Recent Happenings.

Justin and I recently had a conversation about how our lives have slowed down a bit, thus leading to a decrease in our mildly entertaining, whimsical blog posts. We obviously blame the cold. There's no way it could have anything to do with us getting older and becoming more boring or doing less interesting things. Not possible. Anyway, the past few weeks have yielded a string of entertaining, painful, and hilarious events that are worth me ranting about for a while (and illustrating) just to affirm the fact that I remain a spry, young troublemaker.

I went back to Cincinnati for Christmas and in comparison to my Thanksgiving trip, I had no high aspirations or grand schemes as to what I was going to do. I went to enjoy the company of my friends and maybe run into a couple of people I hadn't seen in a while. I ate at Dewey's, got the highly anticipated paper shredder for Christmas, played some vicious tackles football (the brutes beat the speedsters down, and trust me, I'm no brute), enjoyed 70 degree weather during the tail end of December, didn't get a fucking cold, ate whatever I wanted, went to a delightful Christmas party, and capped it all off with a nice trip to the Comet 20 people deep. Here are some photos from the Christmas party and the burrito party.

Christmas party:

Kenny in his amazing cane vest


Killing cream cheese salamis. Heather appears to have pissed herself.


The obligatory group shots. Coates' head appears to be floating behind everyone in the second photo, and you can see my gold underwear.




Comet:

Brian attacking me.


Kenny drinking sour cream. By the way, he didn't do this to pose for the photo. I caught him doing it.


Table shots. People appear happy.




Rebecca's best moment ever.


I left Chicago in a snowy state when I returned to Cincinnati for Christmas. However, due to the abnormal weather, I came back to seemingly clear streets. I was pumped because I hadn't been able to ride my bike for like three weeks due to the weather. Plus, I had just had a bunch of work done to it and I knew it was going to ride like a thick slice of heaven. So on Monday, I layered up and got ready to head to work on the Falcon. Not two minutes from leaving my house, I bit it hard on some black ice sneakily hiding on one of the three turns I have to make the entire trip. Ouch. A bit dazed, I decided to suck it up and cautiously move onward, which I did just fine.

It turns out that this was all a precursor to this past Friday when I was heading southeast on Milwaukee during a relatively slow traffic day (not many people working the day after New Year's Day...except for me of course) when a Mini Cooper owned by a suburbanite unfamiliar with the laws of bikes, decided to pull out, make a left turn from a parking spot, and clobber me. The only thing I could muster to say as I saw the accident forming was "Oh shit!" and then I braced myself for the hit, finally ending up lying on the concrete with my bike about 7 feet down the road. It sucked. My knee got fucked up and has been damn painful ever since. The funniest thing about it was that although the lady was extremely apologetic and worried, she had no idea that bikes have the same right as cars on the road. When I talked to her yesterday, she was using phrases like "dual responsibility" and "whoever caused the accident" to the point where I had to stop her and tell her that the incident wasn't my fault one bit. She honestly didn't think that bikes had the same rights as cars and that bicyclists are supposed to yield to cars. Give me a break. From the suburbs okay...that dense though? Please. I knew that when I was like 12, and I'm from the suburbs.

Anyway, my knee is getting better, and she is going to be paying for any necessary repairs. Oh, and she's definitely going to be buying me a new pair of jeans. That's for damn sure. Shit got ripped. Jesus.

Finally, here are a bunch of pictures from my fancy New Year's Eve. I drank several adult beverages. There's no progression to the photos.


I like this photo.


The Burlington.


Can't remember that dude's name. Priceless face.


The $60 included plastic noisemakers. Fancy ass shit.


I'm not looking at anything.


This is Loren's alcohol drinking face.


Attacking Robyn.


I have a weak tongue.


Loren thinks she looks super good in this photo. She told me so.


I can't get rid of the red eye in this one. Too bad Carley. Great picture.


Uploading photos takes forever, and I'd probably say that this has been my most time consuming blog post ever. I just really wish I had a photo of my mangled body lying in the middle of the street after the bike wreck. That part of the post has got nothing without an illustration. Oh well...