Rob Penn’s New Bike

Here’s a video about a guy putting his perfect bike together…..kind of a contemporary historical travelogue.

Maybe it’s a consumeristic travelogue?

That’s a pared down and weak description of what’s going on here.

Rob Penn….buying the best and talking about a lot of bike history and design while he’s doing it.

Check out the section on bike tire construction and manufacture…..pretty cool.

(I know….I know….it sounds boring as h….. ….heck, but it’s pretty cool to think that making something as mundane as a bike tire….could be such an interesting process….interesting to someone…..)

What the heck? It’s all interesting.

Maybe that’s the secret of life? Maybe it’s important to always have something in your life that you find interesting?

Everything’s interesting to me.

That’s kind of a problem.

(You know, though? That’s not really true…..there are lots of things that I don’t find all that interesting. For instance, I don’t really care about Kanye and Kim all that much….what they do with their lives is their own business….why should I add that to the list of things that I care about? I don’t care about them.)

The middle section in this short video….about 30 minutes in….is about mountain bikes.

Old hippies having fun on Mt. Bikes out in California.

It doesn’t get much better than that.

This world is an amazing place.

There’s never an excuse for boredom.

Nice bike, Rob Penn!

 

amsterdam….ride a bike

Woke up late and the little ones will be up soon and….and…..and….

I’ve had some coffee and I better ROCK THIS POST!!!!

Another video about bicycling in Amsterdam…..cycling in the Netherlands.

This is looking more and more like the coolest country I’ve ever seen….cycling wise, at least.

How a country treats its children…..and animals (children are far from being animals….I don’t mean that….they can act like little animals sometimes, but they aren’t animals…)….and how they handle their bicycling “situation”….um…..says a lot of good things about a country.

Here’s a parallel that’s kind of interesting, too….how about the drug laws?

Now, that’s irrelevant to me….I go drug free….even aspirin is off the “approved list” and I know that I haven’t been getting into the steroids….I’m too skinny for that….but….a country that doesn’t send all its people to the slammer for enjoying a visit to the “coffee shop” (look it up…it’s where these guys go to SMOKE MARIJUANA!!!) sounds like a more humane place to live than a place where you can get tazed because an aggressive dog smells something in your car.

(Where do you go to get a good cup of coffee in Amsterdam? I’d have to figure that out if I ever got a chance to ride my bike over there….)

Anyway….all this drug stuff is irrelevant to bicycling….but it seems like the people who support cycling are pretty mellow folks.

I don’t hear a lot about road rage coming from the cyclists side….although I remember a dude in lycra wailing on our lab with his bike pump…while his girlfriend screamed “LET’S GO!!! JUST LEAVE HIM ALONE!!! LEAVE HIM ALONE!!!! LET’S GO!!!” because the young dog was barking at him as he rode by….and I guess it scared him.

That dude was full of rage.

I think it embarrassed his girlfriend.

I think that FEAR and RAGE must be similar emotions.

Anyway…Nate is up and on my lap and I can’t see to type and the morning IS ON!!!

Ahhhhh…..I miss him already…..he just went downstairs to get the instructions for a Baymax doll…..

It’s easier to type, though.

It would be cool to feel like a bicycle had any status (on the road) other than being an irritation to the people in their cars.

It would be cool to get a cup of coffee in Amsterdam after a ride around the city.

fearful rolling

I wear a helmet when I ride my bike.

I encourage my children to wear a helmet when they ride their bikes.

I lock my doors at night.

I wear my seatbelt when I drive my car.

I do the things that “they” say I should do to be safe.

It’s funny how malleable I am….and how scared.

This is a video explaining the reasons that we think that we need to wear helmets….and why the speaker thinks that we probably don’t need them.

We rode on the Swamp Rabbit Trail the other day….and almost everyone had helmets on.

We ride….we wear helmets.

That’s the way we roll.

Jenny said, “did you notice that the European people didn’t wear helmets?”

It seemed like the people we saw without helmets on all had foreign accents.

I don’t know what that says….

Maybe a foreign accent keeps you safe?

I’ve been fortunate to only have had a couple of bike wrecks in my life…..and they were all when I was younger….before I started wearing a helmet.

To the best of my knowledge, I didn’t suffer any brain injuries during or after those couple of accidents.

To the best of my knowledge, I didn’t suffer any brain injuries during or after those couple of accidents.

To the best of my knowledge, I didn’t suffer any brain injuries during or after those couple of accidents.

That’s not funny.

I don’t know….I’ll still wear a helmet….and I’ll have the kids wear helmets, too….Jenny, too.

It’s Jenny’s decision to wear a helmet, though….I don’t mean that I’ll “have her wear a helmet”…..it’s not like that.

I don’t get away with saying things like “YOU WILL WEAR A HELMET, WOMAN!!!

I can’t do that.

This guy raises some good points, though.

How’d we get so scared of everything?

velo

 

rails to trails….hendersonville to brevard?

We had fun on the Rabbit Trail.

That was the short version of the story…..we had fun.

The big picture, if you took a look around and noticed all the other people, from families with rented bikes and carts to lycra clad “pros”, was that there were a lot of people out using the trail who might have some money to spend while they’re enjoying the 14 miles of trail and at all the businesses along the way.

Of course, we weren’t going to spend any money.

I’m too cheap for that.

We’ll just enjoy the trail and the free water midway down….enjoy the free air station….enjoy all the free stuff.

Free is how I roll….even on a bicycle.

But….riding a bicycle is kind of an “event”….so I might spend some money on one of these family bike trips.

It’d be like a mini-vacation.

That thought….of all the people who might spend some money….helped me understand a little bit about some of the things that I’d read about the positive economic impact the Swamp Rabbit Trail has had on Greenville and Travelers Rest.

This is a video about a potential trail inbetween Hendersonville and Brevard, NC.

I think that some of the people I talk to think that it’s silly to spend money on something that they probably won’t enjoy.

They aren’t set up to enjoy non-motorized transportation.

It’s not a pleasure for them to feel the breeze on their cheeks if they have to pedal something to feel it.

They think it’s stupid to tear up tracks that a train might roll on again someday.

But….I like the idea of a safe way to bicycle out to Brevard…..and to get up into Pisgah and enjoy the mountains out there.

I can see that a trail like that would serve a lot of people who might be willing to spend some money while they were enjoying the ride.

Maybe that’s the tipping point? “Spend some money….”  Maybe that would make it appealing to the people who hold the purse-strings to crack the vault and dole out some “tear up the tracks” dough?

It all comes down to dollars, somehow, in the end.

I don’t know why it’s fair that the people who have the time and the money to put on a lycra bicycling costume…..have the time and the money to ride around in a skin-tight cycling suit.

I guess I’m thinking that if they have the money for that, they might have the money to spend on a sweet-roll….or a sandwich….or dinner….or whatever else a tourist town might provide.

Bicycling is such a conscious activity.

You really can’t space-out while you’re pedaling a bike like you can while you’re driving a car.

I think that you have to think about things a little more when you’re pedaling yourself around than when a giant metal box is carrying you.

If they build this trail, the route becomes a destination.

It’s not just another way to get to Brevard from Hendersonville.

It’s a place that people celebrate and make an effort to get to.

Of course, I’m just talking because I think it would benefit my family.

I’ll say that it’s a good thing for all the selfish reasons I can come up with.

But, wouldn’t it be cool to ride out to Brevard and back some sunny Spring morning….park the bikes and walk around….have some lunch…..walk around some more….and then pedal back?

What a day that would be!

I hope it comes together…..I’d ride on it ….for sure.

Netherlands….and biking….again

Here’s another video about the Netherlands….and how it is to be a bicycle user there.

We rode on the Swamp Rabbit Trail down in South Carolina yesterday…..took the kids with their carts and tagalong bikes and snacks and….

There’s a lot more planning that goes into including people on an expedition who can’t take care of themselves.

I suppose that’s what the people who included me in some of the fun might have sometimes felt?

I think it’s a lot of fun to take these little guys out for a ride.

They had a blast….and so did we.

If you don’t know about the Rabbit Trail, it’s a trail that runs from downtown Greenville up to a town called Travelers Rest.

Look it up….it’s pretty cool….pretty safe.

Staples is having a sale on Dymo Label Makers.

Our’s broke….sortof….it only prints the top of the label.

I could buy another big hunk of plastic for under ten dollars at Staples right now….and just throw out the old one that “sort of works”

We watched a documentary about the giant islands of floating plastic out in the ocean.

I knew about that already….but it never hurts to be reminded of how the world is falling apart.

(I’m kidding….it hurts.)

We throw away a lot of plastic ….all the time.

Plastic stuff is cheap….why not just throw it away when it breaks?

Anyway, it hit me this morning that it should be a criminal offense to make something out of plastic that’s not going to last.

It should be something that manufacturers are accountable for.

If you’re going to make something out of plastic….make it out of something that never goes away….you should be planning to make something that lasts as close to forever as you can get.

I guess that kind of attitude would probably put places like the dollar stores out of business.

That doesn’t have much to do with places like the Rabbit Trail….except that it’s out in the world….and the world is filling up…..with people and plastic….and it’d be nice if we could continue on for a while….it’d be nice if things were good.

I don’t want to have to wade through an island of plastic.

And….while we’re on the subject of islands of trash….

I’m still cleaning out that old barn…..last corner I cleaned out had about a ton of moldy old clothes.

That’s pretty darn gross.

The thing that’s really gross about it is that when I got it cleaned out I could finally see that the floor in that corner was completely rotted out…..and, with the help of a flashlight that only shone on fabric and black mold before, now I could see that the plate (the bottom board….underneath the studs….the sill? I can’t remember what it’s called) was completely rotted out.

That’s bad.

Lots of years of moisture and piled up leaves isn’t good for wood.

Anyway…..the Netherlands looks good to me.

I wouldn’t mind being able to ride my bicycle everywhere.

And, if I rode my bike to the store, I’d bring my own bag.

Freaking plastic island.

Freaking rotten barn.

 

safe on a bike

Here’s another video about biking in the Netherlands.

Mannnnn…..the Dutch rock.

Now, of course, the Norwegians are still the coolest people….that’s not to be disputed.

But….look at these Dutch people go on their bikes!

Look at how they set their country up for biking!!

Look at their response to the problems that the use of cars produced!!!

We’re going to go down to what is called the “Swamp Rabbit Trail” today for a maiden family bike trip.

The Swamp Rabbit Trail is a converted railroad route that goes from Traveler’s Rest, SC to Greenville.

Here’s a short wiki article about the trail…..

It’s not quite like being in the Netherlands….but it will be nice to be on a trail that’s designed to handle bike riders and pedestrians.

It should be interesting to see how the little guys handle it all, too….Nate on his tagalong bike…..hooked to my bike….and Sparrow in her little Burley trailer….hooked to Jenny’s bike.

A short trip on the Rabbit Trail is a little less daunting than a cross-country tour.

When I watch videos like this one of a country like the Netherlands that’s set up to respect their cyclists…..and then I read about how much of a positive impact the Swamp Rabbit Trail has had on the Greenville area, it makes me wonder how long it’s going to take for people to wake up and make it easier across the board for bicyclists to get around in this area.

I suppose that it’s easier to get in the SUV and head out for another Big Mac than it is to build a bike trail ….or ride a bike on an existing trail.

Anyway….what am I doing about the situation?

Nothing!!!

I’m not building a bike trail….I’d get in trouble if I started tearing up the tracks.

But wouldn’t it be cool to have a converted railroad track trail system running from Hendersonville up to Asheville?

And….why stop there?

Why not have one going all the way up the Eastern side of the country?

And….why don’t we let all the pigs FLY!!!!

Pigs flying? How about a snowball in HELL?!!

How about a snowball?

I’ve heard people say that the railroad isn’t going to have a chance to come back if we tear up the tracks.

I’ve heard people say that the railroad is going to be the only strong response when everything hits the fan when society falls apart.

I’ve heard people say some wacky things.

I like the idea of a safe bike path….there’s something appealing about not getting hit by a speeding hunk of metal while I ride my bike.

Something appealing about that…..

Apparently, there’s a pretty extensive trail system up in Minnesota….hundreds of miles of paved trail…..over a thousand miles of dirt or gravel trail.

What makes Minnesota so different than North Carolina?

This Netherlands thing fascinates me….look at all the bicycles!!

LOOK AT THEM!!!

ALL THE BICYCLES!!!

LOOK AT THEM!!!

That looks like a good thing…..all those bicylists look like they picked a smart way to get around.

I like that.

 

Awwwww…..what the heck? I should stop wussing out and just get out on the road with the kooks in cars….and take my chances.

Who needs safety, anyway?

 

 

give me the good stuff….more, more, more….gas

That’s where the zombies in the movie “I am Legend” come from…..a good idea gone wrong.

Who wouldn’t want to cure cancer?

I would.

But….I don’t want a bunch of zombies chasing me down the street….even if they’re cancer-free zombies.

Zombies are pretty darn creepy…..scary.

So….how about that fracking?

That’s a good idea, too….right?

Drill some deep holes……shoot it off in another direction deep in the earth…..and then pump enough water and goo down the hole to fracture all the earth that’s around the deep, deep hole you drilled.

fracking-infographic

What could go wrong?

And….if it did go wrong, what’s the worst that could happen? Water problems? Or…..maybe….

EARTHQUAKES?!!

We need the gas…..we need the gas…..we need the gas!!!

If we get the gas, we’re OK for a while.

We can drive all over the place.

We can drive all over the place delivering the gas we produce.

It takes money to make money, right?

We need gas….it’s what we use to get around….unless we ride a bicycle….but you can’t ride a bicycle as fast as you can ride a car.

“Fracturing”…..that sounds harmless…..deep, deep in the ground….tear it up….open up the channels with some poison goo.

I don’t know the science….maybe drilling deep holes and fracturing all the earth around them…deep, deep down in the ground….would never cause any instabilities.

Maybe it’s just hype mongering to say that it might cause earthquakes.

Besides….what are you going to be doing up in North Dakota, anyway?

Farming?

You make better money drilling the big holes.

Some big wig money bags is sitting in an interview somewhere saying, in response to the question about solving our energy worries and whether fracking has solved the problem…..what was I saying? That was a long sentence….what was I saying?

Oh…..big wig saying something like, “Well…..yes. Yes….I suppose that we have solved the problem…”

Just like Emma Thompson before she accidentally created all the zombies.

Just like Emma Thompson.

 

Here’s a link to the outfit that REI is using to help the people of Nepal.

same road, different driver

I don’t always know where I’m going….and I don’t always know how I’m going to get there.

There….I’ve said it out loud.

How’s that for a confidence booster?

I was laying in bed this morning listening to our little daughter talking in her sleep….listening to what kind of conversations she has with her dreams….and Jenny woke up and we started visiting and I stopped listening to Sparrow’s private conversation.

We were talking about movement and career trajectories and motivation and aggressive ladder climbing.

We were talking about trash in a stream bed.

Jenny said that sometimes it’s like the driver who tailgates you on the freeway…then zooms around you and roars off into the distance…and then you meet them 5 minutes later when you pull off at the next rest area.

Maybe they really had to “go”?

That was part of the conversation about careers….not part of the trash talk.

I don’t know what we have to show for some of the aggression we live….

Hard to figure out, sometimes.

Sometimes it seems like, in the end, we don’t have much to show for all the “achievement”….not a whole lot to show for the hard choices we make.

Check out this traffic jam in China.

That’s progress in action…..everybody has a car now.

Now it’s “their turn”.

Remember when it was like this…..(in China)…..

I guess that people still ride bicycles in China….but I think that there are a lot more cars now.

That’s pretty crazy how many cars there are in China now.

Progress.

I guess that we all have different styles….no matter what we’re doing, we each bring something different to the table.

I’m a mailman….or, I’m an artist who drives a car and opens mailboxes all day.

I shouldn’t try and define myself like that…..maybe I’m not even an artist.

Probably not.

Anyway….I get tailgated all day long.

There’s something about a vehicle with a flashing light that stops all the time that irritates some people.

I must irritate people. People tailgate me.

Whether I drive fast….or slow….I’ve noticed that I always seem to get somewhere.

And….even when I’m sitting still, my molecules are moving.

I can’t help myself….I’m always fidgeting at a molecular level.

I can’t sit still….really.

 

“traffic jam” James Taylor

 

circle the wagons

In the old movies, they’d circle the wagons when the Indians came pouring over the hill, arrows flying and horse hoofs pounding.

Of course, these were American Indians I’m talking about.

They weren’t the Indians from India.

Those are different Indians.

That would have been a different kind of situation….the Indians coming over the hill, swaying and clapping in some Bollywood fantasy….singing…smiling….helping the Cowboys fix their computers.

The West would have been a different sort of place if the settlers had been confronted with that type of Indian.

The white man probably would have figured out a way to put that kind of Indian down, too, though….no matter how many delicious curries their new friends turned them on to at Thanksgiving.

I don’t see any Indian people up here in Detroit….only a far-out chiropractor (in this video, at least).

This is the new Wild West….up in the middle of the country….up in the cool North.

This is where the crazy wildness is.

We’re still cleaning out the property that we bought down the road from where we live now.

Jenny said this morning that we need to rent the giant dumpster again so that we can fill it up will all the trash in the creek bed.

Dangit.

That’s the smart thing to do.

Dangit.

It’s smart.

While we’re in the mode, we should just keep going….but I don’t want to drag all that crap up the hill.

It’s not going to get done unless somebody does it, though.

Anyway….back to this Detroit thing….

Holy Smokes…it’s insane up there….whole blocks of nothing but tall grass, derelict houses, wild packs of dogs, and crack heads.

Sign me up.

I’m kidding. Renting a giant dumpster isn’t going to make that situation any better.

But…it’s all so cheap….all so cheap and dangerous.

I could put my rose-colored glasses (I almost wrote “roast colored glasses”!!) and let my cheap side color how I saw it all…..convince myself that it might be a doable situation even though the arrows were flying all around me.

Speaking of arrows….I almost bought a place….no, I looked at a place….up in Asheville when I was looking for a place to buy….that was pretty bad.

If you didn’t know what you were doing, you might think that you’d lucked into something kind of cool.

It was an old house ….maybe 900 sq. feet…..little old house….with an additional 5 lots included….joined an old park with basketball goals and a soccer field grown over with weeds.

My friend Steve told me, “That’s up by Pisgah View Apartments….I don’t know about that one….”

“You might like it….”

If you see a news story about people killing each other…or a big drug bust going down….or someone being kidnapped and held in their apt. at knife point ….there’s a good chance that it’s up at the Pisgah View Apartments.

That house….with its extra lots….up in Asheville….was 24,000 dollars.

I wonder if I’ll ever learn that you really do get what you pay for?

“Come with Me (Instrumental Edit)” Kami K

 

my new reality

I really don’t have much of a handle on reality.

Take nomadic living, for instance.

I am going to move my ENTIRE family into a Westphalia camper….and we’re not going to pay rent for ANYTHING!!

Not really…..that’s not close to what I intend to do.

I’m not going to bust any kind of move….and I’m really not chomping at any kind of bit.

I’m pretty consistently happy.

I am pacified.

Except….somebody messed with one of the knobs on my chair and now the back rest is free- floating and I can’t lean back.

I have a feeling that I know who did it, too.

Knowing who did the crime is irrelevant, though. It doesn’t change a thing. The crime is repeatable and the criminal is consistent.

What the heck? Not being able to lean back is good for my posture.

Every time I watch one of these videos….or use one in my posts…Jenny wonders what I’m planning.

I’m not planning anything…..or, more accurately, I’m not planning a lifestyle change like living in a van.

(Speaking of lifestyle change…..how about Bruce Jenner?! Did you hear about that? That makes living in a van look like small potatoes.)

But….stepping out onto the ground on a sunny Santa Barbara morning….eating a breakfast burrito….going for a run on the beach…..feeling that crisp, cool California morning air….sounds kind of nice.

I say this as I listen to the soft morning sounds out my North Carolina window….feeling my own little cool breeze blow in….drinking coffee.

Maybe what I look for is “different wonderful”.

Change is good….but it’s good to be able to recognize something nice wherever you go….or, wherever you are.

(Mannnnn….this chair!! What the heck?)

The birds are starting to wake up….and so will everyone in my family, soon.

Sometimes I think that maybe it’s not so much the “going” that I’m reaching towards…..maybe it’s just knowing that I CAN….

Maybe it’s knowing that we still can GO if we want to…..

I need to know that we can still GO SOMEWHERE….

I guess that we’re always going somewhere.

This freaking chair……

“(you were) going somewhere” David Wilcox