VJ is Dead, Long Live VJ

Bye Bye Vanishing James, Mister JimmyJam has a new blog.

http://itsthekitch.wordpress.com

See you there.

Random Thoughts + an announcement...

Thought 1 - This Jon Benet Confessor is a wack job. Dollars to donuts this is not the guy.

Thought 2 - How much worse can it get for Floyd Landis and his family? What a tragedy. Hopefully it's true that the main causes were not the doping scandal.

Thought 3 - I have been with Riz, or he has been with me for both the worst loss ever in Yankee history, the longest 9 inning game in Yankee and MLB history, not to mention a Jet playoff collapse. What's that mean? Absolutely nothing.

Announcement -- My friend and family and the very scant few of you out there that read this fairly neglected blog might know that we have been pursuing adoption. We announced it and started the process and you'll have noticed that the adoption conversation has fairly dried up until right now. Our thanks to all of you for not pressing the issue at all. As you might figure, we freaked out about it for a bit, and then CK was going to get a new job. The freakout combined with the timing of her new job put the kabosh on adoption for a bit. By the time we had our minds wrapped around and committed to it, life threw us a curveball. A nice fat one though that we can drive into the gap. It just makes sense to let CK get time in her position at work so when she goes back to work if she takes some time off that she can go back into the same position. So we have pushed things back about a year and are working with Spence Chapin to make that happen.

So, we will be adopting, just not as fast as we thought. Adella Jennifer Kitcher will be with us soon. :-)

Cheating Bastard or Victim?

Given the witch hunt that's pursued Lance Armtstrong in regards to cheating during the Tour De Lance, specifically the charges levied at him by L'Equipe, a French rag and Dick Pound, head of the WADA; I was not going to be surprised if allegations were made about Landis -- who rode with Lance, and is an American.

Another American winning the tour, worse, one with ties to ESPY winner and Tour De Lance record holder Lance Armstrong is an anathema to the French. Well, not all French, but definitely Dick Pound and his crew.

Is it possible Landis cheated? Yeah. Thing is, it's retarded cheating if it was, because a one time steroid use is going to be enough to wreck a test, but not increase performance. That's according to Dr. Gary Wadler in an AP article published on ESPN right here. All Landis' other samples were clean except for that one day. Further - he knows they test for EPO, one of the substances found in his urine sample.

So, Floyd, if you did cheat, you are as dumb as you are tough, because if you did, they did not do a thing for you and you still won the tour and pissed it away at the same time.

Is it possible someone at the WADA is gunning for Floyd in Lance's wake? Sure. Just Google the backstory on all of that. They were after Lance forever. However, barring someone coming forward and admitting tampering, the burden of proof is all on Floyd, and unless he had some other samples taken and notarized on that day, he's got an uphill battle ahead of him.

Bob Roll from OLNTV.com had some good questions though -- and they need to be answered by doctors from the cycling equivalent of Sweden. Here they are:

• Can one sample be nearly three times different in 24 hours than a previous sample?
• Can the body absorb, metabolize and convert any substance into a controllable sample that has been recorded to be a ratio of 11 to 1 of testosterone vs. epitestosterone -- almost three times the allowable ratio in one single day?
• Can any doctor explain the findings in a way regular people can understand?

You can read the rest of Roll's comments in this article on OLNtv.com. Here's my question, why only two samples - an A sample and a B sample? How about four samples? Two could be taken before the race by one anti doping agency two after the race taken by and  and two after the race and those samples mixed up and sent off to different labs for testing. For so serious a charge, one would think they could afford the extra control measures. Of course my suggestion lacks some detail, but I think the general gist of it has merit.

Sigh. The French hate us winning their tour. Often athlete's cheat.It's hard to say I have anything but doubts and reservations all around.