New Knives

New knives will teach you two things: 1) The old knives were dull. 2) Respect the blade.

Don't Say That!

I've had a slow leak in my right rear tire for some time now. I've had to reinflate it a couple of times--once even using my bike pump. I've been meaning to head back to Costco to get them to address it, but just haven't made it there. It was on my mind as I was headed for the airport on Monday morning, and I thought "I sure hope it doesn't go completely flat during the week when I'm gone." Crap. Don't say that. Sure enough. I went straight from the plane (was in the front row this time, not the last) to my car, found that the tire was indeed flat. Changed the tire in short order (yay for the spare being in good shape after 3-1/2 years of idleness), returned to baggage claim for my bag. It's amazing how fast your bag comes out on the belt when you've got other things to do first.

Recently, I started making a list of things that I wanted to purchase (new desktop computer, heart rate monitor) or need to replace (socks, t-shirts, wheelset, etc). One of the things that made it to the list was a replacement lamp for my projector. Don't say that! As I turned it on tonight to watch practice from the Turkish GP, it's all BLUE. Crap.

I really need to stop putting energy into these things!

Update: After being turned off and turned back on again, the projector came back normal, instead of blue. It was just sad--it missed me while I was gone.

Grenade in My Lap

Turns out that Apple's battery manufacturer is the same one who produced the recently-recalled Dell batteries, and now Apple has issued a recall notice as well. Only one of my batteries is from a batch that exhibits the problem (sadly, it's also the one that holds a better charge). I've switched out the potentially fiery one until its replacement arrives.

21A

When flying United, my "Seating 1" boarding card pretty much assures that I'm one of the first people on the plane. But with my seating assignment, I was guaranteed to be last off the plane. Last row, non-reclining window seat, with sleepy (reclining) people in front of me, on the east side of the plane, so it was hot the whole way down, too. Add in a 30 minute departure delay and a few minutes orbiting Pt. Reyes due to "weather" in SF....

Broken Glass

I definitely uttered a few instances of Samuel L. Jackson's favorite curse word just now. Broke one of my favorite glasses (Guinness rounded pint) while washing dishes tonight. Grrr.

Wheels For Sale

I've broken a spoke on my Shimano wheelsets a third (last) time. Twice on the R-540s and once on the R-550s. Clearly, neither wheelset is designed for someone my size. Once I get them fixed and re-trued, they're going on Craiglist.

The Short Line

When I arrived at SeaTac today to fly to the Bay Area, I figured I'd have plenty of time. Sure, I knew that there were new restrictions in place at the security screening area, so I built a bit of time in. But honestly, a 6am flight on a Tuesday? Monday's the big "commute by flying day", so arriving at 5am shouldn't be a problem, right?

Well, it wasn't. At least, not for me. The line to check in at the counter (with checked bags, of course) was looped through the snaky waiting-for-a-ride-at-Disneyland lane thing, then past the entire length of the checkin desk area, and back to security. I've never been happier to be Premier. My line had six people in it. Cha-ching. Sadly, I hadn't eaten any breakfast, and the line at the BK inside the N-gate area was completely "jammers". There weren't even any pretzels to go with my empty Nalgene water bottle on the plane. Sad.

Mercer Chain Jinx

This year, when Chris came out to Seattle for the Second Annual Let's All Ride The Seven Hills of Kirkland Ride, we did a lap of Mercer Island a day or two before, just to see the sights and enjoy a nice ride. That day, Chris had a problem with his chain: one of the links locked up, and made it very difficult for him to pedal. As I recall, he had to time his pedal strokes to softpedal when the link was making its way through his rear derailleur assembly.

Today I rode with Joel, the roommate of some of my frisbee peeps. Joel's been looking for some new riding routes in the area, so I was happy to oblige, showing him Mercer. Since getting to and from the I-90 bridge (via a couple of different routes) is a useful bit of cycling knowledge to have, I figured it would be a good starting point for him.

We met up at Speedy Reedy at 9am and started heading out. The ride out to the bridge was pretty uneventful, but Joel started having some trouble shifting as we rode up the ramp on the Mercer side, towards the Lid. We stopped at the park and adjusted the barrel retensioner on his rear derailleur, and I prompted him to ride around the parking lot a couple of times to test it out. No improvement. So we had a look at the front, since it seemed a bit of noise was coming from there as well, and he kept throwing the chain off the inside of the small ring. As I looked at the chainrings, I saw the problem right away: a link was badly damaged and about to give way. One side of it was no longer connected to the pin!

Clearly, this was no way to make a lap of Mercer. We opted to double back and head for Triumph in Leschi. Chain fix, no problem. So I started off back down the I-90 bridge again, and looked back to find that Joel had stopped about halfway down the ramp. I rode back up to him to find a grisly scene. His chain had broken while he was simply coasting, and it had lodged itself between his spokes and the big sprocket of his rear cassette. Completely trashed the derailleur, tearing it off the mount bracket. One of his spokes was badly damaged, too, and the chain was inextricable. This reduces a bike to a 20lb., non-rolly weight that has to be schlepped somewhere to be fixed. Sadly, I've been through this drill.

Joel took of his shoes and helmet, and we began the hike back to Leschi. I showed him my 'carry the bike by the rear wheel with a straight arm' trick, so we made decent progress. We walked back to Starbuck's and called a cab (sadly, he had forgotten his cell phone with his roommate's new cell number programmed in--he couldn't recall the new number...). We disassembled the bike enough for it to fit into the 'Mafia trunk' of the taxi, and I saw Joel off on his way back home.

After that, it was up to me to ride back home solo. Completed the ride without incident, and savored my after-ride Coke. Total distance, 28mi. Total time, 2:45! In retrospect, this prompts me to a) have a look at my chain more often, and b) think about carrying a chain tool. Maybe we could have nixed the bad link (or two), and at least saved the derailleur before things went sideways.

Vegas, Baby. Vegas!

We all know that "what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas." What I can say is that when I arrived in Las Vegas on Friday night for a short weekend, I had $650 in my pocket. When I left, I had $680. And I certainly wasn't penny-pinching, either.