It's Friday

I'm gonna start doing something a little different around here. Since Fridays are typically a little slower, I probably don't need to waste my time with a lengthy post. Kinda like how Eastwood does his “Media Fridays” or whatever the hell he calls it, I'll just post up a photo or some other shit like that. For the most part it won't be bike-related, although from time to time it might be. Basically it'll be something to creep you out or make you laugh (or both.)


I'll try it for a little while and see how it goes. Of course, if there's big news or big weekend plans I'll post that too.


So here's the first installment of “Fun Friday”.  Thanks to Lunchbox for sending these to me.

Since this is the first one, I'll even give you a bonus.


One more, and this one creeps me the hell out.

Um. Yeah. See y'all Monday.

Prohibition Repeal Day

This is gonna be a short post. You're welcome.


On December 5^th, 1933 a great thing happened. After thirteen years Prohibition ended, returning things “back to normal.” The 21^st Amendment repealed the 18^th Amendment, which “prohibited the manufacture, sale, transport, import, or export of alcoholic beverages.” It's the only time that a Constitutional Amendment has ever been repealed.


That's because here in “Merica we're serious about our alcohol.

Most of us that ride bikes enjoy drinking beer (or even liquor or wine) so this is a day that needs to be recognized. Eighty years ago people fought to make drinking legal again so we could resume our debauchery. The best thing you can do today is tip a glass to our forefathers, and remember one of the reasons that this country is so great.

So let's party like it's 1933, shall we?

Cheers!

Next Year

This is probably the time I should start thinking about what I plan to do next year, race-wise anyway. With the risk of copying Dicky’s post from yesterday, I'll go ahead and address the elephant in the room...


Single Speed USA

SSUSA next year is up in Copper Harbor, Michigan, which doesn't sound too bad until you actually look at a map and realize that it's way the hell up there.

Kinda like a big “Fuck you Canada, this is 'Merica!”


Thinking I could drive like I did last year to Minnesota, I started planning my route and saw that it would take about nineteen hours. Holy shit. While only three more hours than the trip to MN, that leaves minimal fuck-off time on the way up there. I'm really not sure I want to do that. I know there are several people here in Charlotte that would take the trip with me and all that (and I'm sure it would be a blast), but damn.


I guess you could say I'm about seventy percent against making a decision to go back to SSUSA next year.


That doesn't mean I've completely ruled it out though. The trails look fun as shit and I do like driving long distances (by myself if need be.) I'm just not sure about going that far for what could be a minimal amount of riding. I might be better served taking a road trip somewhere else instead, like out West somewhere.



Registration is filling up fast, but that's not really a deciding factor. Judging from the last two years, I could still just show up and “race.” So, I guess I really don't have to make a decision right now. Nothing is holding me back (other than being unable to make decisions) so there's no reason for me to figure it out anytime soon.


Damn it. I wish someone would just tell me to go (or not to.)


Cue a text from Dicky in 3...2...1.

Almost Too Long

After being off the bike for almost two weeks (due to being a sissy in the cold weather), I finally got out for a good ride. Not wanting to do hot laps on our local trails, I needed to get out of town. I wasn't able to go too far away so I settled for the “little mountains” to our east in the Uwharrie National Forest. As a bonus, a long-time missing person from this blog joined me on the ride.

Yes folks, The Dirty Party Cycle has returned.

It's been a long time since we've ridden together, probably because I'm a shitty friend and don't get over to his side of the world too much. He hit me up about riding Uwharrie, and it just so happened that I wanted to go there anyway. He picked me up bright and early, and we proceeded to have one fine social ride with some punchy climbs and super fast downhill thrown in. While not as mountain-y as Pisgah, Uwharrie is a really fun place to ride if you know where to go.


There are some pretty good views if you take a minute to stop and look.

We used to ride there together quite a bit back in the day, so much that we were more local than the locals. I realized after this ride that we need to get back to that. I fell in love with Uwharrie when I first moved here, but I've neglected it quite a bit over the last two years. I won't say that it's better than anything in the “real” mountains, but it gets the job done. I can drive an hour, get in some good mileage with some good climbing, and be back home well before bed time on a school night. Plus, if you have some kind of mechanical issue out there, it's really not that big of a deal.

That was a field repair of the Dirty Party Cycle's uh, Dirty Party Cycle. The clip holding his front brake cable broke, and we were able to improvise and keep riding. Even if we weren't able to fix it, it would've been a short walk back to the parking lot for a real repair. I like that. The feeling of riding somewhere remote without actually being so remote. Rad.


Uwharrie was my first love here in NC, and I will continue to go there. I will definitely ride Pisgah more in the future too, but being able to drive a little under an hour to ride some pretty fun shit makes Uwharrie my go-to trail when I'm unable to get too far away.

I feel like I'm being pulled in two different directions by two different sets of mountains.



I guess it ain't so bad.

Too Cold

I’ll admit it. I’ve had a difficult time adjusting to the cold weather we’ve been having here. Although it’s been nearly seven years, I probably haven’t been out of Florida long enough. When it starts getting cold outside, I can’t stand it. It takes me a good solid month to get adjusted to cold weather, and that’s just the way it is. During that transition period, I have a hard time getting out of the house to go ride my bike.


Pathetic, I know.


At least there was a Star Wars marathon on TV over the long weekend.

Having a bunch of days without any kind of work responsibilities, I thought I would get in a ton of mileage. I have plenty of warm clothes to wear when I ride, but even getting out of the house is tough. Starting with Thanksgiving Day, I planned to get out on the bike. That never happened, but at least I got out to work on some trail.

I managed to meet up with TomTom to finish the last of our little trail. The photo above shows a big pile of dirt that we need to turn into a berm. While my hard-working pal took off to clear the trail to make it visible so we could ride it, I started shaping what will be a high-speed turn into a jump.

It’s gonna be pretty fun methinks.

Although I was unmotivated (and cold) at first, I managed to get a good part of that berm completed. I’m guessing it will only take one more work day to complete, and I can’t wait. Since darkness would soon be upon us though, TomTom and I decided to quit for the day and do a little scouting for the next phase of the trail. We found some pretty good terrain to use, including a nice-sized creek we need to somehow get across.

After that it was back to the house to wrestle the turkey from Lunchbox.

That was not an easy task.

Friday was even less of an active day. I went to work for a while, and once again I didn’t feel like riding. Instead, the little lady and I headed up to the hills to watch my friend Jonathan Birchfield play a little music.

And yes, that’s Shane Cooper (from DeFeet and CroMoly) playing bass as a special guest.


It was a rockin’ good time, but I missed my bike. I was tired of being cold too, so I had to do something about it. One thing I forgot to mention was that the heater in my truck had stopped working, adding to my misery. Saturday was the day that I finally had time (and the motivation) to do something about it.

All it took was a new thermostat and a good flush of the cooling system. Now I was warm again, and ready to ride. That left only one day (yesterday), and you can bet your ass that I got out on the bike.



Of course that’s what I’ll talk about tomorrow.

I’m Always Thankful For…

Beer, of course.

Thanks to TomTom for this delicious brew.

Right now though, I’m thankful that it’s a short week. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving (you do own a calendar, right?) and most of you will sit around all day stuffing your face with uh, stuffing. And I guess turkey and all that too.


Why am I even here today? Who knows. Judging from my drive into work this morning, a lot of people have the day off. I guess I’m thankful for that too. An easy drive into work is always appreciated.


I’m not big on Thanksgiving, but I’ll probably eat some turkey tomorrow too. Hopefully it will dry up enough so I can ride my bike somewhere around here.  We've had some shit weather lately and it’s starting to drive me crazy.


I will get out to ride over the next four days…somehow.


Do me a favor. When you get done eating yourself unconscious, wake up and go for a bike ride.


You gotta do something, you lazy bastards.



See y’all Monday.

When Things Are Ignored

Yesterday I talked about giving back to the trails you ride. ON the way home from working at Uwharrie, I took a little detour to stop by a local park in the town of Albemarle. City Lake Park had some trails built there once upon a time, which I rode a few years back. The local club (which was later absorbed into the Trailblazers) put in many hours to show the community what can be done with public land. They did a great job from what I remembered, but I hadn’t been there in so long that I had forgotten about it. When I arrived, it looked like the locals did too.

The main thing I remembered about that place was the skills section in the middle of the park, which was quite good for the area. They had one helluva pump track, but form the looks of it no one has been on it in a long, long, time.

I mean, you can hardly tell what it is now.

There are some other features that haven’t given in to nature so easily though.

I don’t really know how many people actually live close enough to that park anymore that would ride it (obviously not many), but that doesn’t mean that it should continue to be ignored. For most of us that ride out at Uwharrie, it’s on the way back home. I was too tired from hurling logs off the trail that day to ride that stuff, but the last time I did I had a blast. Maybe there’s not enough mileage (and feature-type stuff) to warrant a trip out there from Charlotte just to ride it, but next time I’m in the area maybe I should. In fact, maybe it’s time that we started take care of it too.


Since the club that was in the area previously (of which I was a former member) took care of it, now it appears that we (as in the Trailblazers) should pick up where they left off. It won’t take much to get this thing back in shape, and at the risk of spreading myself too thin maybe I should try to get a crew together to tackle it.


Who’s with me?


Probably none of you, since you’re all way over there across The Internets.


No worries. Just the fact that I mentioned it should be motivation enough for me to drum up some support here locally. Who knows, it might make a difference. It’s much better than sitting around doing nothing and letting such a great opportunity go to waste.


Since you just want to sit around, watch this creepy shit for a while:

I have no idea.