New Ride Shades have arrived

After much contemplation, checking at the NEX, heartache, going back and forth, stress, lost sleep, getting Cezanne's advice, emotional breakdowns, hours of sobbing, I picked my new cycling sunglasses.  Okay, there was some going back and forth and getting Cezanne's advice, but none of the other stuff.  It was a little bit of a difficult decision.  I decided to check into 3 brands of sunglasses to replace my 3 year old Specialized San Remos.  I liked my Specialized, but they would fog up just looking at them.  

I looked at Giro, Rudy Project, and Oakley.  Giro is new into the sunglasses market, but apparently after decades making cycling helmets, they had a good idea of how heads were shaped and how to make the sunglasses work with the helmet straps and retention system.  They nailed that, but I don't think they studied the nose very much.  When I tried on the Giro's, they covered my forehead more than my eyes.  It was comical and received my and Cezanne's disapproval.  The Rudy Project sportmask was pretty nice.  Out of the 3, it was the most aesthetically pleasing, fitting the shape/width of my head the best and the best style of lens (for me).  I didn't like the nose piece, it was plastic instead of rubber.  The glasses seemed really flimsy, but I'm sure they are sturdy, and they were really light.  The Oakley's seemed to be the best all around although I wasn't crazy about them.  

Deciding to get the Oakley Radar with Path shaped lenses was only half the battle.  Then came picking out the color frame and lens.  It was between the white frame with blue iridium lens and the LiveStrong edition.  I guess I was a little nervous about being too flashy with the white and how looking out of the blue iridium would be.  On Oakley's website they had a simulation of what it would look like and I didn't like it.  I thought my highlighter yellow shoes are flashy enough, and I have a close and personal (very personal) connection with LiveStrong, so that's what I went with.  I'm definitely happy with the choice, road with them for the first time yesterday and they were perfect.  What makes it better is that I've seen Big George Hincapie wearing them in Tirreno-Adriatico.  

What made yesterday's ride even better was riding up Torrey Pines hill and getting passed by a skinny and in-shape older cyclist.  He was probably around 55.  I was cruising at 11mph and I hopped on his wheel and rolled at 13mph the whole way up with my heart rate right at 179-180 the whole way.  We kicked it up to 15mph at the top.  I had to thank him for the pull.  It felt good to open it up.   Funny how you can push it harder when you have some motivation/competition.

I have to put this blog link I received in an email on here.  I read about this on the news.  Recently, the Berkeley City Council passed a statement indicating that Marine Corps recruiting stations are "not welcome in the city, and if recruiters want to stay, they do so as uninvited and unwelcome intruders."  I love how people who harp on free speech and everybody's right to be equal and do as they chose can be so totally and utterly the antithesis of that.  What is great is that on the back of the USAA magazine I just received is a profile of the reporter in the video at the below link.  He used to be a Marine helicopter pilot and is now a correspondent on the John Stewart Daily Show.  Being a former Marine, it makes the story so much funnier, especially his "venting" away from the guy he's interviewing in one part of the video.

http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/2008/03/semper-fi-berserkely/