I Vote For Spring

This is riggodamdiculous. March 23rd and its 29 degrees outside. I could swear that the spring was supposed to be warmer than the winter. Maybe I was distracted by Annie Liss the day in Earth Sciences in the 7th grade when we covered seasonal weather changes. Then again, maybe not. Rode the fixie today, and despite the cold, it was a pretty sweet ride. Every day on the fixie is another day that I wonder "why did I wait this long?". I have to send mad, crazy, wicked props to the Fixed Gear Gallery for getting me convinced that I can do this, and for having the on-line Swap Meet where I found the Jeunet. Damn nice folks at the FGG, they do it right, which is the way it should be. They are also from the northern midwest, which seems to be the home to a fair number of two-wheeled revolutionaries. Cars-R-Coffins, One Less Car clothing, the FGG... these people have managed to mate idealism with creativity and humor with enough attitude to make it cool, but not so much as to make it like an elitist club. That is a beautiful thing in cycling. It may be time for us to create some trouble here in the Lou... I know that there are some folks who understand, there are at least four people, besides myself, who ride fixies on campus. Two Langsters, an IRO MarkV and a Surly... There is also some nut-case over in engineering who has an old Schwinn Moab as either a single speed or fixie... still sweet with the disc brakes and bright yellow paint. Way to be dude.

Bike Update

I bought a fixed gear last weekend. Modified Jeunet Franche-Comte. Its some seriously sweet Lugged French steel from the late 60's/ early 70's. Lined lugs, no waterbottle mounts, but pump mounts int he down tube, cotter-pin cranks and a damn-near perfect chainline. K did the modifications including the sweet wheel-build on the Suzue track hubs. All I can say is K does not fuck around. She is also very nice, super-cute and has wicked-awesome tattoos. My roommate took one look at the Jeunet and said "Its a real bicycle". There is a definate learning curve to riding fixed, and periodically I find myself doing something stupid, but I have wrecked only once, and that is not half-bad. I need to mount some lights, but I got the One Less Car sticker on the top tube, so everyone can appreciate my position on the discussion. Only modifications I need to make are some new bars and a new stem. Currently things are a little too narrow and compact for my liking, but soon all will be good. Pressure is off on updating the Trek, so now I can shop for some STI's et al. at my leisure.

Winter Solace

Rode in this morning and stopped by Kaldi's for some blueberry bannana bread and a latte. I had intended to make bannana bread last night, and didn't get there. Kaldi's is not my favorite spot, the cafe is layed out really wierd, and the front room has a table in the middle of the area where you wait for your coffee, which is annoying. Its really popular with Claytonites, which is cool for them, but since I am an outsider, its a little off-putting (case in point, there were three BMW's and a new Audi A6 parked in front). The headache, is the coffee is good and the baked goods kick serious ass. Not as good as the Rockwood Cafe in good old Spokanistan, but seriously good none-the-less. Sat outside despite the cold weather and enjoyed the view of Concordia seminary through the still leaf-less branches of the trees. Read a little of Gretel Ehrlich's The Solace of Open Spaces. Its definately up there with Desert Solitaire and Into the Wild for some good reading about the wilderness and the pleasure of free and open land. Something that more people need to understand in this country. There is a joy to being alone out in the middle of somewhere, a connection to the land, the sage, the trees, the sky. This is something that Gale Norton, George Bush, Dick Cheney and their ilk cannot grasp. The inherent value of open space is not what can be done to the land, but in what the land can do to you. This is the heart of conservationism, and more. Its also the heart of the American Dream and the core of the American Ideal, in this land, you are free.

Goodbye Gale...

Gale Norton resigned as Secretary of Interior today, all I can say is, thank God. She isn't the first political hack to hold the position, but she will be remembered by history as the Slum Lord of America's property. Of course, as a member of the John Birch Society she was a great choice to take care of the national lands. Kind of like asking Dick Cheney to run the ACLU. It will be interesting to see what industry hack Karl Rove trots out to replace her. Nice weather today, which I missed as I was inside all day. I may lose it.

Mahalo

Enough Cold

Another cold-ass morning in the Lou. I think I have had enough of winter for this year. We're supposed to climb back up into the high 50's today, on a march to the 70's this weekend. Could it be that the nicest weather of the week would be on the weekend? At this point, it sounds too good to be true. I expect it to be a total blizzard this weekend. Can't decide if upgrading parts on the Trek is smarter than buying a whole new bike. The Bianchi Volpe is pretty sweeet, but lacks the celeste paint job that would put me over the edge for sure.

The LED Lining

Well, thursday was a day. I woke up kind of pumped, thinking that in 12 hours I would be at Super-A's, making fajita's... mmmmm, fajitas. The day before I had put in the serious hours at work, and hadn't gotten home until well after 11, so I was worried I wouldn't have any juice for the ride in. Suprisingly I had lots of energy and I was really focused, which was a really good thing, because about half-way to school part of the flange on my front hub broke off. I walked in to work, laughing at the hilariousness of the whole situation because I had just the day before decided to buy a new wheelset, rear cassette, bar-end shifters and rear deraileur and make the change to 8 speed. After group lunch at Lulu's Dim Sum (I highly reccommend the cashew chicken), I walked the Trek over to Big Shark. I now have a new Mavic MA-3 laced 3-cross to a 105 hub. The only silver lining is the fact that the three-cross spoke pattern has allowed me to mount my Good-bye Batteries light! I'll prepare a field report after a couple of night-time rides, but I expect it to be wicked good, just like the fajita's.