And you’re working for no one but me

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 5 Comments

Dashed off a wee bit of semi-journalism for the VeloNews.com gang and then took off for a short, slightly hilly ride into the Garden of the Gods. I looked just like a cyclist, only slower. Much, much slower. I’d blame the cyclo-cross bike and its fat rubber if there weren’t something even fatter attached to the saddle.

Head-clearing exercise was a must after glancing at The New York Times coverage of the trio of turds who somehow thought that dodging the taxman would never catch up with them. Housekeepers, cars and drivers, Jesus H. Christ. All that’s missing is the Zil lane so the Party bosses never need be delayed by traffic jams en route to the Kremlin.

The worst part of this is the insane sense of entitlement I get from these people and their Beltway buddies. Doesn’t everybody have a car and driver? A housekeeper? Well, yeah — I have a car and I drive the sonofabitch. Make the monthly payment and pump my own gas, too. As to the housekeeper, I’ve been married to her for nearly 20 years, but I’ve never checked her papers. I could be in deep shit here if Obama rings me up, asks me to be Minister of Cyclo-cross or something.

At least I know where our cook comes from. He’s a cranky, bald-headed old fat bastard from Annapolis, Maryland. And he pays his fucking taxes before the newspapers ring him up to ask why he hasn’t. You know you have a retarded cat when he doesn’t even bother trying to cover up his stanky shit. Welcome to the New and Improved Land of the Pharaohs.

Six more weeks?

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 9 Comments
The official NOAA jersey, guaranteed to take weather-forecasting rodents' eyes off their own shadows.
The official NOAA jersey, guaranteed to take weather-forecasting rodents' eyes off their own shadows.

That miserable rodent Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow again this morning, heralding six more weeks of winter. If it were up to me that furry forecaster would see the lands and grooves of a Smith & Wesson .357 Magnum, but not for long.

Now here’s some weather news you can use. Steve Anderson, a correspondent of mine at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), has teamed with a colleague to design some official NOAA cycling kit — jersey, shorts, gloves and cap. The club is an official USA Cycling outfit with some 40 members, from the current head of NOAA to the newest student intern.

I plan to order a jersey up because I’m certain that in addition to matching my eyes it will make me faster. Plus it will serve as camouflage should I decide to attack that Punxsutawney punk from the air.

Stupor Sunday

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 4 Comments

Another month, another gray, chilly morning. February differs from January just how, exactly? Oh, yeah — it’s shorter.

No Yanks atop the podium at the frozen crit the Dutch called ‘cross worlds, though homegirl Katie Compton got the bronze in the women’s race.  The men’s race looked like a Belgian team time trial. Memo to UCI: If there’s no mud on your skinsuit and shoes at the finish line, it is not cyclo-cross.

Thirty-six and windy here in Bibleburg, yet my man Dr. Schenkenstein is already out and about, logging miles. At some point he’s bound to turn up on my stoop, wearing everything he owns and calling me a pussy because I like to ease gradually into my Sundays, like a fat man getting into a hot bath. God doesn’t even get up until noon, so I try not to incur His wrath by starting a ride any earlier than 10 a.m. With everything that’s going on in the world I figure He needs all the sleep He can get.

I understand there’s some lesser sporting event taking place today in Tampa. Alas, lacking cable or satellite we will be denied the dubious pleasure of play, commercial, play, commercial, play, commercial. Talk about your ad infinitum. We get ABC, CBS, PBS and suddenly a couple other off-brand digital channels after scoring a flat-panel TV for a joint solstice present. No NBC. And anyway, it’s wrong to watch TV in daylight hours, unless cyclo-cross — real cyclo-cross, with mud, weather and lots of running — is on.

American Express sucks

~ Patrick O'Grady

I have despised American Express for two decades, ever since I got sideways with them after a layoff and they shit in my credit rating for seven years, falsely claiming that I never repaid the debt. This Boston Globe story does nothing to change my opinion of these loathsome loan sharks, who make the Mafia look like Santa Claus.

Today, Herself and I have excellent credit (none of it my doing), and for some time now American Express has been begging us via unsolicited junk mailings to dip a tender toe in their toothy pool. I’ve thought about sending them a cease-and-desist NastyGram®, then thought again. Let them waste their own time and money the way they did mine. Three-point-four billion these button-down vampires sucked out of the Treasury. Fuck ’em, face down, in the mud, with a big, red, rubber dick.

Thanks and a tip of the Mad Dog green eyeshade to Kevin Drum, who shares my perspective: “Bastards. I really hate these guys and their entire sleazy industry.”

‘It’s a kid’s course’

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 4 Comments
Your humble narrator in an earlier incarnation, racing at Chatfield. That's a titanium Voodoo Loa with V-brakes, a suspension fork and Zipp wheels. I had delusions of grandeur.
Your humble narrator in an earlier incarnation, racing at Chatfield. That's a titanium Voodoo Loa with V-brakes, a suspension fork and Zipp wheels. I had delusions of grandeur.

That’s how Dutch junior Lars van der Haar described the course for today’s world cyclo-cross championships. “It’s not cyclo-cross,” said Van der Haar in a post-race chat with VeloNews‘ Charles Pelkey. “Cyclo-cross takes much more than just a fast start. Barriers, mud, more than one run-up … that’s cyclo-cross.”

Got to concur, Lars. I think ‘cross has become a good deal less interesting since the UCI began restricting a promoter’s natural urge to inflict pain and suffering on his customers. Flyovers and beer tents are all very well and good, but l like insane shit like long, gooey run-ups and multiple dismounts to showcase the riders’ skills at getting on and off the bike.

Chris Grealish was the master of that sort of Colorado course design back in the day, when I still raced. I remember courses at Chatfield State Park that included creek crossings, slaloms through the aspens and muddy run-ups so steep that a guy practically had to toss his bike over the top and climb up after it. Snow was good because it covered the goat-heads.

At one race the dump was so deep that the promoter shoveled a short section for a start-finish area, ordered a LeMans-style start with bikes stuffed into a ragged line in the snow, and sent us off for a couple painful laps of mostly running. I think I got second that time, behind the long-legged Mark Lance; it was one of my few respectable results from that time.

In fact, barring 1999, my one solid season, if the course didn’t call for a ton of running, I’d never see the front of the race until the leaders lapped me. So you’ll understand why I like it dirty. No goo, no glory.