Still trying to get everyone settled in (and settled down) at Rancho Pendejo. Amazing how difficult that can be when most of your earthly possessions are somewhere on the road, in the custody of others, and the cats spend the wee, small hours hunting remorselessly for a cozy basement that is six hours north of here.
I’ve been using Satellite Coffee and the Juan Tabo Library as temporary offices while we await the installation of the Innertubes. Don’t have to tip as frequently at the library, but the coffee and breakfast burritos aren’t nearly as good.
I took a break from work this afternoon for a short march around a trail just east of our new digs that warrants further inspection by bicycle.
Herself has run a bit of it, but all I wanted to do today was just stagger around outdoors for a while, collect a little free vitamin D. I’m still running a fairly significant sleep deficit, and taking a cyclo-cross bike out on an unfamiliar trail bordered with various cacti seemed exceptionally stupid, even for the Irish.
Mad Blog Media 
Have you run into many patches of goat heads? Also known as puncture vine, the best descriptive name for a plant I have ever come across. It describes what the plant does with pinpoint, pun intended, accuracy.
Casa Retiremento is apparently overrun with goatheads.
Oh, indeed. It’s the state fruit, just like the white plastic bag is the state flower.
We had a strong monsoon season which means a banner year for goatheads. Little f’ers are everywhere. Nature’s caltrops.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tribulus_terrestris
md speaks the truth! We always carry a fine tooth comb to get the damn things off Duffy’s paws on his walks. We have the damn things here too, but in patches on the road sides. We have learned which areas to avoid on our frequent rides.
Good idea, that comb, Pat. Señor Boo has already collected a goathead in a paw and didn’t enjoy it one little bit.
Forgot about those goathead things since we left CA years ago. I do remember selling plenty of Mr. Tuffy tire liners and other assorted armor against those enemies of the pneumatic tire back-in-the-day. Somewhere I read about a guy training on the ROADS of Tucson who ran a cut-down clincher tire inside as a barrier. I guess you forget about ride-quality if the battle is just to keep the air inside?
The only reliable answer I have found is Schwalbe Plus tires. Continental Gatorskins or Hard Shells run a close second. I run Schwalbe Smart Sam Plus tires on the mountain bike.
I put folding Richey Tom Slicks on my commuter because they looked light and fast. Well, they are light and fast those few times they have air in them. Otherwise, in the goathead vs. Richey competition, those tires have all the puncture resistance of a slab of soft butter. I’ll be replacing them with Gatorskins or equivalent.
I’m riding Little Big Bens on the Bianchi at the moment and so far, so good. But I remember my very first cyclo-cross race back in the late Eighties … it was run not far from where we now live, and the puncturing of tires sounded like a firefight. I double-flatted in one race, and anyone who didn’t have at least one spare bike and a few sets of extra wheels was doomed to become a pedestrian.
I remember in my bike shop daze the time a test-ride client came back (walking) after riding gawd-knows-where and picking up so many of those thorns, by the time I added up the labor to pull ’em all out with pliers I figured we’d have been better off just throwing the tires away and fitting new ones!
These are two other implements I have found very handy, on the bike and off, when one lives in cactus and goat head country.
http://www.leatherman.com/22.html#prefn1=sizecategory&prefv1=Keychain-Size&start=4
http://www.agrussell.com/ag-russell-field-tweezers/p/RULhhhFT04/
I recall coming back from a mountainbike ride out on the mesa east of our place and walking the bike back with double flats. The back tire was a pincushion. I think I threw it out along with the tube, it was so full of holes.
http://www.kob.com/article/stories/s3573629.shtml#.VChQtxZ0a3N
Fuckion’ A. Can’t these people drive?
Apparently not. I’ve rediscovered that aggressive tailgating is a sport here and that, as in Bibleburg, red lights and stop signs are merely advisory.
Word.
Awful lot of macho bullshit goes on in Albuquerque.
Wonder what the difference would be if say, the truck driver plowed into a CAR stopped or moving at slow speed on the shoulder, killing the driver? Why do I think this will end in “no charges filed”? Meanwhile a cyclist in NYC is getting all kinds of negative attention after hitting a pedestrian in Central Park…because of course nobody NEEDS to be riding a bike in the US of A…that’s what cars are for!
Meanwhile, this was my Sunday
http://cycleitalia.blogspot.it/2014/09/a-little-tour-of-rome.html