Lately, as I ride around looking Yehuda, I find my mind wandering from the usual internal banter of: bike lanes or sharrows(?); and County Supervisor meetings or sledgehammers and dyno-mite(!) to musings of the peace and serenity that can only be found when the gun is fired and the cyclocross race has started.

This weekend my cross season will open, just like Bart Wellens!  Unlike the aggro Belgian multiple time world cx champ, my season will also end this weekend.  I am signed up for 3 races on the Official Website!  Tomorrow night, at Twilight, but not under a New Moon (blog readership suffering, trying to attract new demographic, lost pre-teen Googlers) I will race the 35+ race.

Saturday and Sunday I will be out for the single speed category.  Racing the single has had me switching cogs and chainrings and pedals, removing racks and fenders, switching bikes, switching cogs again, and generally messing with my bikes more than I have been riding them.  It keeps raining, you see, and the course is saturated, slippery, and slow.

The Fuji, which saw to my speed and safety so trustily last fall at the State CX Championship until the last lap of the second race I did, is sporting a 39×18 and a Mafac “Racer” rear brake, which is super cool, but that gear seems steeper than me lil’ legs can turn in a field that the Bush administration might would have qualified as a wetland, so after all the rigamaroll it seems that maybe the Bridgestone, destroyer of the Bridgescissor but afearer of the Bridgepaper, will get the call once more.  It is chillaxin’ in the shed right now next to the constantly evolving touring townie, now with wood fenders!  The development continues, stay tuned, they will be available soon.

So the Bridgestone is geared smooth and supple at 32×17 and sports a totally bitchin’ (for any pre-teens that are still reading, is that even a cool word anymore?) 26×1.5 Conti rear knobby tire.  Probably not very fast, but fun as fun-Fun-FUN, and that is what it is all about, right?  So, tomorrow I will probably just race the LeMond with gears, the rest of the weekend either the single mountain bike or the single Fuji townie.  Maybe both.  And just how good do them locally made and fully shaped wood fenders look, eh?   A set will turn up on the Ira for sure.  Oh yes, it is still being worked on.  It has wheels now, I built the rear one all by myself except I had instruction.  My first wheel, I am not afraid to admit it.  It looks great!  Just need a shiny saddlepillar, stem and handlebar plus the aforementioned provacative bar tape and we are ready to roll.

So lots of action going on, lots of action to come, full race recap next week, if you are around come on down to the races to do them or watch them.  Enter any or all of the beginner women’s races and you could win a new MASI CXR frameset courtesy of us at 30th Century Bicycle, your friendly neighborhood bike commuting and touring shop where, if you did not know, Otis the shop cat now lives.  Look how cute he is!

Online comics go way back to when the first person thought to put a comic online and uploaded that sucker.

No wikipedia page yet, but just you wait, I bet there is one before this sentence is over.  So, there is this famous online comic about a guy who looks kind of like me that some of you may have seen over here?

Well the innertubes that have hitherto maintained pressure in only the metaphorical tire of the online webcomic metaphorical unicycle that was Yehuda Moon and the Kickstand Cyclery are now inflating TWO metaphorical wheels on a lugged steel frame with plenty of fender clearance, a sensible saddle, and sporty Nitto handlebars.  That is right, Cody G is on the scene and publishing her Tales of Woe & Conquest of the Bicycle Commuter at the 30th Century Bicycle blog.  Check it out all week long, the online bicycle webcomic universe will never be the same again!

So here it is, your fresh helping of Pickle!

I have had an interesting couple-a-few weeks.  For one, I did not blog.  I did help roof two houses.  Made my legs sore.  I started running, or jogging, or lurching along, call it what you will.  This also made my legs sore.  I also kept trying to learn to ride the unicycle, which made my legs sore.

But there is more to report than just sore legs!  I also almost severed a knuckle on my left hand on a really sharp chainring, got stung by a bee on my right hand, got a big blister on my right thumb and somehow, in one of the weirdest injuries ever, got the top of my foot sweated into my sock somehow which then pulled all the skin off when I removed the sock.  Strange times to be a me.

But there is more to report than just sore legs and other assorted injuries!  I read the last two books of the Harry Potter series, for fun.  My beard is filling out nicely.  I came up with a fantastic Halloween costume but then got sick and could not use it.  I smoked a hookah!  And of course, I went for some bike rides, too.

And that is all, nothing left out, my life in just 226 words!  Thanks for reading

Tonight was one a them funky group rides with attitude (FuhGRahWAs) from start to finish.  I dunno why it happens, but there was some serious mayhem out there.  Crashes, split-ups, detours, wet feets, barriers, swear words, etc…  By the time I got home I was sure we had been out there for 3 hours.  Nope, just 2.  Crazyness to think back over where all we went and how much we wound around and we even waited a couple of times.

On the further subject of time, this was my last ride as a 36 year old.  I have no memory of my first ride as a 36 year old, but I will probably remember this one for a while.  I worked hard for a long time and tried my hardest to win it, for me and Gipper, too, but I was nipped on the line by the Thrillah.  No shame in that?  Maybe next year!

I dunno, try the number 42?  A good and dirty cross bike works too, for me.

I have had a great run of rides lately.  Last Thursdays group ride which I wrote about here.  Friday night we did a sushi and sake group ride from the shop.  Saturday night I rode out to Sugarbottom on the Bridgestone for the ICORR Halloween Ride.  I used to ride out there at least once a week in the dark, I quickly remembered I used to have a good lighting system for that.  Whoops.  Better luck next time for me, but it was still a great, if slow, ride on the trails, quality conversation around a fire and then the ride home was super.

Sunday morning I went over to the house of Hopson to partake of his stout coffee and another quality weekend gravel grinder.  About ten of us headed for the hills and the B roads to see what they and we were made of.  It was chilly that morning so I wore my new booties!

I know, many of you will be sad to read of the replacement of the Robin Hood, Men in Tights pair I have been nursing along for the past few years, but it was time. So on the road and there was the usual hijinx and high heartrates.  We wound around and finally made it to the Kalona fourwheeler trails, which were sloppy as ever!  I got “Ricked-Over” early on and lost contact, then I got a huge clump of some non-native vine wedged in my rear brake and by the time I had wrestled it out I had lost sight.  The trails are so leafy right now I could not follow them, rode around in some weird places and occasionaly saw a tire track so I plugged on in dogged pursuit and by the time I popped out onto the B road I could barely see just one person ahead.  Bummer, but they waited for me.  I had to head in then, most of the group kept at it but I was happy to get home with 3 + hours in and I still made it to the shop on time!

Today I went down to the Coop and put in some working member hours, then home for shed cleaning and organizing, then I cleaned the bike a bit and went out for another ride.  This time I was solo, which was good to spin the legs out.  I rode South, swung through Hills, then went a bit further South towards Riverside before turning back North.  The weather was beautiful, the gravel is nicely packed from the harvest trucks and tractors rolling around, and it was smooth sailing for 2 hours.  That is what it is all about.

Fall, the season, is in full swing.  It is gray, often raining, and cold most days.  Yesterday was looking questionable for group riding, but I have learned over the years it is best to be optimistic so I took my clothes and cross bike to the shop hoping the weather would cooperate and we could have a ride.  I was not dissapointed!  The drizzle shut off and eight of us showed up at the park.  We rode up around Solon, the gravel was soupy.  3 of us had fenders, everyone else had really slimy looking shorts.  Fenders people, there is a reason that Planet Bike sponsors Katie Compton, Jonathan Page, Mark Lalonde, etc.  They train in the rain with dry bums is the reason.  Join the club!

So we rode a little patch of trails which were a hoot with the mud and the roots and the slippery sticks and there was some good natured crashing and run-upping and then we turned in.  The road home was fast, we never got a smooth rotation going but it was a good strong ride and only an oncoming car through a curve prevented me from making my move to take the win (okay, I was tired, too) so I was happy to roll across yet another fictional finish line, this time in 3rd.  And I was really glad to have gotten in a 2 hour 15 minute ride, because I thought it might not happen.

To sum up: be prepared, fenders good, the season is not over yet!

I somehow fancy myself an endurance mountain bike racer.  Which is funny, because I have really only done one endurance mountain bike race ever.  I am, truth be told, not much of a mountain bike racer at all, I think I have only done five or six mountain bike races in the last five years.  I was going to chalk another one up last Sunday, the Sugar Bottom Scramble is everything I like in a mountain bike race.  Which just means it is close to home.  And we of 30th Century Bicycle were sponsoring by providing some faboo prizes like multi tools, Maxxis tires and Oury grips.  I hoped to maybe win something back so we could still sell it.  That would be cool!

But then the race got cancelled.  Because the trails were wet.  Because Iowa, like so many of its previous citizens, has moved to Portland.  You read that correctly.  It is grey, rainy and wet here now.  Always.  Except for when it snows.  Which it did on Saturday morning.  Not so much that we have started skiing like those lucky die hards up in Wisconsin and Minnesota, but it did snow here, and for quite a while.

So race cancelled, I decided to look on the bright side of life and go ride my mountain bike anyway.  These pictures are from a different ride, but they are where I went, and it was sunny that day so the ride looks nicer.

I rode down Sand Road and did a couple of laps around that little lake down there.  It was fun, but not so fun that I wanted to do a third lap.

Rode over the new bridge down there that makes travel so much easier so I could stop by the Jiggle Cross course to see how it looked and start working on my ss gear / tire selection.

It looked good.

Remember this?  All natural now.

Rode out to Coralville to check on the trails over there.  Those trails are still in rough shape, they need a chainsaw and a week-whacker asap or I fear they will be lost forever.

We used our chainsaw!  Lookit our stack of wood, it just took us an hour to buck that up and stack it.  Why do we say buck up and not cut up?  Because we are chainsaw people now and that is what we say.  Our MS 250 works like a Japanese beaver and I don’t have to kiss any butts down at the local F.T.C. office to say so, because the products I endorse here are not supplied to me in dark alleys by shadowy maketing executives – NO!  the products I review here and recommend to you are painstakingly purchased and researched by me, for me.  I share my finds with you all because I don’t have anything better to do.  So go out and get yourself a Stihl MS 250 today, you’ll be glad you did!  Maybe you too (two?  How many people still read this old blog anyway?) will find yourself on the very first page of the google image search!

Cody has not updated her blog in a while, it is true, but she has been hard at work in her studio lately.  And just what has she been working on you ask?  A handbound anthology of her Awkwardly Put zine!  The great unveiling is this Friday, October 2nd.  Walk on by if you can:

What a day!  I awoke not too hung over after a few Torpedos last night and turned the live coverage of the Men’s World Road Race Championships on the internets.  Sat around and watched for about an hour as the early break powered along.  Was going to ride the Salsa out to Sugarbottom for a lap or two, but at 7:30 it was still 50 degrees

outside, so I changed the plan.  Did a load of laundry and made breakfast.  Cody woke up to the sound and smell of the frying potatoes and made the coffee.  We watched the race as we ate.  Top Iowa City rider Jason McCartney was out there and we kept hoping to catch a glimpse.  No luck on that one.

I got so into watching the race and drinking the coffee with my sweetie that I postponed my knobby ride until after it had all been decided.  Cancellara, I love him, and who am I to second guess, but attacking the selection on the downhill inside 10 miles to go?  Not smart maybe?  So Cadel won, I can’t complain, it was a perfectly timed, really strong attack, but that man needs to work on his victory salutes, here is a handy guide.

photo:  ©Riccardo Scanferla cyclingnews.com

I mean COME ON EVANS, YOU JUST WON WORLDS!

Okay, so no victory salute for us, but while enjoying the morning I also checked out the Best of the Area awards from the local paper, which were just announced today and what the heck, we got a runner up for Best Bike Shop!  Wowza, I don’t know what else to say except thanks and we will keep doing the best we can.

So with World’s over, breakfast eaten, laundry done and hung, 30th Century Bicycle awarded and the beautiful day in full swing I decided to bag the mountain bike ride totally, and townie the long way to work.  Over the res on the Fuji, a fine ride and a fine day to do it.  Work then, we recovered a stolen bike, somebody came in to sell it, but oh shucks, that is our neighbors bike and don’t you try to deny.  He did not, bike is back home with rightful owner!

After work Cody and I rode home and made some really tasty wraps with bok choi and peppers and tomatoes and garden burgers.  All the while the day was beautiful.  Took down the laundry, took a quick nap on the couch.

Got back out for an evening spin, rode the Salsa around town.  Ran into the Leflers and townied across town with them, talking and laughing.

Got home just after dark, with a nice moonlit glow on everything.  Now to blog, soon to shower and to sleep.  What a great day it was, I can ride the mountain bike tomorrow.