Bike Tinker

I’ve gone out a couple times riding in Annadel with friends from work. On Superbowl Sunday, Josh and I went 16 miles or so, in the rain.

I was a few minutes late, and caught up with Josh on the long climb up Warren Richardson, and we did South Burma – Buick Meadow – Marsh Trail down to Lake Ilsanjo.  At Buick Meadow, I went up Quarry a bit, until I saw Josh come out of the trees from Burma, and stopped to turn around. I almost get rear-ended by a guy who had ninja’d up behind me. “JESUS!” I say (it wasn’t Him), “I had no idea you were back there!” He says, “Sorry, I thought you were pulling aside to let me by.” I’m like, “Nope. I thought I was alone out here.”

Josh comes up, and he’s like, “I hate tools who don’t announce themselves like that. It’s rude and dangerous.” I told him I used to do that, just figuring people would hear me coming, and saying something would be intrusive, until I rode with my friend Scott and his daughter on the Springwater Corridor in Portland. Hundreds of bikers, dozens of them overtaking us. Every time someone would slide by silently on the left, Scott would say loudly, “On your right!” Josh was like, “Oh, man, that’s great. ‘On your right!'” I was like, “it took me about five times to get it.”

On the last bit before the lake, I popped a couple little mini-jumps off some rocks about the size of 7 speed freewheels. Just as Josh says, “I’m so tired I’m not even hitting any of those ‘features,'” I landed sort of crooked, and cut right into the back third of Josh’s bike, forcing both of us off the trail, “What? What what what?” onto our sides in the dirt and grass. We looked like mountain biker cutouts that had blown over in a high wind. Josh was like, “WHAT? What was THAT?” as I’m laying on my side laughing. Worst mountain biker ever.

We got up, admired the giant rough  boulders we had NOT hit, and rode around the lake, planning to climb to the top of Warren Richardson to bomb back the steep downhill to the cars (you can ride offroad almost 40 minutes longer if you drive to the trail – who knew??). After resting and talking for a few minutes, I got ready to go, and he said, “I ain’t moving.” Okay, that’s funny. I ride halfway up the hill, around the corner and out of sight. No Josh. I wait a minute. Nothing. I ride back down.  He’s straddling the bike, staring off into the same point of nothing that he’d been staring at two minutes before.

So we rode back to the lake and down Canyon, around part of Spring Lake and back to the car. All in all, total success.

The dog and I went for a ride on Mt Burdell again today, putting in two hours on the last day of the year, and seeing down the sun on 2013. Again, great dogs, great cyclists, great hikers. A shibe mix, an old dog named Duke, and someone thought Chick was, “Two? Three?” She’ll be 8 next month.

We spooked a murder of turkey vultures from their roosts on a cattle trough. This is them, wheeling around until we were gone.

That’s what I look like. I never smile.

Here’s the trail, carved 18″ through the topsoil. Mountain bikes are pretty low-impact, compared to a D8 Cat.

I got out yesterday on the Quickbeam for a long (for me) ride, up to Healdsburg from Santa Rosa, and then out Westside Road to Forestville, and home.

The ride out was nice; I felt strong, but went all the way out Fulton and by the airport and through Windsor, instead of cutting over to Eastside Road. I caught the same guy at two different stoplights, once on Fulton Road, and once on Old Redwood Hwy north of Windsor. I’m pretty sure he went a faster, nicer way. Next time.

I saw lots of cyclists coming South of of Healdsburg as I rolled in about 2:00. I cut through the hobo tracks by the old train station and got some pictures. I sat in the park, ate a Luna bar, drank half my water, and then walked around Healdsburg for a bit. It’s been upscaled a bit since I was there last, but I know there are still freaks out in the hills.

I tried to pick up Eastside Road to get out of town, but what I thought was Eastside looked like a freeway onramp, so I walked the bike* a block North and got on Westside. Which is fine; I love that road.

I stopped at a pretty roadside rock feature by a vineyard. It looked like a mini park. I needed to pee a little, but thought it would be gauche to wizz on the rocks and oaks.

Another stop at the Wohler Bridge took care of that.

When I hit River Road, I decided to pop into Forestville and say ‘hi’ to my brother. I stole a liter of apple juice, pet the dogs, and changed gears from the 80″ 44×15 gear to the 71″ 44×17. The Tire Savers need to be repositioned when you move the wheel, and the front one’s sexy ‘under-the-crown’ mount puts the whole thing too close to the tire, not just the business end.

As tired as I was, I should have run back out to River Road, which is pretty flat. Instead, I headed home on 116, tackling the steep pitches between Forestville and Guerneville Road I always forget about. That was pretty treacherous, because the entire shoulder was broken up with six foot steel construction plates every fifteen feet. I guess for “technical road riding,” I should have brought my new “29er road bike.” The C-Lines handled it pretty well, though. It’s not like I was going very fast.

So four and a half hours out, all told. More than half the daylight hours I was awake were spent out on the bike!

*I won’t ride the wrong way, or on the sidewalk, if I can help it.

Richard Sachs explains “why he left the recording industry.” I like that kind of recorded minutiae, and I think it’s art in its own right. It’s definitely the marks of a thinking mind.

I think e-Richie could nail all these ledgers to a board, and frame them under glass. “ATMO.”

In a much less organized way, I have a giant piece of watercolor paper under my laptop, and I’ve been keeping notes and marginalia on it. I have all the drawings and measurements for laying out Angelina’s book on it. If I still like it in a couple of weeks, I may cut out the most interesting rectangle and frame it.

Today was my birthday. I always take my birthday off work, because I want to do exactly what I want to do, and I don’t really like a workplace fuss. Yesterday I was almost giddy, hitting DECLINE on 5 meetings that would have taken 6 hours out of my workday. Birthday. And cut across lunch. And no time to ride.
DECLINE
DECLINE
(oh my god, another one?)
DECLINE
(what the… that’s lunchtime!)
DECLINE
(oh yeah, there’s the regular other Wednesday meeting – crucial that I be there for UI approval before launch)
DECLINE

Instead, I took my dog out on a leash-free mountain biking excursion in Marin County.

Two and a half hours of riding the brand new bike (Well, the frame is new… to me. The headsets is new! And the cables!). Even the bartape is old, but I flipped it around so the faded/unfaded markings make a zebra stripe. I like it.

Up on Mt Burdell, there are nice roads going across the face of the hills, and then steep climbs to get to the next level. There are some singletrack steep descents that are not signed against bikes, but technically the dogs should be on leash for them.

The Gryphon rode great, the smooth Schwalbe tires hooked up on the dirt climbs, and baby heads were no problem. I was pretty surprised at the traction on the rear Marathon, but the dirt conditions were about perfect. Crusty, not dusty or muddy.

Halfway up the first climb I realized I’d overdressed, and shed the gloves, balaclava and outer layer. Rolled them up inside the sweater and tied them to the bars.

We met a couple dogs, and my dog was great with them, and met some cool people hiking up. Bike people. Ibis Mojo, Santa Cruz Bontrager Race, early Litespeed kind of bike people. This Singular Gryphon is a real conversation starter. Another guy we (I) talked to was riding his passed-away friend’s passed-on hardtail Fisher. He takes pictures on his rides on the bike and sends them to his friend’s mom. I love that.

A fellow with the dog that I talked to (“Gaucho’s” owner), said the Rangers mostly come out when the cows are in the open space. I asked him how you know the cows are out, and he said, “You see them.” Oh, yeah, right.

Chick (the dog’s name is Chick) was tired, and I think she hurt her paw. I was a little sore, and the headset needs a bit of tightening, but I call it a very successful first “real” ride on the Singular Gryphon, and I’m so happy to have a place to ride with the dog!

In the rest of the birthday day, I got some new clothes, and my 13 year old took me out for fries, and a stranger in Safeway bought me a sixpack of Lagunitas IPA. She looked at the backed-up line of people buying beer and wine, all guys, and said, “I bet I’m the only one buying this because I’m mad at men.” I said, “I’m getting this because it’s my birthday and I bought some beer, thinking ‘I’ll get something I’d never get. Something special! And it tasted terrible.'” She was like, “Oh, that’s awful!” When the checker rang up her KJ Chardonnay, she told him to ring up my beer, too. I said, “Thanks, that’s sweet. I hope your bottle works for you. And kills all men.” She laughed.

The campaign to hit 7 cafes by bicycle in 7 weekends succumbed to circumstance last weekend.

My Saturday bike ride down to the A Street (Santa Rosa art district) to visit the coffee place down there was foiled by the fact that I left the house an hour after the festivities were supposed to be over. I saw a giant-sized bicycle-ish steampunk contraption riding away, and some decent encaustic painting/collages, but couldn’t find any coffee. The Peet’s and Starbucks facing each other across D Street both close at 9pm. Oops. Signs on the sidewalk, lights on, but people cleaning out drains and flushing espresso machines. I wonder if the baristas give each other the evil eye when they lock their doors in unison, or if they go down to get a beer and a shot together.

My Sunday plan to ride over to Acre Coffee in the Montgomery Village to meet up with my friend was foiled by a dog door.

I’ve had a chore for a couple of weeks now (discharged today), to put a dog door in my mother-in-law’s door, so her Bernese Mountain Dog can let herself out, without the winter air getting in. I pulled the supplied door out of its packaging, and held it up to the door, held it up to the dog, and tried to get Rosie to jump through it. She ran around the yard with the frame around her neck like a collar.

So, I took the door back to Pet Whatever, talked them through their return policy and customer service (maybe I could order it online? “I thiiink you can use the credit online.” Is there a nearby Pet Whatever that might have it? “Oh no, the closest one is in Petaluma.” I’ll go there. Can you call and see if they have one? “What? Oh, sure, I could do that. Just wait ten minutes while I deal with this sudden deluge of high-maintenance customers”), then drove 20 minutes to get the in-stock LIVESTOCK sized dog door. The whole transaction put me arriving at Acre Coffee exactly on time if I drove, but 20 minutes late if I stopped off to switch to a bicycle. Which would be stupid.

My friend and I had a great two hour visit, gave directions to two people – a possibly homeless man (cleaned and well-clothed in a Western Farmer style, but semi-incoherent and pushing a pram with a LOT of stuff in it) who needed to find his doctor’s office (for an appointment the next day – best to be prepared); and a woman who had driven 5 hours from Eureka, bound for Martinez. She’d gotten off the highway 20 miles too early, mostly because she was tired of driving. She was bound on driving through Sonoma on 12, which would not have helped her situation.

The Acre espresso is Portland Style, slightly muddy, but tasty. Interior design is very good, but the Petaluma one is better.

But it doesn’t count, since I didn’t cycle there.

Yesterday, my plan to bike cycle with the dog to the coffee stand at Pacific Market like I’d done the other week was foiled by my friends and their dog knocking on my door to make sure the kid birthday party was still on for 2pm. I was like, “Yes, plus let me get my clothes on so Chick and Duke can walk together!” The dogs LOVED that. Long walk through downtown, back to the friends’ house, and then hot-foot back home to prep for the party. No riding, no coffee.

Today, I actually got an Americano at Holy Ground (tasty), by bicycle, as part of my three-part odyssey to get the Gravel Roadster hooked up tubeless. Bike Peddler guys are super-awesome, Big Apples are too loose to go tubeless, but Marathon Supremes will. Supremes look like regular road tires next to Big Apples.