Strange Dream

Last night I had a strange dream.  Like most people I've had a lot of strange dreams, however, the main character in this dream was none other than Lance Armstrong.  I told myself I wasn't gonna talk about Armstrong anymore.  I realized a couple of weeks ago that I'm not interested in the drama anymore.  I also realized that pro bike racing doesn't interest me as much as it once did either.  I'm still gonna watch it, I'm still gonna pick out favorite racers and protagonists as I just like watching racers fight it out on climbs.  The climbs are actually the only part of bike racing that I get excited about.  I used to love the time trials. I don't know what happened but I can hardly watch them anymore.  I think all of this is just a natural transformation.  When I started building frames about 4-5 years ago I became more and more enthusiastic about building bikes and less enthusiastic about racing. Building became the priority. I still love to ride but its much more painful these days because I'm gradually losing fitness. I still love to suffer but now I'm suffering while riding 18 mph.  Not pretty.  Anyway lets get back to the dream.

There was a crowd of people gathered in a rather dark room.  It more or less resembled a nice stand-up comedy bar or perhaps where you would go watch a band on the weekend or something of that nature.  There was a stage with a handful of spotlights shining down and a red curtain as a backdrop. There were also a couple of tables on the stage, long tables set up end to end.  The crowd was made up of all kinds of different people. Most were dressed pretty casual, nice but casual, and I noticed quite a few were wearing suits.  There were no chairs on the floor, everyone was standing and for some reason they weren't standing in the middle of the room but were all standing toward the right side of the room.  Then three or four guys started bringing out all these glass bottles and jugs from behind the curtain and arranging them on the tables.  The jugs and bottles were all different sizes ranging from an average size jar, to a whiskey bottle, and even some really big glass jugs, you know, kinda like those big glass bottles that sometimes people put all their change in.  All these bottles were clear and appeared to be filled with urine.  Intermingled between these urine filled bottles and jugs were all types of smaller bottles.  Some looked like pill containers and others looked like energy drinks and things, they had labels on them and looked like something you would buy.  All the people are standing around talking among themselves, saying things like, "Whats going on here?"  I was wondering too.  Then after all the tables were completely filled with glass bottles and jugs filled with urine as well as all sorts of other bottles of various things, the 3-4 guys walked off the stage and everybody was just standing there looking at all this stuff.  After a few minutes Lance Armstrong walked out from behind the curtain and up to the podium and  picked up one of the little bottles and just started pouring pills out into his mouth.  Some were going into his mouth while others were falling all over the floor and bouncing around. Then he'd pick up an energy drink and pour that all over his face, and then more pills, going from bottle to bottle and just making a total spectacle of himself.  The whole time he was doing this he was dancing around in little circles, kinda like a joker trying to entertain a king.  He was just laughing his arse off at everyone, dancing little circles, pouring pills and drinks all over his face.  Everyone in the audience was real quite and serious and not really saying anything, just watching the whole spectacle unfold. I then noticed that the people that were wearing the suits were not happy but appeared very serious and somewhat annoyed.  This is basically how the dream ended.  There was no big finale and many people were walking out right in the middle of the whole thing as it became uninteresting after a while. 

 This dream doesn't really appear to be very complex or difficult to figure out.  Its basically what has transpired throughout the whole Armstrong investigation.  The one thing that totally confuses me with this dream is that I was laughing too, I was laughing even harder than Lance Armstrong.  If you know me at all you know that I've never been an Armstrong fan, so I clearly wasn't laughing with him but I don't know what I was laughing at.  That's how the dream ended, me just laughing my butt off.  Maybe I was laughing because I finally realized that all this is just a big joke and of no real importance in my life or anyone else's unless you make it a part of your life.  Its really no more interesting than some movie star or rock star getting into some kind of trouble, but because we love cycling so much we make this stuff an important part of our lives when in fact its nothing.

 I read this morning that Lance was competing in some non-sanctioned triathlon that apparently the Livestrong Foundation had invested in recently.  Looks to me like Lance is back having to pay entry fees in order to race just like the rest of us, only he's paying ten-fold.  I'm reminding myself as I speak, that as much as I can't stand him, he is only human.  Its sad really.  He's abandoned just about anyone who loved him, his entire life's work is crumbling in front of him, and he still seems to have something to prove at the races.  He's got nowhere to go.  I think he's running from himself.  Why doesn't he just start promoting races for racers and fans in order to give back to the racing community.  He has the money and sources to pay good prizes and he would be involved in positive aspects of cycling. It would probably help heal some of his wounds.  Oh well, its not my worry as I'm no longer interested. It was just a dream.  Rock on LA!