Category: Winter

Winter wonderland revisited

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 14 Comments
“Bike lane.” Ho, ho. You can see how much safety that implies by the indifferently tarred seams and that tire scuff on the curb.

With the Ice Capades on pause and my cabin fever in triple digits I found time for a lazy 20-miler yesterday.

Back when I was a man, instead of whatever it is that I am now, I thought nothing of driving for a few hours to race cyclocross for 45 minutes plus one lap in conditions that made the ice planet Hoth look like Epstein Island.

Now I perch like a zopilote on the frozen carcass of my summertime fitness, pecking away at the Weather Underground website until the temperature creeps into the mid-40s.

It finally got there around 11:30 yesterday and I sprang into action, which looks an awful lot like some old bald dude tottering into his bedroom to see if he has any clean winter cycling kit.

Lo and behold, he did — Sugoi tuque, long-sleeve Paddygucci base layer, long-sleeve Gore Bike Wear jersey, full-finger Pearl Izumi gloves, Voler bibs, Pearl Izumi tights, Smartwool socks.

I glanced longingly at my Shimano SH-XM700 GTX clodhoppers with their Gore-Tex liners and Vibram soles. Toasty warm? To be sure. But there is always the chance of shoe-fender conflict when riding a bicycle so equipped, as I intended. Furthermore, your Duck! City driver — unpredictable at any time of year, in all conditions — doubles down on the dumbass on weekends, in poor weather, and during holiday seasons. When rocking the trifecta you want to be able to get out of your pedals faster than a Republican fleeing a primary (or his constituents).

So the beater Sidis it was, and boy, do I ever need a new pair of them. The soles have been ground flat by Dog only knows how many skidding dismounts at speed and long runs up muddy hills. And the Velcro straps are basically ornamental at this point, flapping in the breeze like my tongue at any heart rate over 150 bpm.

This dithering proved bootless (har de har har). Not only did I not need the fenders, I could’ve ridden in Birkenstocks, the way my old pal John “Usuk” O’Neill once did while we climbed Hardscrabble Canyon in Colorado. The roads were free of ice and snow, the only menace to traction being a scattering of white powder, which I assume was the remains of whatever the transpo dudes use to melt that mess. Probably fentanyl seized by the John Laws. Maybe there’s a tariff on road salt. There sure as shit is on Italian bicycle saddles. No, don’t ask.

Anyway, toward the end of the ride, just a few meters east of that bike-lane sign, some northbound asshat in a sporty red auto blew right through the stop sign at the intersection of High Desert and Spain as I approached headed south. Never even touched the brake pedal. An eastbound motorist gave him the horn, and the asshat gave one right back.

I left my Incredibell unrung. Why add my little tinkle to that sonic stream? That’s what blogs are for.

Winter shows its teeth

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 13 Comments
Where my cross-country skis at?

The bad thing about snow is it keeps me indoors, where the news is.

The good thing about snow is it gives me something else to shovel.

We got a couple-three inches of the white stuff here yesterday, about double the official tally at the airport (which is stupid, because I don’t know anybody who lives at the airport).

It started falling overnight. This I know because the Cold Moon reflecting off the accumulation in the back yard blasted me out of a sound sleep around 2 a.m. I howled at it, briefly, then drifted back into a fitful drowse that ended at stupid-thirty, when I had to drag ass out of the sack and shovel the Driveway of Doom for Herself, who had an early appointment with the dentist and a 2WD Honda to get her there.

I got her half of the drive cleared without breaking a hip or throwing out my back, and she navigated the descent without incident, so, winning, etc. Then I went back indoors, microwaved my half-finished second cup of coffee, slammed it, and went back out to shovel my half, as I too had an appointment with the very same dentist, but at a reasonable hour.

Or what would’ve been a reasonable hour, had I not already burned some critical daylight freeing the driveway of Itztlacoliuhqui’s icy booger-snots. There was no time left for my traditional X-rays-and-cleaning breakfast of sardines in mustard sauce sprinkled with chopped anchovies, red onions, and feta, which keeps these visits short and to the point.

So instead, as the hygienist chiseled, scraped, sanded, power-washed, and polished, I was compelled to listen as she prattled on and on — backed by a soundtrack of treacly holiday ditties clearly penned by Satan Himself — about how lovely Herself is and how she was sure someone had made a mistake when listing her birthdate on the paperwork, with nary a word about the striking male beauty of Your Humble Narrator, his wrinkly old Irish-American apple cheeks aglow from an hour’s snow-shoveling in the frosty high-desert air.

Oh, well. At least it wasn’t news. Not to me, anyway.

Not-so-little fluffy clouds

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 10 Comments
These are not the clouds The Orb was thinking about in 1990.

Clouds we got, sometimes. Rain, snow? Not so much.

The mornings are chilly in these early days of the Year of Our Lard 2025, but once the sun finally creeps over the Sandias, shortly before 9, things warm up considerably. The weather wizards predict a high of 60° today.

Yes, I said 60°. Six-oh degrees Fahrenheit. In January.

Miss Mia would like to invite the birds to dinner.

Good for the healthful outdoor exercise, for those of us who take it. Unless we’re talking skiing. Also, not so much for the plants and wildlife and drinking water come summer. See John Fleck for more.

In the meantime, we need not bundle up like the Michelin Man for running and riding so far this winter. It’s been so unseasonably warm that my brother geezers, who ordinarily are traveling to ski or working out in the gym, have called a ride for today.

In the early afternoon, of course. No need to wear the hair shirt. We are not children, with their barely tested HVAC systems fresh from the factory.

Meanwhile, Miss Mia Sopaipilla gets to bird-watch at the patio door, where I scatter a little seed for the house finches and dark-eyed juncos who don’t feel like battling the bigger birds at our feeders.

There’s a little bit of Sylvester and Tweety Bird going on there in her little mind. Bad ol’ puddy tat. …

In other news, the cuckoos in the House of Reprehensibles nearly give their Squeaker the bird. Says NYT’s Carl Hulse: “House Republicans certainly relish their internal drama.” Dinner theater for the insane.

Just a few notes

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 11 Comments
My i-yi-yiPad.

“Our special correspondent in the day after tomorrow reports,” the journalist was saying. … — H.G. Wells, “The Time Machine.”

We traveled back in time for a while yesterday. Seemed appropriate, given Tuesday’s events.

Instead of tapping, tapping like a stately Raven upon the keyboard after the power went out at 12:53 a.m. Thursday — and stayed out, for nearly 15 hours — it was scribble, scribble, scribble like Mr. Gibbon, recording my little fragments of history with pen and paper.

When your entire life has been light on calamities, save those self-inflicted, it’s illuminating to see just how far up your ass you’ve been storing your head. The things you don’t think about until circumstances insist.

Let’s begin at the beginning.

Campfire coffee, but indoors.

First, when the indoors feels like the outdoors you dress like the homeless, albeit with a dash more style because you and your spouse scored some killer deals while doing time in the outdoor industry. When I hit Keller’s for tortillas as the storm began rolling in on Wednesday the two dudes I saw using Heights Cleaners as a windbreak were not outfitted so handsomely.

Next, an electric gooseneck kettle is great for making coffee when there is electricity. Without juice it’s the battered old blue enamelware pot, gas cooktop, and butane lighter.

Speaking of heat, we have two fireplaces that we haven’t used in 10 years, because fireplaces are basically heat pumps that run backwards and messy to boot. O, for the highly efficient wood-burning Lopi fireplace insert of good ol’ CrustyTucky. But when the power failed there we had to break out the Coleman camp stove to cook because the range-oven combo was electric.

Let there be light.

We have a portable propane heater suitable for emergency indoor use, but like the fireplaces, it’s never been put to the test. I envision the headline: “Carbon monoxide blamed in couple’s death.” The cat ate their lips. Safer to add layers.

Light, too, was an issue at dark-thirty in the icebox. Instead of flipping a switch we were flipping our wigs as we tracked down the battery-powered flashlights, lanterns, and headlamps we haven’t used in the better part of quite some time. Some were charged; others were very dim indeed, like their owners, who had neglected to stock actual candlepower.

Once the issues of coffee, heat retention, and illumination had been resolved, the next hurdle was finding out what the fuck, etc.

We are, as you know, in the information business, Herself and I. She gets paid to find it, but I am no longer a meat hunter. I’ll track the wily news items, but only for sport. Shooting off my mouth for fun instead of profit.

For a change — ¡Que milagro! — both our iPhones were charged. So we quickly learned that about 50,000 of our fellow New Mexicans were shivering in the dark alongside us, and that it would be something like 2 in the morning — on Friday — before we could expect any relief.

As you might expect, I had a few thoughts about this, along with many other things as well. And as a scribbler emeritus and amateur podcaster I like to share my musings with this small, deeply disturbed audience while they’re fresh. But I can’t do them justice on an iPhone, not without a magnifying glass and a lot of bad language. I deal in emotions, not emoji. I demand at least an 11-inch display and a physical QWERTY keyboard.

The 15-inch 2014 MacBook Pro I’m using now was literally a non-starter. Ever since the “Geniuses” at the local Apple Store buggered its display while replacing the battery it needs an external display to function, and the external display requires (wait for it) electricity.

So I booted up my 11-inch 2012 MacBook Air, which — untouched by “Genius” — still gets excellent life from its battery. When it’s charged. Which it was not. Ten percent and dropping faster than the temperature.

That left the 13-inch 2014 MacBook Pro. Boom! Fully charged. Using the iPhone as a hotspot I popped up some notes about the power outage and a link to the latest episode of Radio Free Dogpatch. Behold, the mountain labors and brings forth a mouse.

Then we waited.

We took a bit of indoor exercise, Herself doing calisthenics in her office, me riding the Cateye CS-1000 trainer as a warmup for some light weightlifting. There was lunch.

Snowpocalypse. Or not.

As the phones slowly lost juice we went on another scavenger hunt, unearthing a handful of portable power banks and lanterns with charging capability that kept communications alive until the power suddenly returned at 3:12 p.m. yesterday, well ahead of schedule.

We were a little worried about losing it again — the forecast called for 5-12 inches of snow in the foothills — but at a glance I’d say the weatherpeople missed their guess by, oh, let’s see here, about 5-12 inches.

So don’t call FEMA. We don’t need a trailer or anything.

As for the political news — well, our special correspondent in the day after tomorrow has yet to file his report. But his friend had some thoughts.

He I know — for the question had been discussed among us long before the Time Machine was made — thought but cheerlessly of the advancement of mankind, and saw in the growing pile of civilization only a foolish heaping that must inevitably fall back upon and destroy its makers in the end. If that is so, it remains for us to live as though it were not so.

Back to you, Chet.