Bikes, Fire, Dogs, Beer, Smores, Midnight

Last night John, Jim and I rode the JCC as we do most Wednesday nights. This time, however, John was man enough to stash a 5 gallon bucket in the woods near the top of the hill where we usually break. He did this a few hours before the ride. Incidentaly, he locked his young kids in the car as he ran off into the woods with said bucket. Must have been a real scene for anyone who may have happened to be looking out their window as he disappeared into the woods. Don't get me wrong...he's a good Dad....just a little kookoo for cocoa puffs, if you catch my drift....

Normally, each of us carries a can of beer or two for a trailside, nightride break. This time, John's bucket was filled with ice, beer, hot dog wieners, buns, graham crackers, marshmallows, chocolate, mustard and chipotle hot sauce! After the customary hang-out sesh on John's front porch, we got on the bikes and headed for the hills. Yes, one can ride to the trails from John's neighborhood. How many MTBers are that fortunate?

We finally arrived at the top where the bucket was stashed, Jim gathered dead-fall and made a rippin fire. We each found long, skinny sticks to skewer the dog into the fire. There is no better hot dog than one cooked over a campfire! Not even a ball park dog can compare. It's that good. After a couple of dogs, we skewered the marshmallows and made smores! Mmmmm Mmmm! Tasty!



Oh yeah, the ride was awesome! Great spring weather, trail's in super shape, couldn't ask for better company. Good times. Thanks Jim and John!

Bike Art for the Masses

My friend sent me this mail this morning:

Is this a way to boost cred or watch it drop?

I'm talking about this little deluxe emoticon group graphic:


~~~ __o
~~~ _ <_
~~~ (_)/(_)

To which I cleverly responded:

My dearest Matthew,

Your letter finds me in sincere gratitude of your next pearl of wisdom! Yet I must admit, I am not impressed with this assemblage of dashes parenthesis and etcetera which I presume to crudely represent a cyclist at speed. His frame, incomplete; his tires, flat; his head, detached! How does he create this trailing turbulence??

To answer your question, if you are looking for 'cred' from retards...I think your 'art' is a cred rocket booster!! Otherwise, prepare for a short steep trajectory back to earth, my friend, where you will surely be consumed with great fiery...fire.

Nitto Dream Bars

This narrative is of a dream I had last night about a good friend of mine...

I had a dream about you last night

Marie and I traveled to visit you, Kristin and Owen. You and your folks were living in some hippie part of town where the predominate architectural feature on most of the houses in the neighborhood were the carcasses of old cars hung, stacked or balanced on the exterior in what seemed a non-functional, purely whimsical arrangements. You were working on some steam generated fountain idea to which you had assembled a vertical tower of recycled clear plastic bottles and vases. Through some trick of thermodynamics, you had a heat source at the base of the tower that boiled a measure of water without melting the plastic! When hot enough, the water pressure increased such that the water rose in the tower and upon reaching the top, exited through the fountain head where it cascaded back into the basin and was recycled. I got too close and the mal-adjusted fountain head soaked me with scalding hot water! Whoops! But all was well, because the same heat-defying properties that saved the plastic tower from death by fire, also saved me form third degree burns from the scalding, or what should have been, hot water! We laughed about it in a good natured way.

What does that mean?
I dunno....the radio was not on at the time and the only drugs I had were Benedril and an inhaler. Wild.

I built the front wheel for my Rambouillet this weekend. The fork is going to be shipped from Rivendell soon. With the front and back wheels rebuilt, we have almost recovered from the accident. While I wait for the fork, I may take the cork bar wrap off, replace the Nitto 90mm Tech. Dlx. with a 80mm I have and rewrap the bars with two layers of brown Cateye cotton tape. I recently wrapped the bars on my Paramount with the Cateye tape and I really liked it better than the stuff you get from Riv. It is a little more flexible which makes it lay down smoother when going around curves and such. I am going to wrap two layers for a thicker grip. I'll bind the ends with hemp string and apply at least ten layers of clear shellac for a durable, waterproof, grippy textured finish. Maybe I'll film the whole process as a DIY resource.