Soggy Monday

My morning's ride was a contrast to Friday. It was raining from the get-go this morning. Pouring rain, 55 degrees and dark. Not the kind of morning that one exactly jumps on the saddle and says: “Oh boy, let's go for a ride!” Once over the mental hurdle of heading out the door, it was a fun little adventure. I truly do like riding in the rain, and today was not exception. Properly dressed with rain pants and jacket. I even remembered to wear my sandals instead or my regular cycling shoes.

Over the weekend I took an inventory of the tools and supplies that I have been carrying with for the better part of at least the last month. I put a new chain on the Quickbeam, packed my Crank Bros multi-tool, and made sure that I had a new chunk of chain to mitigate future repair needs. In my review, I realized that I had not been carrying a pump either. Ignorance is bliss.
I'm an incredible bike nerd. I 've spent too much unproductive time combing through blogs, websites, list servers, and forums looking for bits of information on Interbike. Looking for information on different bikes or products that might strike a chord.

Friday night, I thought to check out Lake Cycling shoes. For years, I've struggled with what to do about my frigid feet during the winter. I've been checking back now and then wondering if they would be offering anything special for 2008.

I have BIG feet, big wide feet. I've secretly envied owners able to buy the Lake winter shoes. Lake finally comes through and now offers their MXZ302 in a wide size. Rejoice... Saturday, I made a trip up to County Cycles in Roseville. It was a social visit, but also to place my order for size 50 Wide MX302 cycling shoes. I am not sure when they will come in, but I wanted to make sure and get my order in and be on the backorder list for when they do come in.

I feel like I have been on a huge bicycle spending spree lately. I've stocked up on some cycling clothing, picked up a new pump on Saturday, ordered my new shoes, and called over to Hiawatha to order a new 36 hole hub for the Quickbeam. There's nothing wrong with the wheel that's on there, but I am just going to build up a matching wheel for the 36 hole front. I thought about just picking up an inexpensive fixed gear hub. There are a number of reasons not to, but the most important to me being the fact that with a Phil Wood hub, you can remove the bolts all the way and the wheel will drop out of the frame. This cannot be done with any other hub that I am aware of. So, why settle?

Why new wheels? Well, I've been using some overly-fancy Phil Wood high flange hubs complete with the SLR option.


They are truly beautiful hubs. Well, when they are not on the Quickbeam covered in dirt, oil, and crud. So, they are coming off, going to get cleaned up and may go back on in the Spring or Summer.

During my combing for bike information, I made it a point to check out G-Tedproductions. He's a great writer and I appreciate his perspective on the bicycle industry. He just happens to be the mastermind behind the TransIowa ride. Which, mystereously I find myself increasingly interested in. There's a ride on the weekend of October 27th called something like the Guitar Ted Death Ride. While the rest of my family is looking forward to a weekend trip to Chicago to visit the American Girl Doll factory/museum/tourist trap, I find myself curiously drawn to rides with names like “Death Ride.”

The Homie Fall Festival is on the Saturday the 20th. I've previously considered attending such tom-foolery, but wonder if I wouldn't be a misfit among misfits. I am drawn to the idea of an afternoon that involves bikes, reckless abandon of most common sense involving riding them, and instructions like “bring as much beer as you can carry.”

Lifted from the Surlybikes Blog

Homie Fall Fest 2007

hom·ie /ho-mi/ Pronunciation Key - [hoh-mee]
–adjective, hom·i·er, hom·i·est. comfortably imbibing and riding single speed bicycles with friends in the woods.

The pride and joy of the Minneapolis Mafia, the anchor leg of the defunct Minneapolis Metro Frothy Mug Single Speed Series and the only rally event to happen every year here since 1997 is once again about to rear it's ugly head. Yes, the Homie (or Homey, depending on who made the flyer that year) Fall Festival is happening again on Saturday, October 20th.

Here is the flyer with everything you need to know. Don't e-mail us for details unless you promise to bring a piñata full of homebrew, mini bacon burgers and oatmeal creme pies. No seriously, everything you need to know is on the flyer.