Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Ideas For Strange Bumper Stickers

Inspired by Speedblend Guy's random thoughts post, I have decided to share some equally random, and hopefully laugh-inducing, sniglets of my own. Let's back up and try to understand where this post began. I work at Redeker Furniture as a salesman. We are a family owned business, a fairly successful company, and overall pretty conservative as a bunch. However, as with all groups, there are a few nuts (you know who you are;) and among the nuts are (were) myself, my buddy Kurt Phillips, and a super-cool guy named Dave Wagner. Dave has since moved on to a real life and now works in HR for a company in Ames. Now Dave can sure think outside the box and we had many a hilarious conversation that would start with a simple telling of our weekend adventures, a recounting of a conversation with a customer, or a tale from times past. One person would start talking and the other would take it in a completely different direction, and before you knew it we were laughing with tears streaming down our faces! You know the times, right? I hope for your sake that you have time to laugh that hard at work!
So anyway, I was telling Dave about a bumper sticker that I had seen on a truck. It read, "Don't move firewood" and for the life of me I could not figure out what the hell it could possibly mean! Some nut actually took the time to have a bumper sticker made, to express his beliefs in a classic American format, and he comes up with "Don't move firewood"?!!! (I later came to understand that it is common for pests and insects to migrate from region to region via firewood bundles, hence the sticker.) Now we couldn't just leave a mystery a mystery, no, not us. We had to start screwing around and making up our own stupid bumper sticker ideas! Sadly, we didn't have the wits to right them all down, so some of the first ideas are not recorded. I started keeping a record of them one day and I guess I'll try to share some of them for the heck of it. Keep in mind that these are ALL direct quotes from actual conversations. The laughs come from the mis-placement of the context and re-purposing of the quotes into potential bumper stickers. Get it? If you were behind someone in traffic and saw a bumper sticker with any of these phrases on it, you would surely have to scratch your chin and say, "What in the hell?" OK, so here we go:
Do Not Rent Things

I'm Riding My Brakes To Help My Wife Eat

I Don't Know What Cheese Is

I've Never Been On An Island

Am I Going North?

Why Are We Both Doing This?

Magnetize Your TV Now!

I Don't Want You To Say "Notions" Around Me

Don't Sniff Bread

Read This With An East-Indian Accent

Move Your Eyes Like You're Playing A Piano

One Time I Wore A Space Suit At A Food Service Convention, And You Didn't

Don't Write "List" At The Top Of A List

and the ever popular Milk Is Not A Savings Account

Now I realize that this may not be at all funny. You had to be there, right? If, however, you would like to know the real context behind these quotes, just leave a comment as to which one(s) you find most perplexing and I'll respond. Let it bounce around in your noggin for a while before asking. You'll never get it on your own though, like I said, you had to be there.

In other news, I'm sick to death of every bike I own and want a new bike! I would love to lay down for a 1X9 rigid 29er, but it's not in the cards right now. Plus, it's so close to Interbike and the subsequent droolfest that follows, that if I bought a new bike right now I would be crying so hard you could hear me from your own digs! Some day though. If a GT Peace9er with Rasta paint showed up in my sights though, I would have to find a way. Love that bike. I had people laughing at my poor man's 29er at the race at 7 Oaks. That's OK, it's not really intended to be a legit bike people! Do you think someone would take a hybrid bike from 15 years ago (it was a Rassys sale originally) and stuff some 2.1s under it, and take it seriously? With an eighth inch of tire clearance front and back? With a chain stay bridge that had to be hammered forward a quarter inch for the tires to even fit? With a road cassette and stamped steel chainrings? With a quill stem to Aheadset adapter? With an SLR seat on a twenty seven pound bike? No, no, no, no, no, no, and no! I saw Marc from Bike World Ames talking with a couple of his bros at the roll-call, and one of the other guys tried to slighly point at my bike and get him to look over at it. He's too cool though, and didn't totally double take in disgust! Besides, he knows a thing or two about cobbing a bike together. He once raced Targhetto on his Schwinn cruiser. With a blue milk crate on the bars. With a pair of DH tires stuffed under it. With a one piece to three piece crank adapter! So there! Later! Run What Ya Brung!
P.S. You need these links! www.stickerjunkie.com and www.stickernation.com

Friday, August 21, 2009

Take A Minute, Laugh An Hour

Do yourself a favor and click on Speedblend Guy's link to the right and read his Random Thoughts post! That's some funny shit right there! I have a list of quotes I have taken from "deep conversations" with co-crazy people at work that I have dubbed Ideas For Strange Bumper Stickers. Maybe if I can remember to bring them home I will post a few?
Racing 7 Oaks this Sunday, be there with some mud tires! I'm racing SS with my old friend the GT, 1.5 on back and 2.0 up front. Abuse will be induced!

Friday, August 14, 2009

Gravel Season Approaching

The time is nearly here when the riding is at its very best. The time when those after work rides are the perfect temperature, the light is just perfect, and the gravel dust is a little heavier and clings to your legs. Ah, fresh gravel dust, makes you want to ride all day. You know when you can scrape the sweat-and-dust created mud off of your shins that you've been putting in some miles. Better not get too far ahead, we still have to deal with August after all.
I went out tonight on my classic loop. Added another cap to my totem pole. Appropriately, it went on the lowest possible spot. This was the last bottle of PBR that I brought back from Minnesota. Pure rot-gut, but it's 6 point rot-gut, so whatever. Can a person even buy PBR in bottles in Iowa?
I am kicking myself for not going down to Indianola last weekend. It started raining here as soon as I got my car gassed up, so I pulled the plug, stayed in Boone, and watched the Iowa Games 1 lappers come up Waterworks Hill. A beast for damn sure. One ballsy kid came up it on a fixed gear. Nice. My list of hopeful races for the rest of this year is a short one. 7 Oaks, Sycamore, Sugar Bottom. Can't see a way to race the 24 right now, but you never know what might happen. The solo men's should be a real fight this year. I hope that attendance is good for the sake of the event. Too many people go just to hang out. You need to race people! The sport won't grow from people watching!
If there are any of the Iowans out at Leadville who might be surfing blogs, I wish you all the best of luck! Leave an update in the comments if possible. And please, if there is a way Lord, don't let Lance win. That would be nice of you. Thanks. Later!


This picture shows a couple of interesting features of Central Iowa Gravel. Notice from the shadows and vehicle tracks how deep the stuff is here? This is typical of my area. About 2 inches deep in many areas, making the search for a good line a challenge. Also, a classic Q Avenue rolling obstacle. These two were not afraid of me at first, but probably smelled the PBR funk as I got closer and took off for safety. One still had a wad of grass in his mouth as he scampered off. Also, the top of this hill is where Marshall and I watched the meteor showers Tuesday night. We saw a total of 74 in about 2 hours! What a time we had. A great way to bond even tighter while strengthening the love of being out in the "wilds" of this great state. Do yourself a favor and check out the Orionid showers in October. Should be the nights of the 20th-23rd, but they're wildly unpredictable so who knows. Hop on your favorite ride and check it out! Travel Gravel!

Monday, August 3, 2009

Camp Ingawanis Race

I put a number plate on my bike last Sunday up in Waverly, and actually felt like I raced my bike! It was fun again, finally, to try to beat people. Fun to have a strategy for passing or sitting on for a while. Fun to have fun! This was only my second time racing since last August at Seven Oaks, and I guess I can relax about my arm/hand now, since neither seemed to bother me during the action. A great feeling since the surgeon who did my work just released me from his care on the Friday before, I was loving that for sure. The trails were fast and dry, and I decided to leave my poor man's niner in the van and ride my 26" wheeled KHS. I think I made a good choice since the course is all twisty singletrack. I was sitting sixth wheel behind 5 niners for most of the first two laps, and I could see their lines were very different from mine. I think I was able to cut in harder and for sure was carrying more speed and momentum out of corners than the niner guys were. I ended up picking off all but one of these guys as the laps ran out. Hard to say if this was a great niner trail or not, but it is a GREAT trail for mountain biking. To think we only rode half of the system up there is crazy. Those guys have it made. I would rather have that trail in my immediate area than I would something like S.O. which I love, but something about fast and twisty is more interesting than steep and off-camber. A night race in Waverly, say 6PM to 6AM would rock! Plenty of facilities, great trails, awesome people. Perhaps the state could do with a second 24 hour event? Quick choppy write up, time to get ready for a week in the Okoboji/Minnesota area. Later! Travel Gravel!