It all started yesterday when Taitt e-mailed me a link to the Oakland Regional Grilled Cheese Invitational at Eli’s Mile High Club at MLK and MacArthur. I was skeptical at first and said “Taitt, is this a drug house or something?” She said no and I believed her, given that she has way more experience with that stuff than I do. I was planning on having dinner with Elis, so we decided to make it a girls night out on town.

The Grilled Cheese Invitational is an actual grilled cheese sandwich making and sampling contest. I had my hopes set high of platters mounded with hot greasy grilled cheese sandwiches cut into triangle size sample pieces for me. A dream come true.

Elis and I had a nice big snack of lots of vegetables to fill up before heading to the spot. Roman decided to drive us there and come too, so I guess it wasn’t really a girls night out after all. So after parking in a biohazard, we finally got the place and there was a long line of Oaklanders waiting to get their paws on sandwiches, including Taitt and her rommie Oliver. We cut in line with Taitt to avoid the line and soon we were into Eli’s dive to gorge ourselves on sandwiches.

Finally we were in the club and were given these nice paper hats to wear. More lines, but in no time we were divulging ourselves to a diverse selection of grilled cheese sandwiches.

I am fairly certain that these sandwiches were probably not actually safe to eat and also made in unsanitary conditions, possibly somesort of car-engine-turned-sandwich-griller situation. Or maybe they were ironed into a dance floor slathered with butter.

Either way, we were willing to risk it and vote for the best. None of them were all that good to be honest, but we were high on the life of an Oakland wannabe hipster. I think that Oliver got food poisoning and it made his eyes grow in different directions.

Roman was, of course, very analytical about the entire event. He did not like cutting in line and he was absolutely not impressed with any sandwiches at the event.

But one thing we were all impressed with was Christian Kearney’s (remember him, he was on the Yellow Bug Time’s 50 Sexiest People List a while back) halloween costume at bike polo later that night. I am not sure what he is dressed as exactly, but that really is a Louis Girneau tt helmet on backwards. Tight.

Finally, my series of unusal events ends tonight with hot date at the Lafayette tanning salon and a trip to the halloween store in Berkeley.

For the love of god, I don’t know what I was thinking in taking me or Roman to the tanning salon, but by god we went tonight. I wanted to make it a low key, in and out type of event, as this was my first time (and last time) ever at this type of place. A pathetic attempt to rid myself of tanlines forever. However, Roman was so entertained with the situation that he wanted to drag it out as long as possible by heckling the poor girl at the front desk, purchasing special tanning lotions, wearing the eye goggles outside of the actual tanning bed, etc. I was not entertained, in fact I was thoroughly embarrassed and wanted to crawl under the tanning bed and come out next year when nobody would remember me. Due to his special tanning lotions, he came out looking like a ripe tomatoe for a few hours. Now his tan has mellowed out and he is looking like a Jamaican beauty. My tan is still no-where to be found.

While Roman got a nice tan tonight, I got a nice halloween costume. From the kids section. If a curvy Darth Vador comes trick or treating at your door, that is probably me, as the lady at the store told me I am the first adult woman she has seen trying on Darth Vador suits from the little boys sectionn (I guess other people may have used the dressing room, but I decided to use the aisle to save time). Still, Roman says it looks fantastic and it comes with pants attached to boots that fit over your shoes. I usually would never actually purchase a halloween costume but we have to go to some event with his high school girlfriend and costumes are required. Roman just told me that I am not allowed to talk about this stuff on the blog anymore, so I gotta go.

We went and road the Pine Mountain loop in Marin. I was in a world of pain!

Roman kept trying to keep up with me on these wicked fire trails descents, but he just didn’t have the skills

Finally I stop and wait so that he can catch up!

When we got back the car, it appeared that a native of Fairfax wit the initials LH had vandelized the white hood of Roman’s red Volvo. This person is also a team director and tends to heckle people in the peloton. She is also married to a man who has a broken hip right now, but she still makes him ride around with her. Sick and twisted.

If you come skate with me on my birthday, I promise that maybe one of my teammates will jump out of the birthday cake in a skinsuit. And my mom will feed you unlimited chocolate cupcakes with purple frosting. So please come.

There is a new girl in town, so let give a big Had to Martina for braving the elements for coming over to Missingsaddle. Hopefully i can keep her happy!

Curtis
Missingsaddle.com

Today was a lazy Sunday which is great cuz its still my off season. But what off season would be complete without a trip to the bike swap? I think it is Roman’s favorite thing to do. So we headed off to the bike swap in San Pablo today.
Roman is hard to control at the swap because he gets so excited. Don’t get the wrong idea here, its not like the swap is swimming with Gucci bike parts. Quite the opposite- it appeared to me that most of the items there were over-priced rusty stuff. Exactly what we don’t need!
The people there are pretty cool. We ran into Uthman Ray IV from Cal Cycling and BPG while he was trying to sell some stuff.
This the new 2008 team beauty bike for the CRASH BANDICOOT in the NRC. I hope and pray that maybe this will be a more stable ride for the bandicoot! Lets keep our fingers crossed!

Now take a look at the most sickest motorcycle bike rack in the universe. This is Ricardo from Colombia and he can fit 4 bikes on the back of this ride, plus an assortment of wheels.

I picked up a cool Specialized helmet for Elizabet, Rome’s 9 year old sister for $2. As we were leaving, Roman was a little bit sad that he did not find anything he wanted to take home. And so we were heading out of the parking lot when he spyed this SRM for an unbelievable deal.
And so we left happily with more bike stuff and less money than we started the day with! The End!