chicken stock

I start riding; I stop writing—and writing about riding yields only variations on a theme₁. Today's: Consider the word "competitive". How fascinating (no, really) that it names both the capacity₂ and the desire₃ to compete, that one moderately sized adjective can stretch to encompass this yawning disparity between how badly I want to do well and how able I am to do so. Oh, the cruelty of language and the human experience! Tragedy! Woe! Fury!

So I'm trying to revisit the reasons I got into this in the first place.

1. To be outside in beautiful places: Check. After the chill under the watch of the redwoods, I drifted out of a bike lane to avoid what looked like a swath of glass from a broken car window. Instead, white petals from blossoming trees. It was like riding through a haiku₄.
   
2. To Live a Healthier Lifestyle₅: Check. Seriously—bones heal; hearts and livers don't.
   
3. To challenge myself: Ha! CHECK.
4. To find a socially acceptable context in which to scream at people and ring cowbells: Hi-yo!
   
5. To share the love with lovely people: Check. The Cal WC team this weekend will be three times the size of the entire field at this race last year. Granted, this means I'm no longer actually useful to anybody, but I'll cash in my points for good company.
   

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1. That theme₆, in case it weren't already obvious, is "getting my ass kicked by absolutely everyone".
2. ex. "John is student body president, speaks 58 languages, and just cured cancer. He's a competitive applicant!"
3. ex. "John hacked the university's list of students selected for interviews, stalked them and murdered them all in their sleep. He's a competitive applicant!"
5.
Shit, I'm gonna flat
Never mind, they're just flowers
Golly I love Spring!

5a. This phrase to be read in a nasal, professorial sort of way.
5b. "Healthier" here meaning healthier than the Daily Cal and/or sophomoric drinking sessions.
6. This phrase to be read like Ira Glass.