The Costa Rica Files, Version 3.0

UPDATED WITH PHOTOS...
As you will read below, I left my hotel room in quite a hurry this morning. In my haste, I forgot the memory card with the photos. Soon, hopefully this morning, I will retrieve it and add photos to this post, until then...
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We've spent the past 2 days in Monteverde. It's a nice little town, feels almost like a European-backpacker environment. There are lots of tourists here, long haired hippies drinking lattes and writing in their journals. I found Arenal to be more laid back and this town less-upscale, but with a much faster pace, if you were wondering...
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DO NOT DRIVE TO MONTEVERDE. This is a lesson that we learned the hard way. All roads leading to Monteverde are absolutely awful. Actually, referring to them as roads is libelous to roads everywhere. There should be a new word, whether English or Spanish, that refers to a strip of land rougtly 20 feet wide and 50 miles long that was cursed by God, suitable for no other purpose than to brutalize the kidneys of tourists as they bounce and bump along at about 15 miles per hour. The act of driving here quite literally, made me sick. Of course, once you arrive, it is a pretty cool place, but take the boat, take a helicopter, or walk. I've never missed the air suspension of the Range Rover as bad as I did on that God-forsaken drive.

This photo doesn't do the the road to Monteverde justice, but it is all I have:




When we booked this trip, there was a menu of hotels you could choose from in each town. In Monteverde we elected to pay a little extra to upgrade to a the Ficus hotel, which on the Internet, appeared to be cabins nestled in the rainforest. I suppose the pictures we saw were technically accurate, we had monkeys right out side the window at breakfast yesterday, and they ate fruit we left out for them. Further, directly outside our cabin, we saw an enormous sloth eating and climbing from tree to tree. This was quite fortunate. Most of the time, the untrained eye could pass by a sloth without even noticing it, as they spend 95%+ of the time sedentary. To see one moving around and eating, cool.

Back to our hotel. We laughed when we checked in, realizing that we'd paid extra money to stay here. Our cabin, which we thought we would have to ourselves, actually contains 3 hotel style rooms, and the walls seperating them are paper thin. So for the past 2 days, we've heard everything that out our neighbors said, did, or thought. This morning I was aroused (from sleep) by our amorous post-middle-aged neighbors starting their day off right. Not knowing if there session was pharmaceutically enhanced, and not willing to risk it, I came down to the lodge to write this blog. As I type this, they've just walked in for breakfast. Allowing 30 minutes for showering, dressing, &c., I'll assume no pharmacutics were involved...
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I've kind of lost track of days, but our last full day in Arenal, whenever that was, was a very physically strenuous day. We met our guide at 7:30 for a lengthy hike through the jungle/suspension bridges. We saw howler monkeys, poisonous tree frogs, lizards and the eyelash pit viper. The guide was very well educated, having a degree in ecology and 10 years experience. I kept quizzing him about names of trees and plants and he pretty much knew them all. After that jungle hike, we visited a waterfall. To arrive at the waterfall required walking down 500 steps, and not the kind of symetrical steps we have back home, but the physically exhausting kind you'd expect to find here. After hanging around the waterfall, which was quite beautiful, we hiked back up the steps. After a stop for lunch (good food) we went on the Volcano hike. Once again the guide was very informative and we enjoyed it. Sadly, my typical lifestyle is probably closer to the sloth than is healthy, so the cumulative hiking that we did took a toll on my legs. The last activity of the day was dinner at the Baldi Hot Springs. We ate a nice meal and then relaxed in the hot springs that come from the volcano. When we arrived back at our room around 9:00p.m., we had no trouble getting to sleep.

HANGING BRIDGES:

WATERFALL:


So we decided to use yesterday as I day of rest, but not wanting to waste the whole day, we went on another zip-lining trip. Which is a lot of fun, but not physically demanding. Here are some photos:

The last line on the trip is one of the longest in the world, over a 1/2 mile. Christena and I rode it tandem, which gives you maximum speed. It was a rush.
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If you have some extra time, here is a slide show of some random photos. Some of them probably need some explaining, but keep an eye out for a tarantula, a poisonous frog, and a sloth...

Today we make the dreaded drive back to San Jose. Tomorrow we return to the US. Our plane doesn't arrive in Orlando until 11:00 p.m. so we won't be back in Dothan until Tuesday.

Oh yeah, I don't know if it is something I ate or drank, but if you want a description of what is happening in my gastro-intestinal tract, watch the first 15 minutes of Saving Private Ryan or read about a similar problem I had on Borneo last year (here).

As always, sorry about the typos/mispellings. Spellcheck doesn't work here. I tried to read back through this, but I'm sure I've missed a lot.

The Costa Rica Files, Version 2.0

Here is the view of Arenal Volcano from our hotel. Do not be alarmed that we are too close. I bought the Volcano Insurance, so if it erupts, we will be covered...

We had a most interesting drive from San Jose to the hotel. It took about 2.5 hours to travel 90 miles. The first portion of the trip was on a highway. The second portion was on a rather crooked, sometimes one lane, road through the mountains. I'm not sure how anyone could travel from San Jose to Arenal without a GPS, that thing paid for itself today. We stopped a few times along the way and took some photos, check them out:
Our hotel is located in one of the greatest tropical gardens I could imagine. Everything is well tended and there are hundreds of trees/bushes that I've never seen before. We arrived here about 1 hour before our afternoon activity was scheduled to leave, giving us just enough time to unpack, change clothes, etc. before heading out to go ziplining.

The tour guides were excellent. They played multiple practical jokes on me, which I liked, and made Taylor feel quite comfortable. He road the first several lines tandem with the guide. Finally, on the last line, Taylor was comfortable enough to go by himself. It was the longest, and perhaps fastest line of the day. Sadly, Taylor's body weight wasn't quite enough to push him to the end, but like a trooper, he rembered his training and pulled himself along the line the last 50 feet until he reached the platform.


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Sometimes I see blogs that seemlessly embed photos on the right and left side of the page without missing a beat. I've tried it before and always end up with a mess. I've tried it again, and wish I wouldn't have. Starting tomorrow the Razor will once again be a "centered photos only" blog.

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My softball team lost both games last night. Between my vacation and Michael Smith's injury, they only had 9 players, and were missing the 2 best outfielders. So 2nd place...

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In addition to the zipline, there was also a Tarzan Swing as part of our tour. The cable is probably 100 feet long, you attach to it, and swing out over the jungle. Taylor like it so much he did it twice. In fact, I think it was the success of the swing that convinced him to ride a zipline by himself.

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Just realized that while screwing around with getting those left/right pictures aligned, I didn't tell you much about my zipline experience. Highly recommend. You wear a harness, clip to the cable, and have a leather glove that you can use for a break. It's best to not use the break until you are very close to the landing platform. The first couple lines we zipped were over an open area, but eventually we got into the jungle. I loved flying through there, having leaves and vines slap your feet, and enjoying the view.

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The Internet access is good here, but limited to the lodge portion of the hotel grounds. Being unable to Blog/text from the comfort of my room requires that I end here. Oh yeah, the temperature was nice today, but HUMID!

The Costa Rica Files, Version 1.0

The above photograph was taken in central Florida on the drive to Orlando last night. It occured to me today that I have become entirely too dependent on American style signs and signals to tell me what to do. I had a hard time adjusting to the traffic flow with the rental car. Here, the driving regulations seem to be: point your car in the general direction of your destination, try not to hit another car or pedestrian. With the second portion being more of a rule of thumb than an actual regulation.

And crossing the street? Christena, Taylor, and I decided to roam around San Jose today and see some of the sights. Sadly, we watched helplessly as the local people darted in and out of traffic crossing the street while we, without crosswalks or the little "walking man" symbol, were relegated to looking like idiots... Tomorrow we head for the countryside/jungle which should be more our pace.

The picture above? Do we really need to be reminded to look out for poisonous snakes? I suppose so, but here that would be like a sign reminding people to breathe... Just as they've learned to drive, walk in traffic, &c. sans benefit of instruction...
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Arriving in Costa Rica, it was interesting to learn that their version of Spanish is slightly different than what you might learn in a text book. For example, the Costa Rican' Spanish word for "Droid phone with Verizon service" is "Clock".

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As I type this, my softball team is playing for the city championship. Without their best player of course. I've been texting with the guys a little bit, trying to keep up. Last I heard we were down by 6 runs. I hope they pull it out if for no other reason than Taylor's coach-pitch team already won the city championship in the 7-8 year old division, and I don't want to hear his crap if we don't follow suit.

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Sorry ladies, it seems that I have been on the wrong side of the camera for most of the day. We'll try to correct that tommorrow. In the meantime, here are some photos of San Jose:


San Jose seems to sit in a valley with mountains all around. The temperature was quite comfortable today. Not at all what I expected or experienced on my previous trips to the tropics. I suppose it might be a function of the elevation. Anyways, you can see a little of the city/mountains in the background.

No one prepared Taylor for the pronounciation of the letter "J" in Spanish, and for that matter, we never told him the names of the cities we would be visiting. So his 1st exposure to San Jose was via reading it, and as you can imagine, he rendered it with a hard J. Kinda like San Joecee.


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An update from the team. We were in the winner's bracket so our opponent must defeat us twice. We lost the first game 26 -21 and lost our real best player to a hamstring injury. Game 2 is currently underway.

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That's it. Assuming there is adequate Internet access and time, I'll add more content over the next few days. I've optimistically titled today's post 1.0, with hopes that there will be more...

I usually write these things without outside input. At times, I've written something that I thought was funny, only to find out later that no one "got it". Christena read part of this post and didn't understand the droid/clock analogy above. All I was trying to say is that there is no cell service, but it still keeps time... Of course, it will connect to wi-fi, so in addition to not being particularly funny, my joke is also not entirely true.

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Seriously, the last thing. As I experienced in Borneo last year, when you use Blogger in a non-English speaking country, spellcheck doesn't work. As of right now, the software is convinced that I've misspelled about 90% of this post. I'm hopeful that this is kind of on the high side, but I'm not sure what to do about it. So please forgive some of the misspellings and overlook the others...

Syria, G&L Softball, &c...

The most-read Razor post that I've ever produced was my March 16th article entitled, "Pi, Berlusconi, Rania, and Asma: the Razor Returns with Mathematics and Innuendo", it can be found here. While it wasn't a particularly well written post, I showed good judgement by including photos of beautiful wives of Arab tyrants. For your convenience, I've reproduced a small portion of that post here:

...In addition to freedom loving people of Jordan, I wish to show my support for the revolution in Syria. The bloodthirsty dictator there is Bashar al-Assad. It is my hope that in the aftermath of the Syrian revolt Mr. al-Assad ends up dangling from the end of a rope. His wife, Asma al-Assad, on the other hand, if she wishes, can live the remainder of her life in exile in Alabama. Here is a photograph of Ms. al-Assad and her favorite purse:

As yet, I have not been able to look up pictures of the other ruling-women of revolution filled Middle-Eastern countries. However, if the appearance of these two is any indication, I'll extend a standing invitation for any displaced queens, first ladies, &c. to take up residence at my place.

I thought I might give you a quick update on the Revolution still ongoing in Syria where the situation has turned dramatically for the worse as the obviously tortured body of a small, 12 year old
boy, Hamza al Khatib,has appeared on various social media connections exposing the savagery of the Assad regime there in an all-too-graphic manner. Khatib had apparently taken part in anti-government demonstrations several weeks ago; was captured by government agents and was tortured... massively and brutally, to the point where even his genitals were cut off before his body was delivered to his parents!

Obviously, the death of this child was intended to be a signal by the Assad regime to all of those taking part in anti-government demonstrations that this is the fate they may be exposing themselves to should they continue. However, Hamza al-Khatib has instead become a symbol to the people of Syria that the Assad regime is illegitimate and must be overturned.

Best indications are that Ms. Assad did flee the country, not to my house, but to her native London. At one time there was hope that Bashar Assad (and his wife) would bring Syria into the modern world and would turn away from the violence and torture that marked his father’s regime. Those hopes have been dashed. Chaos is now the order of the day and there is no way out from that chaos other than via more and more violence until the regime falls... and it will fall; of that you can be sure.

And what they did to that boy? Unforgivable. There will be an especially hot corner of the Muslim version of Hell reserved for Assad and his lackeys.

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On a less serious note, I've noticed that over the past few years the softball complex has become a really bad place to romantically pursue young women. All the girls who hang out at the park are either there to watch their husbands/boyfriends or are not biologically inclined to have a husband/boyfriend.

It's gotten to the point that referring to a female as a softball player is roughly the equivalent of snatching them out of the "closet". In fact, last year (was it 2 years ago?) when President Obama picked Sonia Sotomayor to be a Supreme Court Justice, the Drudge Report came under attack for showing a picture of her playing softball. Supposedly, this was an backhanded effort to undermine her nomination to the Supreme Court, by pointing out to the public that she is a lesbian. Except she isn't. Perhaps if they would've shown a video of her throwing like a girl, she would've been deemed straight...

This was an attempt, albeit cumbersome, to segue into this news article, which is hilarious. You can find it here, but I'll reproduce portions of it for you:

Judge Rules Gay League Can Limit Number of Heterosexual Players

The ruling was announced after three bisexual men claimed they were kicked out of the Gay Softball World Series for not being gay enough...

The men claim they were "summoned to a hearing room to answer questions about their sexual interests or attractions...

The men said they were told that "this is the Gay World Series, not the Bisexual World Series...

This brings to mind several questions. How gay is gay enough? Where/when is the Bisexual World Series held? Are the feelings of camaraderie that I hold for my teammates actually something more than just camaraderie?

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That's all I've got time for today. I'm leaving for Costa Rica tomorrow. It's my hope that I'll have enough free time and Internet access to keep you update on the goings-on of Central America. If not, see ya soon enough...

Life in the Fast Lane?

Often times when Christena and I meet the Strowd's for dinner, the conversation turns to our blogs. At any given time, Michael is neglecting as many as 3 different blogs and Kelli runs Dio E'Amore. Left out of these conversations? Christena.

Until now. I've just been informed that she has started a blog entitled "Life in the Fast Lane", where presumably, she intends to detail her "life in the fast lane". I suppose that if your blog is called The Razor, you're not left with a lot of highground from which to criticize the name of other blogs, but I do question how someone living "life in the fast lane" has time to blog...

To the extant that our lives overlap, you might find Christena writing about things we've done together, albeit with smaller words and less cumbersome sentences. As yet, there is no content on her blog, only a template and some photographs. (UPDATE: She added her first post.) I suppose that the world wide web, and our relationship, is big enough for one more blog, so let's throw a few web-hits her way. Life in the Fast Lane can be found HERE.
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Have a nice weekend.

Droid Does

In honor of getting my Droid back today, and to prepare for my upcoming trip to Costa Rica, I'm going to attempt to compose this entire post from my phone.


For those of you who didn't hear, I participated in an entirely unplanned, freestyle diving competition this past Saturday, which is a sure fire method for upgrading a Motorola Droid into a fairly expensive paperweight. Fortunately, I had the insurance and the new phone arrived to day. Unfortunately, I've been using a Blackberry the past 4 days in its stead.


It is not an exaggeration to say that the electric chair is more user friendly then a Blackberry. In fact, it's better to have been born deaf and blind then to have been born healthy and find oneself in a 2 year contract with one of those things.
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For clarity, my friend Shawn invited me to go fishing this past weekend. When Shawn calls me to go fishing, I know that he's got some crazy idea that none of his real fishing buddies will participate in. Most of the time we end up blazing a trail up some crazy river that hasn't been explored since Hernando de Soto and Ponce de Leon were bumming around this area.


In the past we took a jon boat out into the open sea, so rough that the boat vacillated between being completely underwater and completely out of the water. My personal favorite fishing trip with Shawn started @ 5:30 a.m. in January, and involved me wading through frigid water, a few hundred yards to the boat, as the tide was so low he couldn't come pick me up. Another time we were on the Chipola river and, due to trees falling across the river, were literally having to chainsaw our way upstream. Shawn had one leg in the boat, one leg on a tree, and was chainsawing the tree he was standing on. To my amusement, the tree shifted and simultaneously launched him several feet into the air and pinched the chainsaw blade in such a way that the entire machine was stuck under water. You might be interested to know that when we finally dislodged the saw, he shook some water out of it, cranked it up, and we proceeded on our way.


Last portion of backstory, I promise. Shawn loves to tell the tale of how he busted a shear pin (a little pin that is designed to break when your motor hits something hard, so the expensive parts are not damaged), and didn't have a replacement. His unsuspecting wife was required to remove her bra, from which he took out the supporting wire and fashioned a shear pin to get them home. Romantic...


Anyways, when Shawn calls me to go fishing, I know it's going to be an adventure. When I saw the chainsaw and a bulk pack of shear pins in his boat, my suspicions were confirmed.


At various times throughout our fishing trip, which was on a small river in the panhandle of Florida, we alternated between cutting a path up river, and getting out of the boat and lifting it over lower obstacles. After one such lift, we both attempted to get back into the boat at the same time. Which resulted in a near capsizing of the boat, and the end of my Droid (RIP).
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Had a little more, but I just learned that I can't blog photos that are contained only on my phone. First I must upload them somewhere and then tell Blogger the URL. Not willing to make that commitment tonight.

One other weakness of Blogging from my phone? Can't figure out how to spellcheck. (Update: I ran spellcheck this morning when I got to work. Major problems!)

Oh Well.

Luvinator 2: Grudgement Day

As promised, today you will be treated to some brief commentary on the news that Arnold Schwarzenegger participated in an extra-marital affair, which resulted in the birth of a child. If only we'd been given a hint that Arnold was a womanizer, maybe then we wouldn't have been so shocked at this stunning revelation. But no, looking back on his 40+ years of celebrity life there was no hint of scandal, no incidents of groping women, no misogynistic comments, &c.

I'm sure you haven't been frantically hitting you refresh key to read my wit. No you came for the photos!

First, the child. As you can see, DNA testing was not required to confirm that Arnold was the father:



Clearly steroid use runs in the family...

And the mistress? Something Arnold said about the beast in Predator comes to mind. Sadly, the language precludes me from using it...




Mamacita!

Ok, here's the real photo of the mistress and the child:

Dear Maria Shriver,
When your housekeeper's son looks exactly like your husband, that probably isn't a coincidence.
Sincerely,

Adam

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Until next time...

Christina, Schwarzenegger, and Saleh - Which name are you most confused by?

Let's start with a sad housekeeping item. Christina, who has been a valued member of my team for quite some time, has informed me that she is moving on, seeking the comfort of greener pastures. It is with a heavy heart that I let her go.

For those of you who are interested in exactly what happened, she assured me that it is nothing that I did or said. Rather, she found what she believes to be a better opportunity, and I wish her well. As proof that there are no hard feelings, she agreed to continue her role through the customary 2 week notice, while I seek to replace her.

With that in mind, please bear with me over the next few weeks, until things get back to normal. If you sense a more somber tone in the Razor, I'm sorry. I hope to be back to my normal self sooner, rather than later...

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I am going to withhold judgement, and the corresponding Razor post, on Arnold Schwarzenegger and his love-child, until I see what the woman looks like. Sorry for the inconvenience.

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Longtime Slicers will no doubt be familiar with the name Amrullah Saleh, one of my personal heroes. He is the former Afghan Intelligence Chief, and I have written about him, and embedded his videos, many times in the past. Recall that he resigned his official post last summer and since then has been working with grass-roots groups to continue the pro-democracy, anti-Taliban movement in Afghanistan.

As he is no longer involved with Afghan government, it has become increasing difficult to get reliable intelligence on his activities. Luckily, I have developed a pen-pal relationship with someone who knows him and I have tried to keep you updated whenever I learn something new. As an aside, Saleh has all of my contact information, and selfishly, I pray that one day I'll hear from him.

He appeared on 60 Minutes this past weekend, and for your convenience, I've provided the video here:



If you would like to see portions of the Saleh interviews that didn't make the 60 Minutes episode, click here.

As I feared, even though he is no longer a part of the Afghan Government, the Taliban continues with their attempts to kill him. For me, the most interesting portion of the video was when, 5 years ago, he told then-Pakistani President Musharef that bin Laden was not hiding in the caves along the Pak-Afghan border, but rather, was hiding in Manshera. Manshera, as it turns out, is located less than 10 miles from where bin Laden was ultimately found...

Also, it's nice to see Lara Logan back at work on 60 Minutes.

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It was my intention for the opening section of this Razor post to cause a great deal of confusion. You see, it's not my girlfriend who is moving on, but my Administrative Assistant. Discerning Slicer's might have noticed the slight variation in spelling. My girlfriend spells her name Christena, while my co-worker uses the more conventional version, Christina. Thankfully, they are pronounced the same, which has helped me to avoid some potentially awkward situations. My apologies to any single ladies whose hopes were raised by any misunderstanding...

The Situation Room, Dogs of War, and a Backhanded Compliment

Just when I thought the past week and a half couldn't get any better, I saw this photo:

That's right dear Slicers, your eyes are not deceiving you, while our Navy Seals were shooting and looting their way through Osama bin Laden's $1,000,000 compound, I mean 3rd-world shack, the National Security Council of The United States of America was easing the tension by reading the Razor!

Like the rest of the intel we have received about the raid, it is not clear exactly which post they were amusing themselves with. Based on the look on Hillary Clinton's face, I assume they were reading this post, where I detail my international web-hits and Joe Biden, who is a moron, mentioned me for the Secretary of State job. Another possibility is that they were reading the post about the 5 year anniversary since the sitting Vice-President shot a US citizen in the face (here).

Whatever they were reading, I'm was just glad to do my part in the Overseas Contingency Operation (formerly known as the War on Terror...). Mr. President, you are welcome.

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Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of Kinetic Military Action.

In a post few weeks ago (here), I was trying to make fun of political correctness and the unwillingness of the current administration to use the word "war". The original phrase, "Cry havoc and let slip the dogs war" comes from William Shakespeare's "Julius Caesar". Specifically, Act 3, Scene 1, if you've forgotten your 9th grade English Lit.

Now that we've got photo-evidence that the President reads the Razor, it should be no surprise that he did indeed, cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war. As I wrote last week, there was a canine involved in the raid on bin Laden. Since I've already set a new Razor record for linking my own articles, I'll not link the post from where I wrote about the dog with full body armor and titanium teeth. If you want to read the post, scroll down. I do, however, have a bit of an update. Thankfully, in the form of photos:



Zoom in, if you must, those teeth are metal!

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It would be unfair for me to take full credit for the pro-democracy demonstrations occurring throughout the Middle-East or for the successful operation to eliminate bin Laden. There are/were a great many people involved. I'm just glad to fan the flames of the former and contribute key mission details to the latter.

Lest any of you feel that I'm getting a bit of a big head due to the success of the Razor, and the impact I'm making on the globe, fear not. My family keeps me grounded. While eating dinner with my parents on Sunday night, my father said, "I've been reading your posts on the Razor recently, you've had some pretty funny stuff." My mom chimes in, "I really like bin Laden's Facebook status in your recent post.

@&$#%!!!

That was the portion of that post that I didn't create! Clearly I stated that someone else did that work! Happy Mother's Day to you too!

bin Laden, Monkees vs. Dogs, Horses, &c...

What a week! Lot's of information and misinformation. At this point the best we can possibly hope for is to live long enough for the actual footage from the bin Laden raid to be released. Although, I wouldn't recommend holding ones breath. In the meantime, the most important thing is he is most decidedly dead. We live in a better world for it.

Late Sunday evening as the news reports were rolling in, I wrote a joke (mentally) about bin Laden's body temperature equaling room temperature, rendering him useless in his farce of Jihad. Sadly, we dumped him at sea before I could publish my joke. Rewritten as body temperature equaling sea temperature, the joke falls flat. Oh well.

Did you see his tombstone? Here is a photo:

Also, his Facebook status, which has been passed to me from quite a few people is quite funny. In case you haven't seen it:


Props to whoever created that...

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While reading some of the coverage of the Seal Team raid, I was reminded of this story (here). The gist of the story for those too lazy to click the link? When the US went to war against Saddam Hussein in 2003, the government of Morocco offer to assist us by providing 2000 monkeys who were trained in detonating land mines. At the time, I wondered how you trained a monkey to detonate a land mine and still had enough of him left to provide the US war effort. I suppose I still wonder about that...

Anyways, what brought this to mind was the report, yet to be redacted*, that the Seals took a dog with them on the raid. And not just any dog, a super-dog with full body armor and titanium teeth. You can read more about him here. They've apparently trained these dogs to wear oxygen masks when making High-Altitude Parachute jumps and they can smell the enemy from up to 2 miles away. Meanwhile, the nation of Morocco has a brigade of 1 armed monkeys. It's good to be a superpower...

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Are you ready for the Kentucky Derby? I'm getting there. I'll be tweeting my picks for this years' race one hour before post time if you wanna follow me. If you have to get your picks in earlier than that, it's usually safe to go with whichever horse Calvin Borel is riding. That dude is money at Churchill Downs. FYI, he'll be riding "Twice the Appeal". Not a great horse and coming from all the way out west, I don't like his chances, but if Calvin works his Kentucky Magic again, payday...

I'll see ya.



* I would imagine, like everything else with the bin Laden story, this will be redacted soon, but in the meantime, we're fighting the War on Terror with a dog that has titanium teeth!