Tuesday, May 1, 2012

welcome to spring 2012!


well, after a wave-like start to the year, in terms of weather and business and riding and running and all other manner of silliness, i believe i can declare that the season is open!  it is a happy time, like always.  there is a steady stream of sick bicycles making it’s way into the store.  we fix them and they leave to resume their duties as bringers of fun to their owners.  people are beginning to make their way in to purchase new bikes and gear and i can feel a wave beginning to form way out there beyond Noblesville and Fishers and even Geist, where the tooth-fairy leaves you hundred-dollar bills.  
roadies are the first riders to catch the wave.  they usually run into it over on Fortville Pike on the Mama Bear’s ride, or sometimes up at Potter’s Bridge, or even at the world-famous Boring Esde ride out of z-ville.  all winter they wander around in the cold searching for it with thick gloves and booties and a miserable countenance.  not finding it, and furious with cold and wet, they retreat to their basements and garages, and sometimes even their local bike shops to ride in place and watch videos.  IWBMATTKYT.  an ancient and terrible way to spend the winter, really.  i was never really much of an indoor rider.  you can ask anyone.  it is well known that i turn into a miserable ogre when i have to ride a trainer...early in the morning...without having performed my customary coffee/news/lounge ritual.  during those times i will not speak much and not even the sight of a black-eyed bieber will cause me to smile.  (we must rid the world of that thing)
so anyway the roadies.  they are the first to catch the wave.  i sort of caught it in february and rode it for a little while myself.  but it did not last long.  see, this year has been weird for me.  after last summer, we had a fall.  fall lasted about six months, completely bypassing the winter of 2011-12 and tearing straight into march as if that was just the normal thing to do.  by then it had built up a big enough head of steam that the only season that could possibly stop it was summer.  so that’s what happened.  spring tagged out and summer came barging in like gary busey on whatever it is he feeds on and put a boot-stomping on fall.  so march was summer.  but summer began it’s campaign so viciously it completely ran out of energy by early april and retreated back to columbia and spring tagged back in.  the first thing spring did was kick the recently beaten fall right in the jibblies and call winter to brag about it.  winter didn’t care because it had decided to take  some vacation time and was in columbia with summer...where the rum flows freely and the secret service tries to pay for hookers with amex.  
and that was essentially the way the season started, ended, started again, paused for shots of rum, took a month-long nap, woke up and drank irish coffee with gary busey, and, tonight, nearly drowned in broad-ripple because of thunderstorms and a broken water-main.  and between all of these volatilities, don birch somehow became faster than last year and logan park had another terrific wreck, in which his head became concussed.  also we hired him at the shop and he is just the most pleasant and well-mannered young man you can imagine!  
anyway back to bikes.  pretty much everyone got in way too good condition way too early this year except for me, which means that if.......you know what, never mind.  this thing is too long for any more anecdotes.  suffice to say, everyone has been riding a lot, tuesday sessions started way early this year, they are still the hardest ride in town, a lot of team heroes have already raced this year...multiple times, and i look forward to regaining some of my indomitable form sometime soon...maybe by the time spring rolls around this august.  
sincerely,
gary busey