🚀 go-pugleaf

As they draw closer and closer to DC, Bill and Monty are  beginning to
hallucinate. We saw Stav go thru this stage when he was in New Mexico. You
see  the road does funny things to you, especially if you've been on it
since Seattle:

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Many of you have heard me remark:
you're not people, you're sheeple!

This week I got to find out more what that really implies, at a
Benedictine Monastery.

At Mount Savior Monastery, the monks raise, and eat! sheep. I was staying
at their place, they needed help.  You see the equation.

There is nothing more exhilarating, at least this day, than running
barefooted in galoshes, across wet fields, chasing wayward sheep.
Especially when your legs have been cooped up doing the same repetitive
motion for days.  Thru brambles, feces, mud, and slime, i ran stumbled,
fell, and yes, occasionally cursed.

Despite the lack of a trained dog, the sheep were all corralled by Monty,
I and two Monks with an ATV.  This is a lot quicker to type than it was to
actually do.  I hope you all realize that.

Its funny how sheep follow the follower.

Get too close and they'll run between two people.  Don't get close enough
and they don't move. There is some critical distance that causes the
correct response, the correct action: moving into the corral.

and there are weirdo sheep that LEAD other sheep off in the wrong
direction, what is up with that?

People have been compared to sheep for over 2000 years.  And maybe they
act the same way.  I can see some similarities.  Ideas or issues thrust
into their face they run away from; ideas they don't get exposed to they
ignore, but there must be the right distance, the right awareness for
sensitivity to take hold, for the desired response to occur.

I don't know about other people, but I can see this with the political
correctness.  It's shoved in my face, and I ignore it.  I ignore it
sometimes on purpose.  I'll gladly call a girl a woman, as long as I'm
paid 1/3 more than she is. That's exactly the kind of stuff I'll say.  Oh,
and I'll steal lines from Tom Lehrer, too.

Maybe biking and the failing environment are the same way.  The right
exposure needs to be found in order to create an effect with the masses. 
How can the issue of the benefits and need to increase biking be
expressed?

Well, even with a whole day of practice, I still had  sheep get away from 
me.  I'm sure that means something.

Excelsior!

-Bill :|
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Last night we camped on state land underneath some apple trees. During the
night we heard something, not a dog!, bark at us.  TWICE! FROM DIFFERENT
DIRECTIONS!!

Monty thinks that whatever it was, i've said it wasn't a dog, right?, that
it wanted to eat the apples around our campsite.  If this was sasquatch,
and I think it was, then our very lives may have been saved by our body
seasoning!

After a hard day of riding, its hard to imagine something smelling worse
than us.  And it saved our lives! I mean, from the way we stank, whatever
it was, and I think it was sasquatch, probably thought there were 30 or 40
of us, and was too scared to approach.

But what was it?  was there only one?  Here are the facts: there was
something like barking, but unlike any dog we've heard; it came from two
directions; and I think it was sasquatch.  Those are the only real facts
we have.

I know, from listening to the art bell show (www.artbell.com), that
sometimes the sasquatch smell really bad.  But we were upwind so, we
couldn't smell it.  And I've also heard they don't attack people. But
let's think about that for a second: 7'+ tall, hairy, upright,and
non-human, plus they're really strong.  I don't know about you, but that
sounds like I should start running right now.

Sasquatch isn't something to mess around with.  We're outta here!

-Bill :|

p.s. Monty says he smelled rotting meat at the campsite.  I didn't. Is
this further evidence of Monty's enhanced senses, or was sasquatch hiding
near him ready to tap him on the shoulder.
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If you want to contact Bill or Monty:
    recumbentman@pocketmail.com
Bill is corresponding with us with his pocket sized Email device, the
Pocket Mailer at:
    http://www.bikeroute.com/NBG2000/PocketMail.html
Archives for his ride can be found at:
    http://www.cyclery.com/lists/nbg
Bill is keeping his own web at:
    http://www7.50megs.com/degutan/bikeTrip.htm
Bill is headed to our party in DC at:
    http://www.bikeroute.com/CycleAmerica2000/DCReception.html
To see other NBG riders in action:
   http://cycleology.com/NBG

-- 
               M a r t i n   K r i e g       
               Attacking with Love         
      Coma, Paralysis, Clinical Death Survivor  
    '79 & '86 TransAm Vet, "Awake Again" Author
   TransAm w/us in 2000: http://www.BikeRoute.com
     N A T I O N A L   B I C Y C L E   G R E E N W A Y