I Like Snow...........

But I love this weather! Got the bike in the back of the truck and Sherman on my mind!

Also got the camera!

I plan on upsetting the natives today! I am gonna pull a Scott-T!!

That's right I am gonna ride the place backwards.. In reverse::: THE WRONG WAY!!!!

I am such a rebel! You only live once and what the hell..

I know the consequences, public ridicule on the local trail forum?

What shame!!! I will hold my head high and face the wrath.. If you see me, don't get your feelings hurt when I am jaming out with my head phones on and pay you no attention!!

Nothing personal!!!!

Seriously, I have never ridin Sherman backwards and always wanted too! I will take my time and pay attention as to not get in any one's way but I am gonna give it try.

Hence the camera, every trail looks different from the other direction..

So tomorrow I will post up with the reverse pics...Stay tuned..

That's right big things are coming........

Twilight Zone ????????????

I think I found the "Twilight Zone".....

OK, here's a story for ya!

First off, Saturday I had plans to ride and somehow ended up cleaning the garage all day! How I got off course I am not sure, but Cody and I made a hell of a dent in the mess we call the garage.

So all was not wasted it, was just re-channeled into a job I have been avoiding...

Now the story! Yesterday (Sunday) we hit church and then Wal-Mart for some golden groceries.. From there it was home and unload the car. In the bedroom ,change and load the truck. Out the door I went!!

SC here I come! I get to Pageland and change shoes, 15 miles later I am down in the middle of nowhere, between Angelus and Jefferson!

I am on this nice long downhill and kick it up to the big chain ring in the front and promptly throw the chain off! So I do the old soft pedal trick to get it back on and it jambs up. I back pedal and try again, it goes on and I am happy,,,for 2 minutes..

Now it won't stay in gear! I mean it's jumping all over the place! I stop and concentrate on the barrel adjuster and get nothing!

This carries on for about 10 minutes and I am pissed! I can't even ride the damn thing it's so bad!

So I start walking! Nearest I can remember I am about 3 miles back to a store, I figure if I can make it there somebody will feel sorry for me and give me a ride back to Pageland. If they don't feel sorry for me at least I can give them a 10 for a ride!

So I am about a mile into my walk and thinking about taking my shoes off. Have you ever tried to walk in road bike shoes, it ain't easy!

So far not one single car has passed me yet! Well that's about to change! I hear this rattle trap coming up behind me and I am about to put my thumb out when I hear it start to slow down, things might be changing!

Yep he stops and gets out. When I say "he" I don't want to sound to cliche, but this dude was every bit of 300 pounds and dirty! I am being nice when I just say "dirty".. He was nasty...

Well he pipes up and says "what's wrong",  I politely say " I think I bent my derailleur" then I say "think I can get a ride to Pageland".

I ain't to picky when it comes to a ride, and I need one!

Well he pipes up and says "let me look at it, it's just a damn bicycle". This catches me off guard! The last thing I am thinking is this redneck knows anything about my high end bicycle!

Guess what, he looks at it for all of 10 seconds and says "hell you bent the chain"! With this statement comes a look, you know the look. "Like I am a dumb ass"

The whole time I was looking at it I never even looked at the chain! I was too busy trying to adjust the derailleur!

So as I am sitting there still kinda in shock! He goes to his truck and gets a pair of channel locks and an adjustable wrench.

Before I even realize he is about to fix it he has already twisted the chain back straight! So now I really have a "dumb ass" look on my face!

He fixed it in about 10 seconds!! Alright, I am in business!!

This is where it gets crazy!

As we are standing there talking and all this is going on, he never turned his truck off. Well all of a sudden his truck cuts off!

He starts raising hell! "You know how long it took me to start this piece of s..." "GD this GD that". I ain't sure if it's my fault or not, he is just pissed...

Next thing I know he says "your gonna help me get this s...pile started". OK, I am thinking how the hell is this gonna work?

I got my answer pretty quick! He has already popped the hood and used his broom stick to hold the hood open!

Now he has a hammer in his hand and is telling me to "climb under the hood and hit the starter while he tries to start it"! What the hell, I am in my spandex riding kit and now I am climbing under the hood of a POS truck with the hood held open by a broom stick!

This can't end good!!!!!

Well I do what I am told, like I have a choice! The only option I can see is I refuse and get my ass kicked by a 300 pound redneck on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere SC!

I can only imagine what this looks like! Me in my spandex, hanging out from under the hood of a 5 color dirt covered POS Chevy truck and this 300 pound guy sitting there telling me what to do!

It starts! As it starts he gets in and slams the door, he is working the gas pedal to keep it running! "Take down the GD stick and slam the hood" he yells at me!

I do as I am told, "throw that GD hammer and stick in the back I got to go"

Again, I do as I am told!

Next thing I know I am watching this ragged ass truck drive down the road with smoke coming out the back!

I am all by myself again!

What the hell just happened!!!!!!

Nothing left to do but ride my bike! 18 miles later I am back at my truck going home..

Welcome to the "Twilight Zone"........................

Friday.....................

I think that is my favorite title for a post! The reason is obvious.. Who doesn't love Friday!!!!!!!

How could you not? I work all week for this and am always glad when it gets here!!

On to the party! Wine was drank and food was had, although I drank beer! My original plan was to go to the bar and watch the game, I ended up staying home and hiding in the garage.

I was gonna take the kid and go to Big Bob's restaurant and watch the game, but one of the mom's brought her son and he wanted to play at the house.

Plans change! Besides I wouldn't have been able to drink if that had worked out!

So I worked on bikes and drank beer in hiding. I really didn't care about the game anyway, and it was a crappy game anyway! Nobody cares about Carolina and NC State! At least not in my house..

Now for the weekend! I have one thing left to do before I get rid of the "boomerang bike". The parts came in yesterday and I will finish it tonight.

Yea that's right, I am paying money to fix a bike I am giving way! No, that doesn't make any since but most of what I do doesn't make any since anyway, so it is what it is!!!

Of course I will still to the fat man riding thing.......Have a good weekend............

3 Posts Ago................

Yea, 3 posts ago I said "It's Got To Get Better"! I was referring to the rainy weather!

Here comes from the rain, AGAIN...

I can't even walk across the yard without sinking up to my shoe laces! Well maybe not that deep, but I was in the yard last night and ended up with with wet socks! Yea my shoes already had holes in them but that is beside the point!

They were my yard shoes, so yea they are supposed to have holes in them! But I still would not have thought about getting wet..

Are you wondering why I was all over the yard! Good question? Well for one I live in a little valley way off the road. Actually off a well used country road!

My tree line goes all the way up to that road, guess what?

People are trashy!! Yea we have trash in the country too!! On my road, everything everybody throws out the window seems to end up in my woods! Yea MY woods...

I just picked it up about 2 weeks ago and here I am doing it again! One full kitchen trash bag!

I know we have had a few windy days here lately, hence the reason for the need to do it again but DAMN..

I feel like I work at the city dump!!!! For free..

I wonder if I put one these out by the road if anybody would use it! They would... You know how I know? look closely at the picture, on the corner of the dumpster it says "no public dumping"!

John Q Public reads that as a sign that says "IT'S OK FOR ME TO USE IT"..........

Oh yea, my wife made me clean the yard! She is having a Pampered Chef party tonight....... It was one of those nights, all I said was "yes dear"....................

Oooops..................

Man, this is the first time in forever, I actually forgot all about the blog today! I wasn't even that busy here today at work!

First time that has happened!

I will get back at it in the AM....Hang with me folks!!!!!!

You know I have something worthless to write about tomorrow! Maybe I will write about the fact I have been miss-spelling the word write..

That would be a big hit in the world of hit counting....

You know it's all about the satisfaction of watching the "hit count" grow with my useless words of wisdom!!!!

Why else would I spend so much of my time trying to spell correctly......

Still Raining...........

I went to bed thinking I was gonna wake up and see the sunshine. NOT....

Instead I woke up to the same crap I went to bed with, that's not what I wanted! If I wanted to live in Ohio I would move to Ohio. (no offense to Ohio) But the weather looks like this all winter in OHIO..

Oh well, last night I spent the evening taking apart and servicing a bike. Why am I mentioning this you ask?

Because no good deed goes unpunished! Why do I say that, because it's true. A few posts ago I made mention I had given away a few bikes. Well I did, trying to be nice! The mtn bike went out the door no problem!

The road bike, different story! I figured I would give it away and it would disapear and never come back! That might have worked if I had given it to a bike mechanic. I sent it out the door and didn't really even give it the once over.

Not to good.... Now that I have taken the time to do what I should have done to begin with I have realized how bad I neglected it to begin with! Man, everything needed some love!

Right now it's in about 20 pieces! The brake calipers had to be completely disassembled and the bottom bracket same thing! New bar tape, and the wheels are so whacked up I need to take them to the shop and have them straightened out.

I swear the kid must have been riding it on a half pipe! You know what's funny about this, Cody never even mentioned how crappy the bike was to ride! I would have been bitching about it from the start! So I will get the wheels back in a few days and out the door it will go.

Never to be seen again!!!!!!! I hope...............

It's Got To Get Better.................

I earned every mile I put down this weekend! Saturday I woke up to rain, with the chance of a lot of rain!
Perfect start to the weekend! So what did I do? Watched the weather forecast and decided to head south.

Cheraw SC was calling my name!

heading south....

It looked like they had less of a chance for rain so I went. I got 3 laps in and only got a few sprinkles! I would call that a good ride. With all the rain the trails were absolutely perfect! It was as fast as it has ever been.

start of the trail....

end of the trail....

Usually I see nobody down there, Saturday was the exception. I passed two trail runners and when I was about to leave 2 guys from Florence pulled up. For Cheraw that was damn near a traffic jam on the trails!
Perfect pine forest single track at it's best!

Then we have Sunday. Saturday I am riding in a jersey and shorts, then Sunday I am digging out all the riding gear I have. The temp. dropped and it was cold! I was hoping it would warm up while we went to church, not!! When I got in the car at 12:30 the car said 37 degrees. Not what I was hoping for!

20 pounds of clothes...

Home I went, I already had it in my head that I wasn't gonna ride. But the games didn't start till 3 so I had time to kill. After whining for a little while I got all my stuff out and promptly over dressed!

Here is the list of what not to wear,starting from the bottom to the top:

                                            wool socks

                                            shoe covers

                                            wool lined leggings

                                            my bib short

                                            under armor top ( long sleeve )

                                            wool jersey

                                            my new wind stopper jacket

                                            wind stopper gloves

                                            and last of all a wind block jacket

I earned that 26.39miles

Yea, that's a lot of crap! Ten miles in I was sweating like a pig! 15 miles in and I was now a Popsicle, and heading to the house! Only problem was I was still 11 from the house! After a 30 minute shower I was warm again!

To recap, I should not have worn 2 layers I had on. I didn't need the wool and damn sure didn't need the wind break jacket. I already had the wind stopper jacket on. If I had left those 2 items off I think I would have been fine....Live and learn....

I go through this every winter.. You would think I knew how to dress by now!!!!!!!