11.6.2007 | 7:13 am
A Note from Fatty: I’m on the road on work-related business for a few days (yesterday, today and tomorrow). I tell you this for two reasons. First, so you know why I didn’t post yesterday. Second, so you will get a glimpse into my work life and what an important person I am.
Also, I want you to know that I have a new contest coming up. There will be lots of prizes, and none of the prizes are trivial. However, the contest will be strange and will, furthermore, require some effort on your part. In order to keep people from half-heartedly (or no-heartedly) competing, I am considering an entry fee, in the form of a donation to the Lance Armstrong Foundation.
Yes, I realize I have not told you the nature of the contest yet. But I will tomorrow. And I think you’re going to want to participate.
Finally — and very importantly (because, as I have noted above, I am a very important person) — I have a new article at BikeRadar.com. You can read a preview below, or you can go read the whole article by clicking here.
Innovations for Safer Cycling
Consider the modern automobile. It is a wonder of safety-conscious engineering. Air bags. Anti-lock brakes. Crumple zones. Run-flat tires. Really, it takes considerable ingenuity and a can-do attitude to get yourself seriously injured in a car anymore.
And then there is the bicycle.
During the same 50 years when cars have gained enough sophisticated equipment to protect its passengers from even the most boneheaded of mistakes, the cyclist’s protective equipment innovations number exactly one: a helmet.
Yes, it’s 2007 and the best we’ve got to protect ourselves is a half-dome of styrofoam. Except that anymore, the half dome of styrofoam is mostly full of holes.
Gee, doesn’t that make you feel downright invincible?
Toward improving the chances of surviving the mean streets — or singletrack, for that matter — on a bicycle, I have invented the following equipment to make riding a bike a safer, saner experience.
New Bike Computer Functions
Here’s an interesting fact that I just made up: Your bike computer has more computing power than a 1983 Cray Supercomputer. And yet, all it does is gauge your speed, distance, pitch, latitude, cadence, wattage, longitude, total feet climbed, and average rate of ascent, and your heart rate. What a slacker.
With a little programming and nine new wireless sensors, your bike computer could be made to do so much more. By sensing the humidity, road surface conditions, the amount of alcohol on your breath, tire air pressure, sudden fluctuations in your heart rate, and the angle of your bike to the ground, your bike can tell if you’re about to fall over sideways, whether due to sliding out or simply falling asleep.
When your bike computer notices a slight problem, it simply beeps a gentle reminder. If it notices that you’re wobbling considerably due to what it considers probable drunk cycling, it delivers an incapacitating electric shock to your hands via the handlebars and sdials the police.
If it notices you’ve actually fallen down, the bike computer should phone an ambulance. Unfortunately, however, I have so far been unable to get this feature to work. Every time my bike falls over, the extra mass from all the sensors, batteries, and computing equipment causes the bike to crash extremely hard to the ground, thereby crushing the bike computer into several small pieces.
Yes, I realize that is ironic. Shut up.
Click here to continue reading “Innovations for Safer Cycling” at BikeRadar.com.
PS: BikeRadar now has RSS feeds. A few of you commented about that a while back, so I thought I’d call it to your attention. Even though I am a very important, busy person on a busy, important business trip.
Comments (29)
11.2.2007 | 3:02 am
One of the most gratifying experiences human beings can have in a lifetime is a deep, abiding relationship. You never know when such a relationship might begin, and it’s not always easy to tell whether you’ve come across a relationship that’s got enough staying power to last a lifetime, or merely a few days.
Once found, though, there’s no denying: it’s worth it. As the two of you learn more about each other, discovering depth and quirks you would never have suspected when you first met, you can’t help but say to yourself, “This is what gives my life joy and meaning. This relationship, truly, is sublime.”
I am talking about, of course, the relationship between a cyclist and mountain bike trail.
First Date
Does the relationship between trail and rider spring to life fully formed? Do you know every waterbar, every spur, every ledge drop the first time you ride a trail?
No, of course you don’t. You wouldn’t want to even if you could, because that would take away the joy of early courtship, the rapturous early days of mutual discovery.
And that would be sad indeed.
So when you first hear about a trail, take it slow. Don’t just rush to the top of the trail in a car and bomb down it. Shuttling a trail is like introducing yourself to a beautiful woman by grabbing her butt. Sure, it’s been done — all too often, really — but you can bet that the trail will not respect you for it.
No, instead find out about the trail. Ask friends what it’s like, what it’s best qualities are. What days are best to ride it? What you should wear — baggies or lycra? Should you bring bottles, or is a Camelbak in order? This is your only chance to make a first impression with the trail, so make it a good one.
Next, introduce yourself to the trail by riding the whole thing. Preferably, do the uphill first. Acknowledge the trail’s fine characteristics, but don’t be too effusive. Excessive flattery sounds false, and the trail can tell the difference between honest appreciation and a tacky come-on.
Second Date
Oh, the heady moments after the first ride on a new mountain bike trail! In your euphoria, you will want to tell all your friends about it — about the trail’s clever switchbacks, its teasing false summits, its rambunctiously fast and daring descent.
Can you sleep the night after such a ride? No! All you can think about is riding that trail again (if only it will have you). Sleep is kilometers — nay, miles! — away.
“Please, please, please,” you pray to St. Eddie, who watches over cyclists. “Let that trail like me as much as I like it.”
And then — at last! — the moment of the second ride arrives. Sometimes, alas, this second ride reveals flaws you didn’t notice in the rush of the first ride. Perhaps the trail is usually crowded, and you were just lucky the first time you rode it. Perhaps it is not as technically challenging as you remember from your first ride; it’s one of those master-it-and-move-on trails.
Perhaps it turns out that the trail is infested with mosquitoes, ticks, and angry, mutant wolverines, some of which appear rabid.
Hey, it happens.
More often, though, the second ride is your opportunity to notice exquisite, charming details you didn’t notice during the first ride, because you were taking in the big picture. “This trail has three distinct kinds of terrain!” you might find yourself exclaiming excitedly. “All in one ride! How is that even possible?”
“And here is a sidetrail that takes me on a quick downhill jaunt over roots and ledges, and through four switchbacks, before rejoining the main trail. I can’t decide which way is better, they’re both so good!”
You may find your emotions welling up, getting the best of you. In which case: pull yourself together, man. Trails don’t like blubbering pansies.
At the end of the ride, if you find yourself astounded to note that you somehow — impossible as you would have thought it just one day ago — like this trail even better now, well, you’re on the way to a long-term relationship.
Going Steady
Before long, you find yourself telling all and sundry that this trail is the best trail in the world. You can’t help yourself. And when it’s time to ride, you don’t even think about where to go ride. It’s a foregone conclusion. Why would you ride anywhere else?
The more you ride this trail, the better you get to know it. Now totally comfortable with the main features of the ride, you begin to explore different lines. Maybe try blasting up a difficult pitch in a harder gear, or perhaps seeing if you can ride the entire trail without ever putting your foot down.
You begin to notice even subtle things about the trail. You can tell the difference between how it rides in Summer and Autumn. You come up with names for certain moves on the trail — in-jokes that have meaning only you and the trail would ever understand.
Eventually, you stop calling the trail by its proper name. In your head, at at least, it’s “my trail.”
Ol’ Ball and Chain
Then, one day after riding your trail, you realize: you just did the entire ride without noticing a single thing. Your mind was elsewhere the entire time.
And don’t think the trail couldn’t tell, buster.
Soon, you’re wondering if maybe you’ve outgrown this trail. If maybe you’ve seen all it has to offer.
And then, one day, a riding buddy tells you about a trail that’s just been cut. It’s still a little rough and the line’s definitely evolving, but it has real potential.
You go ride it — you know, just to see what’s out there — and suddenly you’re no longer interested in “your trail.” All you can think about is this latest piece of singletrack. You don’t even feel guilty, because hey, it’s just a trail, right?
You heartless bastard.
Reunited
Months go by, during which you rarely — if ever — ride your trail. You make feeble excuses (“It’s out of my way” or “It’s Winter and covered with three feet of snow”) for not riding out on what used to be your favorite trail. Oh, sure, from time to time you run into each other and you halfheartedly promise yourself you’re going to go riding there sometime really soon. But you never do, do you?
Until one day.
For some reason, you wake up with your old favorite trail fresh in your mind — you’ve been dreaming about it. Your dream has brought it all back to you: the intensity of the climb, the rush of the descent, the joy of a perfectly realized series of switchbacks.
How could you have been such a fool?
You rush back to your trail — for you now realize that this is truly the best trail in the world — and you ride it again.
And it’s just as you remember. It’s like you’ve never been apart. It’s perfect.
But some day, as you’re bombing the descent and a heretofore unseen exposed root end expertly threads your front wheel’s spokes and brings your front end to an immediate halt, launching you up and over as if your bike were a trebuchet, and your body flies twenty feet toward a welcoming boulder field, you will finally understand the gravity of your sin.
Sure, the trail was willing to take you back. But you were a fool to think you had been forgiven.
Comments (62)
11.1.2007 | 6:14 am
A Note from Fatty: Short entry today, because most of the day will be taken up with Dr. appointments (going to see the new orthopod today, but first must go on a scavenger hunt to collect miscellaneous X-rays and MRIs).
Here are a few fun facts about me:
- In High School, I was the kid who did the morning announcements. I was, believe it or not, dismissed for using bad language.
- I was also President of the Speech Team in High School. My events were Lincoln-Douglas debate and humor interpretation.
- After my Freshman year in College, I was an “air personality” on a Top 40 radio station. I say “air personality” instead of “DJ” because I had no say whatsoever in what music I played. That was all programmed by a company in California. It was made crystal clear to me that the most important part of my job was to have the reel-to-reel heads (yes, I’m that old) clean and coffee read in when the morning show guys got in at 4am. I made $0.55 more per hour than the starting wage at McDonalds.
So you would think, with these sterling credentials, that I would have an excellent, radio-ish voice, and that I would furthermore have the ability to talk in full sentences, without distracting “ummmmmms” every time my mind stalls.
In this, you would be wrong.
I discovered this earlier this week when Jason of RocBike.com interviewed me for his podcast. Still, it was fun to do.
Go listen to it by clicking here.
Comments (48)
10.30.2007 | 8:23 pm
An Angry and Somewhat-Incredulous Note from Fatty: Little by little, I’m getting to the bottom of the confusion I talked about yesterday. It may yet shape up to be an amusing story, or at least it would if it didn’t avoid tumors. Basically, this comedy gold will involve my wife travelling today (Tuesday) to the orthopedic specialist only to find that the orthopod (as we in the business call them) wasn’t in that day. At all.
The neurologist had told Susan she was scheduled for today, but had actually scheduled her for Thursday. Furthermore, when he told us yesterday that he and our oncologist had agreed that it was more important that Susan go to the orthopod than do chemo that day, he did so without actually consulting our oncologist. Also, he failed to send the crucial MRI results to our oncologist today, in spite of the fact that I specifically told him this was the most important thing he could do for us.
Um, we won’t be going back to that neurologist anymore. Nor to the orthopod he recommended, mostly because he recommended him, but also because this neurologist somehow managed to recommend the orthopod that was further away than any other in the county. I’m guessing they’re golfing buddies, seeing as how that neurologist and the orthopod have adjoining offices in this town that is a 70-minute drive from ours.
OK, Fatty, take a deep breath. Take another. Okay, better take a third.
A Much-Less Angry Note from Fatty: I’ve got a new article published at BikeRadar.com: “How to be a Quick Change Artist.” You can read a preview of the article below, or read the whole thing by clicking here.
How to be a Quick Change Artist
As a cyclist, I am used to sudden, intense bursts of effort. I know how important it is to be prepared, steel myself, and then make that all-out-dash that can result either in victory or — if not done properly — abject humiliation.
I am talking, of course, about changing clothes in a public parking lot before a ride.
Why Change at the Parking Lot?
I have perfectly good reasons for why I change into my riding clothes in a parking lot. Specifically, I do this because I don’t want people at work to know that I am blowing them and their group lunch invitations off in favor of some saddle time. In the name of stealth, I leave the office in my work clothes, and I return in my work clothes, too.
It’s possible, I suppose, that I leave a few clues. For example, when I leave the office I’m carrying a couple water bottles and a large sports bag full of clothes, helmet, and shoes to my truck, which has a bike locked in. Then, two hours later, I return, smelling terrible, with dried mud on my arms and salt formations on my face. Depending on how the ride went, there’s a reasonable chance I’ve got a little blood seeping through the knees of my pants, too.
But I’m sure nobody’s figured out what I’m doing when I leave on those long lunches.
Location
My lunchtime rides usually begin from one place, whether I’m riding road or mountain bike: the parking lot of the city zoo. On one hand, this is very fortunate, because this large, open, high-traffic parking lot is unlikely to attract thieves.
On the other hand, it is a large, high-traffic parking lot generally full of children. A man caught undressing here at the wrong moment might be . . . shall we say . . . misunderstood.
Click here to continue reading “How to be a Quick Change Artist” at BikeRadar.com
PS: Tomorrow’s Halloween (or, when most of you read this, today’s Halloween), and I’ll be out Trick-or-Treating with the twins (one will be dressing as nurse, one will be dressing as Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz).
They have taken months to settle what they will be for Halloween, with their decisions changing almost daily. Strangely, though, they have been absolutely certain of what they want me to be, and have been for since early Spring.
And the truth is, I love their costume idea. It’s brilliant. It’s hilarious. It has nothing to do with bikes, which will catch everyone off-guard. And as far as I can remember, I have not ever seen anyone dressing as this supremely recognizable character for Halloween, ever.
Here I am:
Merry Halloween!
Comments (46)
10.29.2007 | 9:49 pm
A warning from Fatty: I am extremely pissed off today, and don’t plan to pretend I’m not. If you’re looking for something non-bilious, you’re going to need to look elsewhere.
Today, Susan had an appointment with the friendly neighborhood neurologist. This was a followup to the MRI she had last Friday, which was recommended during the neurologist visit she had last Tuesday, which was in turn a followup to the EMG test she had the previous Wednesday on the advice from the neurologist . . . okay, at this point I lose track of the dates.
The point is, today’s appointment was the latest in what has now been established as an ongoing pattern with the neurologist. He meets with us, recommends some tests, then we have a followup where he recommends some more tests.
That’s the visit-by-visit pattern. There is also a pattern within each visit: we arrive on time, and then wait for 1.5 hours. I am not exaggerating, even a little bit. I think we are not supposed to realize that a full 1.5 hours has elapsed between when we arrive and when we see the doctor, because the doctor uses clever tricks engineered to make us think things are happening, even though they’re not. For example:
- 45 minutes: Sit in waiting room.
- 20 minutes: Sit in examination room.
- 5 minutes: Talk with Doctor’s assistant, who asks questions. I assume that this information is communicated to the Doctor, although I am not certain, since the Doctor always begins by asking the exact same questions.
- 20 minutes: Sit in examination room. Some more. Five minutes before he comes to talk to us, the Doctor will come and get Susan’s file, to “review” it. I put “review” in quotes because I would be happy to bet large sums of money that this is in fact the first time he has considered Susan’s case since the last time he saw her.
After our 1.5 hour wait, we are rewarded with no more than ten minutes of the Doctor’s time. During this precious ten minutes, he gives the evaluation and a recommendation for tests I knew he would give . . . and in fact asked for weeks ago. Because, unlike him, I have the power of the Internet and am moderately curious, and can therefore use symptoms and observation to come up with a diagnosis.
But I do not say anything like this, because I know that, sooner or later, he’s going to help. Somehow. In some way other than the one trick he’s shown himself capable of so far: prescribing pain medication.
And that leads us to today.
Today’s Appointment
We waited our usual 1.5 hours today. It’s a good thing Susan’s very comfortable sitting in a chair for that long, and that we don’t have kids to take care of, and that I don’t have a job I’m missing, or this would be very uncomfortable and inconvenient. I’m not upset, because I know that this kind of delay is just an anomaly – if you define ”anomaly” as “something that happens every single time.”
OK, I promise. No more talking about the waiting.
The neurologist comes in, sits down, and tells Susan that the reason she’s in so much pain and her left leg has lost so much mobility is because the tumors on her pelvic bones are growing, so much so that her pelvis is in danger of fracturing. Susan probably should avoid walking altogether, and it would be a good idea to have an appointment with the oncologist.
He wishes her good luck — using these exact words: “Uh, good luck.” He says maybe we should set up a followup appointment in six weeks or so, though he does not say why.
And then he’s gone. Two minutes, beginning to end.
For some reason, it occurs to me: “Well, at least his next appointment won’t have had to wait quite so long.”
On the way out, neither Susan nor I make a move to the desk to set up a followup visit. Later, we will both acknowledge this was intentional.
After the Appointment
As we drive home, I call the oncologist’s assistant — I have her on speed dial, because she’s the one person in the medical community who returns my calls, every single time. I tell her what we’ve learned, and ask her to make sure to get the information from the neurologist, because we’re going to need to see the oncologist tomorrow and figure out what — if anything — we can do.
The oncologist’s assistant assures me that this is a bump in the road, not the end of it.
Then, while we’re still driving home, the neurologist’s assistant calls Susan. “I’ve set up your appointment with the orthopedist,” she tells Susan.
“What?” replies Susan. The doctor did not mention setting up an appointment with anyone, and certainly not an orthopedist. Plus, the time being set is 70 minutes away from where we live, and at the same time Susan would be having chemotherapy, and, hopefully, talking with the Oncologist.
The Neurologist’s assistant calls back in a few minutes and says that the Neurologist has talked with the Oncologist and they both agree it’s more important that Susan see an Orthopedist than go to chemo.
To recap, our new situation is now as follows:
- Two doctors have agreed that a visit to a third doctor is more important than Susan going to get chemotherapy, which is — we thought — was pretty much the most importhant thing she could do each week.
- Neither doctor has bothered explaining to us why this is so incredibly important — or even relevant – and neither was available to talk today.
- Because Susan will be going to the Orthopedist instead of the Oncologist, she won’t be meeting with the Oncologist to talk about a course of action to fight the tumors that are — in spite of the chemotherapy — growing inside Susan.
- So not only don’t we know how bad this is and what to do next today, but we won’t know tomorrow either.
I’m sure it’s unreasonable of us, but this causes us some distress.
Comments (90)
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