(sort of) NEW BIKE DAY!

 After putting this on the back burner for months I finally swapped out a bunch of stuff on the Miyata commuter and turned it into a single speed. I know there are people who will swear by brakeless fixed gears and whatever until the day they die, and for a long time I was one of those people.  Fixed brakeless is fun, zippy, and simple.  While these things are true, brakeless fixed isn't always the most practical.  Last summer my knees started to give me trouble and I finally put a brake on this bike. I realized very quickly how much better it was than before.  After coming to Madison and commuting fixed it started to get old quick.  Then I trashed my fork and finally decided to make the swap to single speed. This bike has taken on many different configurations and I have loved them all, but after a bit of dialing in I've got to say this may be my favorite so far.

 Mostly stuff that was just laying around or already on the bike.  Campy front, campy pedals, iro cranks, messenger ring, whatever rear, cheapo brakes, tektro levers topped off with an old San Marco Rolls and some super wide mustache bars. And this fancy bell.

 Still a work in progress, like all my bikes, eventually get the addition of a Brooks and the fattest tires the frame can fit. Overall pretty happy with the way it rides now however.

 Today was absolutly beautiful out so after work I took the newly refurbished steed out to Elver "we don't want your kind here" Park, which as I suspected was largely abandoned and afforded me the luxury of ripping around the disc golf course and relaxing in the sun.

Crappy photo but yonder about 7 miles is the Capital, neat view.  

 This week is going to be gorgeous, go out and live it.

of the deep

There's all of these movies that try to poignantly weave big cities into the narrative of their story as some kind of force or character that take on a life of their own and end up developing a sort of rhythm that's supposed to be the reminiscent of  people in them.  Something like that, I'm no movie genius, but that's my take.  And I sort of buy into it. Some places quickly feel comfortable and are easy to fall in love with, other places make you feel off kilter and want to high tail it before you end up dead or in the hoosegow.  My point in all of this is that my total disdain for Halloween and the garbage it involves I feel like this was one of those glowing moments where my hippy-life-pulse alined closely with that of the place I live.  

 Friday night I headed over to a fellow EC transplants house for a big potluck and house show featuring EC's Kalispell.  I gorged myself on tons of good food and met a bunch of great people.  It's funny in all the time I lived in EC I never caught these guys play (even after running a local music radio show, whoops) but I was really pleasantly surprised. Maybe it was the brie, apples, and wine speaking, but it was a really awesome show.  After things wrapped up I headed down to Rev and completely changed gears from quiet toe tapping to blurry shirtless dance party.

 Tiny Daggers, Fire Retarded, and Poney played and before I could take more then a handful of photos the night tipped into total disorder and I was more concerned with shaking what the good Lord gave me to mess around with my photo making box.

 The night ended shortly there after and I slowly made my way home to catch some well earned zzzs.

 Saturday started off with a huge breakfast as fuel for the 5th annual Madison Halloween Alleycat.  I didn't know anyone racing, but for $5 I figured I knew the city well enough at this point and it was worth it. There was only two real routes to the race so I picked the group that looked like it had some strong folks in it and when the race started I got on their wheels and stuck there to the first checkpoint.  I felt just fine until rolling up to a basketball court. I fancy myself to be a relatively athletic person. Decent eye-hand coordination, reasonable endurance, decent power.  None of that shit comes into play when I have a basketball in my hands. I am by far one of the worse basketball players on the planet bar none. I got to the stop with the first 5 or so people in the group.  I was the second to last player to make a basketball shot to allow me to move on to the next checkpoint. Literally half of the field got there and made a shot and took off while I was stuck sitting around ball in hand like some sort of jerk.  I reasoned the race was over and finally got out of there to the next stop.

 Everything from there went pretty well. I made up time by drinking a minimum and hustling from stop to stop.  Then I pulled a rookie move got cocky and pulled away from a group.  Got lost and lost easily 10 minutes of time.  Took off again, in the direction of the final stop and took my time to ask twice for directions to make sure I was heading the right direction.  Bother people said I in fact wasn't and needed to circle back to the other side of the capital. They were wrong, I realized they were sending me to the St. rather than the Ave, and turned around limping my way to the finish having easily lost 30 minutes on the mistake. Needless to say I wasn't to stoked. 

But all's well that end's well. I hung out at the after party with good people and proceeded to get loose. A little too loose maybe, but there was free beer and free pizza so it's no wonder I didn't make it to the Rev party later that night and didn't get much done Sunday either.  I didn't take many photos from the race, but you can view others online here if your interested. It was an awesome weekend and I applaud anyone who was part of it. 

jams

Good dudes and rock and roll stars Laarks just put out a new video. Lot's of familiar sights and friendly faces in it. Someones been reading too much Phillip K. Dick.

Johnny Law

I think it's pretty common for kids to make fun of lawyers a long time before they even have any concept of what they even do.  At least I know as a kid I knew throughout my early adolescence I repeated lawyer jokes I had no idea what they meant I just knew that lawyers were some sort of fanged heartless creatures that migrated from pond scum into suits and ties and a life spent without needing to deal with one of them is a sign of a life well led.  Obviously my viewpoint has changed a bit since then, and while I remain cynical about the legal code and those who enforce it at all levels I was pretty happy to see this post from the WI Bike Fed blog today.

The upshut of which is something cyclists have known for a long time. The laws on the books need to change to give cyclists a fair safe space on the road and punish those who refuse to accommodate   In my opinion you should not be able to hit and kill a cyclist and ever be able to drive a car ever again. You had your chance, you blew it, too bad.  And this new Vulnerable User law seems like the ticket that might get us there.  It's Friday, the sun is shining, and pro-bicycle legislation is being talked about. Today is a good day.
 

 

halloweekend

I'm sure I've mentioned this before.  Actually I know I've mentioned it before many times, but one more won't kill you.  I hate Halloween. I'm not trying to be a sour old crotch here, but I just don't like it.  Easter is great, Thanksgiving is awesome, I absolutely love Christmas, I just can't stand Halloween.  Every year I try to care, but I just can't  I still partake in the festivities insofar as I pull together a half-assed costume and go to a party and have fun, but don't think for a second that in the back of my mind I'm not wishing Halloween could be done away with and replaced by any other holiday.  Pre-Thanksgiving has a nice ring to it, Leaf Day is nice, Candynacht could be fun. The fact that I will in all likely hood not be curling this year puts an additional damper on the holiday that would traditionally be the kickoff week of the curling season.  Now that I've got that out of my system there are some sweet events coming up this weekend and ya'll should try to attend. You may even see your's truly all accouter in seasonal garb.

LeMond

Cycling, specifically road cycling, is full of polarizing figures.  Sure you get your Mercxs' and your Coppis' that everyone can just shut up and agree on being legitimately bad ass dudes who were remarkably talented and seemed like stand up people.  But for the most part you don't see that.  Maybe because professional cycling is full of ego maniacal whiny douche-hats that have the personality of a bar rag, maybe because times have changed and people just like to bicker.  But whatever the case it seems like since I've gotten interested in following cycling it's been one nut punch after another in regards to professional cycling and it's "reputation" on the world stage.  I feel like at this point the whole Lance debate is not worth even commenting on.  But no matter what your opinion on the guy it's interesting to see someone who was one of the most iconic cyclists of all time stripped of his titles by a bunch of old turds in an office that Armstrong's legacy has been paying for over a decade.  The point I'm trying to make is that as ridiculous as the macho chest thumping is, it's part of what makes sports like cycling interesting.  What sort of pain people are willing to endure and what kind of trash they talk to stroke their ego and get a paycheck is what makes me want to watch a sea of gangly sweaty guys in spandex with funny names chase each other around on bikes all day.  When officials like UCI and USAC and even USADA start spouting insane regulation from what kind of vitamin water you can drink to what you can openly say about regulating agencies without loosing your paycheck things go down the drain in a hurry.  That said, despite my mixed opinions on Greg LeMond it was cool to hear him speak out against a couple of the main sanctioning bodies in the cycling world today in an online statement telling UCI president  Pat McQuaid to "fuck off and resign," and calling on cyclists to quit racing sanctioned events for a year and reinvent the UCI in a new image.  Cycling should not be the domain of regulators or athletes who just race for the money.  It should belong to cyclists and fans of cycling, and it's important to have pro cyclists speak up advocating on their own behalf and on behalf of their fans rather than cowering and sucking down protein shakes while their managers and sponsors tell them what to do.  Hats off to you LeMond.

Read the whole letter from LeMond that I'm talking about here.  

where you been?

 I've got a whole handful of photos form the past few weeks that I haven't done anything with.  Not as many as I'd like, but here ya go. Cable trip above

 My cat's new favorite place to sleep.

 Hellcat on Saturday.  Finding new ways to drink beer.

 Bike jumps

 Fire antics

 How I'm feeling.  Still trying to catch up on sleep and remember all of the events from the past few days. Good times.  

race

The flyer says it all.  See you there.

stay busy

I realized today that I haven't even mentioned the mountain bike trip to the Chequamegon, last weekends cross race, the past two weeks bike adventures, and flyers for stuff coming up in the weeks to come.  Totally inexcusable but I'm a busy dude these days and little stuff like remembering to bring my camera along and actually take pictures and make mental notes has been tough.  Suffice it to say, however, that I've been biking and milking the last days of warm weather the best I can and trying to get my gear in line for the months to come.  I'll be at the Hellcat in Eau Claire on Saturday, if your in the area get there and have fun.
 
This is cool:
 

This is dumb:


 Don't get me wrong, I strongly believe that bikes as a utilitarian tool for transportation are an incredible tool to lift people from poverty.  This just falls apart because cardboard bikes are miles away from being utilitarian.  This is a niche that great charities like Project Rwanda and Maya Pedal among dozens of others have been pursuing for a while.  We don't need crappy proprietary cardboard garbage bikes, just better distribution and education about the gazillions of abandoned and thrown out bikes that already exist.  It's a kind gesture, but totally misinformed and impractical.

inspiration

I've been lacking inspiration so just watch this and go for a ride.

rideordie

Late to the game I know, but still worth a look.

from the vault

Bright eyed and bushy tailed, circa 2007. 

shredder

Start em' young