There's guns across the river, 'bout to pound you
Lawmen on your trail, like to surround you
Bounty hunters are dancin' all around you
Billy they don't like you to be so free.
—Bob Dylan, Billy 4, part of the soundtrack for the movie Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid
That's my new dog, Billie. Name for the handlebar, Will's grandmother, and Holiday. More personal stuff:
My wife was walking around the backyard and a while later noticed something on her shoe, so she looked at it and saw this:
I know what you're thinking: "That's the most amazing thing I've ever seen!" Me too.
My phone's camera focused on the leaf's lower veination, but the gray thing is a rock, but why are the leaf and rock just sitting there?
Because earlier she stepped on or near a magnet, the four-sided thing there. It stuck to the steel shank in the shoe/boot, and the rest is history. The rock must be a kind of iron ore. The leaf wouldn't stick to the magnet without the rock on the other side of it, so...it seems far out there that the leaf and rock would come to action in the same similar way at that time. How did that happen?
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---------- An anagramer/calligrapher--purpleriv (Ana Candela) send me this, and it may be all you ever need to know about fountain pens (of which I am neither collector or connoisseur), but I have a couple and sign books with them a lot of the time, and I write notecards and do scratchy researach notes and shopping lists with them about 1/3 of the time. Regardless, this is an interesting peak into another world, and it's about 4:30 long, as I remember. Skip it if you hate fountain pens. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRebkWHsHC0&feature=youtu.be ------- I just found out that we're going to get some Silver2 sample things in...the clamp, which will allow us to rig up a real final one and see how good it is...and then a sample of a new V-brake we're getting. These should be cover stories in the mainstream bike world. On that note, there are rumors that Shimano is planning an internal black-box , mechanically complicated but easy to use gear system that will fit into the same container as its electronic shifters, and will give them a reason to stop making front derailers entirely in all of our lifetimes. https://www.bikeradar.com/news/shimano-gearbox/ Bike makers have motor-envy. They all want to make motor vehicles. ALL. They drive the innovation in that direction, and say it's for the good of all, because it'll get cars off the road and help old people exercise. Obviously there is some truth in that, but give up derailers? They who should know don't know how great derailers are and how beautiful and simple the movements are, the way they push and lift chains, and pivot in and out and automatically (tho mechanically and visibly) take up the chain slack, or hand the gears more chain as the cogs get bigger. Everything is going auto, like the only way to sell stuff is to make it that way. In 10 years people are going to take photos and make movies with eyeblinks. That will be sold as progress, because all animals are wired to want the easy way. That makes sense in a survival situation (cross the river where it's slow and shallow), but when technology makes everything SUPER easy, there's something good about holding back a bit. Commerce can't live with that, because the status quo isn't news, and news drives everything. It's easy to make fun of this argument, but I haven't said it the best possible way; and if I go on and on about it, then it just becomes weird. Be one of the people who still pedal and grunt. "Pedal and Grunt" has potential as a rallying slogan for bicycle riders, but maybe there should be a clear positive as part of it, like, pedal and grunt and sweat a little. No, still missing the positive. Pedal, grunt, sweat, and maintain yourself. That's what it's about, isn't it? Just slowing declines as you do your stuff, go places, just get around. There's something in this, but it shouldn't be poetic and repeatable, it should just mean something to you. Pedal and grunt and vote. Pedal and grunt and minimize your earth extraction or degradation. I don't know. Pedal, grunt, coast, and ..? I don't know. Is the grunt part too aggressive? What are we trying to do here, anyway? Voting does more than pedaling, but still, we pedal. Pedaling fills you up, like you're doing all you can at that moment. It's not the hippie late '60s anymore, where global warming is something mostly slackers cared about and nobody really believed. We always thought technology would solve it. Now it's "we can always later on live on Mars." --------- Those of you who emailed me your emotional comittment to the SILVER2 shifter will be contacted soon, somehow. Within a month. I'll go back to the post and see what I said. ------ Will's been getting really good at taking pictures. His Bronica broke, tho, and he shot this with a Fuji 6x9. A medium format rangefinder that a huge negative. There's no shortage of cameras around here. He also has a Fuji 6x9, and took this with it just yesterday (Nov 11). Developed it last night, scanned it this morning. It's Manny on his canti -Sam Hillborne.
All for now! I'm going to Rivelo this weekend. Purpleriv will be there, too.
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