Vortex Schmortex

In the throes of the "polar vortex," everything is closed and cyclcing is impossible. The snow is three feet high in some places and drifting snow is covering any efforts to remove it within an hour. This sucks. 

As it is hard to bitch about work when there is none, there has never been a better time to share some bike porn. 

So sit back, relax, have a beer and prepare your eye holes for some hot bike on bike action. 

This sexy mother is the result of a year of efforts to give a customer exactly what he wants. It started with a Bianch Oltre frame and a Campy Record group. It was fine until Campagnolo released its Electronic Power Shift (EPS). After I had been certified (as Campy requires), the customer demanded the best. 

So, ordering and installing the parts were one thing, but fitting them to the frame was another. As the cable routing was originally mechanical, it would not accept the new electronic stuff. Not to be detured, the customer elected to have it shipped to a California based carbon frame repair shop to have new internal routing. Eventually it was back in my hands and was outfitted with Campy Super Record EPS. 

Complete with a Brooks Team Professional with Titanium rails, this bicycle rides like a champ! 

It has a very large price tag to go with it, but when you drive a car that looks like this, 

It's a fair assumption that you can afford a bike that looks like this...

I hope you enjoy. Please stay warm and safe. And remember,

                  

Me, Me, Me!!!

You have come along with me on this blogular journey and I would like to reward you by telling you about myself. 

See, while other bloggers sometimes wish to remain annonymous, for fear that their shitty interweb diatribe will make them too famous as to not be able to step out of their home unidentified.

And the growing mob will then crush them like so many rhinos in the savavna... I see things differently. 

Heres what you need to know. 

First,

Next,

Also, I look like this in the snow

...I look like this in the mud

I'm pretty fucking awesome,

... And modest too. 

Love, 

Me!

"Happy" New Year?

After some much needed time off, I am back. Lucky you!

While I have resolved to change a few things in the new year, being "nicer" is not one of those things.

Here in the Midwest, we had more than a foot of snow last week and temps of 44 degrees below zero. I spent three days shoveling snow and re-winterizing my fleet of bicycles. Meanwhile, the students all went home to their cozy Mc Mansions in other parts of the country, and left their fleet unattended for the last six weeks. Chained to bike racks, and abandoned, many of these bikes will never again see a rider, as they simply cannot survive the conditions. Sure, bicycles may not be living things but I maintain that college campuses are where bikes do in fact, go to die.

Alas, the students have returned. Now having dug out their "Walmart Whip" from the snow banks, they bring them to me.

I wish I were joking when I say that the bikes they bring in for repair look like this:

("Can you just, like, put some oil on the chain?")

Flat, dry-rotted tires, chain and cables rusted solid...yeah, it just needs some oil.

Is it totally their fault? No. The Schools will not allow them to bring bikes into the dorms, and do not offer sufficient storage during the seasonal breaks. 

But, they are not without fault, had they listened to their bicycle mechanic tell them how to avoid this, perhaps their bike would last more than a year.

Let's not forget that these are the same kids that study at Ivy League schools, yet don't know the difference between "open" and "close."

(Tulio Campagnolo is rolling over in his grave)

No, they can't be bothered to perform the most menial of tasks like inflating their tires once a week to avoid flats, instead, they call mom and make sure they can put the cost of the repairs on their credit card, or simply say "fuck it" and buy a new "bicycle" at Walmart. The cycle (no pun intended) is complete when that "new" bike comes back to me to fix because it was built by some tool with a mullet who assembles the shitty outdoor furniture and grills, yet claims he is a bicycle mechanic. Seriously,  consider yourself on my "Tit List."

So what does a guy like me do with all those busted ass chains? Make yard art of course.

Don't judge me.