For Once and For All

My housemate Charlie was telling me about his recent experience at a bike shop in Boulder, CO... I suppose first I should introduce Charlie, at least in the context of his relationship with bicycles. He has one, which he uses to ride places sometimes, usually to bars or parties, but he likes waterfalls and books more than bikes...though I think he genuinely thinks bikes are neat, and I certainly did see his eyes light up as I went into detail about all I had just learned about wheelbuilding. In other words, I think Charlie has a very healthy, self-aware relationship with bicycles.

Anyway, he was telling me about going into a bike shop with a friend, to do something innocent, like pick up new brake cables or something, and, also in the shop was a father with his daughter, presumably an incoming freshman at CU-Boulder, looking to buy a bike as part of the girl's back-to-school shopping list. The father said, "What do you mean? The more gears the better, right?" And the girl, rolling her eyes in the way that only spoiled 18 year olds can do to their parents that are just so uncool, said, "No, dad! I want a bike with just the one gear! Just the one!"

Charlie told me this story because he thought it was odd, verging on hilarious, and I'm repeating it because I think it's fully on the side of hilarious. And also because, a couple Saturday nights ago, I was riding downtown, I blew a red light turning left, and someone, from their car yelled, "Fucking hipster!" I looked back, and realized it was my ol' buddy Ian. And I wondered, (and I still wonder, because I haven't seen him yet to ask), if he knew it was me and was yelling that to be ironic, or if he didn't know it was me, and was yelling that because he really hates hipsters. Or maybe, worst of all, he knew it was me, really thinks I'm a hipster and was yelling that to be mean. I was, afterall, riding a fixed gear with a chrome bag, cycling cap and pants that I'd cut to make into shorts (which, to my credit, happens every summer, anyway).

Oh, god. I disgust myself.

But then another day, another ride, I got passed by an older-ish man in a car, and he slowed down to yell out the window, "Fixed hub! You don't see too many of those these days!" And I thought, "oh, if you only knew, buddy...if you only knew." But I was charmed by what, I assumed, was a genuine and long-lived appreciation for the fixed gear bicycle.

And so I'm admitting, right here and now, that I absolutely love fixed gears, I love them for many reasons, many reasons that are my own, and one, because like the Chuck Klosterman article I wrote about in my last Blahg post--how the over-abundance of choice ultimately makes us depressed, so you might as well keep it simple, at least for commuting and running errands and going from here to there. Nothing gets fucked up on a fixed gear. Every once in awhile my chain gets a little stretched and I need a 15 mm to shove my wheel back a little further, and sometimes I add a little bit of air to my tires, but that's it. Plus, if you've ever gotten up to speed on a downhill, did a half-assed skid to slightly slow down and a half-assed look to the left so you could at least tell yourself you made an effort to make sure no cars were coming, and cornered faster than you thought you were going to, didn't clip a pedal, came out of it smooth and at almost as much speed as you went into it, and your legs are going so fast, and the winds blowing against your cycling-caped head bedecked with the biggest smile you've ever smiled, and you have no where to go that evening except for some place you decided you had to go to just to give yourself an excuse to ride into town, and that's love. And that's why I love my fixed gear.

And I worry for the younger generation. I worry that they like fixed gears because they're cool, but they couldn't even tell you why they're cool, they just remember reading it somewhere, or they saw someone else with it, and that made it cool. They've never truely felt it. They're not in love. They just want to like it, but they're not even sure why they're supposed to like it.

And then there's the problem that I call Dave Matthew's Band Syndrome, which is when you know something is really awesome, but you can never bring yourself to like it, because everyone else is obsessed with it, and that turns you off. I've got bike-rider friends who will never go anywhere near a fixed gear because of their association with hipsters. Singlespeeds galore, but not fixed. They don't want to be lumped in with those losers.

But if you love it, love it. If you hate it, hate it. But do it for you own sake, and your own sake alone. Don't do it because it's cool, and don't not do it because it's too cool.

Do it because you never want to stop pedaling. Then shut up about it.

The Learning Process

The other day, by which I really mean, like two months ago, I was in line at West End Bakery, and their tip-jar had a note on it that said, "Trix are for kids, but Tips are for Struggling Young Adults." Or something to that effect. Which made me think of the line in my header to this blahg, "young adult ridden angst" and it makes me think of the conversations I've been having lately with my young adult ridden friends, and a I'm starting to realize we all need tips. Not the monetary sort (which never really hurts, but tends to go towards beer rather than anything lastingly valuable), but the philosophical sort of tip, the advice, the direction, the reconfirmation that shit, I suppose we are actually doing OK.

Which may sound rather emo (to use an young adult ridden phrase), and may sound like a problem of decently-educated suburban youth, which frankly it is...but its apparent and its prevalent and as a young adult ridden young adult, I have no idea what the hell to do, or what the hell to tell my friends. The problem, as I see it, is that throughout school (and college if you so choose) you have a very clear idea of what the next step is. Starting in March or so, you start making plans for the summer...trips, a job that will make you enough money to last another school year, and then sometime in August, you look at the class schedule to figure out when you need to be back. And then you laugh, and drink coffee, and goof off, and stress about tests, then get a C then get pissed then get over it, then its Friday, then its Monday, and so on in this sort of repetitive, reassuring pattern...until you graduate with a Bachelors degree in something you don't really know much more about than you did four years ago, and you can't find a job, and no one's offering you funding for Graduate school, and even Americorps is freaking out with applicants. And so you say to yourself (and your friends when they ask, and maybe your parents if you're open and honest with them) "I really have no idea what the hell I'm doing with my life."

Which makes me wonder if anyone really ever does. It makes me wonder if that reflective introspection is good and necessary and should never go away. Part of me thinks this directionless wandering and constant drive for something more meaningful is good...but that's not to say its not frustrating. Which, leaving out the double negative, means it's pretty darn frustrating.

And so, whenever this conversations pops up amongst me and my fellow recent college graduated peers, I think of my conversation with my last hairdresser, "What do you do?" She asked. "Oh, I don't really know..." Then further on down the conversation she said, "You pick tomatoes and ride bikes, that's what you do." And that is what I do, in the most simplified nutshell of my life, and that's a good enough definition to help feel a little more settled. So I've repeated that in many a intimate bar or front porch conversations, and now I'm thinking of a certain amazing country song, and I'm thinking, of course, of bike riding.

The other night (by which, here, I really do mean, like, two nights ago) I was taught how to build wheels...and I built up my first wheel ever (write that down in my baby book, mom)...a fixed Surly hub, laced to some DT Swiss 4.2's. I love learning the process, the specific steps, the two hands full and a spoke with a nipple ready held between your teeth, the "this is how you do it, why? Just 'cause that's how you do it."

Having absolutely no artistic mind whatsoever (though, admittedly, I do rock at bubble letters and collages) I of course have to transfer whatever aesthetic sense that is trapped up in my human nature and apply it to bicycles. I don't like overt artistic-ness, which seems to be all the rage in hip urban centers, but I'm a sucker for the subtle examples of beautiful perfections. The scripted "Campagnolo" all lined up on chain rings, the ferrals and zip ties that strategically match some understated color on the frame, and...as I was taught to do while building wheels, if you look through the valve stem hole, you can see the logo on the hub. Why? Functional? Of course not. It's just how you do it.

Someone, somewhere, in the flowchart of people teaching other people to work on bikes, decided that's how it should be done, so you learn it that way, and you pass that on to the next person who asks you how its done. And its arbitrary and you know it, but you'll still always follow it, just 'cause. And there's a certain reassurance in that.

Chuck Klosterman, who is amazing and you should go read some of his stuff right now, has an article about Johnny Carson's death, which really is more about the idea that the overabundance of choice ultimately makes up depressed. At first, you feel golden...you could pick anyone of these options, oh the wealth! But once you make a decision, you realize you have fewer people to relate to, because they all made individual decisions, too, and you'll always be wondering what would have happened if you picked something else, did you make the right choice? Oh dear. This is similar to another book I've heard about, but haven't read, so I can't vouche for it the way I will so confidently for Chuck Klosterman, called "What is the What" And essentially, from what I've made up in my head about this book, it's about the Dinka people of Sudan who's creation story is that God offered them either cattle or the what. They asked God what the what is, and He, being the sneaky bastard He tends to be in so many religions, said, "Cattle or the what, your decision." They chose the cattle, and the rest of the world got the what. So while they're all meeking out their livings as herders, there's a whole bunch of spoiled-ass middle-class kids sitting around asking themselves what the hell this all means.

We have too many choices. We don't know what the what is. We're confused. We're lost, We're alone. We have no answers. I have an empty crossword puzzle tattooed on my fore-arm to help get this point accross. We know jackshit, and we shouldn't pretend we do.

But we also shouldn't be intimidated by that. I know the logo's supposed to be seen through the valve-stem hole, I'll work with that. I'm riding my 'cross bike to Brevard after work today, I'll work with that. What am I doing for a job in October? Uh.....

Let's go ride bikes this weekend.

Colorad-uh-oh!

I just got back from an awesome solo trip to Colorado and I really want to write about it, but I tend to suck at this sort of writing. I can't think of how any of my experiences are relevant or pertinent enough to anything the reader (i.e. you) might be experiencing, and I really don't want to talk AT you. I want to talk with you. But that's not what the internet is for. I've also learned that people don't really ever read anything anymore. So I suppose I should just let the pictures do the talking.

Unfortunately, I don't have a camera

So, courtesy of Google Image Search, here is a photo journal of my summer trip out west:

The spontaneity got its start with my first night in Golden, which involved free beer at Ace-Hi because it was ladies' night, the meeting of a semi-local who took me riding right from town the next morning, and the purchasing of the largest, cheapest avacado I've ever seen. It was magical, and I never even meant to stop there. Here's a picture of the bar, as well as, what appears to be a very succesful greyhound named "Ace-Hi Rumble."

Then I drove a leisurely two hours to Granby, the site of the 2009 Mountain Bike Nationals. It was a party.

Next I went to visit my ol' bff Sarah, who is working as a climbing guide in Estes Park. I love Sarah very much, and I got to hang out with her little climbing co-guides, whom I now also love very much. Here's a picture of us having fun at an earlier date:

And here's another picture from Estes Park, of one of Sarah's climbing buddies on, I think a 5.10:

Anyway, I went on one bike ride outside of Estes that included (I dare say) some of the best trails I've ever riden. Not like a destination ride that everyone talks about or anything conventional like that, but rather...completely unmarked trails that no one ever talks about. But there were pedal scrapes on rocks and log pyramids, so apparently someone was out there riding. Such fun tight, technical singletrack that would pop you out at some great little vista then twist you back into pine forest, then up through Aspens, back up to a different vista, and back into pines. It was magical. I will forever hold that day's ride in my heart. Shit, I'm about to cry.

Next I departed Estes to go see what the hell the deal with Fort Collins is. I still don't really know, but I did have a good time there. Stopped on my way to ride something called the Devil's Backbone, which was over-used like Bent Creek style for a little bit, but eventually devolved (or evolved?) into really awesome, flowy, can't-see-anyone trails. I was in a Colorado Meadow. It was awesome. Then I turned around, goy in my truck, and drove the rest of the way to Fort Collins, even though I think I could have just mountain biked there on that trail. Stupid logistics.

Here's a picture:

And, apparently, a few other people also think this is a great trail, and you can buy a commenterative mug...if you'd like:

Well, like I was saying...Fort Collins is cool enough. You can ride from town, it's a college town so you have a good chance of meeting cuties (or "fresh young tenders" as one Asheville lady once put it), and you can stumble into New Belgium Brewery at any hour of the day (just because you have an hour to kill before leaving for Denver) and they'll give you four free samples of your choice of any of their beers, just for being you. I had a Tripple, another Belgium style thing, Adam's Ale (sort of pale, absolutely delicious), and a Dandelion ale. All I had to do for them in return was tell them what I would name my band, if I were in a band. I called it, "My Dog Dave" and drank four delicious beers. I thought this was the coolest thing ever, but then I realized I must not be the only one, since, according to Google Image Search, several other people have had (and thoroughly enjoyed) the exact same experience. But maybe with a different band name. Oh well. New Belgium is the People's Brewery.

While beering, I talked to some homeboy who recognized my Endless T-Shirt and told me about the "biking scene" in Fort Collins, I sent a post-card to Megs, because said homeboy talked to me about bike polo, went for a long walk to make sure those four half-pints wouldn't affect my driving capabilities, and got in the ol' truck to go see Little e in Denver.

Eric, or Little e, or Dr. Cutlip and I were going to go on a 4-5 hour ride, but my goal of riding so much that I wouldn't feel like riding at all when it came time to sit in a car for 24 hours came a little bit too early. I didn't have it in me at all. All heart, no legs. We rode for a little over 2 hours on some awesome trail outside of Evergreen, CO, saw a brown bear, switched out bikes...so I got to ride a fixed Viscous 29er, and he got to ride a 26" geared Independent with a 3.5 inches of squish up front. I think the change was much harder for him. I'm going to address this issue in more depth in a later post...but for now, let me tell you what a fucking amazing rider Little e is. Little e is a fucking amazing rider. He never really bothers to take the smooth line, he just takes the straightest line, and even rigid and fixed, he makes it look smoother than riding a boardwalk on a cruiser. God is jealous of Little e, and so beyond himself that he was able to create something like that.

So I pussed out of a big ride, but we got to eat some Middle Eastern food, which is my favorite genre of food, and I had been (seemingly) living off fig newtons and beer, so this meal was all the more incredible. Then Lil' e took me on a ride through greater Denver...a 2+ hour, late night tour of the town on our fixed gears. It was awesome. I guess I hadn't been in a real city for awhile, 'cause I was dumbfounded and slack-jawed by all those skyscrapers. So cool! And just as magical as that ride outside of Estes. Just a different sort of magical.

With that, I got up early-ish the next morning, and retraced my westward drive eastward. Met up with Slowhio Robb at some McDonald's in southern Illinois for breakfast, as he was heading westward to go do the Colorado Trail Race (which begins Aug. 2, so keep him in your thoughts.) I made him sit at the Lego table with me, I think he was disgusted.

Then I got home, got out my townie, rode around Asheville, got a text from Alex that said, "West to East...what dreams came back with you?"

I told him, no new dreams, just the realization that I'm on my way to manifesting old (and current) ones.

Booyah.

$1850 just to impress your boyfriend!?!

While purusing Craigslist (like I do all day everyday) I saw this that caused a severe disappointment in my gender. Sigh. That was one of my best jokes, telling people I ride bikes to meet boys. Then I realized people actually do that. Meeting boys could definitely be a result of riding bikes, especially considering the ratio is "80 million to one" as a lonely male collegiate racer once pointed out, but it should not be the reason for riding bikes. That's silly.

Anyway, stepping of my high-horse of tom-boy-ism, now...

Went mountain biking with some Brevard boys (of course) this past Saturday and it was amazing. We rode some secret trails and they were the jam. Then we jumped in the lake and it was like summer. The next day I skipped a ladies-only ride (of course) and accidently wound up going tubing in the Smokies and it really felt like summer.

Speaking of which, remember Tom Petty's lyrics, "I feel summer creeping in and I'm tired of this town again"? Well, I realized I hadn't done anything too interesting in a really long time when I turned on the work truck the other day, and Alice in Chains came on, and I thought to myself that that was the most exciting thing to have happend in the past week.

That's all about to change though. I've got a ten day weekend coming up, and I'm heading westward for some moutain biking, soul-searching, and cowboy wrangling (of course.)

A couple and half weeks ago was the Cowbell XC in the pristine college town of Davidson, NC. The marathon was the day before (Saturday) and I got a voicemail from Ohio Robb that said, "It's hot. I quit. I'm driving home. Start drinking water now." We showed up Sunday morning to stories of the hellish conditions of the day before: 103 degrees in the shade, people dropping out left and right, regional wars starting over what was left of the ice cubes. But the weather for us measley cross country racer was great. Maybe 80, slight breeze, over-cast to slightly sunny. Perfect. I mean, I was definitely thirsty each time I came around to the feed, but it was about as far from hell as eating baklava while listening to Neil Young would be. So I really don't have any good stories to tell. It was a really fun course, I got to hang out with the Niner crew one last time before they headed back westward, I learned that someone makes an eccentric bottom bracket that fits in convential BB shells and got excited about that.

Cool new Indy Fab kits!

Oh, and we stopped at Bojangles on the way home. I'd never been to Bojangles before. Actually, my only experience with Bojangles was a story from Phil Shaw that goes like this,
Phil: "...and some botatoes"
Woman behind counter: (erupts into laughter) "Botatoes! Hahahahahahaha. Yo, Denise, this
boy just said he wants some botatoes! Hahahahahahahahahaha"
Phil: (Stands there awkwardly, realizes he meant bo'rounds, and waits for the woman to
ring him up)
Anyway. I'm a changed woman. I never felt the need to venture beyond the Waffle House Egg and Cheese biscuit (99 cents!), but now there's no turning back.

So this was number 4 or something of the "Kenda Cup East" series I've been doing, and now I have a little bit that I can put my feet up and go ride the hell out of my bike just for the fun of it. I'm so very excited about this. So very excited, in fact, that I forced myself to wait even longer to have a free weekend for day-long Pisgah rides, and decided to go down to Athens this past weekend for The Buddy System Alleycat.

Phil and I raced as a team, in remembrance of our strong showing at the Holidaze Alleycat in Asheville back in December. Despite all out smack-talking on the way down, we failed to produce anything remarkable, although I guess we did win the Kiddie Bike time trial, which would make the SECCCCCCCCC, and Ryan Fisher, proud. And since my entire life revolves around making Ryan Fisher proud, I guess we did alright. My roomie Charlie came down with us, too, which was awesome. He needed to get out of the house and the factory. So we took him to a college bar with a rediculous name and rediculously priced (to our advantage) beverages, Max Canada. I still don't understant the culture down there, so I watch it with awe, starring at it slack-jawed until I catch myself about to drool, and I go back to talking about bikes with the boys, and about the boys with Megs. Heh-heh.

It's not what it looks like.
We're just doing body-shots.
It was mandatory, mom.

It's our country's Birthday this weekend, which is one of my personal favorite holidays. And I get a long-weekend, which means huge mountain bike ride on Friday, long road ride early Saturday, followed by sipping cold drinks, playing lawn games, watching fireworks, watching people act rediculous, and then going to bed at an unreasonable hour. And then another huge mountain bike ride on Sunday, hopefully a social one. Sunday church at the Fish Hatchery, anyone?

Races, Places, and Sad Faces

After eons of on-again, off-again, the boy and I as an institution are officially R.I.P, which means, obviously, that I've been listening to a lot of awful (i.e. amazing) country music these past few days. Favorites lately are anything by Taylor Swift (amazing or awful? I hear there's a certain Super Pro in town that thinks the former...not to spread any unfounded rumors or anything...it's just what I heard) and whatever that "under the lights of the neon moon" song is. Oh, and the ultimate depressed cowboy song: "put some whiskey in my whiskey." I'm still a dignified lady, however, so I just put my whiskey in some ginger ale. Or the other way around, depending. I did see BioWheels Dennis pour some kegged Yuengling into an empty PBR can after last weekend's Massanutten Hoo-Ha. I'm not sure where that fits in on the emotional spectrum, but either way, it rocks.

Speaking of the Hoo-Ha, I guess I have a bit of race-report catch-up to do. Because this could potentially be quite voluminous, I'll offer the abridge version for now:

1. Ducktown -- Good race, I love that course. It was muddy and wet and awesome. I was pleased.
2. Dirt, Sweat, and Gears -- I raced the "12 hr" with Robb, who is cool and fast despite being from Ohio. But you should read Dicky's rendition of the race, because that man is hilarious, and surprisingly accurate.
3. Singlespeed USA -- Intimate two-day race scene at Hawkes Creek Farm, a slice of privately-owned paradise in northern GA. I met, and dare I say, mananged to befriend, some amazing people, including Scott Hodge of Addictive Cycles, who raced a fixed (and brakeless) steel IF, which reminds me of another country song: "I saw God today..."
4. Bump and Grind -- This was supposed to be my first "A" race of the season, but I failed to pull off anything remarkable, even by my lowly standards. Everyone showed up for this one--I mean, the for-real Pros. The start was very, very fast. I don't remember the rest.
5. Massanutten Hoo-Ha -- Stunningly beautiful location; long, flat, rocky ridges, flowy trails into endless rock gardens. And mega-props to the folks who built the trails- fine works of masonry to put it lightly. Another "ugh" sort of race for me, mainly because my heart got ripped out just a few days earlier, and those things are kind of important, it seems. I tried to be all angry and fast, but instead I was just sad and pokey.
   

With that out the way, I'd like to give a full race-report on the Mayhem Alleycat, which turned out quite nicely. After a brief run-in with some friendly police-men (apparently, selling t-shirts in public areas without a permit isn't cool by cops'-standards), a very fair and civilized conversation, and me ensuring the sheriff that, "next time, I'll learn the laws before I break them," they let us carry on with our bicycle race. I kind of want to go tell my story to the Asheville Copwatch Support Group next Tuesday, but I don't think I'd fit in. Anyway, some of the coolest people managed to become even cooler in my little mind by helping out at checkpoints and metal-working some amazing looking trophies/beer coozies: Robb at the Pumptrack, Caroline at the Slip-n-slide, Eric at the paper-boat race, Megs my BFF with me at the flip-hammer, and Alex slaving away in the metal shop producing those great trophies for the top three. I wish I had a picture...but you'll just have to visit Sunshine Cycles in Athens, GA to see the winners'. And while we all know in our hearts that, technically, everyone is a winner, the winners for reports' sake were:

First Place: Ben and Chris of Athens. How the hell did the out-of-townies win? And Chris was on a Polo-bike gear. I still don't get it.
Second Place: Gabe and shoot, I forget his name...I'm such an asshole. They won a tattoo from Galen at Freeks and Geeks.
Third Place: Phil Shaw

And honorable mentions to Christine for being the only one to get the "UNCA student's name, phone number and major" bonus and to Rob (the welder, not the Ohioan) for being the only one to go to the Jewish Cemetary checkpoint. It should be noted that at some as-of-yet-undecided date there will be a midnight crit at this same Cemetary, so stay posted...and in the meantime, you kids should learn where this is.

Anyway, I love community building events, I love bikes, and I love everyone being respectful and happy--this was the most ideal synthesis of these three ever. Thanks to everyone who raced and helped out, again and again.

So back to real life, I'm leaving my shattered little heart in a pile for the time being, I suppose until I get annoyed with it enough to clean it up. In the mean time...my new job is the jam, I just made the best biscuits of my life (they fucking rock, not to toot my own horn or anything) its summer, which means there's enough time to run, work eight hours, mountain bike, drink a beer, water my plants, and still have enough daylight to read outside until it gets too dark and I can call it a day. So it's really not that bad. Moving on..."forward, never straight" as that guy who stole my heart once said...usually right before he left me in his dust blowing through a yellow light. Oh well.

Just letting you know...

There's going to be an alleycat bicycle race here in Asheville on Saturday, May 23rd.

Start is at 4pm at the Mellowdrome (at Carrier Park, you know the one.)

There will be t-shirts and prizes and beer and smiles and life-long memories.

It will be awesome. Tell all your friends.