Get Your Grump on Thursdays - Was (What's chapping my @ss today?)

[j44ke]

Do what you can Dustin. Work with what you are given. If the youngster comes back around, it will be a great opportunity to teach him about forgiveness by your example. Sounds like you are making good progress with the older boy. If the younger one takes a while, you’ll have more time to make sure things stick with the older one. Must be tough for your wife also. This cannot be how she imagined life would go. Strength to her as well.

[rwsaunders]

[Marvinlungwitz]

Shoulda posted this yesterday, but how is it that our youngins were taught such a bizarre view of the 1980s era economy?

[gregl]

Shoulda posted this yesterday, but how is it that our youngins were taught such a bizarre view of the 1980s era economy?

It’s not just the youngsters. There are many grown @$$ adults (who were adults during the ‘70s and ‘80s) with romanticized, skewed memories of that time. Hindsight is more often 20/200 than 20/20…

Greg

[robin3mj]

Took almost three years but Covid finally found me. Figures it happens during the first PTO I’ve managed to take since last summer. Will put a damper on the miles I was planning on racking up between today and next week.

[bigbill]

I've dodged the Covid, probably. I had the worst "flu" ever in January 2020 before Covid was declared a thing in the US. My wife and I both did vaccinations and boosters. She still got covid in September 2021. We were in Sedona and Phoenix over the last four days; let's see what happens. I think any exposure in PHX would have already hit.

[bigbill]

I'm working ahead. On Thursday, I'm taking my son to the airport.

[doomridesout]

December was brutal-- something threw my back out just before solo travel with young kids, the smallest one of course needs to be carried quite a bit. Got sick three weeks ago and am still fighting it. Kids are so demanding I don't ride any more, and if I have time I suck so bad it's not fun. Just feeling the weight of it. Ready to get to the next thing, ready to get some free time back.

[htwoopup]

It really didn’t look like a big drop, perhaps it was the snow made it visually seem smaller.

And, I had been riding on snow which is soft.

I mean, it’s not like riding the trails in the summer.

On Wraithchildren which are Fat.



But the crack in the Hed Big Deal caused a pretty instant flat.

I have had a winter of 2 cracked rims on the low profile tired Volvo and 1 cracked rim on the the cushy tired Fatboy.

[j44ke]

It really didn’t look like a big drop, perhaps it was the snow made it visually seem smaller.

And, I had been riding on snow which is soft.

I mean, it’s not like riding the trails in the summer.

On Wraithchildren which are Fat.



But the crack in the Hed Big Deal caused a pretty instant flat.

I have had a winter of 2 cracked rims on the low profile tired Volvo and 1 cracked rim on the the cushy tired Fatboy.

Does that Z match the weave pattern of the carbon? And is that another crack further up? Might just send it to Hed and see what they say - not necessarily as a warranty claim but more as a post-mortem.

[72gmc]

I have had a winter of 2 cracked rims on the low profile tired Volvo

Add meat!

Screen Shot 2023-01-26 at 12.52.56 PM.jpg

[htwoopup]

Does that Z match the weave pattern of the carbon? And is that another crack further up? Might just send it to Hed and see what they say - not necessarily as a warranty claim but more as a post-mortem.

I hadn’t noticed that. I was pretty bummed out and not looking closely I guess. It is interesting.

Hed said they would give me a rim at half price and then I can just rebuild. Which, when one considers that it is way out of warranty (I got it seven years ago and it has seen pretty constant winter use in snow/ice and summers constantly on the beach) so it seems pretty fair. It is a a great wheel and very light but it gets there by being single wall which I think is kinda underengineering/ putting one’s faith too much in the fat tire etc to soak up the forces on it.

Of course, my mind is going to spend all night keeping me from sleeping with the “buy the half price rim and rebuild and keep the wheels the same” vs “it’s a fat bike, even though you love the wheels just get a different sturdier wheel” conundrum.

[DBordewisch]

Everybody loved a particular brand that just recently declared bankruptcy. This same brand will leave Shimano and SRAM with hundreds of thousands of dollars unpaid. This brand made one the worst frames I have ever attempted to assemble. Had to send it back. They dodged my phone calls for so long. I resorted to finally calling the owners house while he was eating breakfast one morning. Sigh, I will quietly go back to work now.

[j44ke]

My wife rented a Colnago in Abu Dhabi to ride with her group at a conference and got crashed out by a colleague who turned right when they should have turned left. End result is a dislocated elbow and a partially torn UCL, now with lots of swelling and purple bruising and a giant robotic hinge-brace to wear. She's gotten very good medical care in both Abu Dhabi and Paris, but now she has to go to Singapore for a court hearing where she is a co-arbitrator and then from there to Brazil and Argentina. As her husband, I can say that's a stupid fucking idea what are you a lunatic, but she's a grown-up professional person and kidnapping your wife while crossing international boundaries is probably illegal. So you know, go get 'em tiger.

Not easy, in other words.

[bigbill]

We're getting a big winter storm in a few hours. Much of I-40 in north AZ was closed last night into today. It is sunny right now but in about 90 minutes, the clouds will roll in.

On the non-grump side, my son returns from a two week field exercise at Quantico today. It's the last exercise before graduation in March. He and another Marine signed a lease for a place in Pensacola next month.

[jclay]

My wife rented a Colnago in Abu Dhabi to ride with her group at a conference and got crashed out by a colleague who turned right when they should have turned left. End result is a dislocated elbow and a partially torn UCL, now with lots of swelling and purple bruising and a giant robotic hinge-brace to wear. She's gotten very good medical care in both Abu Dhabi and Paris, but now she has to go to Singapore for a court hearing where she is a co-arbitrator and then from there to Brazil and Argentina. As her husband, I can say that's a stupid fucking idea what are you a lunatic, but she's a grown-up professional person and kidnapping your wife while crossing international boundaries is probably illegal. So you know, go get 'em tiger.

Not easy, in other words.

Well....that sucks rather big time. I hope she heals quickly & fully.

[BBB]

My wife rented a Colnago in Abu Dhabi to ride with her group at a conference and got crashed out by a colleague who turned right when they should have turned left. End result is a dislocated elbow and a partially torn UCL, now with lots of swelling and purple bruising and a giant robotic hinge-brace to wear. She's gotten very good medical care in both Abu Dhabi and Paris, but now she has to go to Singapore for a court hearing where she is a co-arbitrator and then from there to Brazil and Argentina. As her husband, I can say that's a stupid fucking idea what are you a lunatic, but she's a grown-up professional person and kidnapping your wife while crossing international boundaries is probably illegal. So you know, go get 'em tiger.

Not easy, in other words.

Yeah...but how is the Colnago???

Jokes aside, that's a bummer and hope she heals quickly.

[j44ke]

Well....that sucks rather big time. I hope she heals quickly & fully.

Yeah...but how is the Colnago???

Jokes aside, that's a bummer and hope she heals quickly.

Thanks guys. I can argue with my wife, but I can't argue against her tenacity. That's gotten her where she is in her career. And she's come around a bit and rearranged her schedule for some recuperation time. Pain is more convincing than I am.

She liked the Colnago! And it had SRAM AXS on it which she also liked better than the Shimano on her own bikes. Simpler. She was there when the pro teams showed up for UAE Tour, so she got to ride along with Astana and Mark Cavendish for about 5 minutes.

[bigbill]

We had another winter storm yesterday which closed I-40 east of the Hwy 93 exit to PHX, Route 66 just east of my house, and resulted in many accidents and stranded drivers. I have a doctor's appointment this afternoon if I-40 clears out. It was a parking lot last night. Hopefully the sun coming out and temps creeping above freezing will sort things out. I've waited 3 months for this appointment, I don't want to start over.

In the non grump world, my son is in the last two weeks of The Basic School at Quantico. He's done, academically, they only have their full pack, 15 mile march to complete. 160 pounds of kid, almost 100 pounds of gear. He doesn't skip leg day.

[htwoopup]

Waiting to go to MRI. Best case 2 weeks worst case 8 weeks.