Category: Plague

One step beyond

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 32 Comments
Your money’s no good here, and neither is anything else.

Mikhail Gorbachev has died and gone to Commie Hell, which looks a lot like Walmart.

Capitalist Hell, of course, looks more like Bed Bath & Beyond.

If I cared to visit a BB&B, which I do not, I could wander right on in with my face hanging out as in days of yore, and not just because there would be no other customers (and possibly no employees).

No, it seems that overnight Bernalillo County has switched from Condition Red on the Bug-O-Meter to Go-Anywhere Green, for reasons which elude me.

Oh, wait, just thought of one: The Labor Day Drive Far and Spend Heavily While the Gas is Still Cheap(ish) Holiday Extravaganza. Get out there and buy something, you sissies!

I suppose it beats hanging out in the castle with Prospero, waiting for the Red Death to come knocking despite the “No Solicitors” sign on the door.

And if worse came to worst one could always bunker up in a Bed Bath & Beyond, which has to be the closest thing to a sterile environment outside the Wildfire lab near Flatrock, Nevada.

But still, it all seems a bit one step beyond. Madness!

Dropping the Peloton

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 18 Comments

OK, so this is only one story, but still — is anyone surprised that another pricey indoor-exercise phenomenon may have gone kerblooey?

Quoth The New York Times of the once-mighty Peloton:

The pandemic status symbol, which customers once waited two months to get their hands on, may soon become the modern equivalent of the 1990s NordicTrack: a high-priced piece of exercise equipment that becomes a glorified clothing rack, cluttering up a home until it is sold or dispatched to the curb.

Signs of its cultural downfall are hard to ignore. Sales of Peloton’s stationary bikes and treadmills fell 17 percent year over year in the third quarter of 2021, and the online resale market is flooded with used bikes selling at a discount.

Those of us who have real bikes* and ride them outdoors have seen this buyer’s remorse before as we pedal around our neighborhoods with one eye peeled for hidden treasure at the garage sales.

The Fitness Flavor of the Month (stationary bikes, treadmills, free weights, etc.) may be rockin’ around the Christmas tree, but chances are it will drop right out of the Hit Parade by Valentine’s Day. Goodbye, laundry room; hello, eBay. This exercise shit is hard! Who knew?

Those of us who have real bikes* and ride them outdoors, that’s who.

Dodging pickups and potholes, patching punctures, ducking and moving, bobbing and weaving, wearing all manner of kit through all four seasons — it’s so … random! Also, fun. Plus, like crucifixion, it gets you out in the open air.

Of course, some of Peloton’s plummet can be attributed to the stir-crazy dashing back to their gyms, where for a small consideration they can ride other people’s exercise bikes indoors. This explains much about the state of the human condition at present.

* E-bikes not included. See “Fitness Flavor of the Month.”

And now for the rumors behind the news

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 25 Comments
This photo has nothing to do with the blog post. I just like it.

This morning I awakened, cracked one eye, gauged the light levels in our bedroom, and guessed the time to be 6:33 a.m.

It was 6:35. Boom. Close enough. The ol’ temple of the soul is back on track after two days of the Pfizer Pfeebles.

Coffee and the news. I see via my former employer The New Mexican that some douchebags are tearing up the Nambé Badlands. My old riding buddy Dave Kraig, who is very much not a douchebag, is on the case with the Friends of the Nambé Badlands.

Down here, meanwhile, Herself saw someone throwing an unread bundle of 20 Sunday Albuquerque Journals into the recycling bins near the Lowe’s on Juan Tabo. When I was a paperboy the idea was to throw the papers onto readers’ doorsteps so that the readers could throw them in the trash. Division of labor, don’t you know.

FInally, up in Colorado, the latest in a seemingly endless invasion of out-of-towners is trying to make a silk purse out of the sow’s ear that is the dormant Cuchara ski area. Good luck with that, fellas. I hear they’ve been in touch with my man Hal Walter about doing a burro race. How about adding a “Little 500”-style gravel race in which all the competitors have to ride Range Rover Evoque bicycles? Electrify them sumbitches to bring ’em up to date and you’ll have a little sumpin’-sumpin’ goin’ on.

No. 9 … No. 9 … No. 9. …

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 17 Comments
I haven’t been up there since breaking the ankle.

Got my booster this morning. Easy peasy roll up your sleevesie. I’ve burned more daylight waiting on a No. 9 breakfast burrito at the Golden Pride drive-through.

Of course, a No. 9 might be more effective against the newest variant — some Irish bug called the O’Micron — so I’ll try a couple of those too, just to be on the safe side.

In the meantime, after getting stuck I filled the bird feeders and went for a stroll through the foothills to collect a little free vitamin D. I’m a senior citizen on a fixed income, goddamn it, I’ll take all the free shit I can get.

To be honest, a nap sounded pretty good. But it was 64° in the ol’ cul-de-sac, and my rule is “Sun’s out, guns out.” The weather can’t stay like this forever, unless it does. It’ll make the chile real mean.