps me healthy and happy, bike. And I run smack into the bureaucracy of an “efficient” health care system. I guess they would rather have me on narcotics for the duration rather than actually getting things fixed. I suspect it is part of the ingrained culture of insurance putting up resistance in the hopes that I will just go away. I’m not going away, I’ve been paying into the system for most of my life and I’m not into giving money for nothing.

Doctorow, over on Boing Boing, linked to a great article on our health care system. It’s by Rhonda Hackett, and coincidentally is an article from the Denver Post.

Michael Jackson is gone. One thing I think everyone can agree on is that he was a truly tragic figure. Where I differ from most is that I wasn’t a fan.

Get past Motown and I didn’t like his music. He was talented, but I thought it was over produced, over-hyped, and over the years, has served as the model for the likes of Madonna, the Jonas Brothers, Jessica Simpson, and Britney Spears.  It’s the cynical hype machine music model. The model that says it is not about the music, it’s about the brand and the bottom line. I have trouble believing The King of Pop got any kind of release from his art.

Goodbye Michael Jackson, I hope you get a chance to express yourself where ever you are.

I am really liking early Sunday mornings. This time sans CBS.

Daytrotter.com has really been stepping up to the plate lately, I may have said that before. I’ve actually gone out and bought four or five albums from Amazon in the last couple of months, all have been bands I hadn’t seen before I heard them on the site.  My favorite ones so far:

Mostly Bears - “The Man” (aka “Your smile decorates the afternoon”) drew me in. I stayed for “Leda Atomica” and “The Pharmacist” and “Passeig de Gracia”.

Colour Revolt – “Naked and Red” caught my ear, but the album version of “The Siren” is even better.

Blitzen Trapper – (I was a little slow on the uptake, but thank god for their archives). “Miss Spiritual Tramp”, Bananafish indeed! The album version of it is worth the price, but the Daytrotter version is a better listen. “Black River Killer” is a bit disturbing but a very good anyway.

Little Joy – Only two songs? Disappointing but “Keep me in mind” hooked me.

There are a couple more, but I haven’t had time to jack the headphones in for a good listen. That is what Sundays are for!

The Excedrin isn’t cutting it anymore. The Excedrin + Stranahan’s isn’t cutting it anymore. Even the Excedrin + Stranahan’s + Vicodin isn’t cutting it anymore. If you’ve read here for any length of time, you’re probably annoyed with the ride induced headache references I’ve made over the years. I assure you, you’re not nearly as annoyed by it as I am. This time I’ve been trying to fight one off for about 10 days and I’m either high as a kite or having people ask what’s wrong with my face.  Sometimes to get where you need to be, you need to be pissed off enough to do the hard thing. I’m heading to the hills in the morning with a very specific intent. To kick off the biggest headache I possibly can. Given the last couple of weeks, that shouldn’t be very difficult.

The last time the headaches were this bad, I went for a CT and killed a Volvo with my Trooper on the way there. No repeat performance of that. I’ve recruited a trusted friend to shepherd me around. I’ve got more capable tests scheduled for Saturday morning, and the headache should be in full bloom by then.  Wish me luck, if you don’t hear from me for a while, don’t take it personally.

Payola in reverse? One bit I read compares the radio market in the U.S. to North Korea. Man, they are laying it on thick trying to get HR 848 passed. Making radio stations pay to play music. Pretty soon singing in the car will require a license, now that would be like living in North Korea.

I caught up on cycling news this weekend (again against my better judgement). Not much has changed on the doping front. People get caught and then say, “oh yeah, it’s easy to beat the system.” A blast from the past re-appeared, Simeoni.

I really like this guy. Simeoni could possibly be a tool, he could be a jerk, he could be a drama queen. But he gave the Italian National Champion’s Jersey back! Was he supposed to kiss Armstrong’s ring to be allowed in the Giro? That is one helluva refusal. Panache, that’s what this guy has.

If you are looking for history on the Armstrong/Simeoni feud, here’s a little bit from the Village Voice, and a bit from the archives here.

Given the current state of pro cycling, Simeoni looks like a bright spot.

Tony Ortega of the Village Voice asked a question about this year’s Giro and Le Tour:

Am I the only one who wonders what the hell this comeback was about if Armstrong isn’t going to try winning (sic) any of the big races?

Could it be the scrutiny being applied and his “full access” having been shown to be a bit farcical? Bundle that up with Kohl’s admission of how easy it is to dope, and maybe the chance of getting caught red-handed is the answer.

So, Simeoni, I’m glad to see you are still around, still not taking shit from anyone, and doing it in a grandiose manner.  My suggestion still stands, write that book! I still like my idea for a title: No, Really, It’s About the Bike.

It’s a nice Sunday morning, I seem to have defeated my riding headache from yesterday before it got a chance to really set itself up, and I’m enjoying coffee and catching up on the news.  CBS Sunday morning is pretty innocuous, bubble gum news, and then Ben Stein shows up.

This is the same Ben Stein who told us the mortgage crisis was really nothing to worry about way back when:

Ben Stein, don’t worry, be happy.

Now he’s saying it should be ok for companies to be able to fully reap the benefits of their human capital and hold meetings, but they are scared it will bring the sharp light of critical review. No one is telling the companies that received bailout cash they can’t talk to their own people and benefit from their experiences. What is fairly self-evident is that they need to do it in a manner that is indicative of their financial state. No Bahamas, no charter flights, and maybe Motel 6 instead of the Waldorff-Astoria. If, when the harsh light of reality comes on, things are seen scuttling about looking for places to hide, that might be a sign of an infestation.

The question is why did shareholders not give a crap about the culture of entitlement management in these companies created. Why? These guys have lived beyond their means, are interested only in the next quarter, and will sacrifice the shareholders long term interests for their short term gains. The travel junkets are a symptom of the culture of looting. Pay me now, screw the consequences. It is not sustainable, was not sustainable, and will not be sustainable tomorrow. It’s time to extend our attention past a three month time horizon. Maybe it’s time for Reg Z and Glass-Steagall to make a comeback. Maybe it’s time to get all of our eggs out of the “too big to fail” companies and go all Teddy Roosevelt on them and break them up.

Good Sunday morning to you Mr. Stein.  I was hoping you’d stay handcuffed to Shaq and out of my line of sight for at least the rest of the year.

I received a new HP workstation last week at work, had to rush it into deployment because another one failed.  No sweat, I thought, same model, same build, there will be no issues. Uh hunh.

My user comes to me and tells me that he can’t RDP into the machine. Hmm, I thought, it has to be going into Power Save.  I check the settings. Oops, not it. Maybe he put it into hibernation. Guess again. Firewall? Nope… NIC? Scanned and 3389 is open. Hrm…

The event log showed “RDPDD.dll failed to load”. What? The conflict, it seems, is not really a conflict,  but session memory allocation for the driver for the nvidia video card. Odd since I requested an identical build out to the last one he had and that one actually worked out of the box. Not enough memory is being allocated for the RDP session since it shares it with display and print drivers. Solution, update the driver or do some registry diving. I chose registry diving, just to be sure, and because I wanted to leave the office without hunting and pecking for the right driver/version.

I added the following registry key:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management]

“SessionImageSize”=dword:00000020

Frustrating problem solved, and it really only took an hour or so.

I went down to the REI at Confluence today to pick up some odds and ends for the summer. Everything was going pretty well, I got my stuff and headed home.

I drove up Colfax and traffic was snarled. It took a few minutes before I saw why it was snarled. There was a woman lying in the street. She’d been hit by a car, a pickup truck, I think. Her bags were scattered all over the place and it didn’t look good at all. I pulled off on Emerson or Williams or one of those streets to get out and help. The ambulance showed up as I pulled over. None of my training covered auto accidents, and with much better help present, I moved on.

It’s been on my mind all day, I can’t shake the image of the scene. There is no mention of it on the local news sites so I’m not sure if she was OK or not. If you happen to know, email me at cjones at this URL minus the blog.