*Note: Kozmo did eventually fix his bike.

This school semester has really taken a beating on me!  I have been working full time and going to school full time which is why I have not blogged or posted any videos lately.  The school semester is winding down though, one month left, so expect more from me.

Cheers

Ryan

So I road up to Rosemead this morning to go to a small conference at a church about bridging the gap between the GLBT, and the church.   The guest speaker was Andrew Marin, founder of the Marin Foundation.  He had some really good things to say about the church, and about how we should respond to people in the GLBT community.   He summed it up in three basic points:

1. Its the Holy Spirit’s job to convict, Its God’s Job to judge, and its our job to love.
2. We are called to live in relation to and relationship with the GLBT community.
3. The number one way to encourage someone in the gay community to pursue a relationship with Jesus (which should be our goal as the church, not trying to make them straight) is to teach them, and affirm the belief that God exists, and desires a communicating relationship with them.

What I was so blown away by, was that this is really no different then how we respond to any community that needs Jesus, but for some reason we act so differently with GLBT community.  Anyway, if you have the time check out there site, themarinfoundation.org.  He was a fun speaker to listen to, and he had a lot of really good points.

On a completely different note, the 605 has got to be the worst freeway to ride a bike on.  It is so bumpy, and just overall scary compared to any other freeway I have been on, even the worse then the 710.  I am the only that feels this way?

And lastly what is up with the fires today, it is really gross outsibe, and I saw on the news that over 10,000 people have been evacuated from their homes.  Lets remember to pray for then today.

YAY!

The site is back up.  It was down for a few hours today, because of some glitch with our hosting site, but all is well again.

I thought I would also use this post to share some updates on what has been going on with trip planning.

We are pretty set on the cities we plan to visit, you can see those by going to our tour schedule page.  What we have been working on lately is getting all the church’s names and info together that we plan on visiting.  I am about 60% done with that, and I hope to be completely finished in the next week or so.  From there we are planning on trying to get a hold of these churches, via email and telephone, to schedule the time for us to stop by and visit.  When the list is complete we will have over a 100 churches that we plan on visiting, but for now, there are still a lot of cities where we don’t know of any local churches.  I am sure there are some there, but before I just start doing google searches, I thought I would list some of the cities we plan on visiting and seeing if any of you know of churches close to those areas. So here you go:

Baltimore, MD
Bowman, ND
Butte, MT
Cheyenne, WY
Coeur D’Alene, ID
Custer, MT
Des Moines, IA
Ellensburg, WA
Fairmont, WV
Franklin, NC
Keystone, SD
Knoxville, TN
Long Beach, MS
Louisville, KY
Manchester, NH
Memphis, TN
Miami, OK
Mobile, AB
Montpelier, VT
Murdo, SD
Nashville, TN
Oshkosh, WI
Pittsburgh, PA
Portland, ME
Providence, RI
Redding, CA
Richmond, VA
San Louis Obispo, CA
Seattle, WA
Sioux Falls, SD

I added a feature on the tour schedule page, that allows people to follow where we are on a map.  Check it out, and let me know if you think it works.

Nate Emerson Rocks, he just finished putting together this site for us, with an amazing design thanks to Cameron Schuyler. let us know what you think?

Ryan says that he does not want a trunk on his bike because he thinks it will make his bike look ugly. I have one on my bike, and while I can pack everything I need for a 2 day trip without it, the trunk comes in handy for long trips and for things that I didn’t plan on having to pack. I think he should get one, so that we have more than enough space for luggage, and so we are not struggling to pack things just right all the time. What do you think?

The Poll is on the right side of the page.

Please feel free to leave comments on how Ryan’s bike looks already.

Well no more than 10 days after Ryan dropped his bike, I too was humbled.  I actually thought it would happen, after I gave Ryan so much crap for dropping his.  I am completely OK, not even a scratch on me, but I attribute that to the fact that I was wearing full gear.  ATGAT (All The Gear, All The Time) should be every rider’s slogan, I know it saved me today.

Here is what happened.  I was at Mid-Cities Honda looking to see if anyone made a rear crash bar for my bike.  I know pretty ironic right?  I even told the guy working there, after I couldn’t find anything that maybe I should just never drop the bike, then I wouldn’t have to worry about a crash bar.  I did not realize how far off I was.  I got on my bike and headed south on Lakewood, I was headed toward the freeway onramp to the 91 east.  I was just going to go to Bellflower Blvd, and stop by the church.  As i went through the first turn on to the ramp, I was going 20+ mph, I know because I did not have to downshift into 1st gear to make the turn.  Then coming out of the turn, I realized that I was going to fast for the second part of the turn, which was a sharp right u-turn on to the freeway.  I immediately straightened the bike out, and grabbed the brakes.  Instantly the back tire slid to the left, which makes me think I hit an oil spot or some kind of a slick spot, because that is not a normal reaction for a back tire to make.  I tried to straighten out the bike, but it didn’t work.  The whole bike flipped from leaning right to falling on the left side, and it kind of catapulted me off the bike.  I landed just a couple feet away on my left side.  My bike was still on, and for some reason the throttle was still engaged.  This caused the Bike to spin around and hit me in the leg, not hard, but enough to get my attention.  I jumped up, and turned my bike off.  It was then that I noticed the three cars behind me just staring.  Here is the odd thing, they did not look concerned, they looked annoyed.  I can imagine the thoughts going through their heads, “Stupid biker, serves you right for riding one of those things.”  None of them even asked if I was OK.  I picked up my bike, which wasn’t easy, pushed it over to the side, and eventually walked it back down to the sidewalk.

I examined my bike for damage, and all I could find was two things.  My left saddlebag was scratched along the bottom, which isn’t even noticeable from the side, and my left highway bar was bent back a little bit.  I got it started again and road it back to the dealership to have them take a look at it.  I get it back tomorrow, and hopefully that is all the damage done.

I know a lot of people are going to want me to quit riding, but I just can’t.  If anything this makes me feel more confident.  I know it doesn’t make sense, but to actually have an accident and walk away from it fine, scares me just enough to stay humble, but not enough to want to quit.  It does make me realize that full gear is essential, and that I need to be more aware of what is a safe speed at all times.  So far I honestly feel thankful.  Thankful that I had all my gear on, thankful that it was only around a 15 to 20 mph incident, thankful that God was looking out for me, and thankful that I have this experience now.  I actually have prayed several times, first that I would never crash, but secondly that when I did (Cause it happens to everyone) it would be a humbling experience, something that I can learn a lot from, and something that I could walk away from.  Today was both, so thank you for answering my prayers God.

Now, go ahead and leave your smart mouth comments.  I deserve them.

On our ride up to Morro Bay Kozmo radioed me sying he needed to pull over and tighten up some parts. No problem, I came up to a stop sign with 5 ft of asphalt on the right and 15 ft lot which appeared to be solid ground. I chose to pull over to the bigger area so we would have plenty of room. When I started to brake I hit a soft patch of sand which took me down to the ground. Thankfully I was only going 5 mph. Damage report: a few minor scratches and a busted front right turn signal. Not a big deal. What does this mean? It could have happened to anyone of us, it just happened to be me. So when Kozmo tells everyone I crashed, you can read this and get the real story!
Cheers
Ryan

One more cool thing that happened this weekend was that on Friday I saw a guy in Pismo Beach with a backpack on just walking through the town.  He came up to Ryan and I and asked how many miles to Santa Barbara.  I told him it was about 80 miles, but I wasn’t sure.  Turns out it is more like 100.

Anyway, he walked off, and I didn’t think nothing of it.  Then last night, when I was riding home.  I stopped in Santa Barbara for dinner.  Went in to a Mcdonalds, which I normally hate, but it is hard to find any fast food places in downtown Santa Barbara.  Anyway, the guy right in front of me in line, was the same guy who asked how far Santa Barbara was the day before in Pismo.

So I asked him his name, he said John.  Then i bought him some dinner, and we chatted for a while.  Turns out he is 19 years old, grew up in the foster care system, and has been hitchhiking his way up and down the coast, and back east for 2 years.  Pretty nice guy, but once he found out I was a pastor he was a little distant in talking about himself.  I tried to let him know that I didn’t care what he had done, and that it wasn’t my place to judge him anyway.  Once he realized that, he had some pretty sweet stories.  You should ask me about the guy if you would like to know more.  I wish guys like that had blogs, cause they seem to have the most adventures.