choo choo train

So it ends up that I did have a reason to go to IBC this weekend. I needed to purchase and get new pedals installed because - gasp! - I'm flipping that wheel over and going fixed.
Not that I haven't been riding fixed on the track bike. But the Bianchi and the Dolan are such different rides that switching ponies was never a problem. I could rock the freewheel for a longer ride in the morning, then skitter around town later fixed. True, I almost tore my leg off once or twice, but the Dolan's stiff, twitchiness was a constant reminder to keep the cranks turning [or else momentum would].
The Bianchi's relaxed geometry and natural propensity to roll over everything in its path pairs perfectly with a freewheel. Which is why I almost expected to have both legs lurching around yesterday, propelled forward by my rear wheel when I attempted to coast.

It wasn't so bad. In fact, my legs stayed attached to my body. Mostly because my drivetrain sounds like...a train.
Dan M. took a look and jumped on my bike to make sure it was just the shark-finned cog. And as his 6ft+ frame weaved around the store on a 44cm bike, he jokingly squeezed the squealing front brake like a train whistle. It screamed, as usual, like a puppy being run over. It also sounded exactly like a train.

Assured that it wouldn't do anything except sound like I don't actually take care of my bike, I left debating changing my gearing or just purchasing another cog. For now, it's actually a nice reminder that I'm not on that wondrous freewheel anymore. I miss it already; especially being able to clip in and climb hills without that built in assist that fixed gears give you. And coasting. Oh, coasting.
Pedaling [the whole entire way] home, my feet naturally pushed back on the pedals, slowing down, creeping between cars, and allowing for a much greater amount of control - the kind that requires a level of skill that I haven't yet achieved on a freewheel. I remembered how fun it was to maneuver around piles of snow on a fixed gear, even if my knees weren't so happy later on in the day. This might be temporary, but it's definitely still fun.

Grinding to a slightly screechy halt in front of my apartment, I winced a little at the noise. And then remembered Dan's goodbye to me a few hours ago:
"See ya, K Train."
At least I'm still faster than the Green Line.

operation

When I was little, it seemed like every household except mine had that game. I loved it though [who didn't?].
I remember seeing a friend with the game in college, and attempting to pick out the plastic pieces for the first time in over 10 years. Even sober, it was hard, and after about 12 or so attempts, we'd finally give up on the wishbone piece, letting the game buzz while we just tried to dig it out.
Operation was the closest I'd gotten to any kind of "surgery" up until about a few days ago. I loved biology in high school but the sight of blood and scalpels always made me queasy. Besides, I can't do math, don't understand physics, and chemistry gives me a headache.
But give me a wounded garment, thread, seam ripper, and a needle, and I will dig right in. JT at CB gave me that exact opportunity with the snapped brim of his Laek House cycling cap. Given his great compliments on his own pedal strike "Boston" hat, I couldn't say no to his request to get it fixed. Besides, cycling caps always have some kind of sentimental value...not to mention how cool that ELVS stuff is.

So I got to ripping seams. Aggressively but carefully, taking care to remember how it was assembled so I could stitch it all back together once I was done. As soon as I got 90% of the brim free and tore it open, shattered pieces of plastic poured out, cracking even further as I undid the last few stitches holding the plastic in place.

The pieces were swept into the trash can before the hat was washed once for good measure. A solid piece of interfacing was measured out to match the shape of the brim, then fused into place. The layers of fabric were then pinned back together the way they came. The sweatband inside was re-aligned and then the whole thing went under the needle of my machine.

It came out looking like new, the brim clean and whole. And minus the whole washing and drying, the entire operation look about an hour, total. That's probably less time than a game of Operation, and the plastic pieces weren't so hard to dig out.
Don't worry, I'm not entertaining any ideas of entering the medical profession. Blood still makes me a little sick, and my hand-to-eye coordination is terrible. I'll be sticking to dissecting inanimate objects, for now.

between books and buttons

Books are officially closed for the summer.
And before I have to slip into button downs and the occasional suit, I have a small window of freedom. Well, I have a growing list of things that need to get done, but that comes after I regroup, mentally assess the mess that my life and apartment are in, and say fuck it for now and fall asleep without worrying about anything.
I have incredibly selfish plans for the next few days. They mostly involve doing whatever the fuck I want, mostly on my bike, mostly by myself. I have miles and miles of training to catch up on, places I want to pedal to, and that ever-persistant obligation to fall asleep in bliss and not wake up until late morning. And if that wasn't enough, there are beers to be consumed, Americanos to be sipped, and cookies to be baked and eaten.

Oh, right, and hats to make. Running to the grocery store after a quick post-exam ride, I parked next to a bright red Iro. Coming out of the store, I met its owner, who greeted me with:
"Hey, I know you from the Internet!"
I have to fix a hat for him. I was planning on putting that off until tomorrow, or the next day...but the guilt's winning out. So, I'm starting that tonight...after purging my inbox, a cup of coffee, and being completely lazy.
It's going to be a struggle getting that last one done, though, I can feel it already.

best of boston

Attempting to organize the hundreds of pictures I've apparently taken in the past year of all things bike, I realized that this time last year, I hardly knew anything about bikes.
It's weird...has it really only been a year? The tractorino's official [Boston] birthday is January 7, 2008. Before that, the last bike I rode was [according to my sister, because I don't remember] a Giant mountain bike and I was probably 12. I barely knew how to lube my chain, much less tension a chain or fix a flat last year. I can't believe I just admitted that.
So forgive me if I didn't know the who's who of bike mechanics and shop employees until this year. Luck decided to stop backstabbing me and leaving me when I needed her most when I became a regular at IBC and met Erich and the rest of my IBC peeps. I learned a little more about bikes, started making hats, and got lucky again with Kip, Jason, Zack, Pete, Tom and everyone at Cambridge.
I still don't know the official who's who of Boston cyclists, but I do know a few mechanics who are known around town as some of the best.

Maybe I'm hitting a lucky streak, but when I dropped in to buy something blatantly hang out, one of Boston's reputed best tweaked a few things on my bike. It progressed from the usual: I walk in during a lapse in the busy day, prop my bike up somewhere, and while I'm talking to a friend, someone much taller than me decides to hop on my mini bike and ride it around the shop.
This time it was Tom. Tom, who does no handed skids in the shop while wearing one of my hats. Tom, whose beater bike is a stickered Bareknuckle with cruiser bars and a basket in the front [I wanted to kill him out of pure jealousy when I saw it, even if I'll never fit on one of those frames]. Tom, who, like Erich, is known as one of the best mechanics in Boston.

Almost instantly, my bike was put in a stand. My impossible front brake [which was being a little sticky] got adjusted ever so slightly, and my baggy chain tensioned. Meanwhile, I went into paparazzi mode.
I got so excited I started taking pictures of everyone, including Zack and his hair.

And if the hairstyles of the CB staff aren't enough incentive to stop by the shop, my front brake came out working, and I can now ride confident that my chain won't hop off my chainring and try to kill me. Sure, those aren't terribly complex tasks, but it's in doing the simpler things where you see the difference between "good" and "okay." Or, at least in my case, the difference between "good" and "total suck/fail."
I heart you guys. For serious.

laced

I woke up this morning with my face pressed against wire. Wtf?
And then I walked into the bathroom to find two bare rims in my bathtub and tubes hanging from my shower curtain rod. Oh yeah, I left my bike in pieces last night. Oops.
Not the Dolan; I had enough sense to perch that next to my couch before battling my Bianchi. I turned it upside down [due to a lack of a bike stand] last night, thinking I'd quickly switch out the tires for my ride today. "Quickly" turned out to be half an hour of frustrated screaming which degenerated into a crying fit of frustration. I hate hate hate it when I can't do something by myself. Being faced with a lack of physical power was the last straw in the estrogen blitzkrieg that's been assaulting me lately.
After crying pathetically with a wrench in my hand for about 5 minutes, and seized by that "crazy" that powers women through irrational decisions and ugly fights with significant others, I finally managed to wrench off both wheels. I was covered in black stuff up to my elbows. I tossed both the wheels into the bathtub and tried to forget about how inept I am.

It was harder to forget how depressingly lonely times like this feel, and reminded me of something a friend from school told me:
"These past two years have been the loneliest years of my life."
I couldn't agree more. Law school - an environment in which you're pitted against your peers - isn't conducive to developing trusting relationships. Add to that the fact that we see each other every day and by Friday, it's understood that our weekends are saved for whatever we have outside of school: college friends and girlfriends for my friends, my bikes for me.

Bikes don't console you when you're depressed though, and they don't give you high-fives when you manage to accomplish something stupid like getting some rusted over axel nuts off your bike. My hands sore for hours afterwards, I bawled in front of my computer to an ever-diligent best friend about how much I wanted to leave Boston. There's nothing here for me, I claimed, and no one really gives a shit, so what does it matter? I'm waiting, studying, cycling...to leave.
As I threw copious crumpled up tissues into my trash can, something grated against my desk. I looked down to see a bracelet I had nearly forgotten about wrapped snugly around my wrist. It's a DT Swiss spoke - light, flexible, and a reminder that there's a place I can go to hide and recharge. It's an upgrade from the bike chain bracelet I was sporting last summer - a heavy ring of metal that I was wearing just to seem cool and bike-y, but carried with it too many double standards and expectations I just couldn't [and didn't want to] meet.

The spoke bracelet was made by Chris at IBC, and everyone behind the counter seemed to be sporting one yesterday. Needless to say, I passed out last night with it around my wrist, my hands and arms still black and blistered, but feeling just a little bit better.
Maybe, just maybe, I won't pedal straight out of here when I get that J.D.

this isn't working

It's funny how on some of the most beautiful days, you end up in the foulest mood.
The ride in yesterday was fine, the day at school was fine, the ride home [the long way] was fine...
...until, getting reckless because I wasn't willing to accept that a guy bombing down Mass Ave was, in fact, faster than me, I threw my chain chasing him. There was an ugly snappy crackling sound and then I found myself pedaling...but nothing was working. My back wheel didn't lock up which meant that I was pedaling air for about 5 whole seconds until I figured out, oh, I have brakes [and now might be a good time to use them]!
I flipped my bike over, pulled out the wrench and started untangling the mess. I was planning on stopping into Cambridge Bikes anyway, so after getting my bike operational, I slowly gimped my way there.

I arrived with a stunningly attractive mix of dirt, brake dust, and chain lube covering half of my face. Of course, I didn't know this until I walked into the uber cool, hip shop that is CB. But, as regular readers may know, I've pretty much lost all sense of dignity by this point, so I almost didn't care that I looked like I had just made out with my filthy chain.
The only thing keeping me from throwing my bike into the river on the way home was trying to keep pace with Pete [I managed to scoot into CB right before closing, so we headed home together]. Dragging a 20lbs+ fixed 'cross bike, plus an overstuffed bag, plus all my extra weight...I was hating life.
Seriously, my bike's a tank. Utilitarian, but a tank. I made up my mind today to sell her when the new bike's done. My friends are sort of right...I should be looking into road bikes so I can do decent rides. And while the tractorino's been good to me so far, I just don't see the point of having two fixed gears. And come on...am I really going to ride the tractorino once the dapper Brit's up and running?
So...anyone want her?
[Just kidding. I wouldn't sell her for the world...but it is April Fool's Day :D]