Folsom Prison Blues

Evening all, this weekends been another washout so not been up to much. Decided to visit Folsom's #2 most popular attraction the Folsom Prison Musuem (#1 being the folsom valley railway, treats!!). I've been quite looking forward to visiting the prison due to the recording Johnny Cash did here. Anyone who's not heard Johnny Cash At Folsom Prison should buy it cos its a good listen.What I didn't realise was Folsom is a high security prison full of some pretty horrible people, I have no idea why Cash wanted to perfom here. To go to the museum you have to park up in the visitor parking where people are coming to visit inmates. There any signposts for the museum so you just had to wander round the grounds. I felt seriously uneasy in there. It wasn't like I thought they could break out, just not a good vibe.The museum was supposed to be $2 but the lady said I didn't have to pay. fair enough. The museums not bad for free. Theres a mock up of a cell as they were when the prison opened complete with animatronic Charles Bronson lookalike. Loads of weapons the guards were equipped with. Back in the thirties they were tooled up with tommy guns and baseball bats. must have had some ropey inmates. Famous people who have been incarcerated here include Robert Downey Jr, Rick James, Charles Mansun and Timothy Leary.One of the most interesting bits was the collection of confiscated blades and shanks. All the prison officers have to wear stab vests and i'm not surprised with these things kicking about. The newest ones had been taken during a riot that was due to a long running race war so they'd probably been used..
All in all a good visit but I wont be going again. I hopefully wont come that close to high security prison anytime soon.
The rest of the weekend was spent working my way through the dvd collection. I've run out of Wire and Entourage so gonna have to buy some more sharpish

Bye!

Prologue

Nar then, Saturday saw the first leg of the Tour of California kick off in Sacramento so I hopped on the light railway to check it out. Like most international tours the first day took the format of a time trial. They had a 2.5 mile circuit set up around the Capitol building and gardens so there was some dry heaving on the cards. Nothing wrong with a good puke after some hard sprinting, can happen to the best of us..There was a good turnout with the crowd there for one reason - Lance Armstrong's comeback. The big man has been out of the race scene for the last couple of years doing marathons n whatnot and this was his first race back. He did his fans proud with a decent 10th place. not bad for a 37 year old.^ Lance just getting going ^
I was hoping to see David Millar do his stuff but I couldn't see him on the results sheet so dont know what happened there. Talking of drug cheats, Floyd Landis got one of the biggest cheers of the afternoon. I think the Americans see the situation more as plucky American being picked on by the snooty French establishment, not guy who tested positive for banned substances. I didn't cheer him on.
Swiss Fabian Cancellara won for the second year running.I dont know who this is but its the best picture I took all day so had to stick it up innit.
Arnie was wheeled out to give out the prizes. From where I was stood it looked like he was comparing biceps with the winner. I hope he was. "you are a gurly man!"
"Git to da Choppa!"


Other than that I haven't really been out of the house. The weather has been pretty terrible. 'owlin' gales and 'orrizontal rain. The telephone was out this morning after high winds took a telegraph pole down.

Anyway gotta go cos the NBA Allstars is on and its off the hook y'all!

Bye!!

Stoof

Howdo, How you all doing? I've just about recovered from my saturday boozeup. It was good fun, and wasn't all lone drinking. luckily some of the locals were keen to take a feckless foreigner under their wing. My only downfall was the drinks were a little stronger than expected so I was fairly steamin by the end of the night which meant sunday was a right off.
Before I went into town I had a quick ride out the back of town over to Eldorado Hills n took a few snaps.
Space StationThis is the back road into El Dorado Hills. You can just about see one of the gated communities to the right of the main road. Theres loads of em round here. I find it funny they have so many because the chances of trouble round here are slim and none. Everyone has ended up totally paronoid that people are going to come into their homes when they're are in and 'get them'. The tv is full of ads for home security with masked men smashing through windows in the dead of night.
Road back into Folsom

As promised I got a couple of videos up from the supercross:



Bye!

satdee nights alright

Evening all, I'm writing this while getting ready for first boozeup in Folsom old town. I've been told a raucous atmosphere awaits with the choices of drinking hole being Scarlets, Folsom Hotel, The Sutter Club, Powerhouse (not gay) and Hacienda (I asked if the owner was a manc but apparently its mexican joint). Hopefully the patrons will be able to understand what I'm on about. No one at work has any problem but occasionally I speak to the some of the staff at the hotel and they just smile and nod. I know they're not getting me cos I do exactly the same thing. You can't bullshit a bullshitter. I had to rephrase the question "do you have a number for a taxi" four times tonight. don't smile and nod I'm asking you a bloody question!!
Its been a fairly uneventful week all in all. After spending two weeks busting a gut trying to design something completely new to me we found out it wouldn't actually work so I was quite relieved cos i thought I'd gone stupid. I'm not stupid, I'm actually pretty clever.
Other than that I was fairly dismayed to find I didn't get a Yorkshire joke my mum had sent me. In my defence it was a joke that needed to be said out loud and I wasn't in a position to be sat reading jokes out loud in a broad Yorkshire accent. Sat in the sun in February in California its easy to forget your roots and embrace a new lifestyle but theres nothing like watching this video to remind you where you're from.

Beautiful, I need to find a nice piece of 'addock.

Bye!

FBP get mad get mad

Eyup, went to check out Folsom Bike Park on Sunday, so thought I'd share a couple of snaps with you. Didn't take many pics cos I got loads of riding done.
After having to ride at tracks built by people who don't know there arse from their elbow it was so nice to be able to ride somewhere built be someone who knows what they're doing.
The trails here go from about roughly blair witch main line size jumps up to full on contest sized jumps so if I'm not going massive by April I'll be disappointed with myself.$2 lets you ride all this all afternoon (^cleeeeck^)
The kids are all shredders as you'd expect. Tuck no handers seems to be trick of choice

there was a few spins and turndowns going down n all360sLovely takeoffs

Other than that, on Friday I went to see Slumdog Millionaire. I'm quite picky with my films but I definitely recommend you go see it. They're billing it as the feel good film of the year out here which I think is stretching it a little seeing as its a film about child slavery and poverty in the slums. Its pretty full on, I felt exhaused by the end. The sound track is mint with a heavy dose of M.I.A. and Leeds even gets a (very) brief mention, Brap! check it!
Might have some non bike related posts for the rest of you soon

Bye!

Supercross not Superbowl

Howdo, been a busy weekend, first off I went to the AMA Supercross over in San Francisco.
Getting there was no problem as the freeway outside the hotel goes straight into the city with no turnoffs. The only problem i had was getting some petrol. They dont have service stations like we do in UK so if you need to fill up you have to just pull off into whichever town your passing over at the time.
This wouldn't be such a problem if they had any streetsigns but they don't. Once you leave the motorway your on your own but you dont know where you are because that information isn't deemed important for the motorway user. The junction i came off on didn't even have an on ramp so i had to just follow my nose for quarter of an hour till i finally got sorted. I was worried it was gonna go a bit Judgement Night starring Emilio Estevez but it didn't come to that.

The Supercross was totally amazing. In all my years following SX I never thought I'd ever get to go to AMA race. They certainly know how to put on a show over here. They had enough pyrotechnics to blow up a small town and once we'd had a rendition of the star spangled banner (new era hats off boys) it was time for racing. In the main supercross class I was lucky enough to see Bubba, Chad Reed, Kevin Windham, Ivan Tedesco and Josh Grant duking it out. Bubba totally killed it though. If he doesn't win the series I'll eat my bike.
Bubba had a great entrance before racing with his own video of him dressed as an old rocker performing Wanted Dead or ALive by Bon Jovi on guitar hero. Following some big explosions he rode into the park on his 'steel horse' with the same rocker outfit on. had to be there i spose...


Before the mains we had the cowboy Kenny Bartram and his Jagermeister stunt team do a 4 man backflip train. all four of them were in the air at the same time over the same jump upside down. totally mental. I'll see if I can get a video of it up cos it was sweet.


I'll tell you what i did today later cos i got some washing to do

bye!