Category: Just mumbling along

The weather is here, wish you were beautiful

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 6 Comments
One shot, three seasons: Summer in the lawn, fall in the trees and winter on Pikes Peak.
One shot, three seasons: Summer in the lawn, fall in the trees and winter on Pikes Peak.

Deadlines suck. Like The Turk, I’ve been indoors more than I care to be lately, in my case generating bicycle comedy for fun and profit (well, for profit, anyway, and only just barely). This is particularly irksome because we’ve been enjoying a stellar fall here in Bibleburg. It’s 76 right now — 76! — at 5:45 p.m. on Oct. 15. Imagine my amazement.

This will change, as it must. Tomorrow and Sunday look pretty damn’ nice, and wouldn’t y’know, I have to clock in for a couple of shifts in the old VeloBarrel. Come Monday, the weather should become a bit more seasonal, as in 50-something with a chance of showers. Ick.

After that, it’s the Colorado lottery, which means exactly what it sounds like — a total meteorological crapshoot, which I must say keeps life interesting, like the wining jug in John Steinbeck’s “Cannery Row,” a punch blended by understudy barkeep Eddie using any booze left in glasses by the patrons of La Ida. A Palace Flophouse roommate, Jones, first pans, then praises the concoction:

“You take whiskey,” he said hurriedly. “You more or less know what you’ll do. A fightin’ guy fights and a cryin’ guy cries, but this —” he said magnanimously — “why, you don’t know whether it’ll run you up a pine tree or start you swimming to Santa Cruz.”

That’s the sad part. Pine trees we got. But Santa Cruz … not so much.

Samue night fever

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 17 Comments
A fall morning in Bibleburg.
A fall morning in Bibleburg.

Finally it feels like fall. We had a smidgen of rain late yesterday afternoon, and then the wind sprang up and the leaves began falling. This morning, the furnace clicked on.

I surrendered to the inevitable and skipped the shorts in favor of some cotton samue drawers. My sleeveless summertime wife-beater T bit the dust a couple days ago, but I’m not quite ready to go to the full-on sweatpants-and-socks combo. Not yet.

Steel-cut Irish oatmeal fortified with cinnamon, honey, nuts and fruit is back on the breakfast menu, as are eggs, especially when scrambled with green chile or hardboiled, sliced and served alongside a potato hash involving chopped chile and scallions, diced red bell pepper, minced garlic, Mexican oregano and some leftover protein from the previous night’s dinner (chicken, beef or pork).

Did I mention chile? I made a green chile stew using chicken thighs instead of pork last week and it was killer. Tonight I may whip up some buffalo enchiladas in a red sauce that has its red-hot roots in Chimayo, New Mexico. You can’t stop me.

Also back on the menu is running. I haven’t been doing much of that this summer, but since it’s no longer summer it’s time to suck it up and get back to the ground-pounding. It’s not as nifty as cycling, but it’s easier to do in the snow.

Snow? Did I say that or just think it? Where’d I leave those wool socks?

Hinterbike 2010: Last waltz in Sin City

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 9 Comments

It makes no difference who I meet

They’re just a face in the crowd

On a dead-end street. — “It Makes No Difference,” The Band

Sounds like day three of the Interbike trade show, doesn’t it? A convention center full of thousand-yard stares from zombies who are getting too much Scotch and not enough brains.

But cheer up, y’all — it’s only Day One of Outdoor Demo West, and the recession is over! I don’t know about you, but I rushed right out and bought me a Honda Element, a Canon EOS Rebel T2i EF-S and a second home in Santa Fe. I can’t tell you how relieved I am that our long national nightmare is over.

OK, so I rushed right out and bought some potatoes for the green chile stew I’ll be making this evening. Also a sixer of Bohemia. And I picked up an extra day of work posting news (remotely) from Vegas about stuff I can’t afford and don’t need anyway.

But I did persuade one of my colleagues who is actually at Interbike to spend some time focusing on affordable goodies. There should be plenty now that we’re all shittin’ in the tall cotton again, right? Right.

Paul Conrad, R.I.P.

~ Patrick O'Grady
A cartoon by Paul Conrad, then of The Los Angeles Times, circa 1982, when I was the editorial cartoonist (and a number of other things as well) at the Corvallis Gazette-Times.
A cartoon by Paul Conrad, then of The Los Angeles Times, circa 1982, when I was the editorial cartoonist (and a number of other things as well) at the Corvallis Gazette-Times.

Editorial cartoonist Paul Conrad died today at age 86.

He was one of the greats, deflating blowhards with a stroke of his razor-sharp pen, and won three Pulitzers for his mastery of the art. His first came at The Denver Post, where if memory serves he was succeeded by the even more acerbic Pat Oliphant. Conrad also won himself a spot on Nixon’s famous enemies list.

I met Oliphant once, at the Fine Arts Center here in Bibleburg, back when I was working for the Gazette. But I never met Conrad. However, I do have a signed print of one of his cartoons, a nice rap in the tusks for the Elefinks from when he worked for The Los Angeles Times.

He will be missed.

Thou art mortal

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 8 Comments
calabacitas
Chicken quesadillas and calabacitas.

Damn, this has been a fun week. First I make drunkard tartare out of my right leg in a trail tumble, and now I’ve managed to throw my back out again.

Hitting the deck on Tuesday started the ball rolling. Favoring the bum leg gave it a nudge. And the kicker was probably spending too much time crouched over the cutting board, assembling last night’s New Mexican feast, chicken quesadillas and calabacitas.

These are easy dishes, to be sure — the quesadillas are merely poached and shredded chicken, seeded and sliced jalapeños and grated Monterey jack layered between two flour tortillas and baked for 12 minutes at 350 — but some assembly is required.

Long story short, this morning I bend down to see if Turkish is lurking under Herself’s car and pop! Out goes the back, which I first injured in college while delivering heavy appliances for beer money. Every couple of years it likes to slash the tires on my chariot and hiss, “Thou art mortal!”

Still, things could be worse. A couple of friends are on Cape Cod, playing hide-and-seek with Hurricane Earl. Or I could be one of the poor chumps blown off the latest offshore oil platform to explode.

So, yeah. I’ve got that going for me. That, and the drugs, and the ice pack. …