Fauna

     I leave the house early to go on my rides. I do this to beat the heat and the traffic. This time of year I accomplish little of either. The temperature at 5 AM is 82° with 90° humidity  and the school traffic starts early now. Still, I am out earlier than most people and I get to see animals most people miss. It's all part of paying attention when you are on the road.

    Lately there has been a coyote on my route, a young female or juvenile male. I kinda like coyotes and they leave me alone, not like dogs. There are plenty of dogs in the early hours but this is about wild animals not wilding pets. I frequently spot owls, ghosting across the road from field to field. Spring and fall there are skunks, delightful and humorous creatures if you don't bother them. They do bounce around like Pepe Le Pew.

    I sometimes ride over to the state park. The hours just before and just after dawn are magic. The bike path has its own special hazards. Suicidal cottontails are the biggest threat. They are surely cute but they dart from one side to the other, change their mind and dart back, then make one last dash right in front of your wheel. They don't always make it. The nighthawks wait in the middle of the path and take off just before contact. They will sometimes give me a fighter escort for some distance, swooping like a spitfire just off the deck. Beware the lost glove you have just found! If it crawls off it is a tarantula, like skunks fun if not bothered.

    On morning there was a menagerie for my delight. Inside the park was a coati (very rare down here, like a skinny raccoon with glasses) armadillos, raccoons, javelina, tarantulas, an indigo snake and a very confused pug. The pug was just sitting there in the middle of the park road saying "beats me boss, I just got here myself" Then there were the birds. Wild turkeys, chachalacas, cardinals, green jays, owls, hawks kiskadees and roadrunners. Lots of tweety birds I have no ability to distinguish.

    So there are some good reasons for getting out early. The heat is not too bad, they traffic a little better and the fauna is frisky. By noon, it is over 100°, the traffic is homicidal and most of the animal sightings are roadkill. Get up and get out early but by all means pay attention. You don't want to be the morning's fresh kill.

Where Did The Time Go?

     It seems like it was only yesterday I was writing about Good King Sauerkraut but it was over 13 years ago. What in the hell happened? Maybe I decided I didn't need the diversion of writing a blog, maybe I ran  out  of things to write about. The need for gainful employment might have superseded the desire to write. More than likely it was all of the above.

    My devotion to cycling hasn't wavered over the years. I'm older and ride a little differently now. I'm also collecting social security. I used to ride 200 miles a week and now I ride a little over a hundred. Most of my riding now is done in the early hours of the morning much of it before dawn. It's a wee bit cooler then and the traffic is light albeit just as sketchy. 

    A few years back, maybe a decade, (decades are such tenuous concepts when you're older) I went to my first handmade bike show. I volunteered at NAHBS (North American Hand Made Bike Show). It was a game changer. I met builders worthy of worship and bikes beyond belief. I waited a couple of years before my next show. I told myself it was pointless since I didn't have two nickels to rub together but I volunteered anyway. Long story short there was a blizzard in Louisville and I was promoted from bike valet to badged volunteer. We could get into a long discussion about herding cats but the job evolved from "who's he?" to wearing a radio and traveling the country.

    Covid came along and pretty much killed that show. There was some structural weakness involved but the show was fun while it lasted. I worked The Philly Bike Expo one year and then Last year I worked the MADE bike show in Portland. There are many friends from all over the world who will be there this year. It will be part reunion and part business. I still don't have two nickels but you can expect to see more of my writing, here on Cyclophile and you just might see my byline in a real publication.

    I'm back.

Good King sauerkraut look out On his feets uneven

There have been many requests for me to get off my duff and publish a new post to Cyclophile. While I do need the money that hard honest work brings in, I will instead bow to peer pressure and put some ruminations into print.

The winter holidays are neer upon us and I am trying hard not to be a scrooge. We are finally getting some much needed rain here in deep south Texas. I should be happy but instead of a quick flash and a loud boom we are getting a whimpering drizzle. I have been spoiled living here so long. I like it when it rains really hard for an hour or two, the sun comes out, everything gets nice and green and my bike stays clean.

What can come of talking about the weather? Not a whole lot we can do about it (aside from vaporizing the ozone layer and melting the ice caps.). So I am going to rave about things that bug me. I have already raged against golf carts. They are back again and just as bad as ever but that is on going and wears thin after awhile. Antagonistic school bus drivers would be a good topic but I think I am going to borrow a term from Yehuda Moon and discuss Bike Ninjas.

Three days a week I get up at 4:30 AM and pour two shots of espresso into my body. By the time 5:30 rolls along I am ready to head out the door to go on a training ride with my good friend Mr. Cheerful. There are several thing wrong with this. I can’t stay up past 9PM and it severely curtails my beer consumption. That and it is really dark out. I have lights. Sponge Bob told me there are three types of headlights. The ones that allow you to see where you are going, the ones the allow you to be seen and the ones that can be seen from space. He made me one of the latter. Most of the riders down here have a blinky, it’s a little red blinking tail light attached to the rear of your body or bike. Most of them are wishful thinking. Mine has been known to induce epilepsy. One rider followed me around like the kid from “Shane” asking me over and over where did I get my blinky.

“Bike Ninjas” is a fanciful term for people who ride at night wearing dark clothing and no lights. We have Yehuda Moon to think for this. Before I heard about Bike Ninjas I just referred to them as morons, organ donors, or stupid m!@#@#@!$%$%ers. You would think this class would be made up entirely of people who ride in shorts and flip flops, typically riding the wrong way down the street with a short case of some wretched lite swill on the handlebars. It isn’t. This group includes many otherwise intelligent people that are either clueless or egotistical enough to think the whole world sees them even in the dark with a little red dot on their ass.

Now if you are dumping opossums at Kmart or tossing roosters over a fence you should really turn all of your lights off. It just makes sense. When you are out in the fog or the dark before dawn and you see a car driving along too fast with no lights, you should stop and think about your own mortality. You only get one shot at living. Riding over to meet the group you need lights. Just because it will be light soon doesn’t mean it is light now. Apparently common sense is not all that common and it is definitely not universal.

So dear reader, as we head into the winter months, put away those black jerseys and break out the reflective tape. Black may be slimming but if you get run over it really doesn’t matter how thin you look. Spend some good money on lights and keep fresh batteries on hand. Be realistic, can your blinky be seen by anyone more than ten feet away? Here is my one little tip for style conscious riders. Get some reflective tape and put a nice strip down your cranks. If you use the silver tape it will be ever so stylish and shows up like a pinwheel in headlights.

Whilst the snoo lay roun' an' 'bout,
All kerchoo achievin'.

Life is Hard

Sometimes writer’s block means a lack of inspiration, nothing to write about. Sometimes it is an abundance of ideas and no where to start. My absence has been due to the latter. There are so many things I would like to address. My mind swirls with eddies and backwaters of trivial humor and strong ardent truths. Yet my pen yields little more than a drip. So before this metaphor heads towards plumbing remedies I am just going to start somewhere.

I told myself not to let this blog turn into a travel diary so you won’t get all of the details of the trips I rode on this year. Suffice to say there were many good ones, some suffering and all ended well. I am blessed with true and loyal friends to ride with. My boating trip this year was thwarted (naughty nautical pun) by a 30 year flood. They changed the name of Town Lake in Austin to Lady Bird Lake and Stevie Ray Vaughn was up to his knees in a

real Texas flood.

Late in this year I found myself contemplating how sour I seemed to be getting. The lack of compassion and understanding in our community was starting to get to me and I was losing my composure. I raised money for the Bob Woodruff foundation and the lack of support for our injured veterans was appalling. But there was a brighter side. People who really had no money to give came through. I wound up being the top fund raiser for the ride. This gave me little if any special recognition but The Woodruff Foundation took the time to contact me personally. So I did a

little more thinking and it came to me that I am not as kind and giving as I used to be.

I’m going to make an effort to change a little bit. A little old lady ordered a dozen cookies to be baked and shipped to her grandson in Afghanistan. I sent six dozen. Random acts of kindness are good. I doubt that I will every be as genuinely happy as I was at 20 but I am willing to give it a shot. Good things do happen. I’ve been learning to mountain bike. Nothing makes you feel like a kid quite like falling off a bike. My prized racing bike is getting new paint and parts. Best of all, my wife still loves me after 20 years and we have a new kitten. Life is good.

So there, the cork is out and more posts will follow. Here’s to a new year!

Rollin' Rollin' Rollin'

Sal wanted me to write about being prepared for the Easter Hill Country Tour. Sal wants me to do a lot of things. Sal is a school teacher and a coach. He is idealistic and patient, both laudable traits. This is good because I have not been prepared for the EHCT in years. In fact, I have not been prepared for any ride in recent memory. If you are prepared where is the adventure? What’s the point?

I did do the EHCT. It was harder than I expected and a couple of rookies actually sagged part of the course. Sponge Bob crusted his gloves up with sweat salt, cramped like hell and whined. He finished with dignity. The tour organizers found a double dipper hill with 16 to 18 percent grades just before the finish. Miss Nellie did splendid and will be a real contender when she learns to descend. Myself? I rode all right, I was a little short on gas and felt I could have done better. I made a miscalculation and went to Harper. It was not on the course but I have a friend named Harper so I felt obligated to visit. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

The second weekend back from the Hill Country, the local bike club put on a charity ride. I try to avoid these rides, there is a mixed group of riders and I usually wind up in a “sweeper” position. That is a ride leader who brings home the stragglers. The ride is named “Karie’s Ride” after our friend Darlene’s daughter Karie. Karie died young of colon cancer. I did last year’s ride for Darlene. This year it was in honor of Hudler’s niece Shelby who died of Leukemia as a child. Once again I volunteered. I did lead out a ride and pulled the whole ride with Dr. Martin. I had nearly 100 miles when I got home. That meant two century rides in one month.

Then our renter in Chico went insane, even by California standards. I was planning on going out anyway to fix the fence but replacing a renter turns it into a long ordeal. The Chico Velo Wildflower Century happened to coincide with my visit so I decided to combine business and pleasure. The Wildflower is rated one of the top ten rides in the country and has been on my “to do” list for years. Remember Sal and being prepared? I foolishly thought that having done two centuries I would be ready for a third.

Wildflower sounds so bucolic, as does Honey Run. Paradise, Oroville, lunch stop, they all inspire a warm fuzzy feeling. Inspiration is a tricky thing. The Wildflower has 5000 feet of climbing all in the first 50 miles. Honey Run is a six mile climb the flat spots are 6% grade. That is just so wrong. Paradise is a throw back to the 50’s. The run out of Paradise is fast and steep, the locals buzz by you at 45 mph with no warning. You get a splendid rest stop and great cookies and juices then a pleasant little ride to Table Mountain road. No route with “mountain” in the name bodes well for a flatlander from South Texas. It was actually worse that Honey Run. The flat sections were 8% and the bumps 12 to 16%. If the numbers mean nothing to you, smash your fist into your thigh over and over until your hand hurts. Then there was the descent down Cherokee Road. Winding and tight, in and out of shadow and traffic. Think of the scariest roller-coaster you have ever been on and 23MM tires.

The Wildflower is one of the best Century rides I have every been on. The food was great, it was so well organized and mapped out only an idiot could get lost (several did). So, Mr. Sal, was I prepared for it? Not on your life. If I had known just how hard a ride it would be I might have demurred. I was at times terrified, exhilarated, blissed out and in pain. There was also the transcendental moment coming down Cherokee Road when I was doing 40 mph with my brakes on and starting to really nail the corners (no brakes in the corners of course but they were all blind). Then there was the best part. Going to all of the bike shops the day after wearing my ride T-shirt and getting a knowing smile. I would hear the same question, “Did you do the century?” then the nod and “Pretty cool heh?” Oh yeah, damn cool.

Special thanks to Windom Kimsey for letting my tag along while he did his second century, The Wildflower.

Objects in your Mirror are closer than they appear.

I just got home from my annual Tucson trip. It is not a big bike trip but a shopping trip for beads, gems and glass. I do manage to get in a ride if I can and they are always interesting. One thing to keep in mind about Tucson is that is never really flat, at least not South Texas flat. Tucson sits in a bowl of mountains that look really close but are actually just really big. I did a flat ride this year and still got in almost a 1000 feet of climbing. When I lived in Oregon I considered myself a bit of a mountaineer. I moved to South Texas 20 years ago and one morning I woke up a flatlander. This is not a good thing coming from a long line of hillbillies.

I will not refer to the riders in Tucson as hillbillies. It is a term to be used by people who are actually hillbillies. Use by outsiders is usually derogatory. I personally would take offense if a flatlander called me a hillbilly but not if a true kinsman did. It’s a lot like the “N” word. Lawyers have a similar problem with labels. The extent of lawyer jokes should give you a

clue. I have been known to attach various degrading adjectives to the word. This being said, there are a few people I know that are attorneys, fair and noble practitioners of law. They can pretty much be counted on one hand but I can be a harsh judge.

Erik Ryberg (http://www.tucsonbikelawyer.com/) stands out as a noble practitioner. He is a cycling advocate, a former racer and a commuter. He gets very excited about cargo bikes and was as proud as a new father when he showed me his Dutch commuter bike. Last year he used his lunch break to take me up Sentinel Peak. This year he got going early to meet my wife and I for coffee. This means a lot to me and is one of the reasons I try reach out to cyclists who are visiting.

I rented a bike from Fairwheel bikes again. I was hoping to get a Trek Madone but evidently Trek doesn't like short people so I wound up with a Fisher. Good enough for me and more important, it fit. Bruce set it up for me and by some luck of the gods, eyed my legs and adjusted the seat height by eye. I like Bruce a lot. The first time

I rented from him he told me to

“Ride fast and take chances” Unfortunately he jinxed me this time. He innocently asked me if I knew the lay of the land and I foolishly replied “yep”. After all I had a map, what could go wrong?

I had planned on riding with the Cactus Cycling Club but their plans and my time did not work out right. I am a member of the club but just a $20 member. This entitles me to say I am a member on paper but since I only show up once a year, not much more than that. So, I left the bike shop on my own, headed out into the sunny cool morning, and promptly started getting lost. The first wrong turn was a pretty good stroke of luck. I stumbled onto a bike path (no cars) that took me a long way out of town. The second wrong turn was the result of a momentary lapse of reason, a brain fart, or sudden onset dyslexia. A left turn would have taken me to the right road and given me a small chance of connecting up with the club. The right turn I made took me way out of the way to a place even the locals can’t quite place unless they too have gotten lost. Should you ever find yourself at the intersection of Houghton and Valencia, don’t bother to stop and wonder where you are, don’t waste your time looking around for familiar landmarks, you are lost.

There was an upside to this unplanned excursion. The reason I knew that the way I was going was absolutely the wrong way? Somebody moved the mountains. Yes, the hereditary hillbilly surfaced and for one short moment I was a flatlander no more. I turned around and headed back in the right direction, back up the hill and towards the snow. My head was clear, I was heading the right way, and it was indeed a beautiful day.

Shameless Commerce

The harsh reality of life has burst the Utopian bubble of my blog. Yes indeed loyal readers it has come to my attention that I need to make a living. It’s a cruel world we live in but the alternative is, in my case, less than heavenly.

So just in time for the solstice celebration of your choice, I am offering you the chance to buy an Alley Katz T-shirt. The Alley Katz is my logo and can be found on everything from homebrew to bikes. The T-shirt is 100% heavyweight pre-shrunk cotton and sized from small to xxl. A mere $20 buys you one of these lovelies and keeps me one step farther from the poor house. Shipping is $5 for priority mail or I can deliver in the Mission/McAllen area. You can reach me through this blog by posting a comment or you can email me at curtistex@sbcglobal.netnospam. (You'll have to remove the nospam from the address)

Thanks a million and should you need a million shirts, I can arrange that.