The wind woke me at midnight, a reminder that despite the warnings from the National Weather Service I had neglected to take down the wind chimes and hummingbird feeders and store the patio furniture’s cushions in their plastic footlocker.
But I’m a light sleeper, and thought drowsily, “Oh, well. How bad could it be?” And rolled over and went back to sleep.
Pretty bad, as it turns out.
About three hours later it sounded like God thought He was John Bonham and our house was His drum kit and it was time to perform “Moby Dick.” The long version.
Well. When God wants to rock out, you gotta get up and dance.
We figured that if the thundering blew us out of a sound sleep, it was probably scaring the bejaysis out of Miss Mia Sopaipilla, who overnights in the half-bath, where a goodly wind can set the fan vent a-flapping like a hi-hat cymbal.
Naturally, she couldn’t have cared less. Nothing scares Miss Mia. But she was delighted to find out that we had suddenly become lovers of the wee small hours like her and immediately set about performing her morning rituals, albeit a few hours early.
Outside, the cushions were up against a wall — we got lucky, the worst of the wind was coming from the south, or else they’d have been spotted flying in formation over the San Luis Valley — but the backyard trees lost a few limbs and our young pistache was bobbing and weaving like a stoner in the front row at Madison Square Garden in 1973.
So I stabilized it with a couple rubber bungee straps, stuffed the cushions in their footlocker, and collected the hummingbird feeders. Then Herself and I stumbled back to bed.
This dude got blown away last year.
Well, that pissed off Miss Mia, who hates a party-pooper the way Clarence Thomas hates feeling a little light in the wallet pocket. And for the next couple of hours she shared her feelings with us at some volume, sounding like Robert Plant wearing pants three sizes too small, until we finally said to hell with it and got up for good.
It was then that I noticed the wind had peeled the outer layer off our “Save the Elena Gallegos” yard sign to reveal a campaign pitch for Khalid Emshadi, a Republican candidate for the state House of Representatives, who got blown away last year by incumbent Democrat Elizabeth Thomson.
No such thing as an ill wind, I guess.
Tags: Clarence Thomas, Herself, Led Zeppelin, Miss Mia Sopaipilla, Save Elena Gallegos, wind
Mad Blog Media 
May 13, 2023 at 11:29 am |
Windstorms in March ain’t right. We have rain chances all next week, and that ain’t right either. I guess, to riff on Patrick, that our nest has finally filled up with our shit.
May 13, 2023 at 11:45 am |
Make that May, not March. March is when wind is supposed to happen.
May 13, 2023 at 11:54 am |
More of the same in the forecast, too, with a chance of showers. I guess we’ll find out if this little love tap from Thor’s hammer loosened up the seals on any of our skylights.
May 13, 2023 at 12:55 pm |
Was quickly rounding a right hand curve at an intersection with a bad pavement mismatch yesterday (Bishop’s Lodge and Camino Encantado) and heard POP WHACKA WHACKA WHACKA WHACKA. Sure enough, snapped a drive side spoke, which was whacking the seatstays as the now funny shaped rim whacked the brake on every rotation. Managed to get the spoke out of the way, release the quick release, and adjust the surrounding spokes enough to ride home without the wheel collapsing.
Took off the tire, tube, and cassette to expose the wound and took it to, obviously, The Broken Spoke to buy a replacement spoke or two. Instead one of the guys in the repair side of the house said, “I’m not busy, I’ll have it back to you in five or ten minutes.” Sounded good, so I took him up on it. Meanwhile, had a nice chat with a guy who brought in a 1970’s era Motobecane Grand Touring bike in near-showroom condition. Was the bike I would have bought had I had the money, but instead I settled for a Mirage.
Gent handed me back my newly repaired and trued wheel and refused to take a buck, so I put a pair of fives in the tip jar. He did say that it is getting harder to find traditional Open Pro rims and Campy ten speed hubs. Sheesh.
Happy way to end a bad start, though.
May 13, 2023 at 12:56 pm |
The rear brake quick release, or whatever you call it, that is.
May 13, 2023 at 2:07 pm |
Who says there’s no such thing as good news?
Meanwhile, if you must have some of the other sort, it seems The Bike Coop is going under. And in The Great White Midwest, so is Waterford-Gunnar.
Grim tidings in both cases. I did a bit of business with The Bike Coop when I was still reviewing bikes for Adventure Cyclist and they always treated me right. But the chaos the ART project caused down in that neck of the woods, plus The Bug, kept me away.
As for Waterford, I chatted with Richard Schwinn and his daughter Anna a time or two Back in the Day®, and reviewed an All-City Space Horse when Anna was affiliated with that outfit. As Grant the P notes, definitely bicycle royalty with that moniker. Richard in particular was always a pleasure to talk to, though oddly, I never bought a frameset from him. I was pretty locked in with Brent Steelman, whose Eurocrosses suited me right down to the ground, where I could often be found sprawled.
May 14, 2023 at 12:13 am |
Patrick, thanks for informing us of the news of Waterford’s closing. Yikes. I share some history in common with all those concerned up there. I just drove past it a week ago, and didn’t stop in. I guess I should have, in retrospect.
May 14, 2023 at 6:33 am |
’Tis a sad thing, for sure. It reminds me that there will be no more Steelman bicycles, now that Brent and Katryn are in the rug business.
Steve Frothingham at Bicycle Retailer and Industry News plans to chat with Richard Schwinn soon; look for more on Waterford this week at the BRAIN website.
May 13, 2023 at 3:35 pm |
Meanwhile, look at Velocity rims. I have ’em on four-five bikes, a couple-three different flavors, and have been very happy with their resilience and longevity. Also, made in USA. Rivendell uses them, too.
May 14, 2023 at 7:55 am |
I can vouch for Velocity. Been using there stuff a looong time starting with bottle cage and bar ends and now multiple rims/wheelsets. Best part is the folks there are simply down to earth, quality people and some are world class riders.
May 14, 2023 at 8:27 am |
Rivendell has Velocity build their stock wheels, and their very own Rich Lesnik builds the custom stuff. I have a set of his wheels on my Voodoo Nakisi — Velocity Cliffhangers and LX hubs — and them shits is burly, son! Cost more than the frameset, if I recall correctly, and worth every penny.
May 13, 2023 at 11:14 pm |
That’s terrible about the Co-Op. I rarely did business with them given we aren’t there, but I did stop in from time to time when we were down in your neck of the woods and I thought it was a neat place.
We are running Velocity rims on the tandem and they have held up to more than a decade of pounding and inept maintenance on my part. If I have to do that, I’ll rebuild both but meanwhile, try to keep the Open Pros round and spinning.
Also looks like BTI stocks some nice looking DT rims.
https://www.bti-usa.com/public/category/RM/RMTN/DT
May 14, 2023 at 6:43 am |
Excel Sports in Boulder used to offer a great set of affordable wheels — the Cirrus, if memory serves — but their rim-brake offerings are down to Ritchey and Shimano. The Cirrus came with Mavic Open Pros and Dura-Ace hubs Back in the Day.® After a while the hubs were downgraded to Ultegra — not much of a downgrade, not for me, anyway. And when I wasn’t looking they went away altogether, a victim of the Great Leap Forward to disc brakes.
I still have three sets, two Dura-Ace, one Ultegra. I should give them a close inspection one of these days. They may be old enough to be president.
John Neugent does a nice set of wheels too. I have a set on my old DBR Prevail TT road bike and they’re absolutely bulletproof. Check out his YouTube channel while you’re at it. Free banjo music!
May 14, 2023 at 8:55 am |
Looks like Open Pro is still out there, if you can find them.
https://www.mavic.com/en-us/open-pro-c-jr0738.html