Dark Days/Light Years

First hit out this afternoon since Saturday. Glad for the break if I'm honest, I've found that since I've been able to take a holiday and step outside the workingridingfamilyworkingworkingfamilyridingtrainfamilysleep holding pattern that I've been existing in these past few months things have caught up with one somewhat. So it was with mixed feelings that I stepped out into the watery sunshine this afternoon to get amongst it. I mentally slapped myself for the churlish, spoilt ideation that going for a ride in The Redwoods could be *sigh* A CHORE.I was faced with a temporary loss of inspiration to ride.

People talk about finding their inspiration in different ways and just like the good Dr's latest trieste I found myself completely knocked on my ass and reinvigorated by a piece of art, which has elegantly been described as
"Just the sci-fi groove-rock mindfuck to shake us out of our no-fun times". Now there's not much I thank god for about my Welsh heritage (sub six foot, body designed to dig coal. Ginger beard) however knowing that I share a cultural (if vague and somewhat tenuous) commonality with SFA is A ok. SFA OK in fact. This album is genius and with all due respect tips Hey Venus into a crooked hat.

In fact, if we're going to play the game of "vague and tenuous cultural associations" that link me with SFA then I've got another one for you. Bare with me here, it's all about my burgeoning interest in both Six Degrees of Separation and Morphic Resonance. I know, if there is one thing you can say about me it's that I'm truly scientificological.

Right.

Ahem..... SFA are on the record label Rough Trade, Got that? Rough Trade. Now, if you were to walk into the Rough Trade Shop You'd find an album that I played on is sold in said shop. It would undoubtedly be in the bargain bin (having been reliably informed that we'd sold at last count FOUR COPIES in the greater London area). Ha! that's two. We're practically family SFA and me.Both Welsh and both sold (one in greater number than other) in the Rough Trade Shops. And they said it couldn't be done..

The whole "four records sold" thing reminds me of a particularly cutting comment that I read online between two friends of mine, one, hassling the other (in his subtle, polite manner) about purchasing his album. "okay bro, I'll give you 20 bucks for a CD" began the reply "but do us a favour and chuck the album straight in the bin, let's cut out the middle man". Burn. Truly the wellspring of talent I swim in knows no depth....

Right. Back on track, or trails as it were...the trails. Yes. They were wet. Wet, sketchy and muddy. This mattered not, as I was inspired and wanted to soak the album up as much as I could in the privacy of my own head (and the relative anonymity that riding a bike can give you).I tooled about for a good couple hours, pretending that I was on a cyclocross bike and that I had a cycling cap on under my helmet. It was grand. Tomorrow I'll do the same thing, then the two days after that I'll be riding with my old man. Should be a stone cold party.

It only leaves me to finish this rambling, digressive and most importantly inspired post in an apt manner. I remain, inspired.





They had an animated video!! so did we!!! FUUUUUUCK...It doesn't get more real than that maaaaan...They had Sir Paul McCartney sing backing vocals on that song, We...Oh. Never mind.

I Belong To the ___________ Generation.

I think I've over romanticized the Rotorua winter somewhat, and find myself mildly put out as we charge headlong into our fourth straight day of rain. Rain was s'posed to be a Dorkland phenomena, it was all clear crisp mornings and frost on the brochure. Sigh. Thus far I've avoided riding since Satdee, as A)it's been pouring down and the trails are stoked B) I'm spoilt and can ride here every day if I want C) I'm enjoying hanging out with my family whilst I'm on holiday D) I don't want to have to shell out more coin for some new pads if I can help it..yet.

Rarely do I have time to potter around, and this morning has been one of those rare occasions. As we only moved here 8 months ago, I find myself still tidying away stuff, music mostly. I was charged with clearing a big bag of CDs into the garage this morning, and to my wife's imminent disgust (she doesn't know yet) I've returned with AN EVEN BIGGER BAG of gems that I haven't played in years.. amongst them, but not exclusively early TVOTR, Richard Hell and the Voidoids, Antibalas, Pavement et al.. My Itunes library aint gonna know what hit it. Turns out that I also had a massive stash of spare tubes of the tiny wheel variety. I've heard they'll stretch.

I've also been thinking about my riding this year. I'm still stoked on Saturday and have been thinking about my deliberately parochial/regionalistic(is that a word) approach to events thus far i.e. I've stuck around home and gorged myself on the events put on by the Nduro crowd. I've done four out of the six events on offer this year (missed the first summer cup round due to a christening and the 24hr due to disorganization + it was the week before the highlander). So far that's equaled all the races I did in 2008. I've got the Winter Series coming up leading up to the Whaka100 in October. 2010 has got me thinking about 12 hour solo's and possibly some races across the ditch. But who knows.
The Old Man is coming down over the weekend, so a good time will be had there for sure.

Richard Hell. There would be no Pretty Vacant without The Blank Generation




Aaand, without that carry on, you could make the rational assumption (the mother of all fuck ups?) that this would not have happened in the way that it did...



Then there would be nothing like this...



Then what would I do?????

SVBBSPNZSSC09

It's a strange mix of feelings for me after last weekend. I've spoken before about "Sunnyvale baked bean syndrome" which is what I used to find would happen after a big weekend or week of playing music, usually supports for international acts although it could have been a couple dates of a tour or an ep release show. All the good times, adrenaline, booze and people telling you that you're the best thing since dah dah dah wears off, and you find yourself (in my case) in Sunnyvale (where I used to live) sitting in your lounge eating baked beans, with a distinct lack of anyone applauding you when you get up to make more toast. I've had this distinct phenomena assail me a few times post racing weekend, however this time it's tempered somewhat, because after this weekend racing the SS Champs I feel part of something rather larger. Having met kindered spirits from across the Tasman and further afield in NZ, I finally feel part of a community. It's odd then that this should happen when I met people who live hundreds, if not thousands of Km away. It's odd that I still feel mainly out of step with the majority of people who ride where I live (Which is tonnes). This isn't on some superiority tip, I'm a distinctly average rider, but it kinda felt as if a lot of people at the champs on Saturday didnt' somehow get it. Lots of dudes on Single speeds rather than Single Speeders? I dunno..too cynical? a touch bloggercentric? maybe.. but I'm owing it. And by it I mean I don't exactly know what "it" is or, if "it" matters.. whatever.

It seems very rarely that loving the jesus lizard (for one example of a band I love) axis and riding bikes axis meet.

Anyhoo...
THE GOOD

The Course.Sweet jesus that was good, not overthought and fun as hell. endless (four) laps of Sandy skid road, pondy new, the second half of roller coaster, second half of old chevy and then yellow brick. One of my favourite loops. Done four times it became less favourite, but still completely awesome.

Singlespeed bikes are gorgeous. And there were some particularly nice ones in evidence. mmmmmm Karate Monkey.



These Bastards!!! Damn. Ben and Michelle. Stellar, Stellar individuals. They hit the apex of "like punk rock/think about stuff/ride single speeds" hard out. And there are many more like them.. They've got me thinking about stuff, hard. I wanna be in their gang and will be flying the colours as soon as I am able. Too easy!

The pre ride out from the Pig to the forest. Sweet little whistle wetter.

The looks of rage on some "serious racer" faces when we stampeded into the clearing to find that our bikes had all been moved... awesome.

The one beer I had whilst riding was awesome and terrible at the same time. But mainly awesome.

The ghost of Robin Bain

THE BAD

Middle New Zealand riding bikes (or doing anything) in large groups tends to annoy one a touch.

The effeminate sneer of some leathery-never-was-lycra-bandit criticizing a guy completely dressed as a ghost for "taking me out" or something with his ghost robes... "Bad form buddy" was the hiss at the beer tent. Fuck off, it's a singlespeed race. Not the Mt.Maunganui C Masters crit semi finals. Jump back on your trek and ride hither would you? take your friends as well.

I haven't run in years..and never in a jersey, tap shoes and stretchy pants.

sigh.

That's it really. Not much to complain about. It was what it was..not a tribal gathering, not a celebration of singlespeedery, but a race. A fun, hard race..which was won by...A racer. Natch. I guess it concerns me some that it was kinda made out to be something it wasn't..the fun (apart from riding bikes fast on awesome trails with heaps of cool people) almost felt a tad forced...ah well. Small gripes. Will I be doing it all again next year? Damn straight..am I now thinking of bigger things re bikes and the riding of them? Damn straight. Am I thinking about Dinosaur Jr? Damn straight...I've said before that it was a moment of clarity when I saw them last that I realized that I had pretty much bitten Lou Barlow for the entirety of my bass playing career. Anyway.

He Suffered Poor Health

It took me ages (years) to work out that Gruf was singing "An asthma sufferer".
I remain cynical about middle New Zealand's ability to pull tomorrow off. I think I am just being overthinking guy. Or prehaps it's my chronic feeling of being out of step playing up. Dunno. Judging from where I saw them putting up the pavillions today, the course should be a good'un. The trails were nicely just this side of greasy this morning, and judging by the weather forecast for the weekend (rain)things are only going to get more gnar (muddy and stuff.I'm totally down with extreme speak). It felt kind of odd cleaning my bike tonight, knowing that tomorrow I would be subjecting it to mud and mud for hours and hours, kinda like raising a prize chicken then turning it into Mc Nuggets, or something. My funk will lift I am sure...

All Done and Dusted.

I've entered. Nearly didn't as A)It's expensive, B) I'm distrustful of large crowds. C)I don't realllllly know anyone else who rides SS. I ride mainly by myself, Race usually by myself D) I'm homesick at the moment and thought about a trip to Dorkland to ride with the old man and Matt K. However, The SS champs won out... I've heard that next year they'll be in Queenstown, so that will prolly be off the cards. Work was bad yesterday, that's why I'm not feeling so "up" at the moment.I was feeling "up", great in fact, until about an hour ago. Now I appear to be in a surly funk which, if I'm honest, knew was coming at some point. 30 hours of plain sailing must be some kind of record. I'm on leave from tomorrow however for two weeks, and my last act before said leave is giving a lecture on Mental Health Law to a bunch of undergraduates at the polytech, which is something I love doing. Undoubtedly this will help.

I'm being deliberately vague because I'm not elegant enough of a word smith to matter-of-factly describe the situation without seeming i)callous ii) somewhat overdramatic iii) alarmist. I fully realize and accept that all stress is relative, however in my line of work, a bad day = BAD. Suffice to say that this is only the second such bad day I've had in 10 years of doing this, and everyone is safe and more or less sound. Right, that's enough of that.

The commute through the forest this morning was excellent, and the watery early winter sunshine on the way home was perfect weather for The Eraser.

Aha!

Gold

Poor Jon Arbuckle

Who would have thought....

That riding with a chest infection would have such hilariously predictable results? My wife for one. That ride described in the last post, whilst psychologically fortifying, proved to be physically debilitating. I was laid up for most of yesterday, missed my third consecutive day of work and generally walked around the house feeling most sorry for one's self...However it appears that today I'm "over the hump" as they say, and ready to hit it tomorrow Sans phantom noise!!!!

Why? because BIKE VEGAS rule, that's why. with my rotors rotated (front to back) a "wafer thin" spacer added to the caliper and the little silvery thing that sits in the brake (names? if you can name this I'll tell you what the back of your knee is called)tightened (it appears that this was the source of the noise)I'm all ready to go. The bike is clean, degreased and smells good (thanks Simple Green)and even after one "shake down" ride in the street there is no noise, and shizz generally feels tighter. whew.

It's been a light week for riding, due to sickness and hip pain, so tomorrow will be about pushing the boat out a tad whilst attempting to avoid pushing one's (admittedly still fragile) lungs out of one's chest. I'm thinking more Tokorangi pa and Sandy Skid Rds rather than fanging it about Direct rd et al (Sense and sensibility?). Old Chevy will definitely be making an appearance amongst others..Actually, I'm very excited.

I finished chewing through the mammoth Radiohead concert that I had downloaded as podcast from NPR. I have to say, it was pretty amazing. All the more amazing for this song, played in the encore. Everything in its right place indeed. The version of the track shown below is taken from a French TV special that is probably seven or so years old. Man, them Chaos Pads are cool beans.

Day of one thousand thousand posts.

I ended up going riding..It was either that or go mad. A gauche 35 minute blast through a couple trails in the forest. Psychologically fortifying more than physically I think. I even drove there. Luxury. Chest doesn't feel too bad, and it was great to ride sans pack or tools... The phantom noise kept quiet for the most part, until the trail became sharper in it's dips and climbs. I'm convinced that the noise may be due to my entry level wheels flexing as they would be inclined to do with my lack of suspension (I think, I dunno).However, some lighter stiffer wheels wouldn't go amiss. I'll add em to the upgrade list. I'm having seditious thoughts "drink the wine...have some chocolate" and am fighting them off with marginal success. Tomorrow should be a better day.

I Got/Have It.

I left my degree half way through, vowing never to return... as one does when one is 19. Anyhoo I came back to my degree (as one does when one is 21). I saw Yo La Tengo like a month before I was due to sit my finals, and I had to exercise all my frontal lobe's dubious ability not to quit again that night..Indie rock-riffic.

Your Touch

The white who?

Now is the late summer/early autumn of our discontent. Or something.

Great, I'm sicker (Sickerer?) More sick today than I was yesterday..I had hopes of waking today, being a bit fragile in the morning, however recovering enough to have a sneaky sick day hit out this afternoon. Not even a little bit. This should be good for the crazy self doubting thoughts..

Example The First
I have to be like This Guy (unrealistic) however all I will ever be and am is This Guy (just as unrealistic. probably)

It's gonna be a good day. Sigh.

Occam

I've spoken about Sheldrake before and as esoteric and loopy as it sounds I have to say, Morphic Resonance is real. Just ask Matt K. I am the proud incubator of a chest infection, I am off work and wishing to ride desperately. I rode yesterday and managed to smash my hip into a tree that I had scooted past successfully many many times before. It was Get-off-the-bike-double-over-and-spit-on-the-ground sore.

I have developed a theory relating to bike related injuries...that is the size of the bruise/scrape/contusion is inversely proportional to the soreness of said wound. For example, the double-fist size bruise on the inside of my thigh resulting from a low speed oopsie in a clearing the other day? meh. Conversely, the 50c piece sized bruise on my gentleman's area (found just above my gentleman's parts) from a minor wheel rub on the highlander which resulted in my feet leaving my pedals and said "gentleman's area" slamming into my stem at approx. 150m/sec? very tender indeed. Arriving home yesterday I immediately whipped off my jersey to show my nonplussed better half the cause of my considerable pain, which turned out to be a very minor bruise on my left hip. No blood, No huge bruise or scrape, nothing. Fuck all in fact. Hypothesis proved. This coupled with the chest infection has made me feel very sorry for myself indeed. Next up for this guy is the Single Speed Champs in a couple weeks. I've decided, in the true spirit of the thing to bust out some truly stunning sartorial elegance for the day. You just wait and see.

The back story to the my opening missive on the whole resonance thing was born from my listening to one of the superb NPR podcasts that I've become rather addicted to. I happened upon a particularly impressive live version The National Anthem and immediately txt my man to inform him of a "Tune!!!" (It's what we do..being complete dorks). It turns out that MJK himself was in Nelson, listening to his Ipod on shuffle and the self same song was playing at the exact moment I txt. coincidence? Most probably..but it's still rather fascinates and tickles me that in this random cruel and unusual world sometimes the chips fall "just so" and nice little moments like this happen.

In other breaking news "Old Man Clements" done got himself a bike with big boy wheels.. well done Chap!!!. I'm assured that the reflectors have been removed, however I remain suspicious... I'm looking forward to many many Kms of sweet singletrack joy on OMC's next trip down to these parts.



In other news the Phantom noise in my front end continues with it's random annoyance. Grrrrrrr.

Tune.

For Mazdef.

Monsters

Patina.

I had a dream I was at a family event at a zoo. Then a Male Lion got out and went on a rampage. I scrambled down a bank and hid. Strange.



They let us keep our number plates at The Highlander what you can see reflected in the camera flash is what Ira Ryan would very customly,lovingly and Portlandly as a "patina of sweat and dirt". Yeah, that sounds really romantic,"Patina". There is probably some expelled energy gel/sports drink combo on that bad boy as well.

The Highlander Course was epic. I had thought I would get in at about 6 hours for my first 80km event on the SS. Trotted across in Four Fifty Four. Stoked. I didn't blow up, Hit any walls or anything.. pleasant change of pace. All I can think about now is doing longer races. SS champs and winter series next. Excuse the berevity of the post. I'm shattered.

Into the Fire

All signed up. No turning back now.