Awk!tober

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 8 Comments
Cloud cover, Duck! City style.

Ninety-three yesterday as the last day of September dragged its sweaty arse into the National Weather Service record books.

Anyone who got out early yesterday had nothing to complain about. Come to think of it, anyone who got out late, well, likewise.

The Rio wasn’t snaking its way up the drainage channels to snatch up our kinfolk, pets, and proud-ofs. We are light on natural disasters here at the moment, barring the odd pedestrian getting run over by three (!) vehicles, one woman going after another with an ax, and the city council considering guidelines for artificial intelligence, when the real thing seems to be in such short supply.

We may have a spot of wind that will set us to dashing around the foothills chasing our lawn furniture, which we have not been using because mosquitos, which will be chasing us around the foothills, and so on and so on and scooby-dooby-doo-bee.

At least it gets you out in the open air. Like crucifixion.

Meanwhile, a former colleague at Bicycle Retailer and Industry News reports that he and the fam’ are OK in Black Mountain, N.C., save for the lack of “water, internet, cell coverage or landline.” They have a propane generator that supplies electricity — as long as the propane lasts — and while driving is impossible due to downed trees and flooded roads, cycling is not. Stay high and dry, Dean.

Another former bike-industry bro in South Carolina says via text that he too is rocking a generator for power. The water is on, and he has plenty of grub, but the gas “is a bit tricky” and “cold showers suxxxx.” Word, TC.

The Shit Monsoon. They say the job isn’t over until the paperwork is done, and this one took more than the one roll.

I’ve only ever been a spectator at this sort of thing. Back in the late Seventies I got yanked off the Gazette copy desk to help cover the aftermath of a freak tornado that walloped Manitou Springs. And in Colorado we had to keep an eye peeled for fires.

One within eyesight of our shack in CrustyTucky had me scouting a back way off our one-road hillside. Another in Bibleburg had us taking in refugees.

Lucky for us, the worst we ever had to deal with was the occasional four-foot snowfall, power outages, and the fabled Shit Monsoon of song and story.

That was pretty crappy (rimshot). About like having a circus elephant with a crook gut let fly in the basement. But at least we still had power, water, and food … though our appetites were not up to snuff for a while.

I mean, c’mon. The place smelled like canned farts.

• Meanwhile, speaking of shitstorms, it’s been a while since I thumbed through the Book of Revelation, but it seems The New York Times is reprinting it in modern lingo.

R.I.P., Kris Kristofferson

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 12 Comments

“I wouldn’t be doing any of it if it weren’t for writing,” he said, looking back on his career, in a 2006 interview with the online magazine Country Standard Time.

“I never would have gotten to make records if I didn’t write. I wouldn’t have gotten to tour without it. And I never would’ve been asked to act in a movie if I hadn’t been known as a writer.”

“Writer” was the occupation listed on Mr. Kristofferson’s passport.

A writer indeed. The Old Gray Lady has the obit.

Your Daily Don (or not)

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 19 Comments
Are we there yet? No.

The whole “Your Daily Don” thing never really took off, did it?

Honestly, the less I think about Darth Cheeto and his new droid, Clockwork Orange, the happier I seem to be.

Speak of the devil and he appears, as the saying goes. So let’s not and hope he doesn’t.

There are other ways to pass the time. Jogging. Hiking. Cycling down to the bosque to gauge the color of the cottonwoods (not quite spectacular yet).

And reading about the newish editor and vice president of the Albuquerque Journal, who apparently is doing 10 days in the clink on a shoplifting rap.

Whatever is the world coming to? I’m old enough to remember when only reporters, photographers, and copy editors were so poorly paid that they had to steal to make ends meet.

The Journal may be so hard up it can’t even afford a poorly paid copy editor. My tribe goes unmentioned in the “Contact Us” section of the Journal‘s ghastly website, though I found a “design desk” with four people on it, or under it, depending on whether they’re still sharp enough to steal booze. And two assistant city editors but no actual city editor. Maybe s/he’s in jail too.

That the Journal apparently has no copy desk wasn’t news to me. Not after I saw the story refer to Patrick Ethridge as “editor in chief”, “executive editor,” and “Executive Editor” (in the “Contact Us” lineup, Ethridge is called, simply, “editor”) and report that he was serving “10 days” or “ten days” in the calaboose.

These are peccadillos that even the most poorly paid, knee-walking-drunk, one-eyed copy editor could catch on the first pass through the story from underneath the design desk between attempts to grope one or more of the designers. When one sees these tiny turds floating in the bowl one wonders what monstrosities lurk beneath.

Burned again

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 7 Comments
“Ain’t you heard? Smoke gets in your eyes.”

Miss Mia Sopaipilla thinks it’s a good day to leave the bike parked and hang around indoors, where there are suddenly fewer people to distract The Help from its primary mission, which is the care, feeding, and amusement of (wait for it) Miss Mia Sopaipilla.

The sisters-in-law have departed, and an air-quality alert has arrived.

I thought I smelled smoke last evening, and sure enough, fire managers from the Santa Fe National Forest apparently have begun prescribed burns.

Not a word about it from The New Mexican or the Albuquerque Journal, of course. I had to find out by checking the New Mexico Fire Information website, which I assume is available to our local newspuppies as well.

Even the TV nitwits managed to figure it out, probably after a few of their talking heads bitched during makeup about how their eyes were all itchy and red. Is it the eyeliner? Nope.

At least the Rio hasn’t risen up on its hind legs and started chasing us around, the way the ocean has on the right side of the country.

I knew I didn’t want to live anywhere in hurricane country after seeing “Key Largo.” If the ocean isn’t trying to kill you, Edward G. Robinson is. Here’s hoping our readers in that neck of the mangrove swamps are sitting high and dry.

Change of pace

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ Leave a comment
One of the rare flat spots on Tuesday’s ride through the Manzanitas.

A friend and neighbor who’s lived here longer than me and grown bored with The Duck! City menu of cycling possibilities proposed we try something a wee bit off the beaten path this week.

And so we motored up NM-337 a ways, parked at the Otero Canyon Trailhead, hopped aboard our trusty cyclocross bikes, and took a 21-mile tour of the rolling back alleys to the east and south, beginning with Juan Tomas Road and ending with Oak Flat Road.

One of the smoother descents.

Phil had warned me that we were headed for some steep, gnarly bits that could only be described as “roads” because they were passable by horse or halftrack. But they weren’t any worse than some of the knee- and tire-popping Paris-Roubaix-style bighorn-sheep circuits I used to wrangle in CusterTucky County, so I got along just fine on the old Steelman Eurocross with its new 34x32T low end and 33mm Donnelly MXPs.

To be sure, long stretches were steep as medical bills, with ruts that may recently have channeled hot lava, enough bad lines for a Sylvester Stallone film festival emceed by Carrot Top, and more baby-heads than the basement of the John Wayne Gacy Memorial Montessori School in Hell, if your idea of a baby is a 45-year-old Scandinavian blacksmith who dabbles in professional wrestling, rugby, and steroids.

But we saw plenty of wildflowers, and the motorists were mostly parked, hunting piñon.

Oak Flat dumped us back onto NM-337, just below the Morning Star Grocery, and we had a fine, high-speed plummet to our parking spot. As roller-coaster rides go it was worth the price of admission and then some.