The latest iteration of the Pescadero from Soma Fabrications.
Ho ho ho, etc. The Santas at Soma Fabrications have a fresh catch of Pescadero road framesets for all you good girls and boys this Christmas.
The Pescadero is a “road-sport” steed, designed with 35mm rubber in mind but good to 38mm, my personal tire width of choice. And did I mention that it takes rim brakes? Your choice of centerpulls or dual pivots.
This was the frameset I wanted to review Back in the Day® for Adventure Cyclist, but it was out of stock. So I went instead for a first cousin from the Merry Sales family, the New Albion Privateer, which has become one of my favorite bikes for the mean streets of The Duck! City. (You’ll see mine, black with silver rack, in the photo carousel.)
Hm. Decisions, decisions. I need a new MacBook Pro to carry on The Work, but another resident of the San Francisco area has annoyed me by leaping clear across the country to kiss the Pestilence-Erect’s ring (hope you packed plenty mouthwash, Timmy me lad).
Maybe I need to redirect my holiday spending. Some might say I have too many two-wheelers already, but I have plenty of Macs, too. And as we all know, the proper number of bikes for a man is n+1.
My Nobilette takes five at the Michial Emery trailhead.
It was the Wednesday Geezer Ride and I was running on O’Grady Standard Time as per usual.
I almost always make our meeting spot on time, or within shouting distance of it, anyway. But not this Wednesday.
After a distracting morning spent accommodating Herself and a visiting sister I was horsing the Nobilette northward along Tramway, a few minutes off my usual delayed kickoff and feeling a little light in the jersey pockets for some reason.
So I gave myself a quick pat-down.
“Shit, forgot my tools. Aw, probably won’t need them.” Onward.
Then the Watch cheeped.
“Forget your water bottle?” asked Herself.
“Shit again. That I will definitely need.”
So I texted the Ride Leader to let him know I’d join up somewhere along the route, then pulled a U and big-ringed it back toward El Rancho Pendejo, which this morning seemed aptly named.
While headed south I saw our Ride Leader headed north. We both looked at each other like, “WTF?” He should’ve been at the meetup while I should’ve been a couple minutes behind him and closing in.
“Back in a minute!” I yelled and punched it.
At the casa I grabbed bottle and tools and headed north once more, advising the Ride Leader via text that I’d try to catch up around Simms at Eagle Ridge, or at the Elena Gallegos Open Space.
But when I got to Eagle Ridge, no Geezers.
So I backtracked the route a bit. Nope. Rode up to Elena Gallegos. Nix. Did a couple laps of that loop to pass the time. Nuttin’.
Shit.
So I rip a quick shortcut to the next checkpoint, in High Desert. Nada.
¡Basta ya! I text again.
“Where you gents at?”
“At top of Elena’s,” replies the Ride Leader.
Sheeeeeeyit.
Anyway, to shorten an already-overlong story, one Geezer had a crook gut and bailed pre-ride, another flatted (the Ride Leader stopped to offer aid, which explains why he was running behind), and there were a couple other no-shows. A late start thus became even later. Our carefully designed velo-structure simply fell apart like a toilet-paper tent in a heavy rain.
At least our communications devices didn’t explode in our pockets or hands. First World Problems only, please.
In any event, so we’re a little slow off the start line. So what? Rivendell’s Grant Petersen likes “pleasurable, unhurried riding,” and so do I. When I can manage it, anyway.
• Hat tip to Alex Strickland, the former boss-fella at Adventure Cyclist, for passing along the Rivendell story.
January’s getting all, well, January on us. New year, same old song.
It’s been chilly, but not so much so that a fella can’t ride his bike for 90 minutes with three or four layers of 30-year-old cycling kit, adding and removing same as conditions indicate while awaiting the fabled Snowpocalypse, which by noon Thursday was as you see.
The Sandias, post-Snowpocalypse.
Betimes we are reminded that rich people, politicians, and rich politicians can be insufferable, twisted, lying, featherbedding assholes. This is not an annual or even seasonal event.
Meanwhile, just to keep things interesting, evildoers found a back door to our credit card while Herself was in an personal-electronics-free secure area and I was out on the bike, oblivious to my my own digital alerts as I removed and added layers of this and that while rolling around to no particular purpose beyond taking pix of the Sandias.
So, once I had been made aware of the breach in our fiscal defenses, I had to race home, doublecheck my receipts, mumble several filthy words, block the attempted piracy and croak that card over the phone, go get two new cards from a local branch, and then go back to get two even newer ones because the Top Secret Your Eyes Only Three-Digit Security Code was buggered on the first batch.
Now I get to work my way down the long list of bills set to autopay in order that we do not suddenly find ourselves freezing to death in the dark with no Innertubes and The Blog up on blocks.
It should go without saying that today was the day I had to drop Sue Baroo the Fearsome Furster at Reincarnation for its semiannual pulse check. I did not ride a bike home from the shop and will not be riding one back there to pick up the wee beastie.
Thirty-three, feels like 25°? No thank you, please. I’ve seen the way Burqueños drive under warm and sunny skies. There aren’t enough layers in my winter drawer and none of them are Kevlar.
I launched the new theme and the Block Editor (curse its name, yes) because like any good test pilot (and many more bad ones) I got tired of kicking the tires and decided to light the fires.
I expect we will find a few bugs in the bird as we tumble along, but here’s hoping we wind up with the cockpit on top and the wheels on the bottom.
It’s quiet around El Rancho Pendejo. Herself races off to the Lab at 5:30 in the a.m. and it’s just Your Humble Narrator and Miss Mia Sopaipilla manning the battlements. Cat’lments. Whatevs.
Sometimes I’m up before The Boss hits the door running, sometimes not. This morning I managed to see her off and then got down to brass tacks, as the kids don’t say anymore.
Miss Mia must be greeted, loved up on, given a second round of food and drink, and her litter box unburdened of its dark freight.
Then the Winter Palace is to be prepared for Her Majesty, after which I may offer myself a little sumpin’-sumpin’: coffee; toast with butter and jam; either oatmeal with dried fruit and nuts or yogurt with granola; an apple or mandarine; a scoop of crunchy almond butter; maybe a mug of tea.
The news is to be scanned but not dwelt upon lest it hamper the digestion.
OK, so I missed a few needles. I blame management.
This morning saw the last slice of bread slide down the rathole so a new loaf was in order, and I set that machinery in motion.
Next I congratulated myself for taking a moment yesterday to rake up the pine needles scattered across the lawn by last Thursday’s window-rattler, with the goal of restarting the irrigation system for a quick spritz this morning, when I noticed our bird feeders were getting low. So I filled those up. From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.
This short detour threw a slight hitch into my gitalong. The next items on the schedule were exercise and grocery shopping. If I hadn’t stopped to pat myself on the back I could’ve squeezed in a quick trail run before the sprinklers came on (I wanted to be around to make sure nothing had frozen up during our short cold snap).
Running afterward would put me at the grocery noonish, which is not optimal; the amateurs scuttle out of their holes and get in everyone’s way at noon and 5 p.m. I like to do my shopping between 9 and 10, or sometime after 1, when only pro hunter-gatherers are working the aisles and the registers don’t look like The Big I at rush hour.
Thing is, the meal I have planned for tonight is a slow-cooker deal that wants four hours in the pot.
So, yeah. Here I sit, muttering to myself (and to you) while I update my grocery list, avoid the news, and wait to see whether the irrigation system erupts like Vesuvius.
Mad Blog Media 