My July Habit

At the end of June I acquired a free T.V, and gift that resolved my inner debate on whether or not I should purchase one. Considering it would take a kind benefactor to buy one, I was quite pleased that I found a benefactor who was willing to give me one. For free. (This lady was leaving Dubai for good, and I received a whole bunch of free stuff as well. Yeah!) The television set also came with a DVD player and I was content enough to sit at home watching all the DVDs I brought from the states (or borrow the ones available for rent at my gym--that's right my gym where I exercise), but my landlord thought this was not good enough and arranged for me to get a box that would hook up to the satellite dish.

I wasn't too sure I wanted it. First of all, the satellite box-thingy was not free, plus I could easily see myself flipping channels for hours on end in the evening--not writing the blog, not reading good literature, and not going to bed on time. But the Tour de France was quick approaching, so I consented.

When the Tour began on July 4th, when you all were celebrating Independence Day with barbecues and ice cream, I had to go online to read the first stage--as it unfolded--on velonews.com. It wasn't the ideal way to watch my favorite sporting event, but better than nothing. I even figured I would fare quite well without a satellite connection after all.

Luckily for me, my landlord came through, and one evening a Pakistani gentleman not only hooked up my box, but he also found all the English language channels and moved them up to the front of the dial--as well as including a French channel for me--and deleted the surprisingly large number of porn channels. (It was astonishing since the country blocks Web sites like Flicker and other relatively harmless sites because there may be innapropriate images, yet they had not managed to get rid of the actual harmful content on the satellite. I guess that's harder to block...).

The very next day I was watching the Tour in French, and that day's stage was a mighty thrilling one to watch. Cervelo Test Team's Heinrich Haussler was in a solo breakway for a large portion on that rainy, hilly stage, which he was able to win by a large margin. Actually being able to see his face holding back victory tears as he crossed the finish line nearly made me well up with joy for him. Reading does not make up for watching moments like this.

I am pretty sure there are only about two of you who care about my Tour fascination, but I will write a little bit about this year's Tour anyway.

1. This year I officially stopped worshipping at the Church of Lance. Oh sure, I am very grateful to him for helping me love professional cycling, and his organization does wonderful things for cancer patients, but he's been gone from the peloton for a while and I met other cyclists that I prefer. And other teams with a lot less drama...

2. I got very annoyed with the goings on at Team Astana. Everyday Velo News was full of the latest "who's the team leader?" drama. First it's Alberto Contador, next its Lance Armstrong, then it's whoever is strongest. And then when the strongest contender (not Lance) exerted himself, it was all about that awful rogue Contador. Enough already! Go Bradley Wiggins! Go Schleck Brothers! Go anyone else!

3. The Schleck Brothers, Team Saxo Bank's powerful duo, were very entertaining to follow on the last week's mountain stages. I loved how they worked together. Sadly, they weren't strong enough to topple Contador, but Andy Schleck did get 2nd place and the white jersey (best young rider). He'll win the Tour soon.

4. Garmin-Slipstream is not responsible for George Hincapie not getting the yellow jersey. This was a seriously lame piece of drama. Hincapie misses out on the yellow jersey by five seconds and everyone wants to blame Garmin because they moved up to the front of the peloton. So what. The only reason it was such a big deal is because it happened to George Hincapie. If someone else missed it by five seconds, the media would have said "Oh well, tough loss, better luck tomorrow." But no, since it was Lance's supposed "best bud in the peloton" it became a major inconsequential issue.

5. Fabian Cancellara proved once and again that he is an awesome cyclist. He can time trial, he rides in the breakaways, and he can help get his fellow teammates (the Schleck's) up and over the mountains. And he's not ugly.

That's it. Now what am I going to do with my time?