Cocked and primed for the roll

January 21, 2017

Good morning.  It is now almost the year of the fire rooster, or, the fire cock, as I like to say.  Here is a cocky young wheelman I encountered at Chatty Corner this Thursday (or was it Friday?) morn. 

It is thrilling to me to behold fellow commuters and also interesting to see what wardrobe/set-up choices they have made.  I am fond of the "colorful pedaling clown" look, as this compatriot is portraying.  This is also one reason that I've not switched to a bicycle with anything bigger than a 66-cm (26-inch) diameter wheel. 

https://sites.google.com/site/arkansasmountainbiketrails/mini-clown-bicycles-mini-clown

Also, speaking of bicycle fashion, here are some new pants that I recently sent away for.

https://www.mec.ca/en/product/5040-120/Mica-Pants

As I many have raved about the glorious Rad pants in the past, these seem to be somewhat similar.  I'll let you know more than you want to know about these pants in the future.  Thanks MEC.

As we prepare ourselves for some Chinese New Year celebrating, let’s remember to have a nice cup of sake (or xake, as we USians call the Chinese/ancestral form of this rice liquor [actually mijiu, so sorry for offending]) but not to start any fires you are not prepared to toast to, followed by prompt dousing.

Also, (as you likely did not notice anymore than we USsans noticed when your country's new leader was elected/forcibly seized power) we USsans have a new president.  Here he is astride grabbing holding gently cradling a cockhorse bicycle.

 

http://richcruse.blogspot.com/2009/09/why-is-donald-trump-holding-huffy.html

Also I have seem some recent notices that the endearing Grand Life Gravel Gran Fondo of the eastern Iowegian loess hills is slated to be held yet again.  I am not sure about participating in this one, but it has been quite enjoyable for me in the past. 

The National Bike Challenge is a feel goody two shoesy event that I have enjoyed participating in for the past few years.  But now it needs a sponsor.  Well, perhaps Donald Trump will reach out a helping hand towards bicycling yet again.  Pleeeaaase?! as Snot Jr. would say.

I found a dollar bill whilst bicycling home yesterday.  It was a bit soggy, but dried out nicely.  I am guessing someone saved it for a rainy day, but then dropped it whilst fishing in their pocket for a mini-bottle/nip of Rumple-Minze to celebrate/mourn the inauguration of DT or perhaps just to relieve the DTs.

Well, I’m sorry there’s not a lot more going on right now, that I know of.  So I’ll spare you any more blathering.  Godspeed and keep the (year of the) fire cock safe and happy!

-BS

Hogging the yogurt

May 4, 2015

Hello and welcome.  What have you been up to?  I see, I see.  Please send me an e-mail so I won't forget!  I would like to apprise you of my latest and fairly late activities if you don’t mind:

1.  Taco ride – My dear ol’ Da and I made it out to the plush limestone chip of the Wabash Trace Nature Trail Thursday last.  It was a hoot!  

I got to the steakhouse and ordered the salad bar and a Fat Tyre bier, which was not available last time I recall.  I was informed that this event is not called “The Salad Bar Ride.”  Touche! avec accente mon frer, avec accente, silvous plais.  Nevertheless, I procured the sustenance I needed including the following:  potato salad, pasta salad, bean salad, creamy pea salad, crispy iceberg lettuce salad, pudding with Oreo salad x 2 trips!  Yum!

2.  Despite the hourly forcast with 15-minute details showing rain and thunder this evening, I ventured out to bicycle to the grocery store without my raincoat!  Exhilarating!   It didn’t’ actually rain, so it wasn’t that exhilarating!  I purchased some Greek yogurt, which I have been informed is no longer a popular purchase.  That seems appropriate, since I like to wait for clearance prices whenever possible.  

3.  It is now NationalBike Month!  Huzzah!  Let’s all bicycle even more than usual! 

4.  The National BikeChallenge is now occurring and you can sign up to participate at your leisure.   You can use Strava to help you get credit for your bicycling deeds of heroic prowess.  Strava is, I believe, a familiar of sorts that will perch upon the body part of your choice as you swoop and soar precipitously upon your chosen venture!  Strava will exhort you, praise you, inflate your ego to pressures that will rival your tyre tubes.  Ware, however, the mischievous nature of this spritely prankster as it may turn from its light-hearted prancing into dangerous tunneling through the depths of your psyche only to emerge eventually into dimly-lit subterranean caverns wroght by creatures long forgot!  It might also eat all of your Greek yogurt if you’re not careful!

5.  Here in Omaha, we have a Live Well Omaha Challenge that allows you to enjoy keeping track of your active commuting accomplishments and to pulverize the competition into a mushy, sweet Greek-yogurt-like substance to be flavored to taste!

5.  It is still spring, and my unwitting familiar and guide, the elusive groundhog has been prancing about and good-naturedly posing for the camera.  

I feel this is a good omen for a strong bicycling season for those of us who revere the stately clumsiness of the hog and her ilk. 

6.  It is too rainy to mow, so we might as well ride on!  To soggy glory and groundhogs! 

Gomaha! Nebrasking!

October 8, 2014

What are you doing!?  Why!?  Why you do that!? 

Just curious.  Many people have asked me the same question in relation to my relentlessly confused webly ramblings.  My answer is generally along the lines of 

Luckily I have cut back on my habit, although I do listen to a lot more country-western music these days, so I’m not sure if this was a good trade-off. 

If you are in Nebraska and/or Omaha, then you may have been riding your bicycle and recording your miles on your computer for the National BikeChallenge/Live Well Omaha Commuter Challenge.  We’re number 2!  Yayay!  We are winners!  Nebraska was #2 and beat those mapley Vermonters.  Maybe if those Vermonters weren't so busy fox-trotting to Rudy Vallee's catchy Deep Night they would be able to be #2 instead of we persistent mid-westerners.  

We did that because we like to bicycle.  Also we like to be recognized for our bicycling relentlessness.  I myself have a compulsion to document various aspects of my bicycling related thoughts and experiences.  

By the way, what is almost as much fun as actually bicycling is finding out stuff that relates to bicycles.  Here are some neat bicycles.
Hey, I've got an idea!  Let’s all bicycle!

Carefully!  Easy!!!  DON'T TENSE UP!!!!!!  
Note to self:  less coffee, more bicycling

    

Climb aboard the monster of life-affirming fun!

May 3, 2013

Perchance you have noted the gloomy nature of these days?  Mayhap you are labouring with mortal morals askew and all askance?  Whitherto shalt thou fly?  To congress with others of the same ilk, says I!  Forthwith!  Thusly were the thoughts of our forebears in the days of yore as Spring tauntingly teased them with her flirtatious dirty muddy dance with Winter as he exited Stage Fore (down the aisle).  

These days we call it Seasonal Affective Disorder Torture as the tail end of Winter directs a chilly fart in our general direction.  Maybe you are stuck at your desk, cashier, wheel, machine or somesuch?  Working for a cold unfeeling corporation that pays you and simultaneously sucks your soul into a gaping maw of profitability for the shareholders?   You could look at it that way.  You might feel like a young Sting pretended to feel in his classic tail tale of early 80s corporate malaise we call Synchronicity II.

Or you might not.  I don't know.  I do know that if you are feeling blue, you would probably benefit by participating in an exciting event we call the National Bike Challenge on endomondo.  In Synchronicity II I believe that the Loch Ness monster represents the NBC.  You can sign up here to be friends with Nessy/join the NBC.  Then you can log miles for your unfeeling corporation/team, your mom and pop business, your bicycle club, a made-up organization , or just for you and Nessy!

lancashiretelegraph.co.uk

It'll be great!  No matter who you are!  Yeaahhhh-HHOOOO!  You might want to send out a bunch of e-mails.  Try to get people to join the team.  Go for team recreational bicycling rides on weekends.  Let the aire out of potential teammates motor-vehicle tyres and then "happen to have" a vixenly bicycle with taut, nubile, fully inflated tyres on hand for them to borrow.  That kind of stuff.  It is truly exciting.  It's also a slippery slope.  I have been participating in such events for the past 3 years or so, and once you start logging your miles/kilometres it is kind of hard to stop.  Between the end of the Winter Challenge and the National Bike Challenge I went through a brief period of withdrawl.  "Don't lots of fellow bicylclers want/need to know how often I am out bicycling?" I asked myself persistently, annoyingly,existentially.    The answer to that question is clear, and it is "No!"  Or, if they do want to know, they are co-dependent, needy, and/or extremely neurotic and you should probably give yourself some distance.  Some time, a, part.

This is what the side of the multi-use trail looked like this morning.

Even the typically perky Curly Dock looked a bit droopy.

But as they say, "May snows brings June jallepenos."  Or is it August jallepenos?  Not sure, pero viva tilda y tu madre con accento!  It is also Cinco de Mayo weekend!  There are a few events that generally go along with this occurrence.  Cinco de Mayo 5K.  Also a mini-tour at Old Chicago, where they have undergone some re-branding.  Also Mother's Day.  Y Dia de Madre.  So maybe you can "kill two birds con uno stone" by taking your mother and/or baby's mama out on a nice fun 5 kilometre run/walk/death march.  I am planning on dressing up like a your mom and taking Baby Snot in the Baby Bjorn on his first 5K.  Should be muchos felicidades amigos!  Brrr-r-r-r-r-r-r-aaahhhh-haaa!