That's a 6-8 year old photo of my recently died Scoutie on the beach, chased by Anna. Scoutie was No. 1 dog of all time. Sorry if you think yours is or was, but anything in the top 1,000 is really good, and you can claim No. 2, 3...anything but #1.
You know that plastic tirade-thing we're on now, trying to reduce the amount in our packing? Here's progress. We have tandem frames coming in and this way costs us $20 per bike. They had to make special arrangements and maybe special cuts and folds. The $20 was for materials and time. Some pretty creative stuff going on, and there you go.
I hope nobody sends me a link that says formaldehyde is used in the making of cardboard. I don't know that it IS. That's not a known THING. But we at least know it's more easily recycled, and whales aren't getting clogged with cardboard.
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Here's a sub-5 minute video cleaned and dumbed down with irritiating narration, a human voice that sounds as plastic as it can get, talking...about plastic. Good content, and there's also some handlebar and grip content.
It's called HOWEVERYTHINGBECAMEPLASTIC
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Friend MJ sent me this. Everything about it is right up my alley. It's 45 minutes long and about horses and humans. If you don't like either, you won't like it. Even if you like both, it's still 45 minutes, and that's a big hunk of time. No shame in skipping...
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I'm backing off spouting off or saying anything about race for at least one BLAHG, but here's an interesting obit I read today, although by the time I post this it will be a week and a half ago:
Dan and I were riding and saw THIS, and started arguing about what it is. It's about four feet long, tawny, no visible speckles, so I'm going with "teenaged mountain lion." Dan says bobcat. If you have the scientific chops to do more than guess, send me a note. Where are the spots? It was 3.5 feet long, tawny, and had the intimidating, inimitable languid walk of a mountain lion, but I'm not a pro.
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Hay flies up and sticks wherever. It's the Nature of Hay:
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Like many people over the age of 63, I've read a few Mark Twain books. One of his smaller ones, Pudd'nhead Wilson, has a line in it that's stuck with me for more than half a century:
"He's a labrick—a simon pure labrick," or something like that. Nobody really knows what a labrick is (don't look it up, you'll find out soon), and the "simon pure" part you can kind of figure out by context. It means really and truly, even extremely so. Will and Harry and I were talking about Twain, and I brought this up, and Harry looked up labrick and got this:
So I'm guessing Benjamin Smith didn't know what it was, either.
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CANTEEN ALERT: Strap Yourself In For a Rollicking Good Ride
Personalize yours, so people are less likely to steal it. Join my squadron! We're the best!
I'd get rid of the chain, just tie cord from canteen to cap. Prevents "Will's Folly," -- trapping the O-ring btw the cap and the threads, then blaming the canteen when it leaks.
Here's the mysterious Enviro-Kote. I trust it. Laken has been Enviro-like for a dozen years or more. Don't ask any more questions, just drink from it like a fiend.
If you want to make an anti-sway strap for riding (not THAT necessary), attach some webbing to this metal thing that comes with it. I sewed it. Ye less handy can use a slider buckle, or even glue and stapler.
Then you'll want (but not need) a side-release or other buckle that fits the webbing. And then another piece of webbing, elastic if you can roust up that. But elastic isn't required. The blue webbing by the buckle is elastic. I stitched that to the original strap, but again, you may glue or staple it, or do it some other way.
Rear view of Will under arrest, with skateboard scars on his left elbow.
FLASH: We're out. Will have more Spanish Canteens with the exclusive mysterious Enviro-Kote by June 7. John at Rivelo will have some by then, too.
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I had one inquiry about my front camera-strap rig. He wanted a photo...and IN the photo, the neck strap (made from a John's Irish Strap) doesn't stretch, but the plain strap does. This matters, it won't work if you switch them around or use stretchy or non-stretchy for both. The stretchy one can be cord. That works as well as webbing. I mean "equally well," not merely "also."
I got an email asking about my front camera holder rig-type thing, so I asked Will to model it for me. There's some stitching (on the non-elastic neck webbing, which would be too bulky knotted. The around-the back webbing is elastic, because it has to stretch. It's the same elastic as in MUSA pants belts. Anything that stretches will do. Carried this way, the camera doesn't get shook up like mad and maybe loosened and over-jostled--as it might in a pack.
Here's the connection.
In a month or so we'll have give us 7 weeks, a rear-carrying system like the one most of the pedaling picture takers I know and use and love. I'm getting one of those, but don't have it yet.
And this here is my cleverness at most most genius, sadly. The thing is, long cap-bills catch wind and the hat flies off. It's happened. Then you have to quickly jam it down tight, tilt the brim down, and meanwhile, you're crashing. This solution uses elastic cord, but there's not need for elastic. Run it up thru a couple of eyelets, knot it, and you are one kool kat. This is Will, who is a genuine cool cat, wearing my had.
Side view...and I personally find greater satisfaction in the "cord behind ear" position.
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This is one thing that's wrong with the world. You know about this by now. It's all over the place:
I want a long-sleeved, pocket-T that says "Quit climbing Everest." Wait--people might think that was a metaphor. How about, "Ban climbing on Everest" ? And there's the garbage thing. O my. How about "No plastic on Everest"? That would piss them all off...the mountain.
Wait, how about: You can climb everest, but nobody goes above 22,000 feet, and if you bring back 10lbs of garbage left over from earlier expeditions, you get into a well-publicized Saviors of Everest Club, and a hat with a patch and a T shirt that says, "I climbed up Mount Everest, but instead of summitting, I spent my energy retrieving ten pound of crap back."
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Swedish country doctor Jacob is known, yes it is true, as "the hat doctor." We're going to send him some of our super groovy new hats when we get them in late July.I want him to like them.
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That chain looks gross, but it's time to change it, anyway, I think.
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Here's a bicycle chain length calculator that almost gets 4.5 stars.
It falls short because it delivers the answer in Esperanto. A standard chain is 114 to 116 links. No bike takes 55 or whatever links. The inches seems correct, and that's easier, anyway.
--------Feel Good Story of the Last 1,000 years----
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it's a work in progress but I don't think it has to change. We changed the Y to an I because an Indian (not Native American) business has, o dang, hillybike.com. They have electric "hillybikes.) That is not a feel-good story.
G