diggin' it, AK styley.

the itch.

deep into fall.
leaves in the yard need raked,
but still plenty in the trees, hmmm.

riding went from worst to better.
recognize the bottom of the
curve and accept it. all uphill
from now 'til June/July.

Back on a program though?
puhleeze. goal right now is
to simply not. get. any. fatter.
hold steady and start making
an effort to actually turn the
pedals during the week, and
clean up the diet...always a
battle.

another 3, 4? weeks, then there
should be reliable snow on the
ground of some sort. either out
of the gun or carried up from
the Erie Lake by Ullr's cool breath.

been watching the weather again,
I love the weather, recognizing
patterns, feeling the shifts, micro,
macro sized timeframes. reading
forum discussions, weather sites,
consensus seems to tilt towards a
favorable local ski season, trending
cooler temps, sweet looking storm
track if the Jet keeps cooperating
this year. Move that October Noreaster
into mid-December and it's game
on fo shizzle!

fingers crossed as always, seems like
recent Octobers have always trended
to a nice pattern, then the patterns
and tracks shift come real winter.

Maybe it's all about conservation of
energy, matter. I mean, it all balances
out over time right? We had a real sweet
spell there in late Sept thru Oct, lots of
energy transferring thru the atmosphere,
lots of stormy weather, wind, rain, loads
of energy expended...and then it calmed
down here over the last couple weeks.

Like things played themselves out,
and are now recharging for round two?
Forecast looks pretty mild for the next
10-ish days, then we're pretty much on
top of Turkey Day with a cooling trend.

I know what I'd be thankful for.


go here, levitation project, for full screen.

riding along

call was out, Elk is getting older,
just like the rest of us. Gonna
celebrate 43 years on the big
blue marble, Jim Thorpe style.

In.

Pick up Buck, meet at a new to
me spot and concentrate on the
Broad. Good times were had.
Perfect mid-hi 60's in and out
of the hollers. Try to hold pace
until blinking, the turn the pedals
tempo grupetto just off the back,
listen to stories from the legend,
the Dutch Eagle himself. Great trail,
everything you'd want out of a suck
ass Peeyay ride, mildly bermed and
shwoopy and sometimes chunky and
overly oomphy primitive benched
love into and out of creekside rhodo
dankness, yeah, nothing to see here,
please move along...

ole Dutch, man, that dude reminds
me a bit of Dirtball, similar cloth,
ya know? It was good riding, good
friends, insane weather and lots of
flowing groove despite the fresh
layer of leaves. Compared to Saturday's
spin in Meeshow, Thorpe is tamped
down perfect right now, that seasonal
week makes a difference.

Getting back out on the Jabberfixy.
A nice spin Saturday, layzzeeee soak
it all in pace, wearing the bright
orange T-town jersey for safety, saw
minimal trail head parking thru the
afternoon, felt pretty safe.

Nice to feel a groove coming back
to the riding. Motor definitely isn't
tuned like it was thru the season,
accept it and just do what the mind
can handle and enjoy, square one.
Feeling ok and relaxed and eager
for the ski season, duh. But also
accepting that turns might not
come until mid December, but
hoping for a Turkey day repeat of
last year. please.

So, square one, here we are again.
Bit earlier than last year, but it is
what it is. Time to not sink any
lower, tread water for a bit then
start swimming against the current.
4ish weeks 'til the snow flies for
realz, gotta keep the knees happy,
and strong knees are happy knees..

suffering.

Eric said it best, 'bike racing is suffering.'

Never more so apparent then last weekend.
Keeferkeefer's brainstorm CrankFestival in
backyard Meeshow. Was gonna run support,
then it turned into a local's match shakedown
with the Mouth calling everybody out.

Fine, double check with el Directour, pump
up and dust off the road bike for Saturday.
Great.

Friday prologue, fun loop up on Piney, niche
local knowledge played a role, especially tackling
it in the dark. Found total JabberJediFixyness
rolling up along the ridge, didn't mind missing
the turn at all, in the floooowwwwwwwww.

Campfire, celebrations, stories, catching up
with the family. Stumble into bed and sense the
skinny tired beast snearing at me from its spot
along the wall. Old girl hasn't been saddled
in 6 or so weeks, since before Teaberry, neat.

Saturday's route, finished at 75mile w/ 6800ish
of climbing, and a headwind that flipped as the rain
came later in the day, awesome. I slummed, it felt
like early March all over again. I had no legs for
the gear, for the continual head against a wall of
wind over those damn orchard rollers churning,
watching the group disappear over the next knoll,
solo, dropped.

Dropped over and over and over and over again,
I had nothing. Tinge of cramps on Mt Carmel,
climbing Staley to Snowy was lots of quiet time,
just churning it over, bonked on the verge of
locking up. Just get over this fucking thing, keep
it upright on the descent then settle into that
survival cadence...what month is this?

Then the breeze turned and a cold pissin' rain
started dropping out of the clouds at Caledonia,
making for a wonderful run back to the cabin.
The descending piece along Graves on the fix is
usually a swell time, made even better by the
50deg rain.

Of course, the sun came out just as we rolled
back into the cabin. Eat, drink, campfire and
9 o'clock feels like midnight, toasted. Passed
out log like sleep, don't reboot the clocks for
the time change, use that hour in the morning
to strip off the ALfine and do a quick once over
of the Salsa. Decided pretty early on on Saturday
that there was no way I'd be riding the Fixy on
Sunday. We rock a parade on up to the Piney
Ridgetop then over to the Cul de Sac, a decent
enough warming climb, then out to the upper
prologue parallel and link into the BrushExtension
to the first timed section across ShakenBake/Fender/
MoonRocks/MyFavorite. Break for a chilly lunch
stop. I was shelled, my back talked back to me
early. Core has gotten soft, the off season came
early this year. off. the. back.

Soon enough though, most everybody else hears the
slumlord callin'. Sohohhhh..plan is altered, 3 mile
abandoned, Last I heard was LittleCO to Jake's, so
that's where I went, everybody else went to the top
apparently. Well, hope they don't wait too long....
Scraped an arrow on Woodrow and pushed up the
road to the gate, yeah, I pushed. up. Woodrow. I
had nothing, best save what little's left for when it's
best used. Roll over and chill on a rock at the top of
R'snake v2.0, finish off my sandwich, listen to the
wind, trees....then hear riders coming.

Reunited! Everybody is on the same page now for sure,
direct route back. Meeshow cracked us once again, it's
not if, but when, I cracked early. The planned 40 turned
into 30ish, way easy to plan for a bigger bite then you
can chew out in those hills. Tight finish to the day,
maximize the flow down to the snowmobile bridge,
burn that last match before riding protected hinterland
on the way to more eat drink and be merry around a
revived fire. Got a stylin' memento, then home early
before it's too dark out, at 6....winter's coming.
good times.

So. That was a tough wknd, local's out kicking each
other's asses against the clock. Buck says to me,
'Keefer must think that climbing is just good clean fun.'
Yeah, something like that, those were some stout
parcours for sure, bit of tweaking, refining...I guess
you'd call it a trial run of sorts with the mostly local
peleton, a bit of beta testing route expectations,
logistics dialing. Venue at the cabin rocks, great
terrain out the door for two or three, four solid days with
minimal overlap. Apres' chatter was leaning towards
a flip to a spring time date, early mid-April, a little
early season sufferfest to see how the winter treated
ya? stay tuned.

beyond all that, thanks to Mike for putting it all
together and hosting and all that, well done. The
wknd was a wake up call for my slack ass for sure.
I need to get back in the saddle, less lazy wknd
warriorish, more steady gunning, harden the fuck
up and get back out in it. Rode the wave and I'm
now officially washed up on the beach. I'm sure
this Sunday will be a rightous Thorpe beatdown
with Elk. Just what I need, another slap to the
face reminder to keep the knees strong and tight
for a winter full of crankin' turns.

so I say bring it Ullr, bring it you fuckin' pussy!
I ain't skeered. Don't think you need to be nice cuz
we're gettin' soft down here. Fuckin' bring it and
remind everybody what it's like to have a real winter
'round here. Fuckin'g bring it you pussy, bury us
under all that terrible, awful, awful snow and turn
down the thermostat and keep a real chill in the air.
Fuckin' bring it, show us what you got. I dare you.






please.

season of meh.

mood went sour,
with it, health.

rolled thru a head cold thing,
not the swine, just a touch of
miserable sinus-ness.

deep into the off season, riding
the shoulder swell, teased by Ullr
and lingering tastes of IndianSummer.

leaves are down, perfect time to
inspect federally protected babyheads.
not sold on the Alfine, definitely not a
just give 'er piece of gear.

break out the Jabber to keep honest,
continue to flirt with the internal style
see if it fits, I think it will for the
desired use...time will tell, tired of flats
though, gotta set up the tubeless.

and I'm waiting, and waiting and waiting.
waiting for winter now that Autumn is on
the downslope. leaves coming down,
daylight savings on the way. I know,
sac up, get used to the darkness, revel in it.

recently splurged on two pairs of new
to me ski sticks. gearwhoring at it's finest
prices were right, cheap, trying different
ranges of the spectrum, learn more about
skis if anything else.

first in the door is the Atomic Telledaddy.
Stupid fat for everyday use around here,
99 under foot, but pretty fuckin' stiff, burly.
'That's a man's ski' Stubbie says, he ain't kidding.

Then a pair of Jaks should be here tomorrow.
Not sure how much life is left in 'em, but should
give me an idea of how I like the ride and be a
perfect skinnin' ski for WV, O1's included.

Also got skins w/ the TD's, which will also fit the
Jaks, combined w/ the Bro's, makes for a
loaner set for when we get buried this year.

right? we are gonna get buried this year?
this is the year, right? please.

pretty please.
it's been awhile.

linkage.

changed up the links over there on the right a little bit...

local colors

rose colored glasses help..