70km down to Redondo Beach and back. A lovely way to see LA.

Clearly I'm enjoying the bike more and more.

Today was the first proper long ride. 70km from our house, down to the marina at Redondo Beach, and then back again.

Most of the ride took place along one of those concrete drainage channels that LA Department of Water and Power calls a "creek". This was pretty wild, because some of the neighbourhoods I rode through were, well - how do I put this.. I've heard about them in hip-hop songs.

There was most definitely no stopping along that bike path! I saw some pretty standard wild LA stuff - homeless men living behind a locked grate in a storm drain (how do they come and go?), miles of wildly fit and beautiful boys and girls playing beach volleyball, impossibly fit and gorgeous surfside girls on beach cruisers, old dudes with longboards, 70's diehards on quad skates, and the underside of a few 747s as I rode under the flight path out of LAX.

Did nothing but drink water on the way, but  didn't need to pee for 3 1/2 hours - I guess I was using that water!

Stopped for a snack at Hermosa beach, on the pier - and suddenly all those low-rider bikes made sense. This is where it all happens, I guess.

There was a bit of surf, but no time to stop and look - I was on a mission.

Next long ride, I'll try and get all the way to Torrance beach, which is another 5k down the path - so that would be an 80k round trip.

Solid.
Now I'm home to eat, stretch and get re-acquainted with my perineum. Wonder if I can sit on an ice-pack? 

     

Greetings from scenic manhattan beach, Los Angeles.

Osher (Andrew) Günsberg

http://andrewgunsberg.com

365 photo exhibit to open from September 15th in Sydney

Live across Australia to 60+ stations..

Each and every week, live from LA all the way to Australia  - right across the wide brown land.

This is us opening the show...  

Using Prof.Pavlov's work for good. Well, pooping actually.

This is all about pooping.

If you're squeamish, stop reading now.

As a dog owner (actually step-owner, when I met wife I also got dog), sometimes when we go outside for walkies dog takes her sweet time in pooping. This can be a hassle when it's late at night, you're tired, you're late in the morning, it's raining, whatever the reason - sometimes I just wished the dog could poop on command.

Well, dogs can poop on command.

Airport security dogs do it, police dogs do it, so why couldn't my dog do it?

She already was going nuts when I pulled the plastic bag out of the bag drawer, so I thought - if Prof. Pavlov can do it, why can't I?

His work in proving that instinctive responses could be controlled with artificial stimuli (his dogs salivating at various sounds that were associated with feeding time, even there was no food present) lead me to wonder if I could work with our dog to achieve a not too dissimilar result. 

Wife had already trained dog to pee on command, so we were - like the man Bongiovi said - half way there..

So, a few months ago, I started an experiment.

As dog was doing "the walk", the set-up for when she's getting in position for the big drop, I would get the bag out of my pocket.

As she began to poop, I would rustle the bag.

Pooping sounds like a plastic bag rustling, so whenever there's pooping, there's that sound again, must be pooping time!

Kind of like me with coffee, but that's another story.

It wasn't long before she started to respond.

We would be outside, she'd be sniffing about, marking some territory here, checking out a lamp post there - and just as she's in transit between one sniff and another, I rustled the bag. She looked at me, and then instantly changed direction to find one of her poop spots in our street. Rustle a bit more, and she's doing the sniff, the set-up and the drop.  Kaboom.

To make sure it wasn't a fluke, I tried it again the next day. Same result. The moment she was slightly distracted from sniff patrol, I rustled the bag and BOOM, she's off to her favourite bush/tree/fern (she's shy and doesn't go in the open) to deposit some reconstituted dog food into a neighbour's front lawn.

The ultimate test came when a mate was dog-sitting her when we were both away. He tried the bag rustle, and lo and behold - it worked a treat every time. Dog has no idea why, but she'll be minding her business and then suddenly at the sound of a bag be compelled to do her business.

About nine out of ten times it works, other times - she just doesn't poop. She's a lady after all.

Anyway, I'm hardly an animal specialist, or a Labrador whisperer, but this worked for me. 

Have a good weekend dog-lovers.

Here's a classy photo of our dog pooping in the snow. Yup, it's a photo of my dog pooping.

Dip 'n Dunk madness.

My mate just bought this on eBay.
It weighs 400kg. Best ever .

   

Osher (Andrew) Günsberg

http://andrewgunsberg.com

Cee-Lo Green releases Song of the year, and it's really NSFW. You've been warned - however it's awesome.

Seriously folks, here it is. The song of the year. It's sweary as anything. I have no clue how I'm going to play it on the radio on Sunday.. But what a track.

Of course, when the album comes out, buy that thing.

Beer Pong - a summer sport.

via flickr.com

Beverly Hills pool party, Summer 2009.

You'd think that Australians, with our binge-drinking culture and no-need-for-a-reason attitude towards drinking would have invented a game of equal skill and devotion (so much so that they even make beer-pong tables, as can be seen here) by now.

However, I imagine that our national predisposition to apathy also may have something to do with it.

These guys were going at it, challenging all comers for rights to the beer-pong table. It was amazing to watch. They take it so seriously here, if you go to the supermarket, there are ping pong balls for sale in the beer aisle.

Regardless, this was at THAT Beverly Hills pool party, at the house of a big Hollywood agent. He had filled his backyard with hundreds of hot girls and guys, and away they went at doing what people in these parties do.. which is stand around being so impossibly beautiful that there's nothing to do but notice them all.
The guys were all carved out of anchor rope, and the girls were all supermodels. And then there was me and wife who just stood on the sidelines and observed...

It was a sight to behold.

The leaky Ae-1 and some Ektar 100, home processed and hand scanned. DIY c41 FTW.

THUNDERBIRDS ARE GO!!

via flickr.com

Something about American fire engines makes me think I'm in a Thunderbirds epidode. I'm 36 - not really into cars or anything like that, but Fire Engines here make me feel like I'm 7.
Especially the ladder trucks.

After I voted today, at the Consulate in Century City, I snapped this off, as it was parked out the front.

Squee.

Also for the Nakatomo building in the back.

 

And just for shits and giggles:

Voted via Remote

Voted today at the Consulate here in LA.

The lovely lady there behind the voting desk summed it up perfectly for me when she saw my excitement and remarked, "I used to work in Timor - people were dying to vote. When I move back to Australia I could never understand queuing to vote next to people moaning about having a barbecue to get to."

I couldn't agree more. I became an Australian citizen so that I could vote.

Think and use your vote wisely. This is your chance. Your shot at the title. Your country, your life, your future.

Don't be scared into voting against your principles. Read into some policy and vote for what you really believe to be the truth.

It was odd being at the consulate to vote. There was only me and the lovely lady behind the desk there.

No shouting matches in the carpark of the North Bondi Primary School, no floor littered with how-to-vote cards that have awfully lit pictures of Ted Grumblebum from the Nationalist Crankypants party plastered all over them, no smell of the sausage sizzle.

Just me, her, and a ballot box overlooking downtown LA.

Hooray for democracy.

Be powerful. It's your chance to run a country, so use it wisely!

Soundtrack on the radio as I drove in. An Omen?

31st floor, 2920 Century Park East, where democratic dreams come true..