Sunday, January 07, 2007

Exercising Shouldn't Give You Cancer

It's been a busy weekend and nothing in Ventura has really caught my attention to drop everything and blog about so instead I bring you an old post from my other blog, DOWN WITH PANTS!. Can anybody explain to me this phenomenon...

Almost every single day I see a guy riding his bicycle, smoking on a cigarette. That is not a good look and it seems very counter-productive.

There is one Mexican gangsta looking guy I see two or three times a week riding his beach cruiser. I've seen a NASCAR kind of guy on a mountain bike a couple of times with his flannel and his mustache flapping in the wind. I've seen a total douchebag dude with no shirt, shorts and flip-flops riding a little tiny BMX. There is another 300 pound guy I see occasionally riding a 20 year-old ten speed that looks like it is going to buckle under the weight. And there are more. Many, many more.

I have found one common denominator. Mustaches. Virtually every guy I have seen smoking and riding his bike has had a mustache. I don't know what to make of that, other than all of these guys seem like trash. Trash smoke, trash have mustaches, and trash are forced to ride their bikes occasionally if the car is up on blocks in the driveway.

I have lived many different places, all trashy in their own way. But I have never seen this many people smoking while riding their bikes. It's an epidemic down here that constantly amazes me. I hope to start documenting this phenomenon, I've got my camera ready.

P.S...Since I wrote this early last year I have seen more and more guys like this with the best being the guy on a razor scooter puffing away. Ventura is a strange place sometimes.

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Wednesday, December 27, 2006

The Surfing Reindeer of Pacific View Mall

Despite the fact that I live less than a mile away from Pacific View Mall, I didn't once set foot in the mall during the pre-Christmas shopping season. So until a fluke cancellation of my regular Wednesday night pickup basketball game in El Rio resulted in a quick trip to Bath and Body Works and Hot Dog on a Stick with my wife, I never had the opportunity to check out their holiday decorations this year.

Now, I really like the kitschy surfer motif that they do in there with the Santa in a Hawaiian shirt and the beach ball ornament decorations, but I wasn't quite prepared for these gigantic wreaths hanging in the middle of the mall...


Yes, that is a reindeer. And yes, he is surfing. Not only that, but his head swivels back and forth periodically helping make these decorations...
  1. Creepy
  2. Tacky
  3. Creepy
  4. Ugly
  5. Creepy
...in that order. I have a bad feeling that combined with the howling wind that is blowing through my apartment, that reindeer is going to haunt my dreams tonight.

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