The Mongolia Chronicles

2004-06-09T09:47:00.000-07:00

Roland.

Where for art thou?

And in the words of the crabs........

Dockity Chock; Dockity Chock

2004-06-02T13:09:00.000-07:00

Capturing in words – the happiness I felt this morning while making a Hobbit Directional sign – over coffee in the shed.

This – following a great day – albeit – a work day – that started at 5:30 am with a great ride down the ridge where I took no less than 40 photos as the environs – after 14 years and approximately 2,311 times down the same trail – and my mind is still blown every day by the beauty of the area we live in.

Immediately following that ride – work. Enough said.

Then, whence upon returning home with the crew on the can; gay and joyous banter and a great 1x ride home on something old, something new, something steep something middle…then – skating until dark with friends – albeit – all of us skating pretty poorly.

Following the shed work, a complimentary upgrade to business class on a 777 to Chicago (small miracles) where upon I did watch ‘Tent City’ and realized that Rick Charnowski and Buddy Nichols have their shit together beyond belief – and that they capture not only the essence of skateboarding – but the essence of adventure and life. A 4 week road trip through Australia – simply to experience life and skate and adventure. Nothing could be more important.

All of this – following a great 4 hour ride Sunday with my lovely wife on trails that see few people – and even getting lost – which is rare these days.

That – preceded by an 18 hour road trip to Carbondale and Aspen to skate, skate and skate. We rolled for about 10.5 hours of those 18 hours – some of it on some of the gnarliest alien terrain ever. And just had a blast focusing on something as simpleas rolling around on a board….and seeing yummy mummy’s; and getting into fights (almost) and getting really scared but having that fear turn into inspiration (more on that trip and the CAPSULE).

Up to the present….Andrew Mccarthy is on Oprah this week – so he ischecking into our hotel – who cares..but the gay man behind the check in desk says I look very young after he notes my birthdate…he says he can tell it is because I laugh a great deal.Best compliment I have gotten in a while and an important reminder….now to sit in this kick ass window seat and overlook the busy city street and the river and the lake.

Bob, I’ll take “this is fucking sweet’ for 15 points.

2004-05-25T15:35:00.000-07:00

Rain. Cold. Fog. Lions and tigers and bears.

Normally – when I go to the neighbors house for dinner – who happen to be food and wine and beer snobs – I eat and drink way too much. This night – however – I had the bug to ride early and long the next morning – so I abstained. From the spirits as it were. I ate like a frickin’ recently emigrated refugee – but I didn’t drink too much.

So when the alarm went off at 5:15 – and it was foggy and freezing out – I wasn’t too bummed. With all the sunny days we get here – it’s kinda nice to ride in the fog. It opens up some avenues that might not be as approachable during the middle of a hot summer morning. I declined from the original route of intention – as it involves much high grass and bushwhacking –a nd in the fog I could get seriously lost (not like Gilligan’s Island but more like Land of the Lost)

The road was squishy, and slow, and I felt extra slow. That kinda – took a day off and now my legs feel like garbage – kinda slow. But it was awesome out – and I was alone –and I had 2 potato and cheese burritos in my pack – and a thermos of hot coffee in the bottle cage.

In equine terms – you could say we were quite well off.

I rode the thing that carries the stuff to the place all the way. It was pretty cold. Cold enough that the water that was hitting my legs was freezing into little ice crystals. I think they call that freezing.

It was very dark and wet and slippery – and I cleaned one drop that I definitely didn’t want to ride alone – but I didn’t see it. In many places visibility was like 10 – 12 feet. Sketchy.

So – on the way down the road part at the end of the ride I am all prepared for that soaking through miserable feeling – when all o f a sudden I bust out of 6,000 feet – and holy jerry falwell – it’s clear as a bell. The road is dry – the fog disappears – I literally pop out of the bottom of it and can see.

Usually it’s the other way around – which we call an inversion. So – if this is the opposite – is this a ‘version’.

I scratch my way through the lunch hour really wanting to skate – but my left ankle is really hurting from some slams Sunday – and I am resting up for the pilgrimage to the land of holy concrete in Aspen and Carbondale. A new skatepark with a full pipe and a cradle. SCARY. 6 sessions and three parks in 48 hours. Holy advil Buttman.

We are going to stay with Choo CHoo – rather than spend the 180 bucks on a hotel. Her suggestion was to eat and drink that money rather than sleep on it. So – a belly full of sushi and hops on the floor sounds pretty good to me at this point.

2004-05-25T10:17:00.000-07:00

Definitely a moment of Self realization.

Sunday. 12:30 or so. Skating alone. Drinking coffee. Hotter ‘n’ a Well Diggers Ass. Well – hot. Trying different tricks…seeking the one trick that will somehow register and connect – and get my focus and stoke. Sessioning alone is tough sometimes – although sometimes it’s really relaxing. No pressure. No waiting. Very tiring – and harder to get the Mojo going.

Decided to just start trying switch axle drops. One of those intuitive roadblocks in the brain. Kinda like jumping into an empty swimming pool. You are dropping in backwards. Not natural. So I try like 12 – 13 times. Not a dynamic trick – as you start from a standstill. Slam. Bam. Slam. Slide. Then – I get one perfect. Then – another half a dozen slams and something clicks and I ‘feel’ the trick. Once you feel it – you know you got it. Then – progress into nose stalls to fakie. Again – really awkward – but the brain is starting to get it. Maybe it was the blow to the head.

The aforementioned moment comes when I am lying in the bottom of the ramp after a pretty heavy body blow. Why – I ask – on earth – do I care if I can drop into this ramp backwards. Why does it matter at all if I can roll on a little four-wheeled board into this curved structure in the opposite way than I would normally? It just doesn’t matter at all. And that’s the beauty. It matters to me.

Later. Dehydrated. After some heavy labor with The Herminator in the woods – the work is done and we crack an Old Guardian to celebrate Middle Earth. I am not a ‘Rings’ fan – other than Liv Tyler. If Liv Tyler were in a foreign re-make of “Paint Drying” I would probably own three. But – anyway – the name just came to me. Middle. Earth.

The 10.6% alcohol by volume of the Guardian does it’s thing. And after a day in the sun, hard labor, skating and the look on The Herminator’s face when I haul out a pint of Barley Wine – metaphorically speaking it really is Miller Time. Only – it’s Stone Brewery time – I guess.

That was realization on the ramp – this is actualization.

Is there anything better than cracking a beer at the end of a long weekend of sun and fun, knowing it’s all downhill on the way home and that the single-track will end at a gorgeous house where there are women preparing large hamburgers and a fridge full of fine foreign beer.

2004-05-24T14:21:00.000-07:00

2004-05-21T10:27:00.000-07:00

Andy, you ignorant Dolf Lungren wanna be slut.

First of all, like Rob Lowe in the West Wing – I fully support your right to use your ‘position’ to espouse your views in print. I think that’s the first amendment – right? But please…I had to comment.

I waded through the top of your tech column for the first (and last) time – and the image that came to my mind was the teacher in the Charlie Brown cartoons – your column read kinda like: “blah, blah, blah bike, blah blah, blah ride, blah, blah, blah bike part”. The saga of yet another industry insider pining for the latest and greatest in order to ‘enjoy’ a ride – gag me with a fucking $900 fork.

Granted, I am years away from my last race, I haven’t weighed my bike in about 7 years. I have joined the ranks of the “ex-racers who ride now to have fun and smile and be outside and love it”. I only deal with the technology that I feel really benefits my ride experience. Crabby retro-wool wearing luddite grouch? No. I do have some lovely wool undies I bet you would like – but – I enjoy technology and bikes. My Santa Cruz Superlight is an amazing piece of gear. I love the lockout, the plush ride when it’s unlocked. It’s light, it’s fast – it rocks. I also have a Kona Jake the Snake – and damn if that isn’t the most versatile bike I have ever owned. I have both bikes stripped down to 8 or 9 speeds – I can’t remember how many rings are on that thing in the back. But my favorite bike – my bike that gives me the most carnal joy – is my Spot John Deere green single speed.

Yes – I said that bad words: One Fucking Speed.

I fell into the ‘cult’ of single-speeding out of necessity. I blew out yet another suspension fork – and not being part of the star fuck bike industry glitterati (anymore) – I had to send it back and get it fixed. Being that bikes are a visceral part of my everyday (read: primary mode of transport) I needed a fix. A good friend loaned me his MB-1 single with a rigid fork.

I hated it. It was hard. It hurt. I had to hurl myself at climbs instead of spinning. For the first week I couldn’t wait to get my fork (and gears) back. Then I started to realize that the Christ like torture (I hear Mel is indeed making a documentary about one speeders) – the direct drive idea – was gratifying in a certain sadomasochistic way. The bike made trails that I had been riding for 10 years seem new and fresh and more challenging. It made me a better bike rider as a result of the momentum needed and the pedal placement. It made it HARDER. This was a good thing. A basic tenet of existentialism is to make things harder – not easier. It’s rewarding – see? All those fat French philosophers can’t be wrong!

I had to respond to your column – not based on disagreeing with your opinions. I have raced my 1X and never did it in a 1X race. I figure if I lined up with the rest that was just fine. I did have the finest finish of my career in an open class expert race on my 1x – top 3 – very proud of that.

I had to respond to your column based on the juxtaposition (that’s a 5 syllable word Mr. Journalism) of your tech talk about through anus bolt cross max l - 69 – and your trash talk about a bunch of folks who were just HAVING FUN RIDING THEIR BIKES!!!!!. Isn’t that the point? Isn’t that what raises your advertising rates every year? What was the point of ragging on the 1X’ers – other than to make fun of a bunch of people who were having more fun than you and your gram weenie vacationing bike magazine staffers? Velo Snooze is a significant periodical in the world of bikes. Why take the LOW road and pick apart a sub-culture of a fucking sub-culture of a sub-culture? Why not use your pulpit to preach the culture of the bicycle instead of break it into warring factions.

Why not just be stoked that they are riding bikes – albeit – not your kind of bikes (which more ironically frequently have engines on them and ruin the very trails that keep your magazine in business – ‘nother issue – ‘nother time). Why not just be stoked that people are smiling and having fun and having festivals and coming together around bikes? Oh – and buying your magazine.

Why not just shut the fuck up?

See – aren’t opinions great?

Hugs and Kisses and fuzzy bunnys

Kingnmby

2004-05-18T14:48:00.000-07:00

So the bug has hit – and apparently everyone is riding uphill ALL the time now in anticipation of our misadventures on the Colorado Trail this summer – coming soon to a set of burning quadriceps near you. Lactic acid! Massive weight loss! Logistics equal to the invasion of a medium sized country! Cotton outerwear! Does it get any better?

I think the fitness for the trail is going to need to be more of an ATV type of fitness – as there is pushing – and there is carrying – and there are MASSIVE sections where you are above 12 – 13,000 feet – just sucking air and praying to stop pedaling.

So, in the interest of planting the seeds for that type of all terrain domination why not do some carrying? Better yet – do some riding, some carrying, some riding and carrying? I LOVE hike-a-biking wet, north facing slopes after recent rain when they are very slippery – especially in my Sidi’s as they are rated as a negative 600 on the doppler traction scale – just beating out the 4 day old grease covered banana peel. As I start the carry after some mega climbing my legs aren’t so much as burning – as feeling really dead. I don’t mind carrying – and I actually prefer it to mainline trails – in that riding places where no one else rides always makes me grin. Not seeing tracks is always cool – and as long as there are north facing hell like slippery climbs it seems like some places will remain safe.

The reward at the top of the climb/carry is amazing – the evening light – the smell right after the rain – the divide hazily shining in the distance. These are all great things. I wonder about the Cat that TP saw in the morning – I wonder if it’s checking me out – weighing my calves in its saliva filled craw. Can’t you just hear it? “Arggggh – some vegemite on those suckers – and a nice evening of watching 101 Dalmatians”. Yum.

The logs are slippery on the descent, my riding skills not so much as non-existent – but firing slowly. There are some kick ass drops on this descent and I want to ride it more – but it’s a ways out there.

Onto the last climb – and still no people – or tracks. I write cryptic signs in the dirt thinking that the boys may be somewhere behind me – but they stayed on the road. More carnivorous beast hiding spots, and soon enough I am home. Super heated and tired from the last long climb.

5:40 this morning – back on it – and imagine that – the legs feel damn good. Hell – I might get to work after all.

This am is a total bust – trying to ferret out some cliff re-routes – some passages to India. Nary a dothead in sight. No favors from the Gods of the woods this morning – they shined me. The mooned me. I got pissed – and then I took a giant dump and I felt better. Perhaps another day. Seems like some days the woods will give it up – some days they won’t. As Ed Abbey said about the sublime nature of the desert – kinda makes you realize the desert doesn’t care – the forest doesn’t care. Just you. And all the little people in your butt. I mean your head.

Wooo. Wooo.

2004-05-17T12:20:00.000-07:00

These are not the Kodak moments.

These are not the edited images that you send to your friends to prove that you can still skate. They don't care - and yes - it is irrelevant.

These are the ugly times - when there is a trick that lives in your head - and in your nuerons - and it just had to articulate through your feet - and come out your board. Simple - right? Some tricks - and more tricks - it seems - grab me by the short hairs. They reside - and resonate within - and they won't go away.

Saturday night, after nearly four hours on the bike and a long day of chores I wandered back out there to the Mojo ramp - the mini-section - the trick generator as it is called in my priveate conversations with myself.

I got obsessed with the whole pivot and roll thing - and got some cool nose pick to reverts the other nite. Sometimes it's so cool just to go skate and not have an agenda - and roll and see what the body and board dictate as far as comfort and things to try. So - I was trying fakie/pivot to frontside revert - the whole frontside revert still a sporty outcome for me - so why not complicate it and go into if from a pivot - instead of nose or tail. The issue - the real issue here is getting your wheels to roll over the coping and into the vertical plane of the ramp - from the horizintal plane of the deck. It's very subtle. When gunning for the trick I really want to learn - and dissecting it into these parts - there is an order and a plan - but it all comes down to that commitment of rolling from horizontal to committed - then - as everyone always says :"Following it in". Hah.

So - got the pivots to fs revert on Friday night. Then - since the ride wasn't enough and I could still move my legs - I went back out - and messed around with it. And if you think about it - if you WASTE your time thinking about these things - if you have hours to waste on wondering if you can slide your board around on a wooden surface one hundred and eighty degrees.......it's really only one step further to a 5-0 to revert. the only issue is that your shoulders are totally rotating in the wrong direction in a 5-0, and you have to get set in the 5-0; rotate and pre-load your shoulders - and then get the nuanced roll of the wheel over the coping - fade into the ramp and then rotate.

On three - everyebody - let's go - REVERT!

So what are the life lessons here? Repetition? I counted 71 tries before I got the trick in a recognizable form. There was some serious slamming in there - some serious doubt - even some frustration.

We skated Kevy's Sunday and I just couldn't get it together. Sunday about 6pm - I decided I had to redeem myself - and went back out to my ramp. Tunes, coffee and only 60 or so more attempts and I pulled a few ugly ones. Once again - something I never thought I could do - and something - that by sheer strength in numbers - and by embracing my virtual INABILITY to do the trick - by loving the process of failing - only then - did I succeed.

That - and this FAITH - that if you just believe that you can follow it back in - that if you try enough times - it'll work out.

Hallalujah.

2004-05-14T15:11:00.000-07:00

Try this one on for size.

Gorgeous spring day. Things are breaking out like crazy – flowers, sunshine, spring is eternal – hope – right.

Visiting a friend who is quite ill. Ill in the terminal sense of the word. Clock is ticking. No code. DNR. Do Not Resuscitate. Comfort. Ease the exit so to speak. Do whatever little we can do on this end to ease the passage. To die - is what all the Euphemisms mean in case you didn't figure that out.

Did ok seeing her. Sometimes it’s ok – sometimes I just want to smash things after I see her. Today was okay.

As we were leaving Hospice, I had Andrew – the human cannonball in my arms – picture about the cutest 20 month old you have ever seen. We are walking through the courtyard and there is this emaciated woman in a wheelchair – sitting with her husband. As I get closer her operable eye opens – and she says “Oh – I love the little ones”. I stoop next to her and hold Andrew out to her – introduce him. Her face lights up. On closer inspection I realize that she isn’t emaciated – so much as – she is missing about a third of her upper body – including one arm from about mid breast. Her husband is adjusting her position so that she can get sun on her lower body – and not her face. The sun bothers her eyes when it hits her direct.

Andrew waves, smiles, and offers whatever it is that 2 year olds have. She drinks it up. As we are waving, and saying goodbye I hear her say to her husband “What a great sight to see such a beautiful little boy on such an amazing day.. I am blessed”.

Try that on for size. If it fits – if you can get it in there with the life, death, whole grateful to be here – and I doubt I have 1 percent of that women’s strength - holler at me and tell me ‘where’ to fit it. I don’t possess that place.

2004-05-13T10:31:00.000-07:00

So.

How often is it that you get to pull up to a southern California skatepark in a Lincoln Town Car, roll out and skate one of the most perfect pools in t he world (I don't think this is an exaggeration) on your average Sunday night? Rare. So the Mexican and I pull up and as I am changing in the car he comes out “Andy Mac is skating”. Nothing like starting a trip off with a mellow, non-intimidating session.

To say Andy was killing the pool would be such a radical understatement. Definitely one of the smoothest skaters I have ever seen – and seeing him in person is way more impressive than seeing it on tape.

As I was descending in the rain/snain/sleet this am…and coming to the conclusion that it really wasn’t that miserable – I was figuring some type of Misery Index for the descent on Mag. The ride is no big deal – regardless of weather – other than the 3,000+ feet of elevation loss. I was super muddy by the top of mag – passed up a ride from Merriwether – too many hours on Socal freeways in the last three days – I needed just to be outside and to get sloppy and cold.

The mud on Z was pretty dense. Friction was the word that kept coming up in my mind. I pedaled – and just stopped as soon as I stopped. No roll – no ease. Really warm though for the thermometer saying it was 34 or something. Lite snow in the air at 8,000 feet. Stayed super warm and got pretty encrusted by the time I hit the top of mag…still pretty dry underneath.

The cement was wet – but not like pouring water down the sides. There were some interesting snow and mud berms – they splashed nicely as folks sped past. About 2 miles down mag it started to get pretty nasty. It was cold enough so that the water/mud was freezing all over the front of me – the word that came to mind was Carapace. I felt encrusted – and as on other days like this – it really helps to keep you warm – it repels the water – as you descend from snow and sleet into rain – but then – Alas – the rain wins out and the ice washes away from your exterior and you start to soak through.

I had some extra rain pants in my bag – but left them there – to stay dry for the ride home. My thighs got pretty cold – but overall it was kinda pleasant.

Boulder was really raining hard and I soaked through on the creek path – some massive puddles and great mud. God Bless the cross bike for it’s speed and ability to slice through snow. Sleet, mud, etc.

So – back to the MMI – I don’t think this ride really gets even beyond an 7.5 (on a scale of 1 – 10). I could feel my hands and feet (mostly); There was ice in my beard – but my chin wasn’t all frozen. Overall – just a gorgeous morning. There are some upgrades due to the varied precipitation forms – snow, rain, sleet – but it just didn’t carry that critical mass to bring it over the top.

Maybe tomorrow.

2004-05-09T12:58:00.000-07:00

So, whitey Johnson and I have been doing self imposed skills clinics on the ramp. Last Sunday it was about 3 hours of slamming, sliding, and generally not pulling too many things off - but getting inspired and trying many things we never thought of trying.
That's where the Juice is - in experiencing new movements and teaching your body through sheer mind numbing repetition how to do things that seem really counter intuituve. It's been coming together so nicely lately - and I feel like there are skills that are filling in the gaps in my skating. I think I tried about a half dozen tricks yesterday that I have never tried before...finally settling on a nose pick to revert. It took some working it out in my head - and then multiple tries to get it to come out of my feet - but it did - and it will pave the way to the BS 5 - 0 pivot to fakie. Same movement - that subtle rolling of the truck from flat to back into the ramp - and then just following it back in - as everyone says about every trick. Also tried nose grinds for a while and hung up about a million times. Close though. Numerous parks in the next three days - apparently the surf is quite large. I am heading west to the coast and family and friends and water a diverse, new concrete.
Not to be redundant - but how the hell did I get so lucky?

2004-05-07T16:22:00.000-07:00

Breakthrough.

Permeating the semi-permeable through patience, perseverance and consistency over time.

“Well if you ever go back in the woolly swamp – you better not go at night
There’s things out there in the middle of them woods ‘ll make a strong man die from fright”

Charlie Daniels Band

You think you know it. You think you own it (This land is my land, this land is y land). There are secrets out there – and after traversing the same ground maybe 35 times – sometimes – those things will reveal. Like a Hooked Hand pirate emerging from Stephen King’s tweaked fog bank. Arrgggghhh matey – I will hook your guts out. Hah.

It makes me wonder about the folks who first settled this area – and what it was like here 100 years ago. Here – we wander – to avoid roads. Then – there were no roads to avoid. Now – we wrangle – we haul and carry and scramble and whack our way through. And stumble upon these memories of the past. And when it’s dawn, and it’s quiet and the light is moving horizontally through the trees one could almost imagine that it was 100 years ago.

Only, the coffee is a little better.

That’s just an assumption.

2004-05-05T15:56:00.000-07:00

I know it's summer.

Because my butt crack is sweaty.

Because the outside of my right knee hurts from slow climbing this morning on still moist singletrack.

Because I have horizontal slices in my arms from hitting trees.

Because the ball (easy) of my right hand is sore(whooooaaa Nelly) from executing regular spring trail maintenence.

Because My socks smell really bad from crossing the creek this am.

Because My right side hurts from bailing a nose blunt/to rock last night and flat bottoming to the ramp.

Because I have tan lines on the back of my calves from my skatepads.

Because I need to rest tomorrow - but I will not - as it's going to be 88 degrees - and the tranny's of the park are calling.

Because the Beer Highway - and the Coffee side-road are intersecting more and more.

Because I couldn't sleep last night 'cuz I didn't stop skating until after 8 pm.

Because I took a nap under a tree by the creek for lunch (and KT's pit BBQ).

Because I couldn't sleep at all as I was still buzzing from watching my friends cross the line from attempting a trick - to deciding to make it. And landing it after approximately 44 bails.

I know it's summer.

2004-04-20T10:10:00.000-07:00

Darkness on the edge of town.

Cold again today. Like 28 or so at 5:22. Dark as hell – really windy. What the heck – let’s ride!
Seeking that elusive rhythm of riding – as I miss it – and I need the fuel – and the down time – and the think time. The spinning of the legs has always been a management tool for me personally. Stress, taxes, life, death…all of these things pass more easily through the cortex and the heart when aided with coffee – and riding. Solo is best. To find your own pace – and not have to explain random routes (my favorites which more often than not do not make a ton of ‘sense’ in the traditional meaning of the word. Straight lines are not a skill of mine – and with 15 years of commuting some 150 – 200 days a year…well – you end up getting creative.

So, I visited some old friends this morning. Standard beginning…into the wind and some light snow at 5:50 when I crested the ridge. The light was sweet – chilly – odds of seeing other humans fairly small. The wind is at my back for a while – howling out of the west – pushing me down the ridge. I take Collette’s new one track – opt against cutting across the road as the wind is wild – choosing the push.

The push is loose and steep and I am conscious of the animals and the fact that some large predator types are probably just waking up – and they are probably hungry. The big, dark rocks and downed trees look like a perfect refuge for predators. I sit down and huck some bagel into the woods to appease the animal gods.

Some patchy snow on the top of the area to the east, and it makes finding the ‘trail’ a little harder than I remember from last year. Seeing as though there isn’t really a ‘trail’ per say here, there is a vague line that goes by certain markers – that three – the white rock – shit like that. I love this area as the only way to find your way around is to get lost up there time and time again until you start recognizing things – like rocks and trees.

The descent is butter. The winter really working some magic on some sections, consolidating them, smoothing them over. The Crux of the descent takes some 6 minutes with nary a dismount belying the duration of the labor that it took to make such a thing possible.

I plug into the Pod for the last climb, and the final descent. Boulder looks like something from a Jolly Green Giant commercial from up on high. The grass is green, the trees are budding. Watching the Spring work its way up the hill through some 3,000 feet – this is the coolest thing this time of year. We get to see summer descend on the land a few times. We get to start the ride in the dark and snow – and finish it leaning against the black tile wall at Sydneys – soaking the sun and feeling the love.

My legs are wasted from the last 6 days…but – the park calls – and I will try to pull together a few turns over there..and rally for the Ned Skatepark meeting tonight.

Sleep come free me.

2004-04-19T16:06:00.000-07:00

Ever kick a water bed?

I mean like – Pele – like just punt the fucker? Of course, it wouldn’t move. Of course, there would be a reverberation, sloshing, and it wouldn’t move. It would sit there like a 3,000 pound, soaking turd.

Much like the bike I rode this weekend.

We are somewhat ‘hooked up’ as a community of misfits in the bike flow. We can usually put our hands on most things Bike – and that’s pretty cool. I have been testing some things for a friend – from winter shoes, to lights, to bikes.

So – I am to test a ‘Downhill’ bike – this I am informed of last week. It happens to coincide with T2’s birthday ride, which also lines up with the Hippie’s and DV8’s birthdays. Interesting. We plan a small ride as in our culture and community celebration goes hand in hand with bikes and beer. Beer. Good – canned beer. The Ridge Dweller – Da Herminator makes an appearance. He is swearing to ride more – we swear to hold his feet to the fire as we know and feel that MORE bike is always good.

So, Saturday. We wake up early, work on the ramp, take a nap, read, drink coffee. I found an old plastic flower basket and this is a nice addition to the 42 pound, 7.5 inches of travel bike that I was going to ride.

We head up the road, whit and I connecting after a skate (BACKSIDE SMITH’S!) and damn – but I feel like I am on an upended big wheel – dragging a bloated bovine carcass. I mean – backwards would feel slow. The tires on this thing are like 2.6 – and they don’t roll. As soon as you stop pushing forward – the bike basically stops moving as if velcroed to the ground. I liken the glide to that of a sand paper bottom snowboard.

S – L – O – W.

Now – I ain’t fit. It’s early yet. But – I am moving slow – getting dropped on the downhills. This is a downhill bike – but the fudge factor and the rolling resistance on the tires – it’s INSANE.

We take a few beer stops (MGD). We ride. We end up in Ned with the group splitting up. Mike and I end up at the Tungsten with a pitcher of Pilsner. We are not shy about drinking it. It’s sunny – it feels like summer (a neat trick in the nigh country as it was snowing a few hours ago).

We end up at Katmandu. 15 to the table. Beer. Food. Friends.

Wealth is ours in this setting, surrounded by the people who keep us going on a day to day basis.

2004-04-14T15:42:00.000-07:00

Back in the hood at 0-dark thirty last night.

Driving up the canyon was amazing - light - stars - fresh air.

It was a large day at Sunnyvale. Focused, practice time in a world class venue. No broken bones, some new tricks and some really new lines.

Opening it up and letting the park dictate whaere the board goes.

So much more satisfying than relying on the brain.

2004-04-12T19:27:00.000-07:00

Huge day at the office in my absence. And that is a kick ass thing. We needed the work, the cash flow, the victories - me especially - as I am about to step away from the business for a while with the whole impending fatherhood thing.
Shenna says I am unflappable - and I guess this is true. Nothing (other than meeting and falling in love with her) has ever felt so right - and it feels as if the rest of the world is fading into a very light background buzz, like a small mosquito a few states away. I am stoked beyond my wildest dreams to be a Dad, and to be a Family. Not something I have really addressed here - as it is a bit too close to the vest - even for me - Mr. BigMouth.
Suffice to say - nothing has ever felt like such a natural path.

So, in celebration of the MASSIVE amount of cash we banked today - I went to Pizza Hut. Yep - $12.000 dinner to celebrate some .25 million of booking. Sat on a bench at the skatepark and ate my wings and garlic bread and watched the Sunnyvale locals tear it up. We skated Kevy's for a really long time yesterday (and it was a hella session - whit pulling out the FS Boneless - Kev pulling some crooked grind kinda shit to fakie - super awkward trick) and I have been fighting a cold - so I figure the whole breathing on the plane was the stress that I will put my body through today. I like watching locals skate terrain they know and love - you can learn so much about llines and where the speed is, etc. There was a pro posse there - including Jason 'Wee Man' Acunah. Guy rips. Not even like for a midget - the guy kills it - although he seems kinda tense sometimes.

The wings kick ass. It's gorgeous out. The last piece of the Master Plan falling into place (slam some business prior to my leave). I will have the Sunnyvale park to myself in the morning and try to apply some of the subleties I saw getting laid down tonight.

All in all - it's all Goodt.

2004-04-09T07:39:00.000-07:00

There are boobs on my board. Not like subtle, sublimated, modern art kind ‘a’ boobs – big giant melon like pink ones with a woman grabbing them. I told JG at the shop, “Dude, this is really not an acceptable graphic for me at this stage of my skateboarding development”. With trucks, taped, you won’t really be able to tell that they’re boobs. But I’ll know at least.

Heading down today to test ride the giant pink boob platter indoors, as we are locked into some fantastic weather. Fantastic from the POV that we are in a drought – so the last 6 days of mixed rain, snow, moisture is really a blessing. If it mandates driving to skate. So be it.

I wonder what happens if my board gets cold?

Skated yesterday after waking up on Sunset Blvd in LA. Not much of a contrast there. Up from sleep, ate outside and there were birds and plants around the pool – nice to see – and a rare treat for the visitor in the fog encrusted metropolis. Give me a few birds, some quiet, and I am overjoyed in LA, NY or any other “Metropolitan Center”. Preferably, give me my yard, with no one and I am all that much happier.

What if my board gets wet?

This 18 hour trip to LA (last business trip other than Monday for the next 2 months – unheard of) is actually pretty cool – meeting some amazing people and continuing the quest for global domination. Perhaps, one day it will be mine/ours – and then I can just walk away – oh – with a big old satchel of cash.

Gorgeous commute Tuesday. Snow at 8,000; rain in the enchanted forests of twin sisters, then dry road below about 7,000 feet, looking backwards up into the clouds. I was dry and flecking dirt by the time I got to work. Crusted, but happy. The darkness and moisture on the trail is such a foreign experience at this point. It will incrementally increase bike maintenece – but it will also keep our homes and our forests from burning down.

A quick word on the BOA Management of West Mag. First, I appreciate them stepping up. It is hard to do volunteer work and even the 10% rule I try to apply (basically 10% of my ‘ride’ time during the week is ideally devoted to trail maintenance, repair, etc) is tough. But, I think them ‘controlling’ or recommending management for that area is like us recommending strategies for Flatirons Crossing. I mean the collective us – not the fragmented, cliqued, bad day version of US – I mean the core crew filling up a large table at Annies) There is an INTIMACY there and a deep LOVE (WHERE IS THE LOVE MIKE?!) of these parts, of every turn, wash out, shortcut, carry…and I believe that this LOVE can feed better solutions and offer more in-depth insights into the area and long term management of the area.

In the 15 years since I first put (a) rubber on these trails it is SO sad what has happened as far as use patterns and the degradation of the resource. Based on the flow of humans – management techniques and some things that I would never have agreed to 10 years ago – offer valid solutions. Yes, I do believe in keeping stashes – and especially based on the logging lately and the fact that some of these trails are literally GONE – we need to step up. If that means interacting with lowlanders – so be it. If that means not throwing rocks at the group rides – so be it. I don’t question everyone’s right to love mountain biking as much as we do – but I do question their ability to LOVE the land with the intimate care that only daily, snowy, ass hot, rainy, long, dehydrated, drunken pleasure can create.

So. I guess it’s almost summer – as all this shit is heating up. And that’s ok. I have faith in the brother/sisterhood. The word is as powerful as the trail tool, and god-dammit – yes Virginia – there is a Santa Claus.

Love conquers all. Even if you leave someone at the bottom of the ocean. Never forget The Titanic. I mean seriously – if you could sketch Kate Winslet’s boobs for the rest of your life…would you let go of the raft? Come on Leo. Get a grip, literally, figuratively.

I thought those boobs on my board looked familiar.

2004-04-01T13:47:00.000-08:00

The light – in the woods – is wrong.

Oh – it’s so right to be riding – but – it’s wrong.

The trail meanders – in a parched fashion through the forest – and the fact that the forest is INTACT and not DESTROYED or marred by small blue paint splotches signifying the IMINENT death of the surrounding growth - this is good. This is heaven. This is spring in late march, but there is something so terribly wrong.

My legs felt like deeply over soaked sausages this morning. Yet to strike the balance between skateboarding and cycling – yet to rest enough, or stretch enough – I pay the price climbing the road. Ouch – they say. Take a day off – rest – relax. I can not. Not as long as this weather holds. Not as long as the mental turbulence outweighs the energy. So I pummel.

Shenna sets a great pace – one that I am too stubborn to set myself – nice – relaxed. I have missed her out on the commutes – and her riding to work is a welcome sign of spring – and a welcome slowing of pace from commuting with the skinny guys who climb way too fast for my bloated, stumpy legged carcass.

We pass through the trails formerly known as the place where there was a large sign but it went away…through the not yet budding aspen grove and into the clear cut. Kinda hard to structure a ride that doesn’t intersect with damage these days. Some of the joy that gets us up at dawn in the spring is tainted by the fact that basically all the A-one trails have been slaughtered by gutless contract workers with chainsaws and little regard for the mojo of the land. Climb, climb, appreciate the quiet morning and the no cars and the being on the trail in the early light of dawn. Short sleeves in the end of March – or April 1 – I guess – not right.

Dropping down, and around and into the lair of Doug Henning. Here, the trail becomes as pristine as we have in the hood (other than the new stuff – which doesn’t ever get into print). I haven’t ridden this trail in about 4 months – seems like a lot longer than that. As we bob and weave and try to remember how to turn and lean and feel the trail – I am struck by the light. It’s wrong.

You see – we shouldn’t be in here – the north facing woods – for another few weeks – or even 6 weeks. These trails should be sleeping, repairing, filling in as they rest under the snow. Normally – north facing at 8,000 feet – is an early to mid-may type of program. There is the inevitable and important post-holing ride where you head out too early into this stuff only to go back in and say “Yep – it’s still buried”. You return with scrappled shins and bloody ankles and stories.

But – it’s dry. It’s so great to be out on significant distances of single-track – but I fear for the summer – our legs – our forests.

Save the forest – Pee on a Bush.

2004-03-25T12:42:00.000-08:00

Not to trivialize. But I think my greatest fear (father – or Father) is not being able to feel. I don’t mean like physical shit. I mean like – what if you were like the pirates in the Johnny Depp movie? What if you were always hungry – but when you ate stuff – you couldn’t taste it? What if you couldn’t smell – what if you couldn’t emote? What if you just felt the same way about taking a dump as you did about having a child? Or winning the lottery? Or not getting eliminated from Donald Trump’s stupid fucking show?

“Buy low, sell high, you get rich and you still die
Money talks and people jump – ask hi how low life Donald what’s his name,
And who cares, I don’t want to know what his girlfriend doesn’t wear,
It’s a shame that the people at work want to read about that kind of jerk…

I just want to make enough to buy this town and keep it rough,
I just want to make enough to buy this town”

J.Gorka

So – back to the no feeling thing. Black – courtesy of Eddie Vedder flowing into the cranial unit from the iPod. Taking off out of SF. Dusk. The fog is rolling in, the water is dark, and I have this irrational fear of water in a plane. That whole people smiling helping each other with life vests – I don’t believe the hype. I think a plane crash – especially a floater – might just bring the worst out in my fellow passengers – my high regard for their behavior aside.

So – if we went down – what would I want to be listening to? Right before the impact. Would they recover my ipod and be able to figure out what I was listening to on impact (great playlist idea there) and play it back at my funeral? Trippin’. What if I couldn’t feel – or fathom what that might be like – to not be here. That would suck.

Eating lunch on a sunny afternoon at the Fog City Diner in SF today. Dude walks by, looks at me funny. It’s SF…I get some funny (flattering in a fab five kinda way) looks from dudes in SF. Guy walks into the place, comes back out and looks at me. “Dave”.

It’s 1983 all of a sudden and I am attending Rollins College, dating the most lovely BC (now BQ) living in the ROC House…all in all…life is as good as it gets. Napping with my girl one afternoon and my friend Kevin comes in quietly. I am awake but my girl isn’t. Kevin crawls into bed and starts rubbing her back, as I slide out. It’s cool. We aren’t THAT close – but the three of us for a while there were pretty damn close. She wakes up – rolls over slowly and there’s Kev – smiling. A large, semi-clothed wrestling match ensues and we end up (I think) tossing Kev in the shower. It’s all good fun.

Couple ‘O’ days later my girl and I are involved in something other than napping during the afternoon, and my door flies open. A python (I am NOT lying) flies through the air and lands in the bed. It’s like 7 feet long – and so heavy that Kev has trouble throwing it. We disengage, jump up and run into the bathroom while all our house mates are just laughing their asses off. This is kick ass. Eye for an eye – snake for a snake.

It’s this Kevin – some 21 years later – who stands in front of me. Damn. We hug. It feels good to feel this brother so close. It floods me with memories that are priceless and that have lain dormant for too long. He looks the same. His eyes are as deep, his coloring super dark – and he is glowing. Unreal.

What if I couldn’t feel what that feels like. Either to see him – or remember our college years. That’d suck in a very major way. I think that would be worse than – or equivalent – to death.

Now there’s a cheery thought.

2004-03-24T09:21:00.000-08:00

Curtis: you made a controversial movie about Catholicism, “Dogma.” what did you think about The Passion of Christ”?
Smith: I haven’t seen it yet. I think it’s funny though, that people bring it up and ask me, “What do you think of the controversy”? I’m like, “What controversy?” The dude made a movie about Jesus in a country that’s largely Christian – a very traditional movie and it made over 200 million in two weeks. There ain’t no controversy folks – that’s a hit” They took one or two Jewish leaders in the beginning and said “This might be construed as anti-Semitic and then spun it into a movie for hard core Christians. You’ve got to see it if you love Jesus.

I wish to god I had thought of that when we were marketing Dogma.

Kevin Smith (Clerks; Chasing Amy; Dogma) in Sunday’s NYT’s

I think I turned on Mel after I saw “The Patriot”. It was a regurgitation of Gladiator, which was a chewed up and spit out version of “Bravehart”. Don’t get me wrong – I really liked Braveheart – almost as much as I liked Mel’s character in the Lethal Weapon movies. All the shoulder popping, fighting, sad, widowed psycho cop. I liked that. But – when I read that you can buy “Authentic Souvenir” crucifixion nails at showings of The Passion – I pretty much turned the other cheek. $14.79 - $19.99. Mel put a Jihad out on the NYT critic who slammed the movie months ago. Mel was quoted – in a major paper – as wanting to see this critic’s (and his DOGS) intestines on a stick. Look it up. Do a google search on Mel – intestines- nyt critic. That’s going a little far – and selling the nails – I mean – let’s be egotistical – and make a film that we feel should be made (I respect that) but mel – let’s not sell the nails. OK?

Just strafed the hood from a safe distance of something like 10,000 feet. One bonus of the westward Ho in the germ tube is the consideration of the neighborhood form the air. We fly north and west out of DIA and directly over bear peak, up over gross reservoir, up the valley and west over Eldora and finally right over the top of James Peak.

Follow up now.

Is Sunnyvale still awesome - YES
Did I try the tricks I promised (fs air over the spine; layback air over the spine; tail slide scrape thing between the big bowl and the putt putt; and layback air to Lien). Yes.
Did I land them?
A few.
Was it sweet?
Yes.

Thank you sir - may I have another?

2004-03-19T16:20:00.000-08:00

Atmosphere.

Lucy Ford.

Women with the tattoo'd hands.

Ok then.

Buenos tardes.

2004-03-18T16:23:00.000-08:00

One clock says 4:56. The other - 5:00. Open the Arrogant. Crack goes the weasel.

It's been a long day. A good day. Focused effort to influence people on the outside to let fly with some greenbacks into the radar account. In exchange for outstanding work - of course. It worked - so far - with one group. As our company has grown we have moved farther away from the core - into brands like HP and Coke and Sony. The new work is with Burton - and that's kick ass. I can't share the content/goals here - as I might lose my license to broadcast - and that would sadden me.

75 today - and the legs were complaining from the climb over flag and the two rides yesterday. I wanted to save some legs for tomorrow - as it's supposed to be almost 80.

Got over the hump on the board slides to disaster on the spine in the boulder park today. That was pretty cool. What a scary trick. All that momentum and all that opportunity to hang up. But - as I read somewhere today - if I fall - it will be moving forward.

Heading back out to the park tonight - maybe skate - but fer sure meet the wife and go get her some pads as she is stoked to skate more.

And that's a kick ass thing.

Gonna ride a medium length route tommorrow with twisted - and try to save some MORE for the park.

So many workouts and so little leg endurance.

Oh well. TGIF and all that. Monday's a holiday - we are heading down to Salida to hang, eat, drink, ride, skate....etc. Then back to SF for a whirlwind 36 hour trip...and then back - to right here.

Oh my.

2004-03-16T16:35:00.000-08:00

Oh, to be back on the ridge – in a fleeting gale – in the early morning light.
Even now – with the ‘season’ just opening up – there are cheater routes on the ridge. Little twenty foot annoyances that the humans have created so that they save time – while they are out relaxing. How absurd. I buried tow of the offensive lines this am on the way to work and VOW to make the ridge a pinnacle of trail monitoring and actionable ‘giving a shit’ as it were. Try and stop me. I dare you.

Twenty minutes into the ride – after massive gusts and horizontal snow I am out in the sun. the Santa Cruz reminds me what full sauce means – and descending on it’s laid back, fully floating carapace after becoming used ot the rigidity of the Hooby in single digits – it feels like a magic carpet.

Due to the late night arrival in from the infected metropolis last night I left at a leisurely 9am, wandered and wobbled around until shortly after 11, ending my journey at the office. Actually – ending it at diggers for a Latte and an everything bagel slathered in butter. Then – onto the flat screen and the inevitable catching up. Whatever that means.

The ride was kick ass. A bunch of climbing that reminded me that it’s March – and that I am really unfit – and that I slammed my thigh on the coping last Friday and it still feels like there is a small ashtray filled with venom somewhere in there.

The spin felt good – and it felt better to be home on terra firma. Another trip to San Francisco next week – and then I am outlawing travel for a week (OH MY) and then taking my throwback – soul searching solo train trip to Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. Hopefully find some peyote out there…maybe just wander the fuck back.

Yoga tonight – the pain that I hate to love and love to hate. Keeps me mobile though.

Ummmmmmmmmmm.

Ummmmmmmmmm.

2004-03-16T10:18:00.000-08:00

Catching up on the follies and foibles of the crew from the deck of the Georgian in Santa Monica, California. Funny flying at night, after a very full weekend, and ending up waking up here. A lovely chow of mussels in butter and ceasar's salad and I think three bottles of pelegrino last night.
In preparation for one more plane flight I purposefully broke my post - meningital workout rule and went 5 days in a row with skate/ride/ride/skate/lift/snowboard/tele/skate things in there. I am amply ruined so a well timed rest day (physically) is quite welcome.

I stay at the Georgian because of the porch furniture. Seriously. It's on the water in SM, and they have breakfast on the porch, and you can sit in this sweet wicker furniture, have kick ass coffee - and - well - write in your blog. When we pulled up last night my co-worker had a fit..."That's Cindy Crawford". She's tall - and cute - but that mole on the upper left lip kinda throws the game for me.
Had a very full weekend to push into the void of generic United Travel black hole syndrome. I try to make the most out of my road time, and stay in weird places, skate, run, see the sights....etc. But it feels like lost time much of the time. So, I try to cram time into time prior and post trips - so I get these really full stretches at home - like the last five days - and then I am ok out here.
Saturday shenna and I had a great adventure. We started from the eldora parking lot and skiied the nordic trails over to Jenny Creek - up to Guinn mountain, down the pipeline trail and into the back gate of eldora and down the face. Despite my SMRP coaching..I can't ski - and although shenna is my favorite human on the planet - I must confess - she is worse. So, we figured since we DON'T ski - we should. It's a kick ass loop and was amazing until we came into the ski area and had to - well - ski.
We were so challenged that Ed, one of the patrollers we know up there came over to us to see if we were ok. On International. I said - "What's up Ed" and he says "What the hell are you doing on ski's" and he said "be careful" and I continued my pizza pie wedge interspersed with body slams down the face.
As if that ski wasn't enough (some 3.5 hours) whit came over and we skated HARD for a majority of the afternoon until about 5:45.

Skating until 5:45 is novel at this point....the spring light is changing and the warmth in the sun is insane. Three weeks until we get the light back in full. Then the mornings are dark - and I really like that. I like watching sunrise form the seat. We worked on some specific tricks and just got into the repetition of trying things 107 times. He - on backside smiths - which he is getting really well - and I on mute grab lien to tails. Ride. Fall. Repeat.
Finally - last night I am crammed into 32C on a 777 (388 people at full capacity) and the nice lady from business class comes back and gets me. "mr. Kingsbury – would you like to upgrade to business class on us?”

So, I end up sitting with the cast of Buffy, or OC or something like this amongst girls with manicured toe-nails and pants that really just don’t fit in the traditional sense of the word. I fired up some vintage Led Zeppelin dvd’s and watched Jimmy Page re-invent the guitar.

And finally to DV8 as you lament your aging.

Two years ago – huffing my fat old ass up the east ridge of Pauite Peak with a couple of friends. Wondering if the oxygen bankruptcy I was experiencing was hampering my judgement. Falling behind. Feeling old. Feeling like I was on the downward slope of the roller coaster of physical abilities. Finally, reaching the top some hundreds of yards behind and and stopping with my two friends.
“Paul – when did you peak physically for this kind of thing (in this case – this kind of thing was a 5+ hour run in the mountains above 13,000 feet”
Paul: “I don’t really think I have”
Paul is 54.
The answer is never.

So. I would like to volunteer Dave’s Midnight Mule Whipping Service to the cause, since Merriweather is showing some signs of sanity (and commitment to tranny skating GODDDAAMMMIIITT) to haul your skinny Nordic ass over Grey’s and Torrey’s this year. You will be suffering. I will heckle you and raise that inner Ted Bundy and make you excel and conquer the demons of BOTH aging and the evil dark nights above 14,000 feet with Mel Gibson type artifacts strapped to your back. I will remind you that I am practically dead in human years (even though you will have some 12 hours in your legs and I will be carrying next to nothing and you will have some 35 pounds of shit on..these are the advantages of the aging) . In your weakest moment – you can think – fuck – if this guy can do it – I have to be able to.
And this will be good.

2004-03-11T10:27:00.000-08:00

Testing, one, two , three.

So, is the world a giant ball of shit – or a bag of roses? Depends on the day I guess. Is that cynical – maybe – pessimistic – could it be possible that it is half full? A question that deserves contemplation if only to reaffirm the facts.
Visited some folks over the last few days out in Boulder’s sister city – Burtlington, Vermont. They ranged from a creative agency to a large Ice cream manufacturer…to the world’s leading producer of snowboards. Cool, creative, awesome folks all the way around. There is a sense of comfort in Burlington that makes at least me – feel like everything is going to be ok in the world. I can’t pinpoint it – maybe it’s the guy at the gate this am – one of two gates at the Burlington International airport. The sign to the airport is more like a small street sign – and the international aspect of the airport could be argued at length – but – hey – I guess the proximity to the Canadian border qualifies the term. 6:50am – which makes it before 5am in my head – don’t really mind the early mornings though – as the noise in my head is quieter and I can think better before all the little demons in the bunkhouse of my cranium rise up for the day, drink their coffee – and start raising a ruckus and questioning the simplest of tasks. I read somewhere this is a waspy trait – applying intense examination to one’s every thought – motivation – mood – whatever – keeps the mind working – especially in the early hours. Dude at the airport was super nice – exit rows all the way home…relative comfort in what is a really shitty environment (the inside of any plane), a reasonably powered battery – charged ipod……wealth.
Ben & Jerry’s was cool – as one would expect – when you can literally see the placard on the door for the “office of social consciousness” from the lobby – you know you have found a kindred company to boulder. The people were super grounded – very cool – and they gave us free ice cream. That’s a good morning’s work.

On to a creative agency that we have worked with for about 10 years. They own a gorgeous building on the lakefront in downtown Burlington. It was once a warehouse – and they have put a decade of work into it to make it amazing. It’s like a skunkworks for creative people. There are photo labs, screen printing. Modeling facilities (for industrial design and product creation). There is a kick ass mini ramp in the basement. Kick ass. Built around huge beams, multiple heights and widths and lines. As I was leaving for the trip I looked at my camera and didn’t bring it – great rule of thumb – always bring the camera. The fact that this business has provided the environment like this – is reassuring to me – it makes me think that BUSINESS might have a fucking purpose other than monetary and the whole keeping the world running thing.
Then – we went to burton – home of jake – the ‘father’ of snowboarding. Our presentation there started about an hour late – seems like those folks there at burton work their asses off – and they are committed. That’s cool to see. I respect the shit out of what they have done there and hope that the passion that got them here can play through with the BUSINESS of snowboarding. We are going to hook up with a bunch of them at A-basin in a few weeks in Colorado – that should be a kick.
So – 48 hours – 3,000 miles in the air – a few meetings – seems like this is the way it’s going to be for a while. Off to DC Sunday night (great) for a presentation to the Aluminum Can board of America…..WTF? Don’t know. I’ll learn it on the way and do the best I can to keep a straight face. My dad tells me that I toe the line between the professional world and my little fantasy idealistic vision of how the world should be. I step out of the comfort and security of open spaces, close friends and a life that I dreamt of growing up – into this piping hot MMMagma of the ‘world’. Which one’s real?

“In the outside world – people are visited in their houses by spirits called television. People use what they call a telephone because they hate being close together but are too scared to be alone. In the outside world – there is no real silence. Only fake silence like when you plug your ears and pretend you can’t hear – but not the real out-of-doors silence. The other blessing that you give up in the outside world is darkness. You can close your eyes and sit in a cupboard but it’s not the same thing. The darkness in the colony is complete. The stars are thick above in this kind of darkness. You can see how the moon is rough with mountain ranges and etched with rivers and smoothed with oceans.
On a night without the moon – you can’t see a thing – but you can imagine anything”

Chuck P.

2004-03-08T10:02:00.000-08:00

And the bliss - of 4 days on the mountain - and the stoke of main-lining upper ambush and never touching ground - and dropping joe's meadow - and even discovering a few new lines - reminds me of the wealth that The Rock offers when the elements meet. Capped by a natty light on the ramp at dusk....spring is here...and summer isn't far ehind...and that is an amazing thing. There were millions of birds out this morning - but I didn't see the big cat that shenna saw in the meadow last night....I will see him soon as the dawns and dusks are drawing out in gorgeous fashion.

I refuse to let a travel day to the east coast kill this buzz. Hear me - I refuse!

Ice cream! Snowboards! Top Hat home brews in Burlington....onward.....

2004-03-05T12:30:00.000-08:00

Stoke.

We lead jaded lives...we are cynical about the potential of our surroundings even on the best day.

Now - take a 35 year old profesional from Carol Stream, Illinois - throw him at Eldora on an slightly better than average Thursday and Friday....and waalllaaa - Magic. Watching one of my clients from the flatlands of the mid-west take to the slopes on maybe day 12 of his snowboarding experience (of his life).

After some general sliding he turns to me and says: "Let's go jump some shit".

Client Services. That's the name of our department - and dammit - we do!

Contemplating the DoJo for tomorrow - wondering if I can handle the discrimination of a bunch of tele snobs. We shall see.

Free the heel - and the bowels will follow.

How many telemarkers does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

12.

One to screw in the bulb - and 11 to critique his technique.

2004-02-26T14:07:00.000-08:00

“Eldora. Hmmm. Now that’s a funny place to go skiing”

The Schizzle to the P – I – izzle (The ability or effect of 12,000 feet of fresh turns in the back country to over-ride the normal shit flow of day to day life).

Thank you sir, may I have another.

Amica’s in Salida. Headwater IPA is going down like water. The joint has the balance of old school, new school, a sort of Moab bound but not even a tenth of the way there kinda place. It’s in Salida – which has a bowl – who can complain.

I-70 self destruction.

The dream is always the same. It’s the movie Armageddon I believe – where is there is this huge line of cars and they just start blowing up one after another and they just explode as far as the eye can see. Maybe it’s Independnce Day with that Oscar winning performance by Bill Paxton. As I Stared up the length of I-70 through heavy snow, and listened to the bald tires of yet another sedan slide by on the right, while the Ford Expedition with the DVD player passed on the right (I almost hopped in) we were in hour 4.5 of a 3 hour drive back from Monarch Pass in Southern Colorado – with the rest of the population of Denver. You see, we have this thing in our society – that runs in contrast heavily to say Europeans – No siestas – two weeks of vacation a year – you tell a true Euro that and they just look at you like you are insane. TWO WEEKS. Work the other fifty. Die. Pay taxes. Next in line please.

So – the phenomenon of the 5 day work week, and the ‘Weekend Warrior’ nightmare – is that you get out Friday at 5. You sit in traffic until like midnight Friday – as out side of Denver there are these things called MOUNTAINS and there is really only one effective way to get through them in the vehicle of choice in our country (MOTOR VEHICLE). So – every Friday – MASS exodus – and every Sunday – everyone tries to get back to their Lofts, and their direct tv and their plasma screen televisions and their DEBT through the constricted bowel of the I-70 corridor. Hell is the result. As much as a 30 mile traffic jam on really bad roads with people who should be in prison for the way they drive.

This is us. Sunday night 2.22.04. The only thing that made this worth it (Oh – and it got worse) is that we had spent 8-4:30 that day making some of the finest turns in the state courtesy of the continental divide and the Fun Truck that is better known as the Monarch Snow Cat – that for a mere $2,000 will take you – and 11 (or 12 in our case) of out best friends for what will undoubtedly the best day of snow you will get in any given year – unless you happen to be doing the nasty with a Kennedy, Heinz or Hilton – and exploiting said relationship for the betterment of your snow choking experiences and have access to the family Bell (Helicopter that is) And we fully expect that if you are coping with the neurosis of a relationship with some Blue Blood . They call CAT skiing the ‘poor man’s ‘ heliskiing. Whatever. I have never been heliskiing – and the $800 a day makes it a bit of a stretch – if I am spending that much I am going to be somewhere warm where you sip Fiji Bitter at the end of the day during body massages. That trip is next June.

Anyway.

In my quest for ways to give people reasons to tolerate me – and share the love that I found down south a few years ago – I plan and execute this trip every year. I believe I will be adding it to my payroll deductions to make sure that I never miss it again – and this year was so good we are going back in a few weeks. Fizzle Trizzle.

For those of you who read OC from places without Snowcats – the day entails taking a lift to the top of a ski area – Monarch in this case – and bailing for the day with the vertical assist of the Snowcat and a few guides – and bombing turns anywhere from 400 feet of vertical to 1200 and basically gorging on perfect turns. And I mean perfect. I was amazed this morning that I wasn’t just wrecked physically from the day. The turns are so sweet – so effortless – that you forget about the scraping, and the crowds and the bad conditions that we are forced to tolerate as we are condemned to area skiing many of our days.

As Shenna and I rode the lift up on the way to the CAT on Sunday morning I really almost had tears in my eyes. There was fresh snow – I was with some of my best friends – my wife next to me – my bestest friend – and we were not spending the day with the masses. We were ducking the rope LEGALLY – with guides – to go get stoked – to wallow in powder and basically suck up as much fun as we could in 15 runs of un-groomed – un- tracked – perfect DEEP and STEEP snow. What could be better? Dunno. Don’t care. We were here. Healthy. Free. White – in our case – not that it matters.

First run – I was given the honor – as I put the trip together. I traversed right as high as I could and pointed down the face. The snow was deep. I was blinded on my heel-side turns, coming out of the wall of powder I was throwing out, catching another turn, and setting up for the next barrage. I pointed a small roll over and got some critical speed – and I basically felt like I was just barely touching the earth…friction courtesy of the north end of various snow crystals, a steep enough slope so that I was flying.

I pulled up to Gail – our second guide – grinned – and the trip was paid for. Right there. As DV8 said to me a while back – cash for experiences is the greatest trade that any of us can make.

2004-02-19T09:25:00.000-08:00

For Paul:

When I told my sister (New Yorker) that I was maintaining a BLOG she was mortified. I think the NY Blog is a distinctly different creature than the Nederland Blog. In reading a piece on the phenomenon of on line web logs – they talked about some NY socialites keeping blogs and talking about who is doing whom, which Versace bag Sarah Jessica Parker will be pimping on the newest episode of Sex and the City. I get overwhelmed with some of the blogs we have locally – and wonder if it’s written self stimulation (read: masturbation – of which I am a participant – so that would make it like a giant circle jerk or game of Oookie Cookie) or if it is something much more important. As we weed through our daily – mostly physically based stimulating lives – did this – done that – doing that – the reality is that we are all very active folks – and that is a significant part of the way we interact with the world – a significant percentage of the way that we seek meaning – and happiness and content – and joy. It’s how we feel alive.

Under the surface of the Idiot Athlete syndrome that I think many of us fall into from outside points of view – a sort of discrimination as it were – people shaking their heads when they see us peeling face masks off in front of the coffee shop while they hit the car alarm on their H2 – people who assume that since we commute by bike in shitty weather that we are: Poor; Stupid; probably a bike messenger; probably rent some shit-hole that if filled with bikes; party all the time, etc. etc. Under that – or beyond it there is poetry and a beautiful expressive element to the accessibility and communal nature of the blogs.

Case in point – a few weeks ago when I was on the business trip from hell - # 6,254 – sitting on the runway on San Jose, CA after getting stranded the night before – I hopped on my little T-Mobile Sidekick wireless nuclear thing – and read Dan’s blog. It saved me that day – I was grinning on the place – scrolling through some haphazard adventure he had the day before. By appropriating my obnoxious technology (everyone else on the place was on their cell phones talking WAY too loud: “I’m boarding now….yep…uh…putting my coat away….uh…..’scuse me…sitting down now…yeah…I think we land about 7…….did you get that call set up for blahblahblahblah…..”

I – on the other hand – am sitting quietly in some germ infected window seat – cracking up at Dan’s exploits in the high country – thanking the God Damned Lord above that large cities exist – and that people live and fucking die talking on their cell phones – and that they don’t do it in my town.

So – conclusion – there is beauty in the day to day – and as David Grey says:

“There’s no way to write it – there’s no way to write it – there’s no way to write it down…..

Write it down”

Just the effort of putting the shit in paper – is noble. It’s Shakespearean in it’s’ importance in the scheme of the world. It matters.

What brings this on? I got a call last night – and an email this morning about an isolated – minor incident that I related on my Blog – about the simple act of nutting myself with a magazine in the driveway riding home the other night. The event cracked me up – but it wasn’t a big crash – or a huge event….it was just a few seconds in the day to day of everyday – but it connected with some very close friends of mine who frequent offcamber for comic relief and inspiration.

One of those guys – Drac – is in year 20 or so of a battle with some satanic combination of aliments that preclude him from doing most things – even sometimes taking away his music – not allowing him to play guitar because of numbness and lack of mobility in his joints. He writes to me about the butterfly garden that he has at home – and about counting bird species for some betty ranger he met at a state park. He can’t ride – he can’t run – he can’t ski – some days he can’t move. His attitude is unreal and inspires the shit out of me every day – I think about him every day.

So – if nutting myself, and writing about it can bring a smile to a six and a half foot tall brother – halfway across the country – there Is something inherently noble about that – and about the statement that we make every time we take the time to write shit down. It means we know it matters. It means we know it’s important. It means we know it is impermanent and fleeting.

And that’s pretty fucking cool.

2004-02-18T15:52:00.000-08:00

"I am not here for a long time.
I am here for a good time".

Unknown

2004-02-18T09:59:00.000-08:00

Damn.

66 degrees in Boulder today. February the 18th. Strange. Contending more with slush, semi-frozen snow on the ride home last night - than with freezing temps and the white stuff. No booties, took my gloves off for the climb out of Ned - and the hands were warm - despite the light spray of mud coming up from the road. The sky is just showing at 6:10 after the can unloads. I can make it about halfway up the climb before I have to turn the light on. I go without - as the visibility is reasonable what with the reflection off the snow.

I have to remind myself to just ride slow, enjoy the night - as this is the DOWN time in a series of days that are taxing from a work standpoint. Haven't really found the profesional groove since Mexico. I guess 8 days with no shoes and rolling around in the embryotic sack of the ocean will do that. Just being inside was really hard for the first few days..the 14 degree morning we had at Eldora was comically painful. A reality check for sure - but this is a fine old version of reality.

Orion's belt is directly overhead along the big meadow - and the stars are just on fire - completely still - not a breathe of wind. It's very peaceful and quiet - and I can smell and feel spring oozing out of the ground. It's a time of awakening - when my favorite thing to do is watch the transitions day to day - and wait for the little purple desert flowers that pop out of the snow as soon as the weather allows. It'll be a while - the heaviest snow won't be for 6 weeks or more. But the birds are coming back already - and the sun is higher - and soon things will be green and amazing.

We have an insane clown posse heading for the continental divide courtesy of Monarch Mountain Snowcat tours this weekend. An expensive day - but as DV8 said yesterday - trading cash for experience is always a great call. I looked at some photos from the trip 2 years ago and they literally kept me up last night. We threw a 30+ foot cornice at the end of the day last year - all bets off - just fall. It was pretty cool. I hope it's still there this year and that we all walk away from the great adventure in good form. Our local snow conditions have been so poor this year - I am not sure I will remember how to bounce and gyrate through deep, high quality snow over cliff bands and chutes.

I bet it'll come back pretty easy.

Picked up the mail last night - quite a bit of it - crammed it into my pants on the way down the last bit of road. After making it the 6 miles of ice/snow/schnow/slush without incident - I endo - right in front of the house. My rolled up 'Surfer's Journal', various bills, a few catalogues slam my private parts good as the seat comes up underneath me as I pitch forward into the wet slush of the driveway, slowly sliding down 10 or so feet with the bike still attached to the right leg. I lay there for a minute - grinning, and staring up at the stars. The grin stays with me...hoping for some epic weather tomorrow for the ride.

2004-02-17T16:19:00.000-08:00

Entertainment is changin', intertwinin' with gangstas, in the land of the killers, a sinner's mind is a sanctum
holy or unholy, only have one homie, only this gun, lonely cuz don't anyone know me
Yet everybody just feels like they can relate, I guess words are a mothafucka they can be great
or they can degrate, or even worse they can teach hate
It's like these kids hang on every single statement we make, like they worship us
plus all the stores ship us platinum, now how the Fuck did this metamorphosis happen?
From standin' on corners and porches just rappin'; to havin' a fortune, no more kissin' ass
But then these critics crucify you, journalists try to burn you, fans turn on you, attorneys all want a turn at you
To get they hands on every dime you have, they want you to lose your mind every time you mad
So they can try to make you out to look like a loose cannon. Any dispute won't hesitate to produce handguns
That's why these prosecutors wanna convict me, strictly just to get me off of these streets quickly
But all they kids be listenin' to me religiously, so I'm signin' CDs while police fingerprint me
They're for the judge's daughter but his grudge is against me. If I'm such a fuckin' menace, this shit doesn't make sense B
It's all political, if my music is literal, and I'm a criminal how the fuck can I raise a little girl?
I couldn't. I wouldn't be fit to. You're full of shit too, Guerrera, that was a fist that hit you!

2004-02-11T09:59:00.000-08:00

“Night flying over charted country by the aid of instruments and radio can still be a lonely business, but to fly in unbroken darkness without even the cold companionship of ear-phones or the knowledge ahead that somewhere there are lights and life and a well marked landing field is something more than just lonely. It is at times unreal to the point where the existence of other people seems not even a reasonable probability. The hills, the forests, the rocks and the plains are one with the darkness, and the darkness is infinite. The earth is no more your planet than a distant star – if a star is shining; the plane is your planet, and you are its’ sole inhabitant”

Beryl Markham commenting on a cross Africa solo night flight in 1932

2004-02-10T07:46:00.000-08:00

"Sitting on the floor in my basement, holding this yellow and orange piece of foam and fiberglass in my arms as if it were a child.

I felt like I was sucker punched between the eyes. I was dazed. Why did I give up the life that made me so happy? I used to live like royalty on $100 a week; now I am barley scraping by on $5,000.

One thing I learned is that money doesn't change your life. You just live at a higher level of pover rty.

I didn't have to become an ascetic and meditate on a mountaintop to reach enlightenment. I needed the ocean again"

Leon Lanzbom

2004-01-30T14:17:00.000-08:00

Countdown to ecstasy.

Some rock hard turns in the am, maybe a quick skate on the home pipe - and then off to Mexico for 7 days.

Just the opportunity to sleep outside for 7 nites - is so amazing - and the fact that I finally convinced my wife to come back to Mexico after a bad trip 5 years ago. My friend scott is getting there before me - he has offered to gather boards, rash guards, beer, mosquite net, etc. These are the necesities - so that I can roll out of bed on Sunday morning before first light, stumble down to the water, and paddle out into 8o degree water with the first hint of light just climbing into the sky. As the sun rises in the break - you look back towards shore and the hills behind town go all red - imitating their larger brothers out here in our yard. It is an amazing, grounding, womb like experience to dive under water and look up through the clear blue and see the sunrise up there in the sky.

Adios. And as our hero - Canoe Says: "Surfing is for little rubber people who don't shave yet; and finally: Vaya Con Dios".

2004-01-29T14:53:00.000-08:00

“Maybe in another life I could find you there,
Pulled away before your time
I can’t deal it’s so unfair.

And it feels like heavens so far away
And it feels like the world is so cold now that you’ve gone away”

Dexter Holland

Why Dexter is echoing right now – I do not know. I learned this song a number of years ago – right after Columbine. It was a coping mechanism for fitting the events of that day into my small, idealistic, petty mind. I was in O’Hare – definitely one of the shittier airports in the system – and ironically- I was in the same place that I was when they let OJ go. There were hordes of people gathered around the monitors in the terminal – much like there were at the end of the trial – only the headlines had Denver news stations, and I recognized some of the landscape shots of the mountains – My Mountains – in the background. The whole way home that day I just couldn’t fathom what had happened there – made all the more powerful as I feel like Colorado is home after 15+ years. This happened on sovereign soil. What the fuck Freddy?

Working backwards – why is Dexter there? In the cerebrum this fine morning on the runway in San Jose – Silicon Valley – home of the lost fortune and found gazillionaires and every tech thing you could possibly imagine? I have been struck on this trip by the complete VOID of personal space out here in the business travel landscape. Not that this is something new….obviously has been going n forever. But – on the way out there was a guy sitting next to me who basically usurped half my seat with his elbows, knees, etc. and spoke on his phone as if he were in a crowded bar – when in fact he was 9 inches from my face. I repeatedly asked him for a little space, a little elbow sharing, and a little consideration. He looked at me like I was really running his day. Looking over his shoulder I gathered from his spreadsheets, etc. that he ran a call center based in India. High volume, low dollar – certainly not made in the US of God Damned Bruce Springsteen – A. Who needs people – when you have technology? What you can’t see – the 12 year old making the solicitation call – won’t hurt you – would you like to buy anything else from Sky Mall today Mr. Bodkabob?

Spent a great deal of yesterday discussing technology and something that was both disturbing and interesting is that all of the iPod advertising now – the PEOPLE have been sublimated into the background and the only other thing that you can see is the device? WTF? Remember the old apple ads – what’s on your Powerbook? Well – haven’t we come full circle Mr. Jobs? Seems that we are simply background news…simply the things that are plugged in at the end of the Matrix?

So – back to the skate park – where we invariably end up.

Pouring rain on the flight in – and I was totally bummed. I flew out specifically to get a few hours in the Promised Land – Sunnyvale – my favorite park in these here United States. If it’s raining at 10pm – odds of having dry ‘crete in the am is basically next to nothing. I went to bed a little bummed – but – such is life. Woke up early – laid there and just fretted and fumed over the fact that I could be skating – and that I wasn’t. I made this huge ordeal in my head about how I could have caught an early flight Tuesday instead of a late one Monday…blah, blah, blah.
Opened the shades at 6:40. Parking lot is dry. WHAT! WHAT! Park opens in 20 minutes……Haul ass…..motivate….appreciskate opportunity for dry ‘crete.

Park was empty. Like 3 puddles the size of a small pizza pie. I absconded with the bath mat from the hotel in anticipation and used it to clean things up a bit. As I was wiping down the concrete I had a vision in my head of footage from Northwest – about the guys from Dreamland – the company that builds parks. How would it be to form one of these parks – and skate it as it evolved? It’s kinda like the home ramp – the more love you give it – the more it gives back.

Skated for almost three hours – making the decision that food in the belly fell far behind in the priorities to rolling around Sunnyvale. Skated with one guy I knew – he is the drummer for a band called ‘Nightly Vaginal Excretions’. There’s another discussion topic that I won’t try to tie in here.

Meetings, work, blah, blah. Missed my flight out – there were no more. Capitalize on the time – head for the Vans Park in Milpitas. Home of the famed Mickey Mouse Bowl. 101 was so totally jammed with traffic – raining lightly – just confusing as fuck out there in the real world.

Found the park – which is in this hideous huge mall. Skaters in the parking lot – attitude thick as frozen peanut butter. Cruised in…there was definitely a heavier vibe than the last time I was there – which was a mid-day session. The heavies come out at night.

As soon as I walked into the place – I was grinning like a fool. The noise, the SMELL…the sounds of trucks hitting coping and people banging their boards around on the coping to show respect/homage/stoke for other skaters.

The skating was heavy. I was in over my head with 6 guys who were all WAY better than me in the first five minutes. In my mature state…I have found ways to relax – and actually warm up before hitting the deck…I warmed up – pulled some trix out of my butt – and it was a hella session.

There was a young, pony tailed girl/young woman there – couldn’t a been a day over 2- killing it. I wanted to shoot video to inspire my wife to get out and skate more (she can almost keep her momentum all by herself in our home pipe) but I thought that would be lurk like.

It was a killer session….capping off almost 6 hours of skating that day.
That’s a bonus check right there I am tellin’ ya.

2004-01-26T11:29:00.000-08:00

As if to add insult to injury - it snowed 5 inches in Boulder last night - and NONE at the mountain?!?!?

Wha' Happened?

Magnolia was comedy this morning. The Subaru Outbrat - studded tires freshly biting through the snow - I passed myriad other vehicles that could eat mine alive (from a monthly payment standpoint) that just pulled the fuck over...Mr. Range Rover - see ya! Mr Audi...oooooh - love the cost of those replacement parts...Mr. Explorer - would love to have that swing weight and rollover capabilities on the switchbacks. Our road drops some 3,000 feet in 4 miles - and when it's gamey - it's gamey for real.

Then - oh - the JEEP Certified POS is railing - but - oh - it's not like in the commercial - and he goes straight where he dhould have turned...and - oh yes - he's upended in the ditch. God Bless SUV advertising.

Killer weekend - rode into Ned with TT Saturday - in shorts. Damn (yes - we do live at 8,000 plus feet - and yes it is january). the 1x felt like a tank after the Hooby all week - but the descending was just effortless and comfortable. I still sketch on the X- bike in snowy, steep, descents. The mountain bike just rolled - and it felt quite nice.

Saturday afternoon the Mexcican and I threw about on the ramp - and it was a bit of a beat down. Having JUST learned the nose blutn the trick still exists in this never-never world of having pulled it - but not really having it down 100%. So - you have the confidence - so you go for it - but then when you miss - you are acting like you are going to make it - and the result is typically a pretty good slam.

Sunday was killer - did chores and then rallied for the TERRAIN PARK at Eldora with the mexican. Rails, jumps, ice-pack - funny. I so associate the snowboarding experieince with woods, powder, FREE-riding - but - it was pretty cool to get over in the terrain park and slide some LOW rails. Quite intimidating - but very scary and refreshing to do something a little different on the board. Felt good.

Off to Sunnyvale and the Land of Packard. Forecast says rain - but I really don't think it would do that to me.

Right?

2004-01-22T13:50:00.000-08:00

Fuck me freddy, but it was cold this morning.

Bank said 23 - but the wind was crisp - and unpredictable - and when it hit - it was cold. Me and the hooby hit the snowpacked road early to do the mini-commute to the bus. Caught the sunrise going up Lazy Z - and the peaks were all orange and amazing - looking really, really, cold.

Big Springs was hysterical - flipped 3 times - but cleaned one generous portion of the descent. The Hooby Kona Cross bike is becoming an all time favorite bike. It is fast, versatile, twitchy, slices through the snow - and just feels damn good. one of my co-workers has lauded his X- bike for years saying that if he only could have one bike - it ouwld be his cross. i think I might have to agree.

Right horse - right course. Someone said that to me yesterday morning as we were hard-booting our way across fresh cordurpy at the mound. It's like that with boards (I have like 13 snowboards at last count); bikes (3) and surfboards (many). The marginal utility gained from being on JUST the right piece of equipment for JUST the right day - it just sweetens the deal. Of course, snowboarding on a 2 X 4, or surfing on a log would be a great experience. But - having the right gear - damn it sure makes it nice.

So, I think the Hooby will see me through the Spring - and well into summer. I plan on doing many road rides on it to prepare for the CT...actually - maybe try to get fit for once.

Shwank.

2004-01-21T16:13:00.000-08:00

11 this morning.

About 900 degrees in the Lakewood X-games Skatepark last night. Nice contrast. Last night I was doing silly flippy tricks on curved wood - and this morning I was doing silly arcing turns on curved wood. How Veird!

Last night there was an old schooler just ripping it up - fluid - smooth - airs - technical. I skated with him for a little bit looking for Meriweather who i thought got mugged in the parking lot - but he was purchasing a new deck. The subtle POP and feel of a new deck can really impact your skating (well - not yours - I don't even know if you skate).

BUTT...anyhooooooo

Here is this guy killing it - and whit and I are getting all stoked in like the first 4 minutes of the session - the sessions are 2 hours - so you have to pace your self - at least at my age. I almost died like 3 times in the first 5 minutes as I was stepping up - as this guy was forcing our respective hands into skating pretty hard - taking some risks - rolling the proverbial dice. Whit pulled a frontside rock and roll in the first three minutes - which - well - is creepy. Damn hard trick....

So - we skated hard...slid home in the Vanagon with accompnaying Mexican hoppy beverages..and it was - well - all good as they say - here.

This am was fuhricking BLUEBIRD and the famed Nealey/aka Sprinkler made an appearance on the corduroy - and despite his absence for years and years - he was veritably killing it out there.

the sky was SO clear that it was basically blue/black. Fresh snow - wind whipping spindrift of crystals all over the peaks and our hills.

Wake me up.

Or better yet.

Don't.

2004-01-19T11:02:00.000-08:00

There was a wall of cold this morning. About 20 yeards from the mouth of the tunnel in Boulder Canyon - there was a palpable membrane of fog and moisture welling up from the flats - hopefully bringing snow to our parched landscape. The ride had been quite pleasant up until then..a bit of wind - but nothing too freezing. Not bad for January.

T'was a random weekend - as there was not enough coverage to warrant a trip up to Eldora - at least for this cowboy. After the back has been open - and is now closed due to the rapid demise of the snow. Going backwards - caught in the temporal metaphors of what it means to go forward (more snow....more snow). It's kinda nice to get a break from the mountain - as from the opening bell in November - to whatever day they close in April - it's a dawn kind of thing every saturday and sunday - and that does get tiring. Oh so tiring - that rally for the first chair. Oh, woe is me.

So, Saturday - we reconn'ed. Me and the little missus hiked down to Boulder Canyon through some random ass shit looking for things that don't exist. Well - they don't - don't bother - there is NOTHING down there. Nothing. Zilch. Nada.

Sunday dawned pretty sweet - and I was in a great, centered place until I started reading The New York Times. Yes, we live in a bubble - and if people say boulder isn't part of reality - then I guess Nederland is something like Michael Jackson's Never Never Land Ranch - exisiting in the heart of LA. The whole Wal-Mart locking their employees in on overnite shifts - and employees being told that if they use the fire exit they will be fired (Hmmmm - should I burn up - or lose my job so that I can't provide for my family on the $12,800 a year I make from Wal-Mart? Tough choice? I am sure Sam Walton was a smart man, and that there really isn't some evil conspiracy behind the GLOBILIZATION of the world - and the fact that Wal-Mart demands that their vendors decrease price EVERY YEAR. But - damn - all I can say is Lick my ass - and I will NEVER shop there. Anyway - between that and some of the Shrub rhetoric in there - and the corporate speak of some of these giant companies (that my business sucks the teat of - but that's a different day). Damn - but doesn't the world feel fucked? But the Pope approved Mel Gibson's Jesus film - aren't you relieved that the Catholic church is going to allow you to see that movie?

So, after the paper - I cut some wood - pretending that it was somebody I hated - noone in particular - just people in general. Then on to skating.

Based on whatever I was feeling that day - I went out and wrote 'Noseblunt' on the ramp. It's a trick I have been trying for quite some time - and one that I felt may have slipped through my fingers. I almost landed a few about a month ago - and I kinda gave up as I was getting disappointed with the results...i.e. falling on my face every time I tried one. So - I wrote it on the ramp in really small letters - and went about the business or warming up - stretching - getting the wheels back under the proverbail ass and getting loose.

I started doing set ups - and pulled one in and ate it onto my face. Meriweather manned the camera - and shot a few falls - one I fell forward onto my chest - the next I fell back onto my back and head. The third one - I stuck. Rode away in a wobble - but I landed it. Fourth one - I cleaned it - and then it was over - I have the trick. Simple as pie.

It reaffirms things for me when this happens - these breakthroughs on wheels. They are really solid markers to lay down along the road of life: Couldn't do this yesterday - did it tiday. Wow. It's like framing a house - you can see what you've done - and you can stand on it - and walk on it and this is a concrete feeling of accomplishment that I think lacks in a great portion of our day to day lives. There comes a point when you commit to either pulling the trick - or getting hurt. There really isn't too much in between. As soon as you make that commitment - you get the trick - the move - the contract - the job...the life.

Or you walk away busted up - knowing that you committed to doing it.

Bolts - or Busted Stuff. Not a whole lot in between that really gets the juices flowing - eh?

To end - here is a quote that I had forgotten about - that rattles my world.

"I guess i could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me but it's hard to stay mad when there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes i feel like i'm seeing it all at once and it's too much may heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst and then i remember to relax and stop trying to hold on to it and then if flows through me like rain and i can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life.

You have no idea what i'm talking about, i'm sure, but don't worry you will someday."

Lester Burnham

2004-01-13T11:17:00.000-08:00

It's mid 60's. It's January in Colorado.

Our snow cover is running down the mountain in small rivulets - only to freeze again into a slick sheet of ice.

There is a brand new rocket ship espresso maker about 11 feet from my desk. It makes rich, dark, frothy caffeinated beverages at the touch of a button. It was designed by Ferrari - and it is really a thing of beauty.

Vroom.

The park beckons. To pretend that it's summer - and roll around the homne turf and look for new lines and new connections. I am going to try to devote a certain percentage of skate time to lines and connections I have never tried before.

Dave Wilcox has a nice music based analogy about this very thing. Saying that he used to de-tune his guitar into something that didn't even come close to any useable tuning. He likened it to driving home a different way - just changing it up a bit. See things from a new perspective. He would re-tune and end up somewhere he hadn't been before. One other Wilcox-ism - is from a song called 'How did you find me here'. All about walking and looking and searching - and at the end of the song - he turns and sees the thing that he has been looking for - the ocean - and he has been paralleling in the entire time he has been searching.

"Now Inches from the water - about to disappear
I see you beside me - how did you find me here".

2004-01-12T16:01:00.000-08:00

Three days. Three flights. Two delays. Two 14 hour days. Candle burning. But there is salvation.

Sunnyvale. Hebrew for “That ‘crete which gives me great pleasure”. I have been a little under the weather so I don’t feel like I have been pushing it as much as I should – should being really bad term for whatever the fuck I SHOULD be doing on a skateboard.

One by product of long plane flights - when I watch skating for hours at a time – I get inspired and I remember that skating – is all about rolling. To quote Ben Krehn: “You stand, and roll”. Not too super complicated. I get hung up on the “did this – made that”. FTS. Watching Mike Vallely skate – and Alex Chalmers – I realize that terrain is a blank slate – and just like canvas – what appears there comes from within – not from the medium as Marshall Mcluhen might say. We are responsible for our tricks – our lines – our movements on skateboards. There are no compulsory moves when you go to the park – and there is no grading other than the craving for approval from your demented inner self - a visceral need for progression. At the end of the session – you answer to yourself – you gauge your own stoke based on what you convinced yourself to do.

I have to shout out to Mike V again – as I am so inspired by his skating. It is not new school – but he has some very new school moves. It is not all old school – it’s basically using the terrain in a very creative and PERSONAL way – and not being concerned about crossing off the boxes in a test. It’s about taking the surfaces and curves – and letting them run through you – and asking them what you should do. It is so much like surfing in that way on that each wave is different. It makes it a little more challenging even in that waves change all the time – and every time you drop into a bowl you have skated 100 times – the tranny’s are the same – the coping is in the same place. It’s up to you.

What are you going to do with it?

2004-01-07T14:36:00.000-08:00

Finding the energy to address the keys here – the first road blog of 2004 – the year of 40 for me – actually the 41st year – or Number 41 as Dave Matthews would say. All harbingers of good things.

The thought of getting back on a plane, on the road, rental car return – hotel – bad air – germ tube – it is all a little overwhelming – and as I stretched last night on yoga – and loitered over coffee this morning I tasked my self with ways to make the road experience as pleasant and disruptive as possible. Having two full weeks at the ranch to do nothing but recover from the year of 2003 – and plan and meditate on 2004 – this is a major goal of mine. I traveled 23 times for business last year – and will probably do about the same this year. That’s every other week. Granted – I am not wearing a suit – and I am carrying a skateboard – and I do get to play a hell of a lot on the road – but – the road can make you tired. As Dale Krantz said: Let the road age your face while you spin your wheels”

Got a three-peat here: Seattle for Starbucks (and 2 new parks); San Francisco for 2 critical meetings with Levi’s and then on down to Palo Alto for a key meeting with Hewlett Packard. Amazing clients – amazing opportunities.

I have my friends…the entire vintage captured crew of Lynyrd Skynyrd blaring the engine noise into oblivion – and I just laughed and gaped my way through the 2002 Tony Hawk Gigantic Skatepark Tour. These are the things that keep me alive and well out here in the land of the BUSINESS traveler’s hell. They are my tendrils that connect me to home and heart and keep me sane and focused and motivated.

The line up looks a little like this as far as terrain: Tonight we are going to skate the Skatebarn in Renton, WA. An indoor facility that looks like it boasts some exceptional terrain from what I can see on the web. Then tomorrow it’s on to SF – rest day on the board depending on weather – or I might get to skate a very ghetto park called Greer Park on Palo Alto – connections allowing. Friday – it’s down to Sunnyvale to the crux of the biscuit – my favorite park that I skated last year (of some 25 new ones). Smooth grey ‘crete – amazing transitions, a nice keyhole that is tight and intimidating – and some great open lines. My first meeting Friday is at 11 – so I will have the morning to skate – which from past experience means I will have the park to myself. This is good – this is amazing – just having 90 minutes or so alone to connect the dots in a sculpted playground.

Seattle is snowing, 33 and I am hoping I can lay my hands on some of that amazing Cuban coffee that I as able to coerce out of my friends here last time around. Hallelujah.

2004-01-04T12:02:00.000-08:00

January 4, 2004

New Year - Clean Slate - go to it Boyz

“Hell hath no fury like a female rock spurned”

Shakesbeer

Father, forgive me for I have sinned. I missed the best powder day of the year at the rock, and I beg thee forgiveness. Albeit for me to make excuses, but I feel that French kissing small rubber babies leagues away in the town of Rock qualifies as God’s work. If the inbound midget were ever to choke on snow…I would now be able to rescue him/her/it so him/her/it could continue of to pillage decades of powder days to honor thy name. Hallelujah.

Two weeks of vacation. Sweet. No snow for the first 10 (well – one day that was reasonable – but my Ipod was unsuccessful in over-riding the ever running mouth of the Dali Llama ): “So, I just look at the face of the mountain and I say Dude – let’s party” Gak.. The wind has been howling and we have been stuck in the border town of Shitdom that lies between freezing cold weather – and freezing cold weather with actual rideable precipitation. Snow – white gold – powder that is.

This past Wednesday we rallied for Winter Park and Mary Jane. It was outstanding. The snow was knee to thigh deep, the woods were deeper and it re-awakened in me the bliss and joy that are the primary products of the snow-sliding life. We did some bumps – as the Jane is bump kingdom – and they are steep bumps and they are relentless. I was tip toeing the line of my abilities on one of the steeper pitches of Trestle – and I just got this rush from being there on the edge – and wondering if I could hook the turns or if I would roll over a small rock band and face the consequences whatever they may be. When 30% of Eldora is open – and the woods are NOT open – there are few moments like that – it’s just groomers and a few bumps. It was sweet to get scared – I liked it. I went back for more until my legs would carry me over nothing else.

Fast Forward 2 days to Friday – and there was some significant snowfall - something between 4 and 8 inches with white-out conditions – snow falling straight down – a rarity for our hometown field. The whole posse showed – something like 8 – 10 good pals and gals taking turns grinning while others ridiculed from the lift. It was a good day – great meal at Annie’s afterward – and a great nap and an all around perfect vacation day.

Snowed all night Friday night – there was some significant build up – I imagine Saturday was an outstanding day. We drove to Boulder – first tracks down Magnolia in the dusk of dawn. Infant CPR, first aid, etc. A very useful thing to be doing with our time and a requirement before we take possession of the new addition. Kinda comical driving east on a Saturday morning when the snow is deep. It echoes and illustrates the ridiculous focus and silly life we have. We basically don’t miss powder days. Period. They are finite and elusive. I was shocked that I was ok with this – but I guess one of these things about growing up is maturity – and if I exhibit that trait once in a blue moon I guess it’s ok.

Onto today. Left the house at 7:45 (first chair is 8:30) as I was going to be the first one down Corona today – come shit or shinola. First chair is a sprint for the back – and you must first ride up the front of the mountain (Cannonball) and then rip around the back on a run called Around the horn – and then ride the LEGENDARY corona chair up the face – then you are at the goods.

Rollinsville barbie’s husband, joey and I were first chair. It was ass cold. Something like 2, with winds coming up at like 40 + mph, and a strange fog that really chilled the outer skin layers. I have the Armageddon outfit that I use when the Rock calls in earnest: Windstopper balaclava (think bank robbers); fleece neck gaiter (Ipod earphones installed underneath) and a helmet. This effectively seals the entire head area and leaves just a smidge of the nose exposed. I smear Dermatone – a Vaseline like substance – on the end of my nose, crank the Hip Hop – and bang – ready to go.

We exit Chair # 1 and Josh immediately gets like 30 feet on me. The snow is stickier than hell due to the sub zero temperatures – and my board is barely sliding. I point – and follow – by the time we hit any degree of pitch – he is some 60 – 75 feet in front of me. We swoop around Hornblower with nary a turn and drop into the sweeping left of Around The Horn. I am riding a very small, very light board – Heelside 156 – a great tree/woods board – and it is less than stable at speed. There are small striations in the snow and I bounce and glide and catch unintentional air over the bumps. We swoop down to the lower pitch of ATH and the speed is getting critical. There is a lip on the way down that I don’t even lift up over – that I just glide some 10 – 15 feet horizontally in the air – touching down to the vibration and bbbrrrrrrrrraaaaaapp noise of freshly mowed snow. At the bottom of this pitch of ATH there is a tricky left that you hit really fast and it always feels like a combination of surfing – bottom turning on like a 70 foot wave – and skydiving – as when you round the corner you come face to face with the wind – straight off the divide – and straight into your face. There is an aggressive flapping noise that comes off of any baggy clothing, and even through the helmet and all my head protection it sounds like a jet engine.

About 250 feet of flat – and then one last giant drop to the left and you get to the corona chair. Josh still has about 50 feet one me as we hit the top of the last pitch and I go into a tuck and bomb the outside of the corner bracing for the second blast form the divide. I lock onto josh through a huge blast of windblown snow – his yellow pants fading into white – and then I am gaining. I catch his slipstream across that flats and pass on the right at speed. I have won the race to corona chair – I m the King – if only for a moment. Congratulations Mr. Williams – here is your prize – absolutely nothing!

It’s amazingly freezing on the lift – this chair being open to the west and the divide. The snow is pretty good – but I am so sure it was amazing yesterday and today we are dealing with some reasonably sloppy seconds. Enthusiasm for the terrain and the weather – now some 30 below – is not to be found in the Posse. I take a short break to heat my boots and feel pretty reinvigorated and ready to go hunt some rodents in the tight trees. I can find no partners as even the mexican bails – giving in to the ridiculous weather. I decide that what I am seeking on this fine day lies on the other side of the ropes, and in the never-never land (that’s ridiculous) of the random runs.

Dropping into Bryan Glade I bank hard right under the rope and traverse. The snow is deep and slow and quiet and wonderful. I cross the upper gulley and bank high – further east to a ridgeline. I must remove the board and hike a little to get over a small ride here – it is gorgeous in the woods and cresting I am taken out by the wind no less than three times – slammed down sideways while I try to hold onto my board. Clipping back in I traverse to an opening and have the whole left side of Muleshoe to myself for about 1,000 feet. This is part of my grail for the day – and the solitude is a blessing as I can go places that I normally wouldn’t. I do a few old Lewis and Clarke runs and finish with a crescendo of trees that have not yet been open – flat bottoming out and quietly gliding out of the woods without incident.

It is these three runs in the untrammeled fresh snow that pardon my sins for the lack if representation from 1934 on the prior day. I have made my rounds – checked on the quiet places in the woods – added my one tracked signature to the broad swaths of open white. The quiet places feed me and I am comforted in the knowledge that they are still there. The addictive rush of their sweet elixir is still capable of fending off my daily psychosis. I am safe – I can face the working world tomorrow and survive having cached some tiny part of myself in this dense and frozen forest. As long as the rocks is able to offer me these things in return for what I give here – I will keep returning forever.

Praise the lord and pass the ammo – I’m all shook up.

2004-01-04T11:57:00.000-08:00

January 4, 2004

New Year - Clean Slate - Go to it Boyz.

“Hell hath no fury like a female rock spurned”

Shakesbeer

Father, forgive me for I have sinned. I missed the best powder day of the year at the rock, and I beg thee forgiveness. Albeit for me to make excuses, but I feel that French kissing small rubber babies leagues away in the town of Rock qualifies as God’s work. If the inbound midget were ever to choke on snow…I would now be able to rescue him/her/it so him/her/it could continue of to pillage decades of powder days to honor thy name. Hallelujah.

Two weeks of vacation. Sweet. No snow for the first 10 (well – one day that was reasonable – but my Ipod was unsuccessful in over-riding the ever running mouth of the Dali Llama ): “So, I just look at the face of the mountain and I say Dude – let’s party” Gak.. The wind has been howling and we have been stuck in the border town of Shitdom that lies between freezing cold weather – and freezing cold weather with actual rideable precipitation. Snow – white gold – powder that is.

This past Wednesday we rallied for Winter Park and Mary Jane. It was outstanding. The snow was knee to thigh deep, the woods were deeper and it re-awakened in me the bliss and joy that are the primary products of the snow-sliding life. We did some bumps – as the Jane is bump kingdom – and they are steep bumps and they are relentless. I was tip toeing the line of my abilities on one of the steeper pitches of Trestle – and I just got this rush from being there on the edge – and wondering if I could hook the turns or if I would roll over a small rock band and face the consequences whatever they may be. When 30% of Eldora is open – and the woods are NOT open – there are few moments like that – it’s just groomers and a few bumps. It was sweet to get scared – I liked it. I went back for more until my legs would carry me over nothing else.

Fast Forward 2 days to Friday – and there was some significant snowfall - something between 4 and 8 inches with white-out conditions – snow falling straight down – a rarity for our hometown field. The whole posse showed – something like 8 – 10 good pals and gals taking turns grinning while others ridiculed from the lift. It was a good day – great meal at Annie’s afterward – and a great nap and an all around perfect vacation day.

Snowed all night Friday night – there was some significant build up – I imagine Saturday was an outstanding day. We drove to Boulder – first tracks down Magnolia in the dusk of dawn. Infant CPR, first aid, etc. A very useful thing to be doing with our time and a requirement before we take possession of the new addition. Kinda comical driving east on a Saturday morning when the snow is deep. It echoes and illustrates the ridiculous focus and silly life we have. We basically don’t miss powder days. Period. They are finite and elusive. I was shocked that I was ok with this – but I guess one of these things about growing up is maturity – and if I exhibit that trait once in a blue moon I guess it’s ok.

Onto today. Left the house at 7:45 (first chair is 8:30) as I was going to be the first one down Corona today – come shit or shinola. First chair is a sprint for the back – and you must first ride up the front of the mountain (Cannonball) and then rip around the back on a run called Around the horn – and then ride the LEGENDARY corona chair up the face – then you are at the goods.

Rollinsville barbie’s husband, joey and I were first chair. It was ass cold. Something like 2, with winds coming up at like 40 + mph, and a strange fog that really chilled the outer skin layers. I have the Armageddon outfit that I use when the Rock calls in earnest: Windstopper balaclava (think bank robbers); fleece neck gaiter (Ipod earphones installed underneath) and a helmet. This effectively seals the entire head area and leaves just a smidge of the nose exposed. I smear Dermatone – a Vaseline like substance – on the end of my nose, crank the Hip Hop – and bang – ready to go.

We exit Chair # 1 and Josh immediately gets like 30 feet on me. The snow is stickier than hell due to the sub zero temperatures – and my board is barely sliding. I point – and follow – by the time we hit any degree of pitch – he is some 60 – 75 feet in front of me. We swoop around Hornblower with nary a turn and drop into the sweeping left of Around The Horn. I am riding a very small, very light board – Heelside 156 – a great tree/woods board – and it is less than stable at speed. There are small striations in the snow and I bounce and glide and catch unintentional air over the bumps. We swoop down to the lower pitch of ATH and the speed is getting critical. There is a lip on the way down that I don’t even lift up over – that I just glide some 10 – 15 feet horizontally in the air – touching down to the vibration and bbbrrrrrrrrraaaaaapp noise of freshly mowed snow. At the bottom of this pitch of ATH there is a tricky left that you hit really fast and it always feels like a combination of surfing – bottom turning on like a 70 foot wave – and skydiving – as when you round the corner you come face to face with the wind – straight off the divide – and straight into your face. There is an aggressive flapping noise that comes off of any baggy clothing, and even through the helmet and all my head protection it sounds like a jet engine.

About 250 feet of flat – and then one last giant drop to the left and you get to the corona chair. Josh still has about 50 feet one me as we hit the top of the last pitch and I go into a tuck and bomb the outside of the corner bracing for the second blast form the divide. I lock onto josh through a huge blast of windblown snow – his yellow pants fading into white – and then I am gaining. I catch his slipstream across that flats and pass on the right at speed. I have won the race to corona chair – I m the King – if only for a moment. Congratulations Mr. Williams – here is your prize – absolutely nothing!

It’s amazingly freezing on the lift – this chair being open to the west and the divide. The snow is pretty good – but I am so sure it was amazing yesterday and today we are dealing with some reasonably sloppy seconds. Enthusiasm for the terrain and the weather – now some 30 below – is not to be found in the Posse. I take a short break to heat my boots and feel pretty reinvigorated and ready to go hunt some rodents in the tight trees. I can find no partners as even the mexican bails – giving in to the ridiculous weather. I decide that what I am seeking on this fine day lies on the other side of the ropes, and in the never-never land (that’s ridiculous) of the random runs.

Dropping into Bryan Glade I bank hard right under the rope and traverse. The snow is deep and slow and quiet and wonderful. I cross the upper gulley and bank high – further east to a ridgeline. I must remove the board and hike a little to get over a small ride here – it is gorgeous in the woods and cresting I am taken out by the wind no less than three times – slammed down sideways while I try to hold onto my board. Clipping back in I traverse to an opening and have the whole left side of Muleshoe to myself for about 1,000 feet. This is part of my grail for the day – and the solitude is a blessing as I can go places that I normally wouldn’t. I do a few old Lewis and Clarke runs and finish with a crescendo of trees that have not yet been open – flat bottoming out and quietly gliding out of the woods without incident.

It is these three runs in the untrammeled fresh snow that pardon my sins for the lack if representation from 1934 on the prior day. I have made my rounds – checked on the quiet places in the woods – added my one tracked signature to the broad swaths of open white. The quiet places feed me and I am comforted in the knowledge that they are still there. The addictive rush of their sweet elixir is still capable of fending off my daily psychosis. I am safe – I can face the working world tomorrow and survive having cached some tiny part of myself in this dense and frozen forest. As long as the rocks is able to offer me these things in return for what I give here – I will keep returning forever.

Praise the lord and pass the ammo – I’m all shook up.

2003-12-16T15:22:00.000-08:00

One Angry Traffic Cone

September '75 I was 47 inches high
Mom said someday I would have
A bad*ss mother G.I. Joe
for your little minds to blow
I still got beat up after class

Now I'm big and important
one angry dwarf
and 200 solemn face
are you
If you want to see me
check your papers and your T.V.
Look who's tellin' who what to do
Kiss my *ss good-bye

Don't give me that bullsh*t
you know who I am
I'm your nightmare little man
Vic you stole my lunch money.
made me cry.
Jane remember second grade
Said you couldn't stand my face
Rather than kiss me you said
you'd rather die

You'll be sorry one day
Yes you will, yes you will
You shouldn't push me around
Cause I will, yes I will
You will be sorry when I'm big
Yes you will be sorry

2003-12-12T15:49:00.000-08:00

Submitted to the Mountain Gazeette Via Email

Fuck That Shift

When in doubt – use fewer gears. Stop the brutal grooming – along with all that annoying shifting. Clickety clackety, Slap, Suck. Aren’t we out on our bikes to get away from all that stuff?

Nederland, Colorado. Reviled and ridiculed by some who have escaped the urban/wildlife interface of the front-range while pigeon holing our little berg as a wanna be mountain town. Crowds, SUV’s; Urban Folks; and small impotent ski areas; people who make a living at less than 4 jobs. No – many of us have shed the stigma of ‘poor and proud’ and hedged our bets in this small in-between place. Arnold and Elton can have Telluride and Goldie and Kurt – Aspen – I’ll hang here in obscurity and happiness.

Ensconced in the wilds of a frigid, windy valley – called Happy Valley – or the town of Eldora (not part of the ski area) dwells a character named DV8; Danimal, some call him Serial Dan (correct spelling) based on his vacant stare (too much Nordic skiing) and inability to articulate at times (too much time on course at Montezuma’s Revenge). DV8 disappears for weeks at a time – and we can picture him – out in the shed – cranking out these stickers solo at 8,300 feet – trying to change the world – one shift at a time. He runs offcamber.com (among doing other things) and he reminds us sometimes what it’s like – to be out there. Reading some of his journals – I feel comforted that I am not as weird as I think I am sometimes. Dv8 – thanks for the balance.

Why the attraction of a bike without gears – or one gear as it were – or two as many say – sitting and standing? What does this have to do with anything other than snobby, eclectic bored mountain bikers who need another reason to be cooler than everyone else?

So much technology and wi-fi this and that and you can feed your cat from your cell phone now – wow – isn’t that useful. This focus on simplicity – and yes – it does require a little more effort – and yes – a conscious decision not to ‘NEED’ the latest and greatest. A couple of years ago at Gunnison – a guy won the Pro – downhill on a rigid (no suspension is commonly associated with single speed bikes….a one speed with 6 inches of travel is kinda like an ethical republican – not something you see much) bike – no cushion to his pushin’. It was pretty cool to see the look of amazement as people watched him use technique and skill and dexterity and flow to get through a course that all the down-hillers were just straight lining – since they could – since their equipment was doing all their work for them.

Less is more? Is it that simple? Is it really more satisfying to get by with what you got – rather than the latest and greatest whiz bang gizmo?

Fuck that shift I say. My other bike is my feet. “Son – I find that sticker offensive” – says the lady as we are waiting for the bus. “Well – don’t fucking read it then”.

You keep printin’ em dan – and we’ll keep stickin’ ‘em.

2003-12-10T15:38:00.000-08:00

I can smell the open space of a day out of the office - like fresh leather - like chicken guts wafting east to west on the wings of a strong upslope.

If smells like freedom - like victory - like I am just giddy with the idea of not having to be anywhere until 9am - and that critical appointment is with a chairlift. 6 fresh yesterday - single digit temperatures - my motivation to ride and freeze has dwindled to basically non-existant. Last week was a pretty heavy all around - with 8+hours of labor on Saturday - heavy skating...riding, skating.

Yoga Monday night almost Kilt me - so - I figure recharging the batteries - banking some immune resistance - going in to the holidays - isa good thing. Two full weeks off - sounds like a buffet - a banquet - of downtime - music - sliding - rolling - flicking - killing sand creatures - and generally celebrating the passing into old age.

God Bless Amerika.

This time last year I was having mandatory Saturday meeitngs at the office - GREAT - and watching my pay decrease exponentially (wait - what's half of Zero Mr. Einstein?).

The year - from a revenue standpoint - which is the monkey that I haul around on my back all year - is over. Kaput. Done - banked - booked - DOA - or DRT as they say - Dead Right There.

Praise the lord and pass the bottle. Smoke 'em if you got 'em.

2003-12-08T16:23:00.000-08:00

The 'ramp' has morphed from a 'ramp' into a 'complex' over the weekend. Yes Martha - there is a Santa Claus.

Gazing out the shower window (oh the advantages of no neighbors), cradling the cold Arrogant Bastard (it's a beer, please) in my splintered palm, I feel a bit - silly - guilty - both - neither? I wax on about the excesses of the consumer economy - us - the richest nation in the world - the home of $600 umbrella stands and couches that could feed the children for months. Is the Goliath - that resides in the woods on the plantation up here one of those indulgences - or is it the opposite - one of the banners of rebellion against the world of luxury cars and signature fucked up color martini's? The actual investment of dollars in the ramp are reasonably insignificant on the scale of 'things that we waste money on" - like video games and bike parts and bike parts and beer and wine and expensive cheeses at WHOLE PAYCHECK. Over time - if I were an investing type person - and I am - I would say that the dividends paid on the ramp - are about as good as they get. Current total investment is repayed in one trick - one move - and one turn. It's paid for by sitting there watching my friends skate - get stoked - learn new tricks.

So - if turns were dollars - I would be a fucking millionaire. And they are - so I am.

So be it.

When I reach the pearly gates - and St. Peter says:"what do you got?" I can simply reply: I gave the gift of wood.

It was the article in the NYT's that out me over the top. Snot nosed Westchester kids with half-pipes in their yards.(wait - that was me 25 years ago). You see - I grew up with a pipe in the yard. Eight foot wide - two feet of vert - sick little monster courtesy of my dad. We built it together - one of the key moments of my life when he gave me those plans - and we built it together.

I lived across the street from my HS - and it was nice - cut class, skate, skate, skate...skate some more.

We added on this weekend (props to Redneck and Whitey). It was about an 8 hour process - but sure enough we were skating the new cross section of the Mojo ramp by dark. Three foot six tall - 8 feet wide with a 7"6 transition rather than 8. Just means that it's steeper - a little quicker - a little more kick to the pitch - a little more umph off the top.

Sunday - it birthed a new trick for me - ample payback for the splinters, flesh ripped from finger tips, and investment. Nose stall to revert. For the non-skateboarders (I doubt you have maintained interest to this point) that's going up forward on the ramp - leaning forward and stalling on the NOSE of the board - rather than the tail - where you (dear reader) would traditionally stall. Rather than just coming down switch - which means backward - you basically pre-load your body - twist 180 degrees - and pivot - and slide the board around 180 degrees - and come out of the tric forward. Wa - lah. Magic. New trick. Feels good - feels like I can skate.

And that's a good feeling.

And when I am dead - and rotting - deck cradled in my skinless decaying arms - I will not say - I wish I had a few more dollars - as they would do me no good - but the memories - and the feeling of doing things I never thought I could do - will carry me for quite a few nights in that cold dark box.

2003-12-05T08:31:00.000-08:00

14 degrees.

Pile of doo doo thermometer on the deck says 19. I know this is a lie.

Clear. Cold. Amazing early morning light - why not ride?

I realized a few things this morning - as I usually do - when I ride early and alone - and caffeinated.

Music - is nice - the ipod was a temptation this am - but I went without - as this is basically the only 'down' time I will have during the day. Work is out of control in a really good - but heavily stressful way. Before the mind gets wound up - it's nice to just concentrate on the cold air, the effort of climbing our dirt road (thankful for the uphill at this temperature) and just let the brain wake up....fire up slowly....find a pace and rhythym for the day.

14 at the base of the Z. Down to 11 at the top. It's really not bad - other than the exposed chin skin.

Random thought: The spinning of the legs is kind of a steam outlet for the brain and the body. The distraction of spinning, steering, pedaling - is so second nature it doesn't really take conscious thought - but it pre-occupies some part of the brain - and allows for a mental stillness that might not be there otherwise. At least for me - and my overactive - dangerous - paranoid inner thought generating system.

Onward. Upward...feeling colder but the light on the divide to the west is a great distraction. Cresting a small rise and descending to Giggy Lake - there is a strip of frost in the trees for south to north - maybe .5 mile in length and 150 feet wide - that I really don't understand - I guess it's the moisture sitting down low - and there is maybe a small gulley that runs that way that held a few degrees lower - so that the frost could form on the trees. From above - it looks like the trail of some low flying place (saucer) that fringed the trees.

Onward - westward. Short climb up into the trails - and I sak myself - SELF - why is always so much warmer in the woods? Surrounded by trees - the penetration of the cold seems to back off - like I can build up some warmth. Maybe it's the 'life' of the trees - and their systems - slightly raising the temp...don't know - but it's always warmer in there.

The trails are clear - very sad fact for this date in december at 8,000+ feet - but there are some pretty intense ice patches - still showing the tread of rides from a month ago - frozen hard beneath the coverage that recently melted away. Kinda slick in spots - but really amazing in the woods.

I reach the Zenith - where the rest of the ride is basically downhill - and have a moment of panic. I have a windstopper balclava that is just the essence of comfort in this type of weather - and I don't know if I have it. At 2 ounces or something - it's probably the most efficient piece of warmth preserving apparel that I own. I only rode once this week - and I don't recall keeping it in my pack.

I park - in the side of the trail - and dig - past the personal electronics; newspaper; Stephen King novel......and - wahhhla - she is there. It's only about a 5 minute descent into Ned - but damn - I think the chin/lower face area has many nerves - and when they freeze - it's pretty painful. The hood goes on, and it's like a blanky - or a sleeping bag for my face. It feels very nice and secure...and the ride down into town is uneventful and really pleasant.

Bank temp says 10. I do laps around the parking lot waiting for the bus and clamber aboard for the long descent that I am so happy is inside the belly of the beast.

God bless heat.

2003-12-01T15:39:00.000-08:00

Ahhhhh.

Just doesn't have the groove of a good session with friends.

Sunday - the friends showed - and there was a pre-determined agreement that we would forego the mountain in order to focus on the rolling wheels instead of the sliding boards.

Whitey showed, and El Presidente. I was still ina sleeping bag on the porch at 1pm - reading the NYT's - my only interaction with outside media in 5 days (FUBAR - fucked up beyond all repair is what resonates with me as I open the Sunday Paper from the big city across the way). 12 slain; 8 dead; BUSH; Michael Jackson...that's ridiculous - I didn't touch his winky.....ugh. Back to the blackout as they say.

So - fired some fresh coffee - gave thanks to the amazing 55 degree temperature - and started right off into some 'new' terrain. Whit was pulling together his reverts that he had 'found' in his bag of tricks at X-games earlier in the week. El Presidente was pulling some very strange fakie pivot grind things - not really sure what to call them. I was obsessing with nose blunts - and got all the way to back into the ramp on 3 - but did not land - as I was jumping off my board. Well - you say - just stay on your damn board! Hah. Brain says JUMP - brain says - you are going to fold your front ankle like a newly minted funny looking twenty dollar bill! I lost the battle - my over-ride switch was not working properly - must get that checked out. I knew I could do it - but committing over that line - where you are either going to make it - or get hurt - that's a scary place to visit. Didn't have the vision - the mojo that day.

I quit - without pulling the trick - which is ok. I felt a little wimpy - and I didn't have that hands over the head - kick the helmet in the air - I am on tour with Tony Hawk glow.......but - that's life in the big city. I 'felt' the trick for the first time- and once you get there- it's only a matter of time - and body slams - until you go down - BOLTS - and roll away. Hopefully this week.

I went in - showered - grabbed a beer and came back out. Apparently the tribbles had gotten to the gravity meter. Remember the tribbles from Star Trek? They used to just fuck with everything on the Enterpoop - damn. So - I sat down and sipped - just as Mike showed up. He wandered down with a beer to watch the show - what a great neighborhood we have. Then - like a human pinata spiked by EL DIOS above - Whit plummeted to the flat bottom like spaghetti shlapping onto the wall. Simple fakie rock disaster thingy - and he hung up. Hanging up - for the non-skaters in the crowd (exactly what crowd are we discussing here Mr. Spock?) hanging up is like running down a set of stairs - and tripping on a wire about half way down - and just clearing the bottom 8 or so stairs - and hitting the bottom - or what we call Flat Bottom in the skate biz. It's called flat - as if you land on the CURVED part of the ramp - you at least slide a little - but when you hit the flat - there is a sudden stop - commonly called deceleration trauma. Ouch. Whit went down hard on his hip. Looked pissed - that's when I can tell he's hurt. Then - five seconds later - Berto tweaks some backward grind thing and WHammo - down - rolling around.

Glad I missed that part of the session.

Onward. Downward. Inward.

2003-12-01T13:26:00.000-08:00

Two roads diverged in a wood – and I took the bus – and it was much easier.

We used to say that – as we were freezing our asses off in the hills of North Carolina on my winter mountaineering course – courtesy of outward bound. 31 below zero and we were humping packs and camping in canvas tents. That which does not kill you, etc, etc.

Working on the ramp Friday – Holiday – day after turkey day – a hell of a day. Rallied early for the mountain – rode the carving board and alpine boot set up – and it was fast and furious and quite enjoyable. I forget the rush of throwing turns at 35+mph and dragging my hips along the snow, popping out of turns with more speed than I came in with – and setting up for the next one. Tip, and rip as they say. Quite enjoyable.

Adding on to the ramp. We discussed putting the mini in Berto’s living room – but I sense the potential for regret – and if I am going to pay for it – it is going to be walking distance from the house. So, I have begun. I hope to spread the construction out over the next 4 weeks…and I don’t have to build the flat bottom – just the transitions – and they are only three feet 9 inches high – easy, cheesy. Another addition to a completely un-necessary, even over kill type structure. So be it. Fuck all. On the cusp of turning 40 – I don’t know – seriously – how many years I will be skating – and I have some serious time to make up – and I have some visions of some runs I would like to out together before I relinquish myself to the sidelines, sipping a Viagra cocktail.

Skated solo today after the mountain – and it was nice –a nd relaxing – but it just doesn’t have the groove of a good session with friends. The energy is created – and dissipates while you catch your breathe before the next run. There is no way to multiply it…grow it….feed off it……but in some ways – it is really peaceful and you can just work on things – or even just do tricks you know and try to push them two degrees further than you usually do them. I was stoked to pull a few FS disasters, and really feel in control of the speed of the board – in the air. I feel like I have done enough of them now – in a wide enough variety of circumstance – that I have a pretty good idea of what the board is going to do.

So – after a nap, and some dead bird leftovers……back to the ramp – working on it – 4:30 – something like that – feels like midnight in the middle of the arctic winter (I exaggerate to make a point) but the light is so fricking low. I am measuring the transitions, and marking them, and I stop to look over my shoulder – and there is: The sky is just beckoning. Deep blue with white and orange clouds – and I just know – from experience – how gorgeous the top of the ridge would be right now. Convincing myself that I am not a freak for rallying when there is 20 minutes of light left, and it’s 30 degrees, and blah, blah, blah (If I could stop having conversations in my head – I would have twice the free time I have right now) I throw on all my shit – grab a Double Bastard to bring to Mike up the road…and it’s off on the rigid single. I like the single when I am riding short and when I am not riding that much – it feels like it brings the ride closer – you get more for your money mile for mile on short rides.

Mike comes to the door complaining about his computer – and I hand hin the Double. Good call – he lloks very happy to be clutching it – and relishing the drinking of such a fine liquid. Mike’s a great friend – and he also allows us to ride across his porch – literally – to avoid a nasty climb at the beginning of most of our rides/Commutes. This means that Mike has folks cutting across his deck at 6am; 7:45 pm with lights – all manner and times of the day/night. I figure – I should drop more beer there – even just leave it on the porch as a token of appreciation for saving my knees over the years. More beer on the porch – ok – Thanksgiving resolution.

On to the ridge – along the crest of the ridge to the east and the sky is just on fire. Burning. Giant amazing reflections of the setting sun on the bottoms of the clouds. The spindrift from the peaks along the divide are backlit by the sun pulling behind them – to the west. It looks like the ocean. I always find it amazing the moods that the mountains express and the never ending subtleties that you see in them – much like the ocean. It seems that the ocean would have a leg up as it were – as it’s liquid – but the mountains have as many moods as any sea I have ever seen.

I park on the ridge top, and I wonder – if this might kinda be what heaven is like. Above it all….feeling so close to the clouds – and watching a sunset that appears to be lasting forever.

Down the ridge through some nice rock drops and sluices that I have not ‘run’ in quite some time…and on up the road a few hundred yards. Back to the house. The ride was maybe 3 miles on the long side – but I saw so many things and smelled and felt..and it was one of those rides that just pops into my head and heart – and will stay with me for a really long time..

2003-11-25T15:55:00.000-08:00

From The Boulder Daily Camera - all the news that's fit to misprint:

BOULDER COUNTY

Eldora closes from cold, wind

Bitter cold and high winds shut down Eldora Mountain Resort on Sunday, Eldora's first cold-weather-related closure in recent memory.

"I can't remember it ever happening, really," said Rob Linde, the resort's marketing director.

The ski area closed in the early afternoon, Linde said.

He didn't know how low the temperatures or how high the winds were: "It was just too cold," he said.

Danny Burbano, who was at Eldora on Sunday, said there were 40 mph to 50 mph winds at the top.

Linde said Eldora had three lifts open before having to close for the day.

I can't remember it ever happening, really. Kinda sounds like Sunday.

Dawn, cold, blah, blah, blah.

The Exploder - whit's vehicle - read 6 below in the parking lot at the rock. The wind was blowing. As DV8 said so well in his blog - the parking lot zombies were just that - lumbering, slow, they exhibited a paucity of movement that one might associate with someone who has designs on flesh eating in the near future. We parked - we sat - we laughed at the white out conditions - only able to wonder what the 1100 feet of ascent might do to the general conditions.

There were not a lot of takers. The pickings were slim. There was no line. Our boards stuck like sandpaper to the squeaky sub-zero surface.

I thought - I could have waxed for this - used my 20 below triple blue freezer wax......but - then - when it was really warm - say 15 - I would get back out here - and I would stick. So - alas - friction was an issue. But as Stephen Wright says - where the hell would we be without friction? Think about that one.

2003-11-19T15:57:00.000-08:00

A celebration of Spring. In November.

Squeaks was puuing some unrela switch tricks - switch nollie heel flip.....there were bets being placed - very focused skating. Work seems a million miles away as the temperature is in the mid 60's and it just feels really good to skate outside, be warm, sweat, and feel the sun.

There is a chasm - a veritable grand canyon - a lunar sea - between the skating that I do in my head - and the skating that comes out of my feet. I can visualize tricks that I won't be able to do for a few years. Take for instance - the nose blunt. Simple - go up the wall backwards - get all your weight on your front wheels - upweight over the coping - and right before you shoot your board backwards into the fence - lean in enough to slap the nose of your board - about the top 3 inches - on the wall. Picture standing on top of a building on a lunch tray - and nose wheelie - ing down the wall. So - you come up backwards - balance in that comfortable position for a few microseconds - then - lean in - POP your board off the wall - and 'follow it in' as they say. Scary. Hard - very un-intuituve.

Very beautiful though - watched some unknown dude yesterday pulling 'em like butter - like the gravity switch had been thrown and he was no longer effected in the least. Just those few milliseconds of weightlessness - a good reminder.

2003-11-18T11:20:00.000-08:00

Cold.

Like - 13 I think on the thermometer. But - the thermometer is hidden in the LEE of the gale - of the fight between fall and winter that we are in the middle of at 8,000 feet. 60 in Boulder - 15 in Ned - someone has to be in the grey zone - and it is us.

Up at 5 - tried to sleep - can't. Checked the temp. - can't really see it and don't really want to know. Riding regardless. Need the down time - need the quiet.

Out and up - cross the road and start climbing immediately into the woods. A couple of rules that will hold - when it's this windy - and this cold - stay off the road - don't even think about going west - and NEVER shake a baby.

It's cold. As I am climbing out of the low point of our road up to the ridge - my feet are going numb. I am riding straight uphill - but I can't feel my legs. They are getting that thuddy feeling that means they are not going to be that responsive in a little while. The sun - refuses to climb over the ridge - and as such - there is not the psychological benefit of the rays. It is dark - it feels dark - it is really kind of gnarly.

Oh - and the wind is like 50 mph straight out of the west.

The ride seems long - and it seems like an effort to stay warm. Not even to get warm - or be really comfortable - but just to stay warm. I am matching effort with the drain of the temp - and we are coming out even.

Magnolia - sucks. Ice for the first 1/4 mile - little lines of singletrack through the frozen tire marks of cars. It's ass cold. But - I hit some sun on the 2nd switch of the descent - and mentally - this makes it a little easier.

It is damn cold in Boulder and I roll the path solo - through town - and to Diggers. Large Latte - egg sandwich - by the time I get to work - I can almost feel my thighs.

Nice.

Three hours later - and my shin bones are still cold. Winter. Love it.

2003-11-14T16:06:00.000-08:00

Opening day at the rock.

Sixty three degrees in Boulder - a mere 20 miles away. Oh - the pain of the decision making process.

Yesterday - the 'crete at the Boulder skatepark was O' so sweet and loving. Eldora has one run open - International to Cornblower. Not exactly Vail's back bowls. But enough - to feel the pull of gravity as p-texed bases glice across white shit. That's magic in and of itself.

As the rest of the crew mirrored - I scrounged around for gear - my boots are ancient and busted. Bindings are gnawed upon and ancient. My bibs are in year 11. It all works - it's all broken (in) and it will make it another season.

Head to the lab to pick up the freakish dentists - Ray is on day 6 - mike is giving in to Ray's endless rants about the perfect storm and the nine feet that will fall and the defensive snow on the left side of psychopath..........

Shelf road is a mess. Wind blowing, iced in...cars sliding.....classic. There is a solid 4 inches in the parking lot which means there may be as much as twice that on top. We get our passes, we gear up - the process is so remote control after so many years. I have had a pass on this mountain since 1989. That's 14 years. Average 70 plus or minus days a year - that's 980 days on Eldora's 600 acres. I was there before there was snowmaking on the back...back in the days of 'there is no such thing as a snowboard boot' and when the back was open it was like a national holiday. In all reality - not much has changed.

We have a great groove at Eldora. We have a great Posse, and we have a damn good time. We are oh so blessed to have that place as a resource in the winter.

The snow - was damn good - 6+ inches of fresh over some questionable surfaces - but the first run was a glimmer of longer powder days with more vertical and more floating and more screaming and bliss. The lift, however, did stop today for almost 20 minutes on opening day - opening CHAIR. The fist eight chairs of the YEAR were there - doubled up - there we were - hanging in space - like frozen sides of beef in the warehouse - exposed to the wind and the snow. And the lift - didn't move. Classic - epic - just storybook Eldora.

The powder didn't last too long today - as there was - you guessed it - one run open. People were hitting it pretty hard. There was some great depth on the sides - but you just had no idea where the stumps and the holes were. Nothing like getting taken out on opening day.

The RITUAL of the place is hard to beat - and seeing faces and a community that only congregates on the mountain is pretty cool. I don't think it is rare to have the kind of energy that happens at Eldora occur around a small - locals type of place - but it is rare to be part of it - and for that - shit or shinola - neck deep or boiler plate - we are RICH.

2003-11-13T16:18:00.000-08:00

"well my daddy told me
A long time ago
Theres two things son
Two thinkgs that you should know
and in these two things
you must take pride
That's your horse
and your woman

Lord both of them - you ride"

What about the bike Ronnie, what about the bike?

2003-11-07T16:37:00.000-08:00

Crack goes the Arrogant Bastard - and - yes - it's the weekend - just like that.

Transitional times are the most interesting - and with the recent transition of fall/summer riding - into the hellish inverted frozen pilots of November - we notice things.

I notice that as I was descending to the Ewok trail this morning - that I felt that I should be standing sideways - on a snowboard - rather than descending on two wheels. Yet another eqipment switch...yet another rhythym to get used to - another sport to add to the daily beat down of the legs.

We skated lakewood last night - and it was sweet. I took a few bell ringers - and they were with me this morning - along with the ache in my ankles, the slight pain in my neck. Sometimes a skate session feels like a WWF match with the invisible man. You are flung, slammed, drop kicked - and there is no one there but yourself. Then - to clamber aboard the singlespeed - and climb the dirt road this am - leaving some funny tracks for my neighbors (BUT HE DROVE _ TWISTED DROVE TODAY _ HE DROVE _ WHAT A DAMN SISSY SELL OUT). So - my ironic artwork on the side of the road was passed at 35mph, esconced in the hull of the beast. Oh well.

Trails to the bus - I like the program. It was like 19 this am - the Swoosh Sweatshop Imigrant Worker Temperature Gauge (what is the opposite temp of the buttcrack of some poor bastard laboring in one of the swooshes factories in (insert) disadvantaged country here) - said that temp. It felt warm - another note of transition.

Back to that whole tranny thing.

So - after tomorrow - no more casual saturday mornings. The Rock - Smalldora - where the employee is LAST - and the customer is second to last - and the season pass holder is DICK. They figure that they make NO money on you after the first day (one really expensive day - and the rest of the year is FREE). We are the monkeys in the parking lot - eating peanut butter sandwiches - drinking coffee from a thermos. We rape and pillage the trails - but leave the tills untouched. We avoid contact - and stealth bomb through the woods with whoops and screeches - seeking the flow - the linked turns that are there - waiting.

Eldora - there are not trees. There are WOODS. You take some fool from Winter Park (NO PAIN NO JANE - Jane - who the fuck is Jane - and why is she in pain - if it's SO GOOD - why does it hurt?) and you take them into a 'tree run' or a 'glade' at the rock - and they are wimpering - breaking branches off - cursing the place. As you silently drop through some horrid rock-infested throat of death - into 7 turns that make your pants wet (in the front).

You see - the scarcity - of those types of turns at Eldora - make them all the more delectable. The DIFFICULTY in finding them - make them all the MORE tasty. And for the uninitiated - if you are not willing to look through the forest - to find the trees - you are introuble - you will not have fun. You will curse the rock. the wind. the cold. The shitty lifts. The lack of vertical.

But - it gets inside you this place.

So - after this saturday - it's basically - up at 7. Tune, wax, caffeinate - and get in the maze - in line - get on the hill - regardless of temp, conditions - whether there are 12 runs open or 2. You must represent - you must show up. You must LOG ON.

Otherwise - you might miss something.

might not be much of anything.

But it's more than you'd get if you stayed home.

Wait - we are home.

2003-11-05T15:50:00.000-08:00

I am achin' for some bacon,
dripping, dreaming of makin'
the little pig parts
To fill the hollow leg
that grows
when the seasons change
and the temps range into the single D's
Sinus hair like brittle sticks
up in the shnozzer, to the sides it sticks
and I wonder if I can rally
for the pain and the consequence of the elevator drop
into rock
into work
to get worked
And I wonder
if it's be feasible
possible
to drink all the coffee in the county
delicious black bounty
to get me up the hill and through the woods
to grandmas' house
to see the wolf
and his friend
the cat who;s wathcing me
like I watch the bacon cook, sizzle and pop
in anticipation of sating that need
and he thinks - should he/she eat me
jump on my back and ride me into the ground
follow me around
til my pants are down
and I am defenseless
push me over in the brown
that I share with the duff

I huff away
spared another day
only to return to the fray
and I would be mistaken
to think he could change the course of my mission
to rid the world
of bacon

2003-10-30T13:52:00.000-08:00

Dusting of snow on the roof - alarm sounds at 5:45. There is no light.

I took yesterday off - part of my 'I don't need to excercise every day to be sane' program. What a farce. At least the legs have some verve - maybe.

Something like 21 degrees out - and the puddles on the front porch are a bad sign. Ya see - cold is cold is cold - right! NO. The eskimoes have 377 different words for "my balls just froze off" - each communicating a certain nuance of variables in the degree of frozation of testicular matter. We have the same here in Ned - and the worst - the most uncomfortable commutes - are these - where you are on the cusp of freezing - and raining - and HIGH humidity. Guns don't kill people - it's the bullets that do". Cold doesn't kill people - it's the GOD damned humidity. If it's zero out - but dry - I can read the Sunday times in my underwear - if I am in the sun. When the moisture roll sin - it's a whole 'nother ballgame. When there are puddles - and it's snowing - you are in for a bad - albeit - interesting day..So - 6:10 - mounted, layered, caffeinated and out the door - with a 9am meeting to be in Boulder.

What could be more simple?

The moisture is great - and the road is less dusty. I traverse up the road for some 300 feet before committing to trail. It's a nice climb - and I am very pleasantly warm - not feeling that OHMYGOD feeling of the first big temperature drop. Usually - when the mercury dives - there is a point of denial - where you just ignore it - and stay inside and drink more. I am motivated this day to ride - and it's fitting that it's alone. I need to come to terms with winter - and they are personal terms.

The sky is dark, the fog is thick. There are ice/snow flakes in the air. One thing for certain - is there won't be any other folks out here. The ridge is gorgeous, and I meander up, and around, and onto the road, and back into the woods (MINERS DAYS) and descend to the thing that carries the stuff to the place. There are no tracks. Due to the less than stellar passability of some of this space, I am hike - a - biking down a steep, north facing slope - in rubber booties. This part pisses me off a little bit - about 1:10 into the ride. Why the fuck am I cavorting around in the woods at this hour - WELL - it's becasue as I haul the metal carcass of my useless bike through the deadfall and gristle of snow - I realize the buzz from this ride will last all day. The rest of the day will be work, and lack of clarity, and politics and agendas. The simplicity of the ride is my YIN to the YANG of the clamor of the workplace. It's simple - don't get shot, lost, or fall down and break a limb - it could be days (in the case of the bushwack - weeks) before someone wandered through here.

I also realize that the annoying metal fallen soldier on my shoulder - will carry me - when I egress again onto something rideable - and that pure efficiency is so refreshing and marvelous - it inspires me.

Across the thing that carries the stuff to the place...into another carry (Lassie - the barn's on fire and there is someone running through the snow with a bike and it ain't Santa) and onto a drive that connects to the big road. As I round the last corner of the drive I see a human rolling down the road with trash receptacles. NOTE TO SELF: garbage pick up on Kiterod road is Thursdays - make a note of it. I am about 40 feet from the human when I see him - I veer left and tip myself over into the woods - silently falling into the light mud, duff of pine needles and a dusting of snow.

I drag myself - low profile like - deeper into the woods and find a trail that I have not seen before. Trouble is - there are big Manly Man footprints on it - and I am quite certain I am on non-Smokey the bear type land. Deeper into the woods - I am seeking the main drag - the big drop - the frozen Kahuna of 3,000 feet of descending into the MAW of the ice storm.

I slip through the side of the woods undetected - pass freshly put out garbage cans - and get onto the road.

Now, the road - whcich is where you would think you would want to ride a bicycle - is not your friend on these cuspy/freeze/thaw types of mornings - 'specially - when you have some 3,000 feet of DOWN. So, take the temp - and combine it with the ICE and the MOISTURE - and a ground speed of something like 30mph......base temp of 19 degrees or so..

http://www.nws.noaa.gov/om/windchill/index.shtml......it comes to something like 1 degree. According to the chart - 30 minutes of exposure will result in frostbite.

Being the veteran of many mornings like this - I stop at the crest of the hill - and don fresh hat (no sweat in it) windstopper balclava - and T.Brown donated gnarly Trek overcoat thing. Glasses on - roll 'em bitches.

1/2 mile down the hill I have to pull over and scrape my glasses clear. The frozen rain is sticking to them like young knees to gravel. There is a sense of claustrophobia - I can barely see - my senses are dulled from the layers of clothes - and the layer of ice that is forming on the outside of my clothes - rapidly. It's hard to estimate speed - and so I am coming into corners super hot (speed wise einstein) and feathering - only - yes - my brakes are starting to freeze. The spray from the road - is coagulating like bloody lung butter and encircling my cables like wax on a multiply dipped finger.

Then - my chain freezes. I pedal - and it just sort of clunks around and does nothing for me as far as forward momentum.

Pull over. Dig the pud out of the bibs under the Roach pants - tinkle the length of the chain - and try to spray some up into the brakes.

Car commuter passes. Why Marvin - I think that man was peeing on his bicycle. Damn. Whatever it takes.

The next five miles pass something like this. Clunk. Zip. Tinkle. Remount. Scape glasses. Repeat.

About a mile from the bottom I am fresh out of the magic yellow chain de-freezer - and I just sit on my bike - resigned to freezing.

I roll up to Spruce Confections - feeling - accurately apparently according to the 'You are going to lose a bodypart Chart'- within spitting distance (as I can't pee anymore) of frostbite. My pinkies are hot, and raw inside my gloves, and my sinuses have that ice cream headache feel that I remember from my youth.

My pants and jacket literally CRACK as I remove my pack, dig for some funds and saunter into the world of heat and warm beverages. People physically back away - as I am making a mess.

Strawberry shortbread and LARGE dark beverage.

Caution - the beverage you are about to pour on your head is something that you are supposed to drink.

$3.05 the guy says - and I hand him a five. He puts the change in my hand and it falls out - as I can't feel it. I try to pick up the dime sitting on the counter - and it's like trying to thread a needle through a shower curtain. No good. I leave the change and grab the one - spot. Meander through the coffee getting people and get a lid. No good - can't seperate the things from each other.

In the bathroom - I run hot water over my hands and splash it up my nostrils. I am feeling better.

The love of the world comes full circle when I am seated at Foolish Craigs - hot mug of coffee in hand - staring at 6 strips - MY strips - of bacn - manifesting little grease puddles on my little plate - getting ready to fill my belly. If I could buy enough bacon - I would make a suit of it - and wear it under my clothes - or maybe wear it instead of clothes.

A suit of bacon - how sweet would that be?

2003-10-27T09:53:00.000-08:00

5:07.

am.

I had visions of the change of weather last night - I could feel it - hear it - as the front that will freeze our nose hairs in a few days - pushed the wind in front of it - right into the hood. Trees swinging, whistling off the divide and into the world.

The benefit of the time change - is that the energy level and the ease of rousting - are both popping like fresh cherry pop tarts. The bummer is - that day is Monday. Which wasn't really a bummer - as woke up early with clear heads and hearts - and drank damn good coffee - and rolled up the Z with west winds blowing, howling - a threesome - gathering speed and force to the second Y - across the Hermann porch poach - and down the ridge into the blissful light of late fall. Three days off the bike - recovering from feeling pretty beaten down....allowing for some down time - which is a very hard thing for me to do.

We roll the ridge, slide down the Zig Zags to the naked trail - the trails are loose as all ball bearings, and just sketchy due to some 65 days without precipitation. This 23 minutes - is just perfect - trail, woods, friends, zooming and careening, and just feeling and appreciating the morning. Across this and that meadow - we see a gorgeous hawk - then pass a skittering chipmunk - probably bailing from the hawk's advances.

Some more across, and some up - and then we enter the promised land - LP and WALLLLLLAH - into Miners Days, Miners days. Aerial views of the terrain will yield logocal answers to lines that may seem conter intuitive on the ground. Across the grain, as it were - we yield to gravity and see new things, experience new angles and drops. perhaps - this area should be called Cigam - as it is the opposite of the trail that Doug Henning waved his wand over. It is pretty sweet - and we drop again to the standard - and roll in to the city - and I run HEAD long into that thing that contests the importance of the trails, and the dawns, and the rest of life. Reality. It is sharp and tactile this morning. It is deep and far. It is temporary.

"You think Rockford files is cool,
But there are a few things that you would change if it were up to you"

BF2

2003-10-23T18:17:00.000-07:00

Days dwindling to the deadline of the deadfall of night. Damn. Darkness. NO Decaf - won't get the job done. Delicious - deliberate dearth of stout. Decadent dealings...damn. Damn.

Dia De Los Muertos - Sunday. The time changes - we are propelled into the liquid ink of night. It is not bothering me this year as it has done in the past. In years past it has felt like a door slamming that I can not open. Now, I am actually psyched. Watching some of the video footage from last year at Eldora - I am stoked to carry the enthusiasm of the rolling in the woods - to the sliding in the woods. The rolling is good - if too dry - and I am ready for a change of altitude - and the anxious evenings of praying for the snow to continue to fall. Play more music. Check the 'other' box when the bikes are put away for a few.

Was just thinking about the parallels between the two sports - snowsliding - and bikes....

It's all about finding the lines - looking at the spaces between the trees - not the trees - that pretty much sums up the whole life experience as far as I am concerned. Pretty much sums up LIFE as far as I know it.

2003-10-20T11:12:00.000-07:00

Darkness on the edge of town. Bruce - said it well. Darkness - everywhere. We are in the final throes of Indian Summer. And as it was an epic snow year - voluminous - and the fall was epicly long - and now - we are 90 degrees in late October - the summer is kicking and screaming into the abyss of the time change - in 6 days.

Lights are now required off the Can - and it is dark - like oily, sleepy, belly of the Guinness can at 6:50 or so. The mornings as well - are rough.

Rolled out at 6 this am. Coffee (dark); half a bagel, no lights, as they disrupt the peace and calm of the morning. All that technology and so little desire to see the Halogen destroy the calm of the rising sun. Well, I was a little early. Just getting my feet back under me after 5 weeks of travel for work. I underestimate the paucity of the orb to pass over the peaks to the east. It's dark, I am sleeping. It's kind of like the old 5:30 am swim workouts - when I could sleep through the first thousand yards. I can sleep through the climb up the driveway, up the ridge, down the ridge, up the doubletrack, into the woods. When I am traversing through Linkin' Park - I finally see the sunlight in the flesh - over my shoulder to the left. the woods are still dark and sleepy.

I seek out the 8,300 foot traverse. Looking for familiar trees, things I might recognize, and stumble directly on what I am looking for.

Miners Days! Miners Days. No birth announcement like Baby J's, but a pretty signifacnat development in the maze of my mind's eye. Cool.

Monday. Damn good day. Damn good start to a 4 day week - playing hookey on Wednesday to play hookey, and not have plans, and rest, and wait for Sunday when the tome changes. Away we go to hibernate and put on fat for next summer. Plan the CT, play music, play games...lay low - re-fuel.

2003-10-17T14:43:00.000-07:00

G-H-E-T-T-O

Not in the traditional – Harlem – African Amercian sense of the word. Ghetto in the sense of under-belly. Ghetto in the sense of my white, upper middle class self feels like a beacon to the transparency of my commitment to ‘Be A Skatebaorder’. I use caps there on purpose. What is a skateboarder? To what level of commitment does one need to throw down to earn the moniker? Can it be done later in life? I heard one person say: “If you aren’t still a skateboarder – you never were one”. Well, in that case – I ain’t. Lord forgive me for I have sinned – I stopped skating for almost 18 years – but I am trying so very hard to make up for all that lost time (Son, please say 50 Hail Blunts and come see me next week). What is the price – you must pay to pass through the pearly gates of skater authenticity? Sitting among the urine soaked cigarettes, watching the locals tear up a legendary ‘park’ under a bridge in Portland, these are the thoughts in my head.

Portland, Oregon. Burnside Bridge. East Side. 6:40 am on a run of the mill Tuesday. I had trouble sleeping last night on anticipation of being able to skate this park. Literally – loosing sleep over it. That’s pretty sad, and pretty beautiful all at the same. Maybe that’s why they call skateboarding an Extreme sport.

I went by the park last night, and the scene was a little too heavy for me to jump in there and skate. I sat on the wall above the park, and watched some of the most creative, personal, interpretive skating I have ever seen. I saw some skating similar to this in Park City, Utah last summer – but I would call that ‘style’ more like snowboarders hitting a park, and skating a concrete park like a terrain park on a mountain. What I watched at burnside was the equivalent of someone performing open heart surgery, using a blunt stick, in a back alley somewhere – yet pulling I off and having the patient up and doing intervals moments after the surgery. Stephen King says in one of his great works – Christine: You can’t polish a turd. These guys – the B-side locals – were polishing turds into diamonds – in front of my very eyes. That’s what they have down there are Burnside – a veritable shit polishing factory – taking the detritus of the beaten down area – and turning it into gold – or concrete in this case. Doesn’t get much more life affirming or beautiful.

I sat on the wall – too scared to skate – and saw one bearded fellow just killing it – while he looked like he was sleeping. Even his bails looked smooth and relaxed, and fluid. It was none other than Ben Krehn. Just two nights prior I had played his segment in Northwest (buy it; watch it; live it) and told my wife – if there was one person I could skate like – it would be this guy. Just this insane combination of new school, old school – all school – and some super random variations of everything you could think of on a board (can you say switch backside ollie – body varial up onto a wall). The equivalent of sitting there – and watching him skate his home park – is basically – like being a complete basketball freak – and heading out to the community center for some hoops – and walking out onto the court with Michael Jordan – just sitting there – shooting hoops. No handlers, no PR people, no fucking circus – just the first hand experience of watching one of the best – in some unreal terrain – do what he loves to do. I don’t think this really happens in other sports. There are so many layers between the average Joe and the Pro. Not so in skating. Here he was, just railing the place to pieces, and I was sitting there – and could have been skating with him if I had the guts. From above the park – the experience in the park resembles what I would imagine one of those super atom collider things looks like. This is the case in many parks – but at Burnside – it is so sketchy. So many blind corners, so many completely unpredictable warbles in the cement, holes to fall into, broken bottles to slide across, an open sewer grate full of garbage that is blind from three sides.

Most parks are made to skate – or made to be easy to skate. No such thing here. Burnside has evolved from a drug den – to a skatepark – since 1990 – organically as anything could ever grow. The locals have shackled the thing together one piece at a time. As I was sitting there, I saw three guys working on a small quarter pipe in the parking lot – pouring one bag of concrete at a time, and shaping it by hand and with trowels. Insane. Evolving as we speak.

Fast forward to this morning – 6:30 am – I hit the park – solo. Not a soul there. Barely light, hazy drizzle falling while the sun peeked its way periodically though dense clouds. The board echoed off the underside of the bridge and my wheels squealed with the reverberating din of urethane on concrete as I tried to recreate some of the lines I saw the locals pulling the day before.

Something that I always think about – relevant to the context that my skating experience has been re-evolvong in – and where I would like to go with it. I feel like I get very ‘accomplishment’ or in the case of skating – ‘trick’ oriented. Oh, I went to the park today and I ‘got’ a front-side disaster. That’s great – and all – and obviously a great way to gauge progress. But the whole evaluation thing seems pretty counter-intuitive to skating – in fact – pretty much not what it’s all about. I skated in contests in my teens, and I made up ‘runs’ as I still do (a certain sequence of tricks that you do in a certain order as that’s the way they ‘fit’ together.) But – damn. What about art for art’s sake (does art skate? - Is skating art?) Watching Ben skate this place, I doubt there is a person who could argue that what he was doing wasn’t interpretive – and personal – and expressive of some kind of amalgamation of what the park offered (in this case a very personal offering) and what he – as a skater – has evolved into over how ever many years of skating. Watching the real time confluence of these two very immeasurable things was definitely a very high form of art.

I tried – in that dawn session – to just roll – and try to let the park tell me where to go (my tweeked analogy here would be something like giving your 7 year old sister acid, blindfolding yourself, and getting in the car and having her tell you where to drive). In the traditional sense of the word (I pulled a – insert trick here) on the (insert section of park here) this was not a stellar session. But – I tried to shadow Ben’s lines from the night before, only twice as slow, and three times lower. The park throws you around – like a kitty in the laundry, like a small terrier tied to the back of a car down a country road. Unsuspecting, you roll over a projection and fall into the 11 foot pool, slide out on a cigarette butt, rattle a bottle away into the far corner of the park. Like Poltergiest – or The Amityville Horror – think of the possession this park has – the raw mojo – the blood, sweat and fears that have been spilled here over the last 13 years. I tried to stop often, and just soak in that vibe of the last 13 years – because in the end – when all of us are too old to roll around in these beautiful places on a small wooden board with little wheels – that’s all that’s going to be left.

Dedicated to those who create their own reality

2003-10-13T17:52:00.000-07:00

What does one offer up to the cold, hard reality of 56,022 names etched in granite - all of them dead. All of them sacrifices to some cause that has never been and will never be understood.

The tour guide said (he - himslef a vet) that his hardest day on the job is always Father's Day. When the progeny of the dead people come, and they come all day and all night, and the weep, and they mourn.

As you cross past the reflecting pool and the Monument looms to the east, you come over a small rise, and there, sunken in the ground, in an L-shaped dark corner, lie the names of the fallen.

I remember going to the monuments at Pearl Harbor - and realizing that everyone was quieting down as the boat pulled over the shattered shell of the Arizona. The water was so clear - you could see the hulk of the rusted carcass where some 1500 men died.

At The Wall, there is a man. His job is to carry the ladder around so that people who want an etching - to touch the wall and carry something away - can reach the names on the upper parts. The Wall starts small, gets immense - tall as 2 men in the middle - in the confluence - and then backs off again and comes back to ground level. None of it is above ground - as - these are gravestones.

I sit, and try to write something that captures this thing I have wanted to see for so many years. I am caught staring at the young couple on the hill, frolicking and kissing, as the sun sets over the cement barriers and the K-9 cop cars...all here - to make sure someone doesn't blow up our central nervous system.

Our dinner companion says - that when you work with these people every day - commute with them - run through the rain with them - get coffee with them - it is difficult to cast them in the light of 'blood sucking government'.

They are people. Just like the 56,022 people on The Wall.

To what end my friends? To what end?

2003-10-06T15:47:00.000-07:00

The clickety clack of little wheels at high altitude. The firm belief in my head that I never really landed that trick I obsess/obsessed about. The joy - of sticking the first one - and walking away.

An unexpected hike through dusk saturday evening - accompanied by the Arrogant Bastard.

Watching Zuma's - stoked that we are shining it for the 468 mile odyessy of the Colorado Trail next year - but a sense that I will need to go do Grey's peak in the wee hours - just to keep up the tradition.

A really sweet long ride Sunday - leaf hunting in the beach - and succeeding twenty fols - and finally having some LEGS after a month of feeling like recycled poo.

Dawn start this a.m. Alarm sounds at 5:50. Dark. But the anticipation outweighs any need for sleep. Cruised the sicko new route with the logs and the drop, and the slab, and the duff. It is really coming together, and is quite enjoyable - all that work paying off. NEW alley down from Kite Rod...ALL THE WAY to the graveyard.

Ain't life grand.

Off to worship at the throne of Burnside - the place it started..then on to Seattle - Rain City - and a visit to the Evil Empire.

Lalalalallalalalalalalal.

Jihad.

2003-10-03T12:52:00.000-07:00

B-L-U-N-T

A term commonly used to refer to a ‘joint’ or some stubby marijuana delivery system. A skateboarding term as well, that refers to the very difficult maneuver of stalling your board above the coping – on the tail – and dropping back in to the ramp/bowl backwards. For whatever reason I have obsessed about this trick for something like 11 months. It is such a beautiful and seemingly intuitive trick. When asking kids I see do the trick – they say simply “Follow it back in”. OK. That’s like saying – just jump out of the plane, and pull the cord – you’ll be fine – really. When we first built the half-pipe at home – I tagged BLUNT on the plywood directly below the coping – with arrows – with ‘FOCUS JACK’. I never pulled one in that pipe – the three footer.

In March, I tore down the three-footer, and sculpted a gorgeous 6 footer. We wanted a little more height, more transition for landing certain tricks, and to up our tolerance for height – thereby hopefully gaining in performance. I wrote BLUNT<40 on the new larger pipe – blunt before 40. When I wrote that I had about 100 days until the deadline. Tick tock.

This past Tuesday I was on a business trip in Southern California. I had the fortune to hit a new park in Laguna Niguel – north of San Diego. I got schooled as hard as I have been in a while – and skated ‘worse’ than I have for a very long time. The clover bowl there (three connected swimming pool like bowls made specifically for skating) is large, and in charge. The deep end is 11 feet, square, and features some corners I had huge issues with. It was 3:30 on a weekday – and the after school patrol was out in full force – battle of the 4 foot tall skateboarders.

It’s pretty intimidating padding up and dropping into a bowl that you haven’t skated before. The nature of the sport is that you take turns, and ultimately, when dropping in – there are some pretty important things to figure out. The ‘lines’ that work in that particular bowl(s); where to get speed, little idiosyncrasies in the terrain. It is hard to do these things under any circumstances – let a lone with the locals watching. Well, on this occasion, I sucked royally. I felt awkward, slow, out of sync. It was a bad session, and I was upset with myself for not pushing harder and making more out of the opportunity and the new terrain. I folded under my inability to perform, and left – deflated and feeling lame.

Flew home the next day, and got in late in the afternoon – which always justifies by – passing the office and cruising straight home for a skate or a ride. We had rallied earlier in the week to try and catch an evening session at home on this day. The evening sessions at home are so super sweet. Great temperature – light fading – making turns with friends in the quiet secluded atmosphere of the Mojo Ramp as it has come to be known.

So, we skated. We skated pretty hard for a couple of hours. There is a rhythm that develops through a session – and there is an energy that rises and falls based on who is doing what…what kind of groove. If you have ever played in a band – I feel like it’s the same kind of ebb and flow. You might be in an extended jam and just stay there for a while following the flow of the music. It’s a beautiful thing – it takes over – energizes you – its pretty magical.

As has been customary for quite some time now, I end my sessions by doing 10 blunt set ups. Repetition is the key for success – and in skateboarding (as life?) this is the way that I have ‘progressed’ – by sheer stubborn attack – focusing – and not stopping until I get something.

The set ups felt pretty good, and I did a couple where I jumped off as I came down backwards. Kevin started rallying – saying “That one was bought and paid for – just get out the damn door”. I started to get pretty focused – and felt like I got into a zone where I actually might pull one of these things. I wasn’t prepared mentally for the risk, and something just pushed me through it. There comes a time – in skateboarding (and life and anything else worthwhile) where you decide you are willing to bear the consequences of actually committing to something – and when you cross the line between focusing on the consequences – to focusing on the ‘thing’ you are trying – you succeed (or end up in the hospital).

At this point – Kevin and Whit had stopped skating – and they were coaching me on where I was missing the trick. I finally landed one – got the board back onto the ramp – and shot it out backwards and fell on my face. I adjusted on the next one – put it down – and came across the ramp at high speed and slammed into the other side – whipping my neck back, slamming my head, and railing my shoulder and wrist. I laid there for a second, and whatever mojo was coming out of he ramp – and into me – made the choice that there was no choice. I set up – caught my breathe – rolled up the far side of the ramp – stalled on the tail – and ‘followed it back in’ and landed and stood back up. Almost a year of obsession – over. Barrier vaulted – for the time being. I shot my board off the ramp – on purpose – tore my helmet off – and kicked it like a football. Game over.
It was a very nice vindication for the session the day before – and it was a major leap in confidence for me as far as understanding – and believing the things that I can still accomplish on a board at almost 40. Felt damn good. Going back for more.

I want to thank the academy, the mojo ramp - and my friends especially - for pushing me over the edge. To life Raja.

2003-09-26T15:08:00.000-07:00

Small birds, pecking at my flesh.

Auditory intrusions that grate like fingers on chalkboards.

Fucking leaves falling through the air offend me in a personal way.

A bad day not to work out - a day that I would like to have skated for 7 hours, or ridden 60 miles on beer can wide singletrack. Or both. Deaden the cerebral cortex, frying pan to the head to take it out.

Perhaps I could pound all of the sand - in all the sandboxes - of the world - up my hind quarters.

Yes, I will do that - and get back to you.

2003-09-24T15:41:00.000-07:00

Only in Boulder...# 6,317

Pre-dawn wake up for a solo session at the boulder park with Merriweather. Amazing temperature, perfect crowd (2 of us total) with open lines flowing, new lines forming, and some darn good skating if I do say so. Merryweather decides to learn Lien to tail transfers over the little islands on the spine. To view this manuever from a non-skateboarding perspective - it kinda goes like this:

1. Roll through a five foot deep concrete bowl, carry enough speed so you can accelerate up and out of the bowl.
2. As you leave the edge of the bowl, grab the front of your board.
3. Stay in the air until you see the edge of the next bowl under your feet/board
4. Lower your board, land the TAIL only of your board on the lip of the adjacent 5 foot bowl. Try not to think about the fact that the tail of your board is about 2.5 inches long - and that if you miss you will certailnly land in the locker of pain. Think of it as like jumping off the roof of your car - and trying to land on your bumper - with forward momentum.
5. Drop into that bowl.
6. Be very happy your hip isn't shattered.

I myself was busy working on lengthy Five - O's to tail....and really feeling some VERVE for hitting coping at steep angles and locking on. It felt good. It was good.

Then, due to the little men still residing in a few remote corners of my Schnozzle, I went to see the accupuncturist. Now, I am piss scared of needles, I faint at the thought of a pricked finger. I will go to some extreme lengths to maintain health, and as such, will submit to the needles. My accupuncturist, well, she is a total babe, and I mean this in the most respectful, inteligent, non-threatening way. So, take the cruiser down 5 blocks to the quaint little office, and lay down for some quality poking. She puts needles in my feet, shins, face, head, hands, and then rigs up this little electrode connector and connects some of the needles. She then - takes this giant frozen sausage - no wait - ok - she takes these tuning fork type things and smacks them - and then holds them to my bone (easy). They vibrate, and connect the points she has stuck - and it is bizarre. She is trying to clear out my head and get my Chi flowing. She leaves me there for about 20 minutes, and between the ocean noise maker thing, and the little Feng Shui fountain peacefully dripping water - I almost relax.

Then, she makes me a little bag of herbs to boil, and inhale (Yes Bill - we inhale here in Boulder) and send me on my little way with dreams of healthy sinuses. How sweet it is.

Then, later in the day, I go to get this book for a client, and I go check the sports section as I always like to look for new books about all my favorite sports. I have this strange habit of checking on some of my favorite books to make sure they are still there. I find Jocko's book (The Answer is Never - read it now); I cruise the Chucky P. section...yup - still on the shelf - Dick Cheney apparently hasn't been to this bookstore in a while..cruise over to find Captain Zero and Banditos...yup - still there - like old friends - just waiting to be passed around (in a good way). I have multiple copies of these books at home, but I need to know that they are out there - here in the REPRESSIVE (right) climate of Boulder. Free Press - first ammendment..all that hooey. Right next to Jocko's book I see "Ninety Wrestling Holds Illustrated". Just as the wrestler may judge the skateboarder - and vice versa - I must say - I will read anything - but this one escapes me.

One last visual...up in the popular books - bestsellers, etc. - I see "15 ways to find a husband after 35". Wow. That is FREEdom of the press, and I assume there must be a market for this type of thing - but damn. Free world.

Now, it's onto the Can (what we call the bus around these parts) and onto an exploratory inventory of some north shore style stunts that have 'erected' in a familiar part of the woods. Solid debate earlier in the day about what to do about these. I guess we are going to photo recon, and let the council decide.

And - such as it is - and ever was - life in Boulder - tiddles along........

2003-09-23T09:11:00.000-07:00

Back in the saddle - as it were. Premature, sniffling, madly hacking - BUT RIDING (I AM NOT DEAD YET). I realize my lack of discipline and maturity when I read DV8's blog and realize he actually took time off. I have a world class formula for staying sick as long as possible. I am an old pro. If you want Meningitus - I know how to get that too.

In summation.....leaf seeking all over the tri-county area for the last few days. Found some good ones up by the sliding area, as well as over in the beach yesterday on a nice weekday 5 hour ride with my gorgeous wife (who throttled me on the last climb of the day). There is a new trail in the beach - and golly gosh darned if it ain't sweet - AND LEGAL - how often do we get to say that in the same sentence. Go to www.Illnevershowyou.com for the map, there is a link to www.dontknowyoucantshowyou.net; with a final link to www.gotobetasso.org.

There are some amazing aspen groves all over the place, and I snapped in excess of 60 photos yesterday on the ride.

Being - as it were - the first day of Autumn - strangely greeted with a 56 degree morning (almost twice the temperature of yesterday morning) The Hooby made it's first guest appearance on Mag, and the bike - rolled ALL THE WAY to Boulder. Amazingly enough - no parts fell off - as I built it. Hah.

It went a little like this:
Climbing...smooth..gears..many hand positions...nice...effortless up The Z...small trax in the road pertty sure they are twisted....rolling is nice - higher tire pressure...smaller wheels...ROLLLLLLLLING.
Descent...ouch....bang...smash..this is a long way from the Santa with it's Dual set up....but it's fast...sacrifice comfort for speed and ease...can there really be a rests day hiding somewhere in the commute?????

I catch twisted at the top of mag and we have a nice, alberit, fast ride down. These bikes are fast. Did I say they are fast? We were happily esconced in front of the warm, tiled, black wall at Sydney's by 8:18. Nice.

Attempting to rest - we'll see how that goes - and we'll see how the Intergalactic's shape up for the weekend.

Nothing but NET here (But god how I love those ball sports analogies)

2003-09-19T14:13:00.000-07:00

Ode to the Dark Tower

Oh I found you
In a fit of inspired searching.
Knowing - somehow - after years on the contours of these valleys - that you existed.

I crossed your path unknowingly numerous times before I made the connection. Cold spring mornings with vats of coffee and the anxious nature of warming weather coursing through my veins.

Discovery.

Such a simple solution to mornings of wet feet and slippery rocks and playing hide and seek.

Many times I have found the sweetest connectors - simply by accidentally missing a turn. As such - you were hiding - not easy to find - but the logic was there - and so - were you.

Restless weeks spent searching for time to find the ingress and egress. So disappointed by the craftsmanship of the beginning - and the middle absolutely sucks ass. the promise - of the nirvana of the big one - blown by crappy creation, bad lines, poor route choices and a general lame approach to creation that leaves scars - not passage with respect or deference on the land.

Still - I admire the audacity of the intrusion and the boldness of the volume of work it took. Next time - do it right. Next time - plan a little better and take to heart the cost of what you are doing and the impact it will have.

To you who created the idea and reality..back to the drawing board - what you lacked in creativity and vision won't last more than a season - it's almost already gone.

better luck next time - and we will see where you strike next, hopeflly with more class and more care.

Send smoke signals when you are done. Or better yet don't - we will know the details before the last tool is sheathed.

2003-09-18T10:42:00.000-07:00

Perhaps it was the blunt kick to the face, and the broken nose during the recess soccer game in 5th grade. Perhaps it was some abuse of a scary white powder in the middle years of my youth. Whatever the cause - my sinuses just are not right. They are too narrow - and my scilia (sp) the little haris that clean the air that goes in there...they don't work right. So - twice a year - I get ass kicker sinus infections that haunt me, take me off my bike, and make me feel like my head is posessed by some nuerotic little men who live inside the cavity behind my nose. They manufacture a green, sticky substance and try to make it stick together enough to block my breathing and my brain. Make me insane. Make me watch the days tumble by like rocks in a raging river where I am free neither to jump in and roll downstream - nor to damn the river.

Instead, I sit, like John Travolta as the boy in the plsatic bubble, and I watch the world scream by. Faster than I can write it down, faster than I can imagine as I am not stemming the tide by being in the river.

Sucks ass.

Butt. It is the other side of the other the rip roaring 4 degree rides in the winter, and the 6 hour clambers over distant mountain peaks, and the aching pain in lung and leg as this vessel that provides so well for me, and takes unlimited amounts of abuse and keeps performing, takes alittle down time. A rest. I had theorized that I should take 7 - 10 days off the bike and board prior to my favorite time of year to ride - which is right now - Sep. 15 through to when the snow gets serviceable at Eldora. This in between - this transition into the dark and the switch to lights and gloves and layers and more shit packing each day as you have to be prepared to either ride home or hike your way through drifts in the dark to reach the haven of the fireplace and the stout on the hearth at the ranch.

Last year I was sick, or injured for 8 days. That's .02% of the time. It makes me live in my heead instead of my body - and as a friend of mine used to say: I don't like to go into my mind alone - it's a scary place. It's all a balance - the physical, the mental. One day - in the not so distant future - it will be all mental - as our physical beings will surely not survive. These down days are for strengthening those mucsles, the 'other' that you check in the box when you describe your life by what rides, bikes, trails, etc.

2003-09-17T14:41:00.000-07:00

Damn. Sewage Lagoon. Grand Central Station.

Two weeks - gone - like 2 hours.

Whirlwind travelling - some great waves on the west coast, and some sweet italian food in Chicago accompanied by Chuck's newest: Diary. Long live Tyler Durden.

Not enough time in the woods - but that will be remedied soon.

The Hoobestank was birthed saturday through a fog of sinus medicine and phlegm. It has yet to see the road/trail - hopefully in the am.

Back in the saddle. back in the game. Semi-silent salute to those who are closest to me - and tolerate my psychosis and intrusions and rants- all - in the name of love.

People make choices.
Choices make people.

Halle-fucking-lujah.

2003-09-02T15:15:00.000-07:00

The dilemmas we face as a modern society. As a modern microcosm of the world around us. As ourselves.

Holiday weekend – good thing. Pouring rain – good thing. Moisture is what we need after something like six years of very dry conditions. I lament the cold and the wet, but I love seeing green well into September, and feeling the temperature drop, and digging for winter clothes. Soon – the trails will be void of humans, much quieter, and there won’t be the pressure of figuring out a ride that doesn’t go into sensitive areas where there might be denizens of riders. I don’t like seeing people when I ride. I guess it’s the selfish core of me that really wants to believe that no one else is out there riding. Last Sunday I rode 5 hours solo – didn’t see a track, skid mark, nothing – and no humans until I took a shortcut through an established campground where you are guaranteed to see live humans on the weekends. I didn’t speak, or scream – or nothing. I did grin quite a bit and laugh at a few stretches of trail that were juts so perfect it was beyond ridiculous.

Did the same ride this past Sunday – with a small group – and it was equally as satisfying, despite finding the obfuscation that I spent time on completely cleared by squirrel boy. We put it back – and will continue to do so. Why people promote the riding of obscure trails – I do not know.

Back to the weekend. Cold. Wet. I had an agenda that involved a great deal of time outside, on the bike, in the woods, plying in the dirt. My only concern was that I would run out of time or energy – and a testament to how lucky I am – and how lucky we are to live where we live under the circumstances that we do. Let’s see – ride perfect single-track? Skate the half pipe in the yard…read in the meadow…hang with my wonderful wife. Overwhelming. Good. Blessed. As my friend Bill used to say as he hammered a group to death in a huge tail wind - you gotta take it when you can get it....

Saturday – it took a great deal of coffee to get my ass out the door. We had a huge breakfast to celebrate a friends’ B’day – and that carried me through to like 11 – some ramp maintenance – and then I KNEW that I wanted to get out and hike and get some other maintenance done – but I could not rally. Finally – after a huge French press of very dark Java – I drove to the gateway – and hiked up into the network that has been absorbing most of my time these days. It was absolutely pouring rain, and they had started logging the lower portion of this area - which we expected – but it’s still hard to see.

Three hours in the pouring rain – feeling a little bonky and/or sick – crawling around in the dirt – funnier than shit. I guess it’s like the crème on the cake to be able to have this time – almost feel guilty about it some of the time. But – I don’t think that

Sunday – COLD – wet. Long ride. Cold on the descents…tacky – sloughing pine needles sliding out from beneath me – causing near accidents. Rode with an unknown – 23 year old kid – funny – to see someone that young so into bikes – very cool….

More high altitude gardening Monday on a very hot ride….almost ran over a few hunters and a black cocker spaniel dressed smartly in an orange vest…I think I scared them. It was strange being in one of these places that never sees people – on a holiday (Labor Day) and seeing people – didn’t like it very much – but mission accomplished.

Monday night – we got shenna out on the ramp – and she was killing it. I was very tired – but had some good practice that is hard to get sometimes when everyone is skating and going off and you focus on skating hard – instead of learning.

West coast bound for 4 days…..water in San Diego is 73 degrees…taking the nephew skating. Life – is – good.

2003-08-28T09:11:00.000-07:00

"If my blog is literal - how the fuck can I raise a little squirrel?"

mm

2003-08-27T14:19:00.000-07:00

As David Grey might say:

"There's no way to write it down.....write it down"

Choosing a little longer route in this morning - after some amazing single wide mountain bike trail riding to get to the point where my wife headed east and I headed up. As I bore though the brush, I ran into some old friends......

About two years ago, I was feeling the itch to get out and ride long, hoping in a typical over optimistic fashion that some of the trails were clear, and that I could begin trodding them again. I think it was late May, early June, something like that. Typically, many of the north facing trails can be closed well into June or July. There is a typical ride for me - that has happened over and over again, and will happen over and over again. Happens around that time of year....

Me: Yeah - I think that xyz trail is definitely open.
Shenna: You know - every year - you try to ride that too early - and get the tar beat out of you
Me: Oh, but I am hyper, I will be fine.

Shenna, being the wiser, typically doesn't come on these rides, as I usually come back feeling like garbage, frozen, shins bleeding from post-holing through snow that won't be gone for another few weeks, bike completely useless with gummed up cables and useless chewed down brake pads.

Well, on this particular version of this ride, which I guess would have been like 2001, I went out and did some things that I cherish during the 'open' season, and dropped down to a little bit more obscure locale that I had dallied with a few times in the past but had a remaining curiousity about, a desire to figure out. All was well for a while until I dropped to some north facing terrain that had but one real way out. As ultimately true on this early season scouting ride, I found myself post holing through granular frozen snowdrifts that stretched as far as the eye can see.

Believing there was a better way (some friends refer to this as The Kingsbury Direct - typically straight up, preferably north facing with massive amounts of deadfall, meandering, twice as far as the regular route, etc.) I headed straight up, just as the sky darkened, and the grapple started falling. Grapple is something that falls between the consistency of snow and sleet - kinda like little styrofoam balls. the temperature dropped about 15 degrees, and the fog rolled in - heavy - like 8 - 10 foot visibility. I knew where I was basically - like within about a 2 mile accuracy.

I kept climbing and topped out onto something I hadn't expected - a large flat area peppered with realy cool rock outcroppings. I was anticipating a ridgetop and a descent to the west back into more familiar territory. As I wandered, I started to get pretty tunred around, and then I got a little more turned around, and pretty soon - due ot the fog and the strange nature of the landscape - numerous large rock outcroppings that all look the same until you get to know them - I became - yes - lost.

"I ain't never been lost! Powerfully turned around for a month or two but never lost"
Charleton Heston - The Mountain Men

So - no real chance of really getting lost - like for days - but a slight discomfort in that I knew it would be dark in a few short hours, I was a little short on food, and had no means of shelter. Not a sense of panic - just a desire to avoid unnecesary discomfort. As I came from clearing to identical clearing, and rock pile to rock pile - I gave in - and finally started building cairns - or small piles of rock markers in what I thought was a westerly direction. I figured if I followed them and I could sight from one to the next, keep building them and eventually know where I was. Kinda like Goldilocks with rocks instead of breadcrumbs.

I eventually ran into something I recognized, and found my way out, and gave the requesite report to my wife when I got home. Yep - it was snowy, and yes - I am cold, and yes - it will be a few weeks before we can actually RIDE that trail.

This morning, after I peeled off from my wife as she headed to town in a more direct way, I was visiting an area that I spend a lot of time in now. Something clicked with me on that cold afternoon two years ago, and I frequent the area now - trying to pass through there once or twice a week. I have never seen another person up there. I have never seen another bike track, moto track, horse shit - nothing. I have seen amazing varieties of wildlife and birds and scat. There is something very reassuring about knowing that when I go there I will not see anyone. I find myself stopping and listening intently, wondering if today will be the day someone disrupts my string of no contact rides....hasn't happened.

This morning I was seeeking out some alternatives to ways to egress the area, and I stumbled across a cairn - one of mine from two years ago. Curious as to how lost I really was that afternoon - I followed my line of cairns as they wrapped in a decidedly north westerly direction - just nowhere near a straightline. I would of ended up somewhere near the Tajikstan border - cold and hungry.

In the last two years I have come to understand this area that is but a tiny corner of the map - completely inconsequential in size - and completely illogical if one were to think of things in a straight line. There is something very reassuring about this area to me, and I hope I never see anyone up there, and when I tire of this area and find another area of curiousity this one will go dormant for a number of years, as it was before I found it by getting lost in it.

2003-08-26T10:26:00.000-07:00

One fucking Turn (dated from SPring '02)

Life, is a series of moments – connected from present to past, gathered in what has been and what will be. We exist somewhere on this continuum, sometimes knowing exactly where we are, and sometimes just floating, waiting for the next moment that will be our handh0ld to the next, and the next. All of these moments are what come to define us in the end, and then ultimately connect us back to our beginnings.

I can not recall the first time I did a cutback on a surfboard. I do, however, remember the first time I stood on a surfboard. Over time I had graduated riding on my belly on the boogie board, kneeling on the boogie board, and finally to a very short pintail – something like 5”10 single fin that crawled out form under someone’s house and found it’s way into my teenaged hands. The waves were really small, and I remember how squirrelly the board was under my feet. The waves were probably two feet or less, breaking on the barrier beach of Fire Island. The only part of the ride that I remember is crossing the very shallow sandbar, feeling the single skeg dragging on the sand, and hopping off the board as it bottomed out into the sand completely. I don’t recall that I was freaking out, or even that I realized that this would be – one of those defining moments that I would look back to over and over again, and would come to influence so much of what I do, and where I go, and the things I would learn and see because of my love for the ocean and surfing.

I have surfed now for almost 30 years. West coast, east coast, Hawaii, New Zealand, Fiji, Australia, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, and now ever more frequently, México. I have stared back at the shoreline and tried to figure out some serious issues about life, love, death, illness, joy. I remember right after college being so freaked about the potential of life in general, that I considered actually just paddling out into the ocean and not coming back. It seemed that disappearing into the abyss of the ocean would be better than facing the insurmountable number of questions that needed answering in what seemed very short time. I had inexplicable feelings for the ocean – I would dive into the ocean when I hadn’t been in the water for a while (then a long time would be about 4 days) and utter: “I’m home”. I never felt that I could get that connection anywhere else, until I found mountains, and solitude and that close connection in other areas of my life.

When we were growing up and there was a big swell, and everyone would line up gaping at the shore pound, and wondering how we would make it to the outside. I would always convince myself that I could stay calm, and paddle slower so I would not get anaerobic before getting into the impact zone. The first wave of the set would beckon, raise up and blow our small group apart with no effort at all. The sets would roll over us and the power that you felt when that waves hit you would be terrifying, completely out of control. Surfacing, and gasping for breathe before the next wave hit, I could look around and see my bro’s all taking the beating, reaching for their boards, trying to get into position to dive under the next set wave. It was somehow inspirational to just clear an oncoming wave and watch someone else get sucked back over the falls, dragged to the inside, and see them fighting to get back out.

Once in the line up, we would re-group and encourage each other, hooting, shouting, and watching each other go beyond what we thought we could do. It was a coming of age in so many more ways than I could ever understand at that time. It formed bonds that have not broken – twenty some odd years later – and that I trust will never be broken regardless of distance, distinctions in paths taken, or even death.

Not too long ago, 1999 I believe, we were out on the island and we lucked into a massive hurricane swell. The crew was back, and for three days we couldn’t get out through the mid-break to the outside. We surfed the inside, and Howd, AKA: HF squared AKA: Dootidorious the most tubeth paddled for a pitching wedge not 20 feet from the sand at the tail end of one of our evening sessions. The wave peaked perfectly, he dropped late – looking like he would certainly bail and roll up onto the beach. As he free fell down the face, he shifted back and buried the pintail of his board in the lower face, pivoted effortlessly, and accelerated up the face, arced into a wide sweeping cutback reminiscent of a mid-70’s photo of Terry Fitzgerald at J-Bay, sent the spray-a-flying, straightened out and ran it out on the sand as the wave devoured itself up the steep slope of the beach. I was speechless, and waves of memories reeled through my head of our lives maturing on the beach, both in and out of the water.

Some years later now, in the present, I am fortunate enough to have the health, and strength and time and focus to stay pretty connected to the ocean, even though I am some 2,000 miles from the nearest piece of moving salt water. A few weeks ago I was able to catch an evening session with a friend in North County, San Diego. He had brought me a board that would make it’s way to Mexico in the subsequent weeks – a Dave Parmenter Fish – 6”2 – great – magic type of board. The waves were small, sets coming in at three feet max, kinda sloppy, kinda blown out. In his endearing fashion, Richard had a plan for the waves. After ‘studying; the line up at Terramar he had discovered that there were pockets of deep water where waves would do brief accelerations, so even in small surf there was some verve to be had. I was satisfied to get wet, and even just paddle around on a new board.

There were a few sets, and the board was performing famously for the lack of power that the waves had. I caught one left, and it just set up – in a small way – but still offered some wall to go after. The board accelerated seamlessly across the face and the shoulder backed off and I was presented with a picture perfect small wall for a gouge. I weighted the tail, set up and threw as hard as I figured I could with the speed/power ratio I had. The board rolled over on edge, grabbed, accelerated around, and just connected through back to the core of the wave. I straightened out, kicked out and started back out. If that was the ONLY turn I got on the trip – at all – it would have been worth the hassle of getting out to the west coast, working, driving, flying, all of the above. Things just came together for probably less than 2 seconds. It was a moment – in a series of moments that continue shaping life.

2003-08-26T10:10:00.000-07:00

Breakfast Bagel: Check
Toasted and buttered garlic bagel: Check
Latte: check
Bitter, embattled bike experience: Check

Feels like Fall. I thought it was colder than it was when the alarm went off apparently inches from my head at 5:30. Dark. Cold. I feel dehydrated despite taking the day off the bike Monday, not drinking any beers, and generally being a good little healthy person. Reports of West Nile, aging, etc. I guess I will go back to the suds tonight - as I think it actually makes me feel better - not worse.

Did a wierd route that involved crossing the thing that carries the stuff to the place, crossing the river, then climbing back up to the other side, crossing the top, dropping back down into the chasm, and then climbing back out again. The problem was - when we climbed back out again we rain into the OTHER thing that carries stuff to the place - that they are working on - and they wouldn't let us pass.

Standing at the little man-held STOP sign, and contemplating the carry around the road - a red pick up truck pulls up - like F-150 something or other. Idea! Let's ask the guy for alift through the 300 yeard "NO BIKES" zone - and it'll take about 35 seconds out of his day. Nice enough looking guy, 60 or so, wife in the car. "'Scuse me sir - but could we possibly toss ourselves and our bikes into your truck for about a minute - to get through this zone - it's just me and my wife - trying to get to work". He looks at me direct - we are seperated by 2 feet. Shakes his head no and looks straight forward. "Sir, it'll take about 2 seconds - it would be a huge help and we could get to work on time....." He rolls up his window and pulls forward. "THANK YOU - THAT IS VERY NEIGHBORLY OF YOU". Not what I wanted to yell - but what I did yell. I was flabberghasted.

Being pissed is my immediate reaction, but it's too global, too ridiculous. This is not a personal attack from Mr. Truckfuck, but simply a biased reaction to someone on a bike. Much like I might react to someone I don't know asking me about detailed land passage information - I might react to their bike, their facial hair, their presence in a group. I can't get that mad at the dude - as I am just as biased - and yes - prejudiced against others sometimes. Good lesson to learn. The carry around the zone sucked - but it was a gorgeous morning, and I was outside riding with my beautiful wife. Enough said.

The other highlight of the morning was getting a note from one of my favorite authors: AC Weisbecker. Cosmic Banditos; The Search for Captain Zero - buy these books - read them - they are insane and wonderful. He sent out an email basically asking himself why he bothered to publish opinions, and that he was having a 'What's the Point' kind of day. I emailed him back - and got a response - which may seem like no big thing - BUTT - his books have taken me on journeys, and made me think about the world, and my life, and all that stuff - in ways that were not in my consciuosness prior to knowing his material - his life and his books.

That's a gift Allan - and the fact that you had your shit together - and had the motivation and the focus and determination to get your books published - speaks volumes - so to speak. It's an inspiration to a wanna be writer like myself.

http://www.aweisbecker.com/enews/

There is Allans site. And as I told him - I respect the tar out of him for having an opinion - and having the balls to put it into writing. It's basically opening yourself up to criticism - and it's scary - but it's also the way we learn - about everything - even ourselves.

Cheers Senor de Pura Vida - this rant's for you.

2003-08-25T10:36:00.000-07:00

And I believe - that it is unique - that if I obfuscate a trail - and leave a bagel in a tree as proof - as it were - that someone knows that it was me. That's funny. But then again, someone asked me about a trail the other day and told me I built it - wanted to thank me. I said I was responsible for no such thing - and they persisted - saying that I was responsible. I told them that the trail they were referring to was created while I was in prison.

They left me alone after that.

Entropy - can come in many forms. Don't mow your lawn - and you will have a field. Don't wash your car - and it turns into a haven for the environments through which you drive it. Don't actively dedicate time to the preservation of things you love - they die, or wilt.

Enough said.

Load your weapons for the Bring Only Assholes nightride coming up. Publicly advertising, and actively organizing the destruction. Tsk, tsk.

Load your arrows.

2003-08-22T11:18:00.000-07:00

The Way of the Gun

Dear Sir:

“……I understand how having a weapon pointed in your direction is disturbing and frightening. Because I did not lower the weapon immediately and did not verbally acknowledge your presence, I increased your fear and mistakenly continued the threat to your person……..”

Legalese for ‘Sorry I almost wiped you off the planet. Lovely. Lick my ass convict.

“We are so sorry for the way we acted. Our parents have grounded us until August. Our parents sat us down and gave us a huge lecture about the dangers and risks bikers face every day”

11 – year old speak for: Doh – I got busted. Sweet.

August, 2002.
Returning from Mcguckins on the single speed after running some lunchtime errands. Approximate temperature: 103 degrees. White Toyota Corrolla pulls up beside me, youth leans out window, points super soaker in my face, and pulls the trigger. Very cold blast of water to the face that sends me almost over the curb, almost under the car. Toyota accelerates away, as someone in the back is flipping me off through the back window. I give chase. The 34X20 is not the most effective urban tracking device. They hit Pearl Street and turn right. I cut through Mike’s Camera and almost catch them before they U-turn around the median, and head west on Pearl. There is a line of cars at the light at Folsom, and they are stuck in it as someone waits to turn left. I approach the vehicle from the back and slide my U-Lock off the bars, wielding it as one would a club. I skid up to the drivers side door as the window rolls up, jump off my bike and slam the bike on the hood of the car, loudly. I say, in politically un-correct terminology using words you would never ever hear in church, to open the window, or I will systematically break all the windows until a door becomes a jar. I relay that I am not a crazy, but that there are some things that need saying, and I am going to be the person doing the talking. There is a young male in the drivers seat, with an older looking girl in the passenger seat, and another younger male in the backseat. They look a little freaked. The driver cracks the window as the passenger smacks him about, yelling something like “I am never babysitting for you again – wait until your parents find out…..” I instruct the girl in the passengers’ seat, to pull the car over, as we have some dialogue that must take place before I am willing to let them go. They acquiesce, and I follow them a few yards to the side of a building for a little chat.

October, 2002.
Riding home from the bus and relishing one of the last evenings that I will be able to ride home in the light, even if I just make it as the early winter sun tracks lower and lower across the horizon. I climb the final rise at the top of Big Springs and see the barrel of a rifle, pointing at my head. The ‘shooter’ sights in on me, tips his head away slightly, and then re-sights on me, grinning and snickering a little bit. I veer into the woods, and sprint to get out of range – as it were. Heart beating out of control I stop for just a moment, and then instinctually circle back around towards the vehicle the hunter was standing by. I note the license plate of the truck, pull back into the woods, and cut out to the road further away, and out of sight. My neighbors pull up in their car, and I read them the license plate, really not realizing how scared I am until I try to talk. I am – literally – speechless – (and that is a place I don’t go very often). I get home after spinning out some of the raw nerve endings, and call the police. When the cop shows up it is clear that what we are talking about is a fairly serious offense – I really have no idea how serious. The officer asks some very specific details, I offer them freely between swigs of beer, as the event is still sinking in to my psyche. I draw a picture of the barrel of the gun – from the directly in front view – something that I think ended up being pretty damning to John Q. Convict.

As I got the woman in the passenger seat calmed down and made it clear to her that I was not going to kill anyone, and after I threatened the driver (If you were 30 pounds heavier this would be happening much differently! - expletive - deletive) I issued my demands: A signed letter of apology from the parents of the offending party. Unless I got that letter in 48 hours, I was going to report the car, and the driver and press charges to the best of my abilities. Based on my limited knowledge of Colorado law, I let them know that I believed this might delay them getting their licenses until they were oh – say 50. I wrote down the plate, wrote down my business address, and bade them farewell.

“Have you ever been hated or discriminated against – I have…. “
Marshall Mathers

Sometimes, it feels like, when one commutes by bicycle, or even just gets around by bicycle a great deal of the time, that every exhaust blowing super sized SUV is after you personally. To mow down, or maim, or generally kill you. I have a pet theory that those of us who ride bikes a great deal have an internal odometer, and every time it hits about 3,812 miles, we get run over. Might be clipped, or dragged, or bumped – but something negative will happen with an automobile. After that contact, it resets, and starts to accumulate all over again. From the seat of a bicycle, it really feels like people in cars are out for you full force. They glare, they stare, they swerve, and they veer over abruptly after passing you. They make it seem that turning the wheel three degrees to one side is the largest inconvenience in the world, and that you – as a person on a bike – do not deserve that basic courtesy. They would rather simply roll over you and continue on their rushed way to whatever urgencies await them down the road.

When you are a victim of this discrimination over time, over years, it builds, and when the vent blows – it blows hard. Back about a million years ago when we rode our bikes across the great US of A, we fell victim to so many vehicle abuses and attacks by dogs – based on the weight of our bikes and the duration of our days – that it became a huge issue. After about 3,600 miles, it was to the boiling point. We had been chewed on, bitten, chased, maimed and derided by canines for the better part of two months. On a loaded bike, when you do battle with Fido – he wins. So, as we were passing through upstate New York, which has probably the steepest and most gnarly hills in the world, the final insult happened. We were climbing some god forsaken 19% grade with my brother in pole position. As he passed some non-descript house, he awoke the inner Cujo in this location, and the dog was charging across the lawn as I made the edge of the property line. At the breaking point, I saw him coming, and vaulted off my bike, grabbing the pump off the top tube in one fluid Lancelot like move. I calmly extended the pump and wound up. The dog slowed its’ charge, I believe sensing a certain psychological imbalance in its’ foe, and perhaps even a certain taint of aggression. I wailed out a string of profanities at this point – baiting the dog – urging it to bring its’ wimpy hairy ass into range. I kicked my bike, stomped and continued screaming. It wasn’t until the dog retreated to the porch that I saw the owner hiding just inside the front door, scared to come out and wondering why his pet was being so traumatized by a sun burned weirdo in bike shorts.

To call it persecution is a little over the top – even Boulderish – yeah – us bike riders and the Kurds – we are all in the same boat – but damn – sometimes it really feels like an active beat down. After some episodes of these ‘incidents’ I am met with disbelief by my friends, office mates. Sometimes, it’s easy to verify the reality of the interactions, like the time I got run into a barbed wire fence and was sitting on the floor of the kitchen in our office picking gravel out of gashes for the better part of a morning. However, when someone just hears the tale – based on some of the embellishments I have floated over the years, I am met with scrutiny. One of my partners said one morning that he thought I had a target on my back – or a poor attitude and I just ‘drew’ these things to me. I relayed back that I was pretty sure it was just sheer volume. If you are out there – exposed to the world of cars and humans and transport from the seat of a bike – interesting things will happen – some of them very wonderful – some of them not so wonderful.

When I relayed the Super Soaker interaction, I don’t think anyone really believed me. Maybe they thought someone showed me a watergun in McGuckins. When I shared the real gun episode, I believe I was met with the same scrutiny. So I share the following not to justify that these things ‘really’ happened, simply to document their passing (almost a year later – as that’s how long it took for Johnny Rifle to get prosecuted). Part of my stipulation for Johnny Long gun was to get an apology letter as well. When asked if I wanted him to go to prison (he was a convicted felon, and was not allowed to own or touch a firearm) I said no – that seemed a little extreme – but I just wanted him to think about it long enough to write (have his lawyer) write a letter.

Is this justice? Fuck no. Does it make me feel a little better – yes.
Be careful out there.

2003-08-20T13:47:00.000-07:00

This in from Mexico - on a quasi-epic adventure down south not so long ago.......

Always – Go.

It looked like Puff Daddy’s yacht. And, although I think he broke up with J-Lo, I was expecting her and her most famous body part to be boogying down to the Trip hop that we could hear playing on the jet propelled launch that we saw somewhere between us and landfall. The launch was our mid – point target for the hour or so paddle that we were doing to get back in from The Cove, at the far tip of Punta De Mita, Nayarit, Mexico. It seems Julio – our boat driver, had gone back to the palapa HQ, had a few beers and forgot to tell his buddy to head on out to the point and pick up the surfers before dark. We had waited two hours past the appointed pick up, and then decided to paddle in, hopefully in time to beat darkness. Mexico. As long as you don’t have to be anywhere for a few days, you never have problems. It is called “Mananna”, or tomorrow there. Everything happens tomorrow – which means – not today. Which means, we would have spent the night out there on the point, and although I am very comfortable in the ocean, I was not OK with floating around on a longboard in the wee hours. It’s been a while since I have seen Jaws, but dark, and unfamiliar water still sketches me out as the shadows fall. So, we paddled the 4 miles back to land. No problem. Bienvenidos – Welcome – to Mexico.

My investment banker friend William put it best the night before, as we sloshed along the dirt road in the back of the pick up truck, finally headed home, balancing our boards and our beers while trying not to get bounced out of the decrepit vehicle. “You know”, he said, contemplating his plastic cup of Corona, “not many people I know would consider this a vacation”. The evening started as normal as ever, seeking surf to the north of home base in San Pancho. There is a river mouth break that tends to be a little bigger, maybe a little quicker, favors the shortboard more than the longboard. We had been scratching bottom for waves, and needed a little more verve perhaps, so we headed up after the afternoon Siesta to see what the river mouth was doing. There were waves – snappy little faces that you could get a few turns on before being slammed into the sand at shore. Perfect for a new 6”2 Fish that was seeing its’ first appearances in Mexican waters. We caught some really fun waves, capped the nearly five hours in the water for the day, and walked back up to the waiting VW in darkness. The car – of course – Mexico – wouldn’t start. We tried for about twenty minutes before accepting the fact that we were stuck.

Inventory: 200 pesos, trunks, board, rash guard, very wet towel. Choice number one: Beer. There is apparently a world cup happening as most of the bar that we walk into off the beach is full of people enraptured by the TV. We order beers, sit down, drip, and try to dry out the car keys so they will work. We believe that we have shorted out the system in the car by inserting the surfed with keys into the electrical system. Giant a-ha there. After finishing beer # 1, we strike up conversation with a couple cooking dinner over open flames on the sidewalk outside the bar. They empathize with our predicament and offer to give us a ride back to Sayulita so we can at least get home. We pile in the back of the pick up, after getting our beers ‘para llevar’ to go – and it is then that William makes his comment that seems to crystallize the night. Circumstance. Fate, whatever ends up being the guiding force that brings us into the situations. The night is warm and breezy, I am sitting in a puddle of salt water, I just had a great surf, and I am not sure what other elements of happiness I could argue were missing from the situation. We are not in a rush – our flight isn’t for two days. Embrace this present that is the present – and sip, bounce, and revel in the fact that we are not rushing home to catch CSI: Miami season premiere.

So, back to the paddle, and the boat. The only sketchy part from a safety stand point is getting around the tip of Punta De Mita. There are many visible rocks, and threading your way around, and through them in uncertain surf is a little precarious. There is always the chance that there is a set looming somewhere off your shoulder that you can’t see, and always the chance that there are some shallow spots that you can not anticipate having never been there before. I paddle for a while, sit up – look for lines through the rocks, look for tell tale boils that indicate very shallow water, and swing wide around the point believing that the open sea is a lot safer than being close to the shore. As I approach the skiff in the middle of the bay I see it’s not J-Lo, but the girl on the boat is a babe, and she is thumping out some sweet, rhythmic paddling tunes. The surreal nature of the moment escapes me temporarily. But, I paddle by, ½ mile offshore, evening light, basically in the open ocean. There is no one and nothing around for miles. I make eye-contact, she tips her beer and says “Hey”. I continue paddling. That’s it.

Moments later I see our boat man heading back out towards the point and wave him down. Mexican time- he’s right on schedule – which according to our watches is about 2 hours late. I crawl into the boat, and we head back out to get William who by virtue of being on a shortboard is quite a ways behind me. We coast into the beach and can see Daemon and John walking down the point. Rather than negotiate the discounted rate for paddling back, we – of course – get some beers. Daemon and John get there a few minutes later, and we get another round. We talk our boat driver down to 200 pesos from the original 500 – he actually seems a little embarrassed.

So, did we find epic surf – certainly not. We got a few waves, had a semi – epic – and saw some coastline from a great perspective that I had never seen before. Sure beats the shit out of rushing home for CSI.

2003-08-13T15:21:00.000-07:00

Another ridiculously gorgeous morning. Day 5 of singles and doubles of skating and riding...the knees and ankles are hurting, but the creek at lunch was a nice respite and I am convinced of the medicinal qualities of the soiled waters of Boulder creek.

We rode an 'established' route in - kind of a reief from the mixed carrying and confusion and OBFUSCATION of the prior days. I have been obsessing about some connections that are not easy, obvious, or super friendly...and they keep me up at night. I pore over maps and wonder - what if.....I could ride my bike from home - all the way to Boulder.

Lucilles in the morning - serious fat fest, and a day of rest to prepare for the Silverthorne and Breckenridge skateparks - and the annual haul of Merryweather over grey's Peak.

2003-08-12T16:22:00.000-07:00

"The Danger of civilisation, of course, is that you will piss away your life on nonsense"

Jim Harrison

And with the first line of this book - I am again amazed at the power of the written word, and the fact that I paid $5.98 for this book, and a movie costs $9.50; a cd costs 15 bucks, and on, and on. Books have to be the best investment ever. I am going to include some reviews of various media in here...

2003-08-12T08:57:00.000-07:00

Sacred places.

If a palce is so sacred - why would we choose to defile it?

Why am I such a dick about trails?

Saturday afternoon - riding somewhere I ususally don't ride on the weeked - finishing up a maintenence ride and heading home. 4 riders approach me on the trail and stop - looking for "67". Hmmmmm. We renamed one trail that used to be known as something associated with something else to "66's" as that's how many of the things that the trails was known for fell off the trail, henceforth not allowing the dumb ass name of this route to be uttered by flatlanders everywhere in their search for the ultimate one track... which kinda sucks now cuz they have all ridden it into oblivion and made it a destination for bikers from Canada to Cancun. No, they couldn't be asking about that. Oh - 68. The road.

I ran into them at a junction that I like to think doesn't see too much use, and has limited access due to private land, etc. When I asked them about how they accessed said trail they said that they knew someone at the entry area of the trail that let them go through their land. When pressed on who - they backed down and said they knew someone who was staying with someone who said they could pass, etc. etc. When asked about the relevance of said line of questioning, I shared that if they were going to lie about how they had come to this junctioin that I was going to withold vital trail directions and insure that thir ride finished somewhere near the Pakistani border. Then, from the cheap seats - way in the back - the one guy babbles out :"Where's XYZ trail?".

I laughed audibly, and told them that the trail by that name had been obliterated by too much use, too little care, and a president who would like to pave the planet. I believe they were getting the gist of the idea that I was not going to be forthcoming about trail information. I believe they - quite accurately - pigeon holed me as one of those guys who is just selfish, and holds trail information tightly - kinda like the watch that was stuck up Christpher Walken's bunger in that movie.

It cracked me up that I had just come from a 90 minute singletrack ride that does not see tracks, or people, and is therefore one of the sacred places I enjoy. Much like the so called XYZ trails were something like seven or eight years ago. They were vague, they were rideable, they were non-descript and unknown - they were sweet as candy pie, solitude and sex. They are now sewage holes, over-ridden, underloved and beaten beyond recognition of anything that they resembled in their hey day - before they were "Found".

Trail access - trail issues. Oh, such heated topics of debate that rile and ramp our blood pressure. We got it - you can't have it. Earn your turns, discriminate, have cliques. Guilty. All of the above. Noone is beyond reproach, and the only way to learn about our viewpoints is to explore them. Maybe even in print. Hell, I have trails that I won't even ride by myself, because I am scared I Might rememeber where they are and inadvertently ride them by mistake. A dick about trails? Me? You're God damned right. I offer no apologies and no soft language, and yes - it is discriminatory and selfish and 'snobby'. But who the hell am I to determine what should happen out there in the woods. Unless I know you - I mean really know you and have seen that ethic of adventure, and heinous carries, and that lust for connections and new routes..unless I understand that you are not here for the short term - and that a trail might 'go away' for a few years, only to return in another...unless you have chosen not just to LIVE in a mountain town - but to find a way to die there - really committed to the area and the long term....then stay the fuck out of the woods. Go to a controlled area and ride nice marked trails that have photo stopping points and little signs that tell you exactly how far it is from point A to point B. Sounds like fun. See you there.

2003-08-08T15:06:00.000-07:00

CAVEAT: unless you watch the Tour De France obsessivley - this will mean nothing. Even if you do - it might still mean nothing. This is a parody. This is a joke. I am not advocating that any of the commentators from the tour have sex with each other - this would be suggestive and disgusting. Right? Right !

If My Commute Were a Stage in the Tour, and Phil, Paul, Bob, Kirsten and Frankie and Sam all commentated ( C'mon people - use those imagination muscles....)

Tour Du Psychosis

Watching the tour every night, listening to Phil and Paul (and Bob) I can not help but hear the echoes from them in my head in the wee hours, commuting solo, voices induced by rich black coffee and the dim light of morning, joining in with all the other voices in my head. Only these voices have English accents, and are commentating from some unseen, all seeing place, somewhere overhead about a non-existent race…….

Paul: Well Phil, it looks to be another hot day here in the countryside with yet another punishing day in the Tour De Mag.
Phil: Well yes Paul, I believe we will see temperatures climbing well beyond the 45 Celsius mark – an awfully long day as well in the Tour to be out there in this heat.
Paul: Perhaps we can give the folks at home a little background on the Tour De Mag, and the unique circumstances of today’s one time only coverage.
Phil: Yes, well, we have a seasoned veteran, I believe some thirteen years here on the tour, putting in a strong showing for this late in the summer and actually turning the pedals at just a few minutes after five O’clock in the morning. There is actually no Peleton, and in fact Paul, no race this morning. We are simply guests here in the deluded cortex of a lone cyclist who seems to have had a bit too much of the warm brew this morning, thereby summoning us out of his unconscious mind to accompany him on his journey.
Paul: Alright then, let’s get to the heart of the matter here Phil and have a look at today’s course. Since we are off-road, and staying primarily in the woods today, we’re going to call on Bob Roll to run the course review.
Bob: Thanks gentleman, and we do have a challenging route this morning. We start off with a brutal out of the gate climb of some 450 feet, with a very short piece on the double-track, and then a hole shot into the woods and onto the first serious climb of the day. Since there is only one rider, we shouldn’t see too much fighting for that hole shot, as there is noone to fight with. We’ll see the Peleton make that first right into the single-track and hit an abrupt climb, made worse by the lack of a warm up on course, and the triple beat down from yesterday’s activities. After this short, yet brutal climb, we have a stretch of almost 4 kilometers of descent. We should see our man gaining some ground on the field here, as he has ridden the route approximately 1,673 times, and knows it like the back of his own hand. After the descent we have some mixed double-track and then some broken climbing that takes us into the Linkin’ Park area. Now, I don’t know how this got onto the approved course, as it is mostly unrideable, but there you have it. After the crest of the Linkin’ Park area there is a very difficult descent into a gulch like area, a final climb to the top of the pavement and then a 9 kilometer descent that will put us at the finish around about 8:40. Overall, there is about 1,800 feet of uphill in this ride, but with the heat and the last few days, I bet it will feel like twice that.
Phil: Now Bob, you being more familiar with the course, and the off road racing, what can we expect to see as the stage unfolds?
Bob: Well, I think we are going to see a slow start. There was some skateboarding and drinking last night after two not insignificant rides, and I do believe there is some difficulty still left in the legs from the airplane ride from New York just some 36 hours ago, so, we can only watch and wait. He is on a Single-speed which may provide some advantages in simplicity and weight loss, but might hurt him on some of the particularly difficult climbs, particularly once we get back to the pavement.
Paul: Well, not much waiting left, as he is off, and up the drive and onto the main part of the course heading for the first turn. It does look as though he forgot his backpack, and is heading back for it, and this bike racer does not look pleased, And so, the first pedal has been turned in ANGER
Phil: Paul, this first climb, it is only a mountain, one of many you can see on this Country morning, but for this young man it will be a place where he would dare to ask himself the question of greatness.
Paul: And Phil, despite your rhetoric, based on his cadence at the early part of the climb, I don’t believe we will see any real action until a little later in the ride, and I would say there is an even lesser chance of greatness.
Bob: Well, these early climbs can be tough, and I actually believe he’s going to walk a fair portion of this. I am not surprised, as this isn’t actually a competition, but we will see this effect his overall time at the end of the ride, that egg sandwich may be getting a bit stale by the time it sees his stomach.
Phil: Well Bob, I hate to disrupt this sleepy morning, but it looks like he is turning up the heat in the kitchen as we watch he is climbing like an angel.
Paul: I do believe he is finding his form, and the acceleration from that singly geared bike is just ripping the legs off the Peleton.
Bob: Well , you know what they say is that a one speed is really a two speed – sitting and standing – and I believe we are seeing the standing version here today gentleman. He is putting the group (Bob looks around cautiously realizing that there is no group, peleton or race) into a great deal of difficulty.
Phil: Yes, I do believe we are seeing the pirate boarding the ship up here on the ridge. Now Bob, if this were you, in an off road race – what would you be thinking – what would your strategy be?
Bob: Well Phil, I rarely get up before noon, so you have to realize that I wouldn’t be riding in the first place – I would probably – and most likely be driving my gap toothed ass to the nearest bacon purveying establishment to fill ‘er up. I also doubt I could manufacture such a detailed hallucinatory experience without some kind of chemical assistance.
Phil: Well, back to the action, he is aflame on this decent, it’s as though someone dropped a bomb into the field. It’s as if he has a motor on his bike on this descent, and I do believe this will widen the gap on the riders who are not quite as accustomed to this rugged type of riding. They are trying to bridge, but it’s rather like holding back the flood with a little finger.
Bob: Well Gentleman, as we come out onto the more open dirt road here, we will have some more descending, and then some rather fierce uphill for almost 900 feet from the base of the climb into what’s known as the Linkin’ Park area.
Phil: Now correct me if I am wrong Bob, but isn’t that the name of a rap metal band?
Bob: Well, yes Phil – you have that absolutely right.
Paul: I was amazed on the preview of the course that we did yesterday that we couldn’t actually find a trail that would be appropriate for a cyclist of any type. In fact – we were hard pressed to even find our way out of the woods. We ended up calling the chopper and barely got back in time for cocktails.
Bob: This section of the course is what we would normally call vague, or obfuscated. It takes a certain Zen like sense of direction to find your way through this portion of the ride. I must say, if our man can get away in the thick of the brush, I believe we will see a new leader at the end of the day.
Phil: Well, we’ve begun the climb in earnest now, and it does appear as if our man is going to put some pressure on the field, and I am sure we are going to see numerous contenders spit out the back of the bunch like a trailer of cans on a motor coach on wedding day.
Paul: It seems that he is maintaining a consistent pace and we will see yet another right turn into the bushes that will elevate this climb to a whole other level of pain.
Phil: Well Paul, I do believe he’s pulling off to the side again, and yes Paul, he is dropping his droors.
Paul: Yes, a cheeky side of the tour that we don’t see very often, even with superhuman strength and bike handling skills these riders still need to pinch the occasional loaf. For more on this, back to Bob for the human side of this story.
Bob: Well, it is true nature does call and shorts off to OLN for covering EVERY aspect of the race. Many times there will be breaks in the action for the teams to empty their bladders and bowels of the ENORMOUS amounts of food and liquid they ingest just to survive the tour. We have some footage from yesterday Phil and Bob that really speaks to the commitment of the domestiques taking care of their man, keeping him in the pink as it were, and out of brown. Here you can see on the right side of the screen, after the peleton breaks for a little pee stop and our man is in need of a bit of number two if you will. If you look carefully you can actually see Floyd Landis gently cleaning the lead rider's bottom, perhaps the ultimate sacrifice for a domestique at this level of racing.
Kirsten: I am going to puke….
Sam Posey: Speechless
Frankie: Damn. That's fucking cool.
Phil: Allright then, enough of this, back to the bike racing action out on the course. They are on the wider part of the climb now and about to crest and I do not see the leg-speed and immunity to attack that we have seen the last few years in the tour Paul, and I would even say that our man looks vulnerable.
Paul: As we have seen in the past, this racer's off-road skills fall slightly lower than yours Phil. I believe the bumps and undulations of this course are causing him a bit of difficulty.
Kirsten: Paul, please, say UNDULATIONS again, I just love the way you say that!
Phil: Please save that for the post race show folks, we have a heated battle out on the course as we speak.
Paul: OK, we have now topped out, we have one more long descent, and then to the Pave, and up and over the last brutal, almost vertical climb of the day. This is shaping up to be a very tough day in the saddle, and on this last climb it does appear that our man is all over his machine.
Phil: Yes, as the yellow line tilts upward, these men dig deeper and deeper seeking the courage to survive the onslaught of doubt and insecurity in their inner most souls, seeking the iron in their suitcases of courage to lead this talented group of riders over yet ONE MORE INCLINE!
Sam: They have suitcases” I would think there would be a significant weight issue there?!
Frankie: That's really cool.
Paul: Phil, it’s a fucking quarter mile climb – I could clean it on a Big Wheel.
Bob: Well, gentleman, you know, one time on a brutal mescal buzz, after about 42 PBR’s I did try to ride some off road trails on a big wheel, and as my orthopedic surgeon retired after that, I can tell you – I was not the brightest crayon in the box to make that choice.
Phil: It’s not all beer and skittles by any means.
Kirsten: Forget the skittles, hand me a beer, Paul is making me so hot.
Paul: Now coming out onto the Pave, I believe our man has been put into sever difficulty by himself, and his legs have turned to rubber and effort reduced to mere survival. He's done his job at the front and now he must concentrate on getting his enormous carcass up the rest of the way
Phil: And the peleton has been streched across the road like a long sausage
Paul: Don’t look back now – you know what’s going on back there because you just left.
Phil: I do believe that our lone rider was playing a bit of a charade, and he is now accelerating up this incline like a Grand Prix Motorcar – I doubt there is anyone out there who can match the acceleration of him now! He looks between his legs and sees nobody there. He will see no more challengers out there today.
Paul: He is really plowing a wide furrow through the field today.
Kirsten: OH PAUL – PLOW MY FIELD!
Paul: He has the bit in his teeth – try as he may – he cannot find a bigger gear on the bicycle..there is no bigger gear to be found.
Kirsten: I found something very large…….

Phil:

"THIS IS WHAT BIKE RACING IS ALL ABOUT"

2003-08-08T11:11:00.000-07:00

This, to follow up on the visit of an angel, someone from the past who has been there and back - and carries with her a huge piece of my heart wherever she goes. God Bless ya Evil Sue - and may your visits increase in frequency and duration.

For Immediate Release
August 8, 2003

Honey, I shrank the collie

Bizarre Hippy Barbie shrinks and abducts collie in upper Mongolia

Boulder County (AP) – Sammy, beloved pet of the twisted family has been declared both ‘shrank’ and missing as of this mornings Mongolia update. Sources close to the incident say a large green econo-van with Intergalactic Phish plates was seen in the vicinity last night.

Other strange reports are coming in from Galctic Pilots who were patrolling the Mongolian airspace this morning. When contacted by phone, a few pilots had these comments:

Danimal: “I was just cruising mag right by the mailboxes there and some betty in a pink belly shirt and a cowboy hat leaned out of this huge green van and said ‘Hey Sailor, need a ride?’. Perplexed, Danimal then apparently spotted the radically reduced in size Collie and fled for his life. “I didn’t think the ’76 van could catch me – and I was right”.

Nacho: “I was just spacing out on the last climb of mag and this huge van pulls over. After that all I remember is beads, patchouli smells, and a lot of small stuffed animals. I woke up at Foolish Craig’s with an empty plate in front of me. I think she used the Vulcan Mind Mold, and I have only slight memories of seeing Mini-Sam in the van – but I am pretty sure he was in there”

KingNmby: “Something wasn’t right in the kitchen this morning, there was a pink travel case on the floor, and then here comes this Lilliputian collie – and I didn’t think Sam could fit through the cat door – but before I could apprehend him – he was out of there”.

KingNmby was found with Nacho at Craig’s, apparently in the same stupor of post abduction haze. They have been flown to a secret debriefing facility in Irag.

A hazy, and controversial photo of the midget sized Sam is being circulated around the Mongolia environs. Any possible sightings should be relayed immediately to authourities.

2003-08-01T15:21:00.000-07:00

I have been hesitant to Blog. The fact that it is a verb really scares me. Butt, I was also jealous when I went back and looked at harrowing tales from the winter, and reminisced about great rides through my good friend Timmy's blog - so - here it is.

The first post is not a story at all - just an iteration of a classic that I felt served my very confusing emotions about the beautiful area I live in - and some of the use/over use issues.

2003-08-01T15:02:00.000-07:00

Sung to the tune of :Stairway To Heaven

There’s some bikers we’re told, are incredibly bold
And they rode the bus all the way to Nedland
When they get there they’ll know, if the trails are all closed
It’s their fault, cuz they brought 67 friends

Ohh, ooh, and they rode the bus all the way to Nedland

There’s a sign on the trail, and they know they should bail
But you know for this they are too…….extreme,
On a trail in the woods, where there used to be roots,
Till the freeriders slipped, now it’s pavement,

Ohhhhhhh, it makes me vomit

There’s a pain in my guts, when I look at the bus
And my spirit is crying for weapons
In my thoughts I have seen, bikers nailed to the trees,
And the carcasses of their 38 pound boingers,

And it’s whispered that soon, if we continue to ruin
Then the forest service will close it with no reason
And a new day will dawn, for those who did wrong
And the forest will echo with moto’s

Does anybody remember Judd’s Trail?

If there’s a trail tool in your ride kit, don’t be alarmed now
It’s just for deadfall, on the main trail
Yes there are more paths you can build now, but in the long run
It’s still best to keep your mouth shut

Your friends are crying, and they can’t go, in case you don’t know
The group is begging you to show them
Dear Squirrel boy, can’t you hear the wind blow and did you know,
The woods will seek their own revenge

when all that’s left is riding roads…
Combustion engines in our nose,
There ride some wankers we all know
Who shuttle hard and won’t go slow
While everything is getting closed
And if you cover where you rode
The woods will thank you with their love
When magik’s gone and reboot’s hosed
To be a mouse, and not a trollllllll….

And they rode the bus all the way…..to Nedland.