Curmudgeon

This morning (Saturday 11/5) is rather foggy and I maybe not sure my self.

Usually I take a short ride looking for roofing nails placed in the streets (that is another story) here but it is too wet now.

22nd Street

The other day I rode up to Point Fermin and went through the hole in the fence to enter Sunken City.

Nudie Fixie

Sunken is all uphill from my sailboat at the marina and recently I have been riding my pseudo fixie with a 42 x 17 combination which equals 65 gear inches. On the way back I ride down and back up the steep hills that make up the area between Pacific and Gaffey (two main drags in San Pedro). When I first converted the road frame I used one brake but it didn't have the stopping power so I bought a set of Shimano brakes off of eBay.

When I was next to the Sunken City fence I found a nice Prickly Pear with three large bulbs.

I have picked these before but never got stuck. This is my third day of Ouch so maybe that is why I am cranky.

A week ago my son Dylan returned from Costa Rica and I picked him up at the airport. He then drove his car back to Southern Orange County but didn't make it all the way. His car started to rattle and he pulled off the freeway right at Epic Bike. Further inspection revealed his lug nuts were coming out on the driver's front wheel. He has a set of very fancy trick looking wheels and apparently while the car was sitting next to my Nissan in the marina parking lot someone tried to remove the wheel by loosening the lug nuts but didn't finish the theft. It cost Dylan $150.00 to replace the damage hub.

People steal bicycles, laptops, iPhones and various other items. Recently I removed a tool chest from by Nissan for fear of losing it while parked in the marina lot.

At the bottom there is a YouTube video of Dylan riding on the beach during his recent trip. The camera work is all solo nothing there on the beach but himself using a camera on a tripod and a helmet cam. Following that video is the action at a High School in Costa Rica where he performed a show in the gym where he had to enter from the outside where it was raining. Very, very slick.

Last Saturday when Dylan left the marina here my Samsung Galaxy decided to stay in the VW and travel with Dylan. This resulted in having a smart phone vacation until I could brave the 405 freeway and make it to Epic Bikes and get my phone. Epic is really full of bicycles and not expensive designer clothing only rich Freds can afford. See Banker Supply. Or visit another Bike boutique in South Pasadena Cub House.

Speaking of expensive bike stuff I found this Blog this morning: Keep the golf out of cycling

As you can see from the title of this blog, curmudgeon, might be my middle name, it used to be Humbug but I had it legally changed.

Here is my Simonetti parked in our San Pedro's finest ghetto Vons next to a Harley parked on the sidewalk.

Only three locks on bike need some more

The word Boutique is missing from the San Pedro Dictionary. San Pedro has it ups and down which makes for interesting riding all the hills here. There are lots of homeless here and many ride bicycles. Many homeless live out of their shopping carts or back packs. The Vons lot usually has a few pan handlers asking for "change" but I never get hit up if I am wearing my cutoff wanglers.

Sunset spokes

Last month I was researching blog writing and cane across wordpress.com. After clicking on their site I started receiving email with links to Bikinginla. This site has many links to local bicycle rides

Where I live in San Pedro it is probably the farthest south you can go in the City of Los Angeles and most of the LA events are not very close and I refuse to use my fossil fuel vehicle to haul my ass around. Many of these events are free and many are not. It appears to me that having to pay $50.00 for a membership to ride once a month might be excessive based on  my budget. The last time I raced MTB as a USA Cycling rider I had to stop eating for two weeks as I was broke from paying the entry fees and couldn't afford to shop for rice and beans.

Senior discounts are not part of USA Cycling package and most races in Southern California don't have age classes for old farts.

Cost for this crazy fun!

Please see race application for Price Increase Dates and Application Deadlines!

Solo Double: $695.00

Solo Triple: $865.00

Solo Quintuple: $1285.00

Team Double: 2 Pers$770.00/3 Pers $870.

Team Triple: 2 Pers $940.00/3 Pers 

Speaking of the high cost of racing this Ultra Ultra Iron man charges $1285.00 to enter.

What ever happen to the free Sunday ride and racing to the next signal or cross walk with your buds???

Loving the Bicycle while Hating the Cars

Yesterday, Tuesday we rode to the airport our destination the black hole in Los Angeles named LAX. The We consists of myself and Dylan my son. Dylan moves around and is presently living in Plastic Land somewhere in Orange County. My butt stays in San Pedro which is the real south tip of Los Angeles and I suffer from a mild case of agoraphobia.

Actual distance traveled isn't much but it takes a long time due to our slow rate of speed. Our first hour traveled after stopping for a fossil fuel refuel allowed us to travel 8 miles. During that hour Dylan only said "Fucking Traffic" three hundred and forty times in between bitching about his rear tire hitting the fender.

We have done this routine several times before as Dylan travels all over the world to ride his bicycle. He recently returned from China where he performed on his bike and I had to pick him up at LAX on a Friday evening at the peak of travel time. The current flight has him traveling first to Houston then onto Costa Rica. He has been to Houston once before riding at a Red Bull Event.

Poster for Friday Show in Parrita, Costa Rica

In grousing about the traffic around the airport I can recall my first visit there. It was around 1954 and I was trying out my first skinny tired bike that had a rear stay mounted shifter that controlled the chain switching. I worked at a bicycle shop in Santa Monica (Cycle and Sports) afternoons and on Saturday. So I rode south on Lincoln Blvd crossing over on Manchester to Sepulveda where I reached the terminal. There wasn't any MapMyRide then so to create proof for those unbelievers I purchased a souvenir.

LAX was moved after my earlier visit and the new runway was extended. We went there in 1961 to pickup a traveler returning and we parked in front of the new terminal. I think the parking was free and there wasn't any traffic.

Current Tower

My car actually has spider webs on the tires and one of my neighbors is always making fun of that so I have to remove the webs. The spiders must be living somewhere in the Nissan as they reappear if I move the car in recharging the battery. Very few people use bicycles for transportation but I do. Since I rely on my bicycles and riding the streets of Los Angeles can be dangerous I have learned to hate our automobile-centric culture more and more.

Nissan Spider Haven

Myself, as the majority of American males, are fond of automobiles. My mentor at the bicycle shop, beside be an active bike racer was a hot rodder. Carl Siefert had a 32 three-widow with a flathead in it. So my introduction in to wrenching started in his dirt floor garage. In junior high I rode to school on my bicycle. The bike racks were full and no one rode to school in a car driven by parents. Parents didn't do that. By high school riding bikes became uncool and nobody pedaled to school. Walk, drive or ride the bus. Like so many other I became a worshipper of the devil. As I approached the age of 16 my car collection grew and far out numbered my one road bike (Arbos) and one track bike (Paramount) having discarded balloon tires.

On out Tuesday morning slow creep to the airport we used surface streets as Dylan had earlier driven from OC to Pedro using the 405 parking lot. In approaching a high school the traffic ground to a halt averaging three signals changes to clear an intersection. It is not surprising that road rage develops among daily commuters along with bad arteries and 40% body fat after sitting in a fucking four wheel cage several hours a day.

Internal gridlock at LAX

During weak moral  times in my live I have been frequently been seduced by a cousin of the automobile devil: The forked tailed jackal that invented motorcycles. Somewhere in the future I will blog about my forty or more motorbikes that kept my pockets empty. Motorcycles are similar to boats where you pour your money into a deep hole in the water but without the water. Motorcycle riders who travel on the streets often refer to the automobile as a cage and the grocery-getter behind the steering wheel as a "Cager".

Both motorcyclists and cyclists have to in ride in traffic (unless there is a bike lane) and cagers hate to share. Cagers also hate to be passed by anything on two wheels with or without fossil power. Cagers hate to see riders having fun and riding two wheel can be great fun. Pickup truck drivers have been known to throw empty beer bottles at me but I have never encountered a shot gun.

Last week when Dylan was scheduling  his visit to my sailboat I mentioned that I had worn out the grips on my Specialized Cross Country MTB and asked him for a pair in either red or blue to match the color of my bouncing toy.

Pretty sure the boy is not color blind so I had to switch the red grips on my Fixie off and put the yellow one on creating a future project for the S-Works bike.

When I started Blogging (see past remarks) my pictures were captured with my Digital Nikon. The data was then downloaded to my laptop, edited, then entered in using Blogger Editor. I love my Nikon and those neat lenses but it doesn't fit in my back pocket. Recently I added a handlebar bag to carry it but the Galaxy Android can take videos and all that other teckie shit the camera doesn't have plus the handlebar bag makes me look like a fucking Fred minus the rear view mirror. Lately I have been thinking some Fred traits are not that creepy. My facial hair gets pretty scruffy at times and in the past beards were verboten on those on men who shaved their legs to ride. Wiggins must have  have followed American Baseball as every October half the pitchers have beards. Early in this year Dylan was at Oakley in Lake Forest riding the dirt track that is on the property. Wiggins showed up with his team as the Tour of California was about to start. My son texted me that he hanging with the biggest of Roadies but Wiggins needed a proper lesson in riding in the dirt.

As one ages and falls into dementia one often forget where one was going which is the the primary purpose of "What was I saying?"

My phone is cute, small but much more complicated than the Nikon. The Galaxy takes great pictures and you can see the results in "Gallery". Gallery is a screen icon but there isn't any folders named that. Those files are located elsewhere. So if a picture is taken the final file can wind up in four or more separate folders. To transfer the .jpg to the blogger I need to know where they are located so I started editing the files on the phone and renaming them matching the contents of the actually picture.