And In Other News...

I admit, the whole carnival coverage was pretty weak, but it was late, I was tired, boo hoo. Anyway. I'm settled in Wanganui at the Casa de Brei, and I have internet access in the house once again (the past three entries have been typed at furious speeds on 'pay per minute' internet cafe places, hence the grammar), so I can finally check out the rest of the world's biz again. First off, let me say that Portland rules. Two of the US's World Championship cyclocross squad are Portland guys. Word up to Barry "The Hair" Wicks and Erik Tonkin, who I have no clever knickname for, but we could call him "The Tonkinator." Could be three if you count Ryan "Tree Farm" Trebon, who doesn't live here full time, but I saw him in P-town an awful lot this year at races and Starbucks and such (hard to miss a guy who's about 80 feet tall).

HOWEVER
While Portland rules, the new Discovery Cycling Team uniforms do not. That's Discovery, formerly USPostalService for all you non rider-guys. The guys who at least used to look slightly different from the gaggle of other teams who wear nothing but white and blue.USPS at least had some red in there somewhere. Team Disco Fever? Just white and blue. Boring.

You know what's not boring? Mooning people. Randy Moss of the Minnesota Vikings agrees with me on this one, but Randy's a pro athlete, he's got some common sense, he knows that whole "right and wrong" thing, so he wouldn't really moon people on the field even though it would probably be hilarious. So in celebration at a touchdown and responding to the boos and flying trash that the Green Bay Packers fans were flinging at him, Moss "pretended" to moon them. Ohh SNAP. Laughs were had all around, even a few Green Bay fans were quoted in thier local papers as saying "it was pretty funny" after Moss mimed a vicious mooning. WAIT. STOP THE PRESSES, says the NFL. In this time of extreme censorship and fear of conservative backlash a la "The Great Janet Jackson Superbowl Booby Fiasco," Moss is being fined $10,000 for his hideous act. Ten grand. Granted Moss has a history of doing wierd crap because he has ADD or something, but I think this shows some restraint on his part, and he gets the size 9 penny-loafer of The Man straight up his butt for it. Damn The Man. He's just trying to get you down. I'm with you Randy. Don't let him get you down.

Speaking of drug-addled freaks, Ben Berden, a Belgian cyclocrosser, admitted use of EPO a few days ago. Why did he use EPO you ask? Because he was "tired." That's easilly the best reason yet. Millar's reasoning of 'team pressure' was my other favorite, no scratch that, previous favorite was when some Lampre guy said "it's for my dog," but this takes the cake. Congradulations Berden, you've thrown down a new standard for excuses, it's going to be hard to top this one. DT