Christian Ross

I have thoughts on Lance too…

Everybody seems to have an opinion on Lance Armstrong this week so I figured I’d throw mine around as well. Here are the following random thoughts I’ve had in the last week or so surrounding the news of his confession. Nothing ground-breaking and in no particular order:

We’re currently a society obsessed with a man who rode a bike for a living. Let that sink in for a second. Now take a step back and remember where it should rank in the grand scheme of things.

We should know this by now but we are a society who loves to build up, tear down, and then build up again [see: Woods, Tiger]. Currently Lance is in tear down mode and after the interview is posted on Thursday, we will begin the process of allowing him to climb to darling-status once again.

Lance was a dummy for taking performance enhancing drugs. Lance was not alone in this endeavor; we turned a blind eye to this fact throughout the entire heyday of this sport. The lives of those who took them will probably be shortened because of it, and if they’re not, there’s a good chance they end up in a situation where they wish it would have been.

You are a dummy if you allowed yourself or your kids to idolize a guy because he could ride a bike really fast for really long distances. Enjoying sports and rooting for athletes is all good & fun but make sure you teach them to value better things.

If Lance has lost any money in this whole banana parade*, it won’t be long until he makes it back. He will write a tell all book and sadly many of you will buy it.

So there you have it, a brain dump of five things that have gone through my head most likely while I was showering. That’s potentially creepy and unnecessary knowledge but at least you know I’m back to showering.

*I just coined and trademarked the term banana parade. I have no idea what it means but it makes me giggle when I think about what it would actually look like. Feel free to use as needed.

Vest over Sport Coat – What say you?

This one is for my wife and could have also been titled, ‘haters gonna hate.’

Yesterday, I woke to temps below 40F (which is borderline arctic for me) but wanted to make sure I was dressed properly for worship. I do not have a large overcoat (for a number of reasons but none relevant to the story) and so I donned a brown sport coat and then layered that with a orange-over-navy vest to stay warm. Almost immediately I was called to the carpet by my lovely bride about my questionable decision but I went ahead and powered through with the look.

Once we made it to the church building, I was greeted by a friend’s wife who, without prompt, mentioned she was actually digging the look. Later, with my wife in tow, I asked her to repeat it so that my wife could hear her thoughts and that I wasn’t completely delusional about my fashion choices. Instead of confirming her original statement, my wife’s friend offered up the thought that it was something she had never seen before but stopped short of mentioning her affinity towards it. Go figure.

With one other conversation had about it on Sunday, I decided it my responsibility to take it to the Internets to see how far off base I actually am on my thinking that this is an acceptable look.

vest-over-sport-coat (more…)

Links of note

I used to run a semi-regular post that I called 6th Day around here that was a Friday wrap-up of Internet things I’d stumbled across or liked throughout the week. Not sure what the significance of the title was but I’m bringing it back for at least one week. I think I’m going to resurrect the concept and kill the name – although I don’t have a good replacement name for it.

Without further ado…

Happy 2013

Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.

– Benjamin Franklin

I don’t often post (or put much credence into) single line quotes but this seems like a fitting resolve for all of us.