Like Greyhounds in the Slips...

Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows of the bar, heat lightning flashes in the near distance, just over the top edge of the curiously perdurable Inns of Virginia hotel across the street from Mad Fox Brewing Company, where I sit alone among what could only be optimistically and loosely called a crowd. Still, they are a persistent, noisy lot, and one can only hope that their livers, like mine, are exceedingly forgiving.

The Vaya is all but built. I have only to cable up the derailleurs (what an alien undertaking!) and wrap the Woodchipper in fine Cinelli cork, and it's all ready for a ride. It's about damn time, isn't it? Should be fully beta-tested before RamJam next weekend, where I can better experience how it shines as a randonneuring rig.

Slightly related, I recently picked up a new IRO Phoenix frameset (linked pix are not mine)—due for delivery sometime this coming week—in black for $199 online, to go with the workhorse high-flange hubset (pink is the new pink, which is to say it's the old black) I all but stole from IRO for $40 a while back. This because, well, dammit, I absolutely need another bike!

Switching topics again, in a blatant by-proxy effort to roam and experience, I've started reading Roads to Quoz: An American Mosey, by a gentleman with the unlikely name of William Least Heat-Moon. (The titular Q-word denotes “a noun, both singular and plural, referring to anything strange, incongruous or peculiar; at its heart is the unknown, the mysterious.”) The book is a lengthy travelogue of sorts, full of colorful accounts of small town Americana, from what I've gathered. Heat-Moon, accompanied by his wife, to whom he gives the curious appellation Q (quoz?), makes a journey by car in a series of short trips that trace the itinerary of the 1804 Hunter-Dunbar Expedition (the wha? Yeah, me too). This route takes him through the small towns and lesser trafficked backroads of Arkansas, Louisiana. Florida, Maine, New Mexico, Missouri, Montana, Oklahoma, and Texas, if the Publishers Weekly and Booklist are to be believed. Since I haven't read the book, I can't really comment from my own perspective, but it seems like Heat-Moon's search for the holy quoz is a gasoline-powered variation on the dérive so enthusiastically and refreshingly endorsed by the SI, may they drift about in peace.

I am probably making a small mistake here, both in sequence and in preference, as Blue Highways, Heat-Moon's first literary undertaking, and the first of his books I perused, preceded this book by 16 years and is more highly regarded by the vox populi willing to peck at the keyboard to share its opinion. Finally getting it right can be a blessing and a curse, because expectations set the bar high. Still, moderate success beats failure any day, and I have a feeling I'm going to enjoy this book. It was, admittedly, an impulse buy. That's often how I find the best reads.

Specifics about my promotion at work remain nebulous; again, it's realization is a certainty, only the start date and salary remain unknown. Yeah, I think I fucked up, you don't have to say it. I am still restless; more so than ever. But there's still much left to do in the readying, much that is mandatory (the rest must be left to fickle Fate—anything overplanned is, almost by definition, sterile and lifeless and poisonously predictable), and I'll use the time wisely. On another front, I somehow managed to pass a background check required to volunteer my questionable mechanical and social skills to support Phoenix Bikes, a nonprofit LBS located at Shirlington Village in South Arlington, and dedicated to providing "affordable bikes and bike repair service to our community." It's a once-a-week gig. I'll be meeting with one Kelly Auer next Tuesday to kick it all off. I met with her briefly last week, and was surprised to learn that she, through at least one of the extremely young mechanics toiling there, had heard of my clan, the Single Speed Outlaw Factory Team (SSOFT). According to Kelly, the young wrench had recounted a race (my guess is Big Bear) he witnessed, describing us as "a bunch of older guys who were kicking ass on the younger guys," or something to that effect.

Older.

Yeah, okay.

Punk.

So, suddenly, I'm a fucking self-appointed saint. Expect the end of days to follow shortly. I can only hope the staff at Phoenix don't judge me by my lack of head protection when I roll in on my commute home next week. Until then, I leave all 14 of you followers (the blog is dead...long live the blog!) with a salty salute. Happy life!

P.S., do I drink this beer the chick tending bar just bought me? I don't ignore the irony that answering such a question requires lofty contemplation among the warm, loving, effervescent company of yet another beer, but this one is free. Is there really a choice here? And beyond the brim of the pint glass, through the window, nestled up and away in the velvety plushness of approaching night, the lightning continues insistently its pyrotechnic posturing, mocking the continence of the clouds.

And no one notices.

We are but a flash. Burn brightly.

P.P.S., just because:

Lovely the suns were in those twilights warm,
And space profound, and strong life's pulsing flood,
In bending o'er you, queen of every charm,
I thought I breathed the perfume in your blood.
The suns were beauteous in those twilights warm.
—Charles Baudelaire, from "The Balcony"

Here's to Now...

This is the world
Why are you waiting?
Everyone's standing by hesitating
So many people halfway there
Between two points in the middle of nowhere
And all those things you thought you'd be
Did you know that it doesn't come free?
Have you seen yourself of late?
[...]
Can you hear the sound of?...
Machines all breaking down
The fuel is running out
Severed lines
Destroyed by too much time spent down
My head forced down
My hope forced down
Between my legs I've come unwound

All my preaching stems from fear
You're my concern, I hold you dear
You must break out of this old cage
Do it now, this is no longer safe
—Jawbreaker, "Down," Unfun

[...]
Yet when we meet we seem in silence to say,
Pretending serene forgetfulness of our youth,
"Do you remember but then why should you remember!
Do you remember a certain day,
Or evening rather, spring evening long ago,
We talked of death, and love, and time, and truth,
And said such wise things, things that amused us so
How foolish we were, who thought ourselves so wise!"
And then we laugh, with shadows in our eyes.
—Conrad Aiken, from "The Nocturne of Remembered Spring" (1917)

The good times ain't so bad, and even the bad times have their secret charm.

It is illusion, of course.

Aiken is dead, and having become an authority on the subject almost 38 years ago, speaks no more of it. He roams the aery halls of the House of Dust now, takes tea with The Tsetse, sups with the devil-bearded Rabbi Ben Ezra. His words, his poems, his opus vitae, as with any great writer, are only as immortal as the mind of man, which is to say they are increasingly volatile.

What is the past to a present hellbent on reinventing itself every minute? It is only valuable to the extent it can be plundered, rebranded, and put up for sale. And even now, even the present, isn't good enough, though its proximal horizons are as far as anyone is willing to look.

No rest for the wicked, hurling ever onward to the next big thing, the next upgrade, as long as it's right around the corner. Endless, limitless progress. The American way of life is not negotiable. Yeah. Let's pretend...

And Baudrillard, too, is belly-up. But there is good news: The facade he so dispassionately spoke of, like Borges' beloved map, is falling apart, and with it the neglected structure behind it. It's all makeup on a dying actor, a mix of Dorian Gray and Faust. But if you don't look too hard, if you keep it just on the edge of periphery, if you don't think, well then, it almost looks, almost feels, natural, doesn't it?

This is the calm before the chaos, the plush interlude between the faux idyll of the recent past and the implacable vengeance of a future that is learning how to sprint backwards to catch up with us. The "devil's due" is a concept little acknowledged by Homo Avarus. We get it, but we love to ignore it. Some other time, Old Nick, when your spikes sprout velvet and you're heart swells with sentiment. You see, we're a little short on funds just now, and, well, you understand, don't you?...

But Lady Nature is tired of the shakedown, the strong-arming, the sterile, myopic emptiness of a civilization driven by rampant self-interest, molded by market forces, and immersed in an artificial reality it loves to create and tweak and improve, one so accommodating (if you have the cash), so instantly accessible, so easy that it makes the real thing—with its archaic and intransigent insistence on presence of body and mind and its immunity from complete commodification—almost unbearable to most people. We contain the seeds of our own destruction, and we are sowing them like there's no tomorrow. And this is becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy. Nous finirez tous par crever du confort.

Sadly, and not without a hint of irony, adding to the abyss is looking more and more like the appropriate strategy. Partake rabidly, belly up to the bar, storm the trough, abbagnarisi la pizzu, embrace Jevon's paradox. It all accelerates a noveau retour a la normale (Sous les pavés, la plage!), one that likely will lack an articulate observer to study, assay, judge, rewrite, and "improve" upon it.

Oh well.

On a lighter, slightly less profound note, I got this bag of bones out on some dirt a couple weekends ago for the Swill d'Ville, an annual mountain bike ride on the trails surrounding UVA in Charlottesville, starting and ending at Mellow Mushroom. Absent minded fool that I am, I forgot that I had set up the Monkey with a road-sized gear (44:19) to use as a foul-weather fixed-gear commuter. So about a mile into the SdV, I notice my rear tire rubbing rudely on the chain-stays every time I lay into the pedals with mean intent. I take a moment to try to pull out whatever little bit of slack exists in the chain, with the hope of moving the tire back far enough to stop the rubbing, when another rider asks me a question. The conversation went something this:

Him (staring at my upended bike): Hey, man, what size ring you runnin' up front?

Me (distracted): It's a 32.

Him: No way that's a 32.

Me: Huh? (Takes a look.) Fuck!

So, I run what I brung, worked a little bit harder than everyone else, and did damn well, all things considered. I even managed to win the derby with a novel strategy composed of 9/10 avoidance and 1/10 luck.

Since then, I hit Rosaryville with a proper fixed gear (but, alas, sans helmet—oops!) with Baler and crew, rode to a flick with Bootch-wah and G-spot at the Arlington Cinema & Drafthouse, and did a 75-miler (out-n'-back) to support some SSOFTies and vicariously experience the mucky mayhem—thanks to a ton of rain—that was the Leesburg Baker's Dozen race this weekend.

The Vaya is creeping along toward completion and should be up and rolling before RamJam comes around at month's end. The shutdown (er, lapse in appropriations, hahaha) ain't happening, and with that nonevent is the nonevent of my forced vacation that I was really looking forward to. Damn, it never fails: if you want something too much, it never happens. On the flip side, this should open the gate on the new job, if I understand things clearly.

Should have gotten out when the getting was good.

Ah, well, here we are. And I am just winking dreary thoughts into a tiddle cup. The posts will take a turn toward the upbeat now that spring has arrived. I'm off tomorrow, and the weather is supposed to border on obsequious. Enjoy the week.

"No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible.”
—Voltaire

Orange is the New Brown...

"If I had to live my life again I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week… The loss of these tastes is a loss of happiness, and may possibly be injurious to the intellect, and more probably to the moral character, by enfeebling the emotional part of our nature."

—Charles Darwin

Damn. As if the improbability of my bike trip going down this year isn't bad enough, Salsa had to come out and twist the blade. The second generation Vaya is now available, and it's not only new, but arguably improved. First, the clever bastards have added a replaceable derailleur hanger. That's a "nice-to-have" (more so on a mountain bike), but obviously not lust worthy in and of itself. The real bite in the bully bag, to me, is that they changed the color from butt-coffee brown (okay, it's not that bad of a color) to opulent orange.

I love orange frames, never mind the fact that I've never owned one (which just makes this accidental near-perfidy that much more difficult to stomach). And damn, that appears to be a really fine shade. To add invective to injury, to make me rue my unruly impatience, they even improved on the graphics, with edgier down- and seat-tube logos and the substitution of a new chain-stay catchphrase, "Adventure by Bike," for the slightly less apt, "Ride & Smile" that adorns the rear quarter panels on both my Vaya and my Casseroll frames.

This is my luck. I think the Mayans might have been off a year in their eschatological estimations. Twenty-eleven just ain't cutting it thus far and seems poised with outstretched arms and open heart to embrace the apocryphal apocalypse and bring this hyperreal horror-show to its ineluctable end. But, of course, there's still plenty of time left in the year to turn things around, to salvage the sordid seconds that have already slipped past, to betray the banal, to ditch the diabolical diorama of everyday life, to make a prison-break in a blurred-legged beeline across the gallows grounds, to dart past the Dule trees (index finger tugging absently at a necktie already nixed), to ditch the Maxwell's demon who manipulates the script, casting doubt, causing questioning, pulling me back into the mold.

The days drag on, but this ever-present me is homeomorphic to the man on the bicycle pedaling ever toward the west. I am changing, becoming myself, almost him already.

No word on the new job yet. Got my fingers crossed in a counter direction.  Soon the verdict. But right now, the bottle over the bike...

I claim proneness to exaggeration
But the truth lies in my frustration
The children of the night, they all pass me by
Have to drench myself in brandy
In sleep I'll hide
But however much I booze
There ain't no way out
There ain't no way out
I don't care what you say, boy
There ain't no way out
* * * * * *
And the night comes down like a cell door closing
Suddenly I realize that I'm writin' now more honestly
While sitting here all alone with a bottle and my head a-floating
Far away from the phone and the conscience
going on at me and on at me
And I don't care what you say
There ain't no way out
—The Who, "However Much I Booze", The Who By Numbers

Two Wheels and a Will...

"It would be strange if, while one too often obeys without a murmur a discipline that one does not understand and does not feel, we were not able to act according to a course of conduct that we ourselves have helped prescribe and keep rigidly consistent."
—Antonio Gramsci, La Città Futura, February 1917

Life, friends, is boring. We must not say so.
After all, the sky flashes, the great sea yearns,
we ourselves flash and yearn,
and moreover my mother told me as a boy
(repeatingly) “Ever to confess you’re bored
means you have no
Inner Resources.” I conclude now I have no
inner resources, because I am heavy bored.
—John Berryman, from The Dream Songs

It all boils down
to not hanging around
gotta keep moving in front of the
gravity, gravity, gravity, gravity
Fugazi, "Long Distance Runner", Red Medicine

The front wheel is built and I am now in the first delicate stages of truing the assembly. I went with Phil Wood disc mountain hubs^* because, in some small part, I have yet to learn the finer points of frugal economics, but mostly because they best fit the bill. Stout, robust, disc, 36-hole, black, bolt-on, field-maintenance friendly, and oh-so-easy on the eyes. I paired an Alex TD17 disc-specific rim with the hub, attaching it in a three-cross pattern using Phil's own black, double-butted (14/15) spokes, which should ensure a nice, tight fit between spoke head and hole (let's agree for now to ignore the obvious bawdy extrapolation of those last few words to other sine qua non couplings in life). Should prove to be a relatively bomb-proof wheelset.

So the anatomical shakedown goes like this (everything in black, where available):
Salsa Vaya frameset, 56 cm
Thomson setback seatpost
Thomson X4 stem, 120 mm, 10 degree rise
Selle Italia Max Flite Gel Flow Saddle
Salsa Lip Lock seatpost collar
Crank Brothers Eggbeater 3 pedals
Shimano 105 crankset, front and rear derailleur, 10-speed
Shimano Dura-ace chain, 10-speed
Shimano bar-end shifters, 8-speed (10-speed compatible)
Shimano 105 cassette, 10-speed
Shimano Tiagra/Sora brake levers
Avid BB7 road disc brake calipers
Salsa Woodchipper handlebar, 31.8 mm center diameter, 42 cm width
Cinelli cork bar tape, black
Chris King headset
Schwalbe Marathon Supreme tires, 700x35c
Alex TD17 rims, 700c, 36-hole
Font de Jante Velox rims strips, 22 mm
Phil Wood MTB disc hubset, 36-hole
Phil Wood double-butted spokes, 14/15, with brass nipples

For a minimum of two months (and up to five, potentially) beginning this spring, this bike is going to be my best friend and constant companion, assuming all goes well. This trip is long overdue. I am neither particularly young, nor materially wealthy, nor excessively fond of risk, be it financial or physical. What I am—right now—is weary of routine and wary of responsibility. And exceedingly selfish. These are the raw materials that forge my will to temporarily abandon what is my life and seek something else on the roads that criss-cross this country, balanced on two wheels that slice the scenery into still lifes and landscapes. From a physical, physiological standpoint, it isn't exactly epic, it's not an Odyssey, it isn't even mildly hardcore (how's that for an oxymoron?), though surely there will be trying moments. The difficulty comes in the initial commitment, the irrevocable decision to abandon (if only temporarily) so much of what so many consider necessities, without some guarantee in the end of a consolation prize. But to dip into cliche, it's that kind of risk that makes life interesting and worth living. No regrets. That's where life lies, raw and real and a little bit ragged. And immensely rewarding. Gravity kills.

I can't wait.

M-Y-T-H is
belief in a game
control that keeps us
in our box of fear
we never listen
voice inside
so drowned out
drowned you are
you are, you are
a furry(every) thing
and everything is you
me you, you me
it's all related
and what's a boy
to do?
Pearl Jam, "Faithful", Yield


^*At the time of this writing, Phil does not manufacture a disc touring hubset per se. The idea of using disc mountain hubs came from a Phil representative, who stated that were they to design disc touring hubs, these would essentially be identical to the disc mountain hubs.

Killa 'Zilla, The Bicycle Escape Comes Through, and Worse Than Detroit...

Damn, well, Terrapin done went and got it right, again (though sometimes they do fall flat on their faces).  Hopzilla, their latest bomber offering (a monstrously hopped double IPA), is described, in part, as "Side Project Volume 12," which is simply some nameless marketing nerd's way of suggesting there's a secretive element associated with the production of this ale and that you, Sir or Madam Consumer/Connoisseur, have profited from this black op endeavor because, against all odds and gods, YOU, in all your divine wisdom and appropriated good fortune, managed to stumble upon this fine ale and muster the good taste (BA overall rating of A-) and wallet mass (variously, $8-10) necessary to make a decision that not only displays your purchasing power to anyone within eyeshot, but bespeaks of your fine taste in all things bitter (110 IBUs) and alcoholic (10.8 % abv).

Okay, this thing is good. Very tasty, somewhat sweet as you near the checkered flag, with some strong citrus influence that hits the coke-holes as soon as you uncap it.  Absent to my delight (and against my early expectations) is the all too typical harsh-ass, uber-bitter-for-the-sake-of-bitterness punch to the palate that comes with some heavy hop hitters produced by breweries that brew before they brainstorm. The result here is a highly hopped, highly hootched, highly drinkable (yeah, I know, just exactly WTF does that last term mean outside of enjoyable?) IPA that will likely get you there well before you're ready to brush your beavers for the night.  Nothing wrong with that, right? So, swap a sawbuck for a bottle, cancel the church social, and treat your TAS2Rs ('cause it's all about the G-protein-coupled receptors) to a bitter beer bomb they won't soon forget. (But help me out here...I get the Godzilla-esque image on the left of the label, but what's with the army dude on the right waving a bottle of Hopzilla—complete with its own mise en abyme* label—as he successfully lines up the titular monster at point-blank range for some soon-to-be-released heavy artillery hell-shower from a Howitzer cannon?  If you dig the brew, please don't slay the inspiration!)

Okay, on to more important matters.  Chatted with Tom from Single Speed Outlaw Factory Team sponsor The Bicycle Escape earlier today and it seems that a Salsa Vaya frame in size 56 destined for yours truly is on the way to the shop even as I type this.  Yee-ha!  This will be the first physical step in a multi-stage process of abandoning the current weary work-a-day paradigm and embarking on something a little bit offbeat.  Posts to follow. For now, a heartfelt thanks to Tom for helping me get things underway!

Finally, as Detroit goes, so goes the country (eventually)?...reclamation!

*The Droste effect, if you're Dutch.

Vaya con el Diablo...

Pictured at left, my next bike, a Salsa Vaya (pic shamelessly pilfered from the Salsa blog), though my build will be a bit different.

Working with Tom at The Bicycle Escape to bring it all in, then building it up slowly on my own, so when it all falls to pieces under my ass in the thrombotic heart of some corn-fed midwestern burg, I'll have no one to blame but myself and baby Jesus (co-pilot).

Right.

Here's a potential list of parts—I invite comments/suggestions on the selection, so let me have it if you're feeling passionate and can put a string of words together in an intelligible sequence:

Frame: Salsa Vaya, 56 cm
Headset: Chris King, Black
Derailleur, front: Shimano XT, Top Pull, 3-Speed
Derailleur, rear: Shimano XT, Long Cage, Black
Shifters: Shimano Bar End
Crankset: Shimano XT, Black, 175mm
Chainring: 48/36/26T
Cassette: Shimano XT, 9-Speed, 11-34T
Chain: Shimano CN-HG93, 9-Speed
Pedals: Crank Bros. Eggbeater 3//
Hub, front: Shimano XT, 32H, 6-Bolt, Black
Hub, rear: Shimano XT, 32H, 6-Bolt, Black
Quick Release: Shimano XT, Black
Spokes: DT Swiss Comp 2.0/1.8 mm (double-butted), Silver, w/ Brass Nipples
Rims: WTB SpeedDisc XC 700c, 32H, Black
Handlebar: Salsa Woodchipper, 46 cm length
Stem: Thomson X2, 1-1/8 x +/-10° x 100 x 31.8, Black
Brakes, front and rear: Avid BB7 Mountain, 160 mm rotor, 6-bolt
Brake levers: Tektro RL-520, Black
Saddle: Selle Italia SLK Gel Flow
Seatpost: Thomson Elite Setback, 27.2 mm diam, 330 mm length, Black
Seatpost Clamp: Salsa Lip-Lock, Black
Tires: Schwalbe Marathon Supreme, 700x35

I went with a more rugged parts mix borrowed heavily from the Salsa Fargo specs, 'cuz rugged rules. That, and I want to avoid parts-compatibility issues, since I know basically nothing about geared bikes anymore.

More to follow on just what the hell I plan on doing with what must be my 7th or 8th bicycle.