Racer wanted

Mountain bike racer seeks same for noon-to-noon mountain bike racing on February 18th and 19th, 2006, at the seventh annual running of the 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo. Our group was up to eight, meaning we could split into two, four-person squads. Then, someone had to bow out. It just doesn't work with seven riders.

So here we are needing another 8th rider, and soon. Fast or slow, male or female; doesn't matter. The idea is to have a lot of fun and not kill ourselves. Your legs should be good for at least one day lap and one night lap (with lights, natch), and you must pilot a singlespeed or fixie. But there is one slight complication: the cutoff date for no-late-fee registration and certain schwag (t-shirt and water bottle) is tomorrow, December 29th.

If you have but one chainring and one freewheel or cog, a decent light, a modicum of fitness, and a desire to camp out and meet lots of new people, oh, and 90 bucks, click over to Cows Suck and contact Team Captain Veelz, the blogmeister over there. BTW, it wouldn't hurt if you also had a fondness for good beer, the ability to cook over a Coleman, a penchant for minor debauchery, and a talent for and/or tolerance of excessive flatulence.

Muchos gracias.

Happy Boxing Day

Last year or the year before, I posted something on MTBR's forums about how X-mas was meaningless to me; just a day for my favorite taqueria to be cerrado. Sure it was flip and I admit I was trolling a bit, but I was genuinely wondering if there was anyone else out there that was thinking along the same lines. Apparently not, and one humorless bastard tried to flame me. Was it really so incomprehensible to him that an atheist might not find December 25th to be a particularly significant day?

That gentleman's response was about as welcome as the attempted shouting-down I got a month or so later from some chog who was upset that I didn't know it was Superbowl Sunday and wasn't aware that the New England Patriots were the MOST IMPORTANT THING IN THE ENTIRE WORLD.

Thanks to both of you for sharing your opinion of my beliefs but please realize not everyone is like you. Or cares what you think. Now get bent. On the plus side, the Stupor Bowl ride was where I first met the distinguished Veelz.

Now, if nobody minds, I'll get back to the business of sharing information about the place in which I'm so fortunate to live; the Sonoran desert. This is picture of a cristate saguaro (Carnegia gigantia Engelm.) that happens to be growing within the confines of Tucson Mountain Park, not too far from a favorite side trail. I'm curious if the misshapen crown on this individual permits the cactus to flower. I guess I'll just have to schedule some rides out to this one starting next April or so.

Lastly, I've had about enough of this chest cold. I'm at over a week with no real saddle time save for three round trip commutes to work. This is no way to prepare for a bike race.

Local herpetofauna

One wouldn't expect to see too many reptiles out and about on crisp December day, even here in the desert, but there's been at least one big brown lizard making the scene. This is my new singlespeed Chameleon being put through its paces at the 50-Year Trail.

Scored the bare frame used at the spring Bike Swap in 2004 and then kept it on ice until I broke my Kaboom the first of October. In late November, after an inexplicable but productive bout of nothing but road cycling, I cannibalized the Kona, built the Santa Cruz up, and have been enjoying it ever since. I didn't get to chose the color, but Root Beer is probably what I would have wanted anyway, as it looks mighty groovy. Flashy, and yet subdued.

I've ridden with suspension forks on and off over the years but always seem to migrate back to rigid. That's how I roll, as the kids say. Now, there are rigid forks and then there are rigid forks. The Planet-X Superlight I've got spinning around in the Chameleon's head tube tracks perfectly, as most decent hard forks do, but the black On-One clone is also punishing; unforgiving of even just 2 or 3 PSI extra in the 2.4" MutanoRaptor up front. On top of that, Chameleons are known to be a bit on the stiff side to begin with. Riding rock gardens makes me feel like I'm operating a jackhammer on armor plate. At least all the weight lifting I've done is now useful for something other than opening jars. Despite that, I can see where fatigue could be a problem on longer and/or rockier rides, but I'm thinking it will be fine for the Willow Springs course. The fire roads and singletracks out there are usually pretty buffed, with minimal technical terrain and lots of climbing. And if it isn't, the elderly Z2 is coming off the Kona and getting bolted up.

Now, if you'll excuse me, my services are required in the War on Christmas.

Ribbed for pleasure

Most species of columnar cacti have a generically phallic look about them. It is more unusual, however, for one to be anatomically correct, as this rare cristate fishhook barrel (Ferocactus wislizenii Engelm.) cactus happens to be.

Thursday miscellany

Went to the local Chinese buffet the other day (this is not on the weight loss topic) and got my fortune cookie. Stashed it on the shelf at work until today, at which point I had a craving for something bland and stale. Cookie! The cookie was fine, given my low expectations. But it was the fortune contained therein that really captured my imagination.

"Others are anxious to get to know you better"
"11 12 22 34 36 3"

Well boy howdy, what a coincidence! Just last night, I added a bunch of links and even categorized them. There’s the bike stuff, or "cogs", as well as "dogs" and "sprogs". BTW, "dogs" is largely, but not entirely, about (hu)man's best friend (Canis domesticus Linnaeus) and "Sprogs" is a reference to kids. I hope not to your kids.

Anyway, the content of the websites linked to from here includes things I like or about which I'd like to learn, merchants I support, beliefs I hold, things I’d like others to get turned on to, etc. So if you are one of these so-called "others" who have been prophesized to be anxious to get to know me better, start clicking and reading. If that sounds too much like work, here's the lazy-assed Cliffs Notes version. I like bikes. I love dogs. Kids, or more accurately, the having and raising of them: hell no. The Sirens' song of parenthood falls on deaf ears in this household. And yet, some of my best friends are breeders.

And about that fortune's list of numbers - 11 12 22 34 36 3 - are they supposed to be lucky or otherwise relevant? Nobody knows for sure, but dig this. I was born in the 11th month, today is 12/22, I am midway in age between 34 and 36, and there were exactly 3 bicycles in the bike storage room at my office today. Similarly, one of my dogs has 3 black feet. Hmm...

Back in the non astrologically-driven world, I'm trying to shake off a persistent head cold. Its been just weak enough to permit me to continue biking to work, lifting, and walking the mutts. Aside from a low-grade fever early on and the occasional coughing and hacking jag, I'm more or less OK. Plus, it'll be nice to get the inevitable annual cold out of the way before my 2-week winter break from work, as that will be my opportunity to ramp up my mileage base prior to the 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo. Oh, and pre-rides of the course are in there, too. I have to wonder how it did after the heavy monsoons we had down in these parts last summer.

I'm very grateful that I'm not experiencing my rhinoviral issues in the upper Midwest, like my bros Farmboy out of Iowa and LakeRaven of the Wisconsin LakeRavens. Log in to the BigWhiskeyMTB forums and see what the snow and single digit temperature situation looks like for these fine fellows. Just this last winter, I made an informed decision to despise the cold, and that's just Arizona's pretend version of cold, so I feel for these guys. I mean, you can rig up a Pugsley and go out dressed all Idita-like, but after a certain point, it just seems inhuman to be out riding. But speaking of inhuman riding conditions, while I'm sweating the 115 degree days and huffing ground-level ozone by the cubic meter here in the Old Pueblo at the next solstice, the Midwesterners will be singlespeed swooping on sun-dappled woodland trails all the live long day. And plus, there's all that GnomeFesting to be done next September.

OK, seeing as how I have to wake up at zero dark hundred hours tomorrow, I ought be pinching this one off.

The great unwashed

When I was much younger, during summer vacation from elementary school, I had some epic battles of will with my parents. I was as much a packrat/hoarder then as I am now. As such, I was not permitted to leave the house to play without having cleaned my room. It would seem to go on this way for weeks until finally I crammed everything under the bed or somewhere, passed the smell test, and was given leave to take off on my BMXer. Now that I'm all grown up and can more or less go outside and play whenever I please, I find that I've taken my messy room concept on the road. And so it happens that this is what the back of my pickup looks like apres velo far more often than not. Some things never change.

Discuss amongst yourselves.

The thorn in my side.

I have a real thorn in my side this evening. And maybe a few errant glochids. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, after 30 years of residency in the Arizona Upland Subdivision of the Sonoran Desertscrub, I finally took my first dive into a prickly pear cactus (Opuntia englemanii). Sure, I've had a brush or two that involved a little follow-up with tweezers, and I've taken on my share of cholla (Cylindropuntia spp.) joints, but this was a full-on flop into a medium-sized patch of javalina chow.

Happened during an afternoon ride at the wonderful 50-Year Trail up Catalina way. I was descending the main trail back away from the Catalina State Park boundary and pased by this one sawed-off mesquite branch that stuck out into the path. I bashed it with my foot the last time I rode there and wanted to make sure my wife didn't do the same. I pulled to a stop so as to be able to warn her and, like a damned rookie, couldn't clip out quickly enough to prevent the SPuD-induced tipover. A quick mental "oh shit" and I was laying in a pile of pads. I somehow extricated myself and surveyed the damage. My left side looked like some human/cactus hybrid. Thorns stuck out all over, and the glochids were arranged in little coronas from my shoe to my armpit, with a separate batch under each nipple. There were a few in my ass and somehow, some in my right elbow. Twenty painful, shirtless, and occasionally pantless minutes later, I and my wife had removed enough of the stickers to get back underway. The ride back to the truck went quickly because there's nothing like having a kajillion little needles jabbing you in the bum to get you to climb more quickly. I'm also thankful that, despite the beautiful day, the southwestern segment of the trail was empty but for one other rider. BTW, if anyone out there knows a fast, Tucson-area guy that rides a black Deep Cove Handjob with a grey sussy fork and who keeps talking about the big white nude dude he saw, please let him know we weren't up to anything too weird.

Similar encounters with various members of the cactaceae, and occasionally mesquites and acacias, are a frequent occurrence at the 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo. In fact, they're a bit more frequent than they should be, seeing as how the area surrounding the race course was, at one point, a semidesert grassland and I hear tell it was a fine place to hunt scaled quail (Callipepla squamata). Scalies need a grassland, and Willow Springs sure isn't one of those any more. Seems like a lot of the things bovids find unpalatable happen to be covered in thorns, spines, hooks, and needles. Enough overstocking of the range, and pretty soon, that's what's left. But no matter, the Willow Springs Ranch, or a big chunk thereof, will soon be a subdivison, a creeping patch of pink fungus, thus backing up the pickup-truck bumper sticker wisdom of "Cows, not Condos". Help keep Oracle historical and sign the petition to bring Arizona State Land Reform to the ballot. Anything that welfare cowboys, shameless realtors, and greedy developers don't like must be what's right for the land, the fish, wildlife and plants, and the regular folk that use and care for it all.

Back to the trip. Despite the botanical incident, the ride was very enjoyable. Singlespeed, natch, and with me on what may be the world's most punishing rigid fork. I felt that I rode strong, as did my wife, which bodes well for our future efforts on the similar terrain at the race course. The sunset, before which I ran out of film (you remember film, don't you?), was one of Arizona's patented, mind-blowing purple and orange and salmon and pink and yellow affairs with the silhouetted saguaros. We've got a nice little life down here in Baja Arizona.

Its mine, all mine!

Thank you Scooter. I'll have an innie once the scab falls off. OK, that's the last umbilical reference, I promise. Now, just to prove to myself that this is something more than a bulletin board for me to communicate with my local bro, Veelz, I give you content.

The now-old news is that SWOBO is back. Their front was better, and this is based solely on the fact that the new line lacks the black, sleeveless jersey with the beer mug and the blue sleeveless jersey with the martini. The current threads are great, but not as great. Like U2's new stuff compared to the Joshua Tree. Anyway, if Parr and Roskopp were to bring back the boozy Merino wool strip in my and my wife's sizes, I'd be in my cycling Elvis Year once again.

Also, this is pretty much all bikes and I'll eventually get around to musing on desert ecology, but I'll also be using this forum to document my progress towards becoming something less of a lardass. I've covered thousands of miles on bicycles, and on hikes and dog walks, and have been lifting weights for a little over a year, but I still have the gut and the man cans. I've sped up a bit and gotten back into some of my smaller clothes from years past, but its looking like the beer and junk food fueled training regimen I followed back in college doesn't work out here at the presidentially-eligible age of 35. Who knew?

I've been up to 280-plus pounds as recently as 2 years ago and am at a more-fit, but nevertheless doughy, 255 now. The near-term goal is a deuce and a quarter and if I can hit 205, my college low, I'll be downright giddy. It would also be nice if my palmares had something higher than a 66th percentile finish. Please wish me luck.

Bike down.

Fly little blogling, Fly! Your cord is cut!

Here is the scoop, I just removed my admin status on this blog, so Jason, my little (have you seen Jason? Little is the last adjective I would use for him) blogling has to fly on his own. Fly blogling fly, and enjoy the ride. I love being the force that drives something, and after listening to gilacopter tell me he would like to blog, I just made him a blog. What he does with it, or where he goes, is up to him. He is the gilacopter after all. I like the name by the way. I am outa here, unless I feel the need to pipe up once in a while.

remember, cows suck
veelz

Patience is not my virtue.

I've been horsing around with this thing through my dial up for a bit. Its not that its a small pipe, its that its a drinking straw. Maddeningly slow, but not so slow as to motivate a severe cheapskate to upgrade. Free e-mail, free blog, free ketchup packets; I'll take what I can get. It appears that since Veelz set up the blog, he has an all-but dictatorial level of control over the template and links. Blame him for the as-yet boring layout and lack of linkage to any other than his own, albeit truly epic, blog. So for those desperate for new content, and I think that's just me at this point, I have nothing to offer.

I will mention that I'll be racing in the 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo endurance bicycle race in February 2006. These sorts of races are full of stories, and here are some of mine.

I informally crewed for a corporate team in 2004 and regretted that I spent the whole race kludging and bodging things together: re-spoking a shredded wheel on a borrowed bike, removing a kickstand, swapping out lights, tightening headsets, and helping all manner of woefully unprepared but nevertheless optimistic riders on a friend's team complete their sole lap. A pair of clipless pedals became community property and moved from bike to bike from lap to lap. Same deal with a helmet. Nobody had warm clothes. They weren't ready to ride, their bikes weren't raceworthy, but nobody told them that. The team's maroons went out with a good attitude and had the time of their lives, at least as good as the team's racer boys, which is what I think this event is all about. I'd thought it through objectively, determined I wasn't ready, and sat it out. Big mistake - I nearly froze to death for no good reason.

I came off the bench on to the QQQQ team in 2005 and rode/swam a couple laps. The late-night pull in the rain, hail, and flood was simultaneously the best and worst ride in my life. Violent, full-body cramps, a puncture and a botched tire change, brake pads gone, lights waning, and the most excitement since the hogs got loose and ate my baby brother. I promised myself another go at it in 2006 and am really looking forward to applying what I've learned to another few circuits at Willow Springs. My friend Claire here says its going to be a kickass fucking time.

I'm on a currently-unnamed team that is, or was, to be 5-person co-ed, and though not really a classification at the 5-rider level, all singlespeed. Another lost soul joined to make it six, which immediately begged the question of "Why not two teams?" So perhaps we'll be back to a coupla' four-rider singlespeed teams. Now I ask, do you have: (a) a singlespeed; (b) 95$ you can spend before the month's end; (c) a ride to Oracle, AZ; (d) a non-Type A personality; and (e) debaucherous tendencies? Recruitment headquarters can be reached over on the MTBR Singlespeed Forum or, and I really do need to cut the umbilical cord at some point, at CowsSuck.

Good night America.

OK then, how do you work this thing?

OK, well, this Veelz fellow is a scholar and a gentleman for setting this up this Blog for me. Bovines Bite, the Yang to the Yin that is CowsSuck. Now that the obligatory linking back to my electronic benefactor is over, let's get this contraption underway.

If you're male, then I'm a regular guy just like you, only fatter. I've been married to my Latina Bonita for ten, count 'em, ten years. Two dogs, no sprogs, CFBC in an almost militant way. I pay the bills, or most of them anyway, via practice in the field of applied conservation biology. That's "jackbooted government thug" to the black helicopter, AM-talk radio listening (and calling) wingnuts and perhaps "biostitute" to the Greens trying so earnestly to counter the Growth Lobby. Fine, good. I sleep just fine.

Moving on. If you'll be so kind as to refer to the photo, you will find a gratuitous shot of myself, obscured behind a sign and in shades to remain suitably anonymous. Well, as anonymous as an eighth of a short ton, 6'4" abberation with two-tone chin pubes can be. If you know the sign, then you know Tucson Mountain Park's somewhat lesser-known southwest portion. It and Starr (aka Scar) Pass are what amount to my home trails, as I'm a west sider. That's my singlespeed, or 'twas until I cracked the frame. I have another one now.

And that's what this is really all about - Bicycles and the riding of same. I suspect my wife, though a cyclist herself (and a singlespeeder, bless her heart), has about had it with my constant chin wagging about bikes, gear, and bike gears. Here's my outlet. I'll throw in some other stuff when the mood strikes. But bear with me, as I am a curmudgeon-in-training, an antisocial butterfly, and, oh yes, a jackass. You will likely find me redundant. I also repeat myself.

Lastly, and this probably should have been firstly, happy birthday to my wife, who turns an undisclosed age today.

Until next time.

GILA

Bovines Bite

And Cows Suck. I am just pushing Jason into Blogspace. He would probably just talk to me about "when I get around to it", so I got him a spot. I will go quietly into the night when he takes over. You should go see my blog, I am his inspiration. He can rant about developers and cattle all he likes here, I will stay in my own yard in the future.