Zapata Espinoza and two colleagues just got the old heave and also the ho from their gigs at Hi-Torque Publications.
According to my man Steve Frothingham at Bicycle Retailer and Industry News, Hi-Torque plans to croak Road Bike Action and Electric Bike Action. Hence the pink slips for Zap, Tony Donaldson and Alex Boyce.
“(The) head winds proved too mighty” for the titles, Espinoza told BRAIN in an email.
Oof. When even a Mountain Bike Hall of Famer like Zap can get dropped you know them headwinds is fierce. Here’s hoping the lads find new homes soon.
Wayne Shorter has moved on to that Big Stage in the Sky.
The tenor saxophonist and composer was 89.
Dude played with everyone. I first heard him with Weather Report, then Steely Dan. He played with Carlos Santana and Joni Mitchell, Miles Davis and Art Blakey.
And he kept his ears, eyes and mind wide open. Writes Nate Chinen in The New York Times:
A lifelong fan of comic books and science fiction, he kept a shelf crowded with action figures and wore T-shirts emblazoned with the Superman “S” logo.
Throughout his career he refused to hew too closely to any tradition except that of fearless expedition. “The word ‘jazz,’ to me,” he liked to say, “only means ‘I dare you.’”
While we’re talking jazz, David A. Graham at The Atlantic — who also has some thoughts about Shorter — reminds me that it’s the centenary of another great tenor saxophonist, Dexter Gordon, who likewise had a habit of stretching himself.
Writes Graham:
He came to greatest popular notice when, in 1986, he starred in the jazz-themed film “Round Midnight.” It was his first and last starring role, and he was nominated for an Oscar for best actor. But the best Dex is blowing Dex. Take his classic “Go” for a spin.
Here’s “Cheesecake,” from that album:
Every time I hear a horn played like this, I wish I’d gotten in line a little quicker when they were passing out the instruments in music class back in seventh grade.
I wanted to try clarinet, but they were all full up, so I went with flute. Flute’s fun, but man, it’s not the sax.
We went from gray to white in the blink of a shutter.
God is pitching softballs at us (graupel), and the temp just fell 10 degrees in as many minutes.
Looks like I won’t need to slather on the SPF 70 for that bike ride I won’t be doing.
Last year, March 2 was “sunny, virtually windless, 61-65°,” according to my training log. I was doing hill repeats and pulling off the arm and knee warmers.
Big Bill McBeef chases Your Humble Narrator upslope in a rare March cyclocross in Bibleburg.
And to think this year I haven’t even pulled them on. When I get out I’m still wearing long sleeves and tights. The only bit of me showing any color is my nose, and I think that’s windburn.
Well, March is always belligerent. Named for the Roman god of war, it marked the beginning of ass-kicking season, and it has kicked mine many a time.
In March 1994 the Mad Dogs put on a cyclocross in Monument Valley Park just to see what would happen and the answer was, “Not much.”
When even the cyclocrossers think you’re insane you might want to check yourself into the screw factory for a vigorous rethreading. We’d have gotten a bigger turnout promoting a St. Patrick’s Day pub crawl in Qatar.
It was still February yesterday, but I “marched” (har de har har) up from Trail 365 to the foot of the final climb to the Candelaria Bench Trail.
I considered finishing the ascent to the bench, but the wind was coming up, I hadn’t brought any water, and I didn’t feel like finding out what the descent was like these days; it’s been a while since I rock-hopped down the other side to the Hidden Valley Road trailhead.
Going down.
Today I had to get on two wheels, wind be damned. This morning I checked my mileage for this year and holy hell.
No, I won’t tell you the actual numbers. I will say that I had logged twice as many miles by this time last year. I haven’t screwed the pooch this badly since I broke my right ankle in 2020. People on spin bikes are covering more ground than I am.
So far I’ve managed to avoid the ER this year (knock on wood). Little victories, hey? Very little.
Can I call January-February the “off-season?” ’Cause I’m, like, way off.
The final “Dilbert,” in its Sunday-funnies incarnation, anyway.
Wile E. Coyote never saw the edge until he went over it.
Then it was “Ffffeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwwwwww … pow!”
Working the ragged edge for fun and profit is a hazardous occupation. Become enraptured by your own artistry and suddenly you notice a certain lack of mission-critical support. That telltale rush of air. From joker to joke in one easy misstep.
Uh oh. …
Until cartoonist Scott Adams took his header I hadn’t read “Dilbert” in years, but I remembered the strip being funny, even though I hadn’t had any real personal contact with office culture since I quit The New Mexican in 1991.
Apparently the strip had become less amusing over the years — to some readers and editors, anyway — and then when Adams shat the bed with a David Duke impersonation over at YouTube, before you could say “Meep meep” it was “Ffffeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwwwwww … pow!”
I got a little too far out over my skis a time or two, mostly before Twitter mobs became a thing.
The University of Northern Colorado’s Mirror gave me the heave-ho after my cartoons inchwormed up some overly tight arseholes. Years later the weekly Sentinel chain in Denver showed me the door; it was part of the usual layoffs, but I got mine for being a dick. The publisher was a twat. These two things can coexist, even find happiness, but ours wasn’t a match made in heaven.
As a freelancer for VeloNews and Bicycle Retailer and Industry News I annoyed a few readers and advertisers with cartoons and columns, but my crimes were rarely felonies and management almost always had my back.
When I finally left it was under my own steam and nobody changed the locks afterward. There were no mourners, but neither was there a lynch mob. I’ll call that a win.
Dilbert and The Old Guy Who Gets Fat in Winter appeared the same year, in 1989. Thank Cthulhu old Fatso never made it as big (har de har har) as Dilbert did. ’Tis unknown what class of a dick I might have made of meself on the YouTubes.
• Editor’s note: Props to The Firesign Theatre’s Nino the Mind-Boggler for the headline.
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