This is my page where I will talk about things that concern me and that are of interest to me. I don’t mean to sound so narcissistic (that is a word isn’t it?) but what I hope for is that its added motivation for me to write/blog here. Hell, Im paying for it I might as well use it. Actually, I feel like the majority of what I post, when I do post things, has to do with vacations to *ehem* exotic places. To me that feels more narcissistic then talking about cycling, food, India, gardening, photography, or my children, etc… So here is where I’ll post things like parenting challenges, personal thoughts, cycling stuff, photography stuff, etc… I’ll keep the other posts like what the kids are up to, what the fam is up to, etc… in the main pages.

A little introduction to my recent cycling enthusiasm
Back home in Andover I didn’t do much cycling. Lately, though, I’ve gotten quite wrapped up in the sport. Stacy would say I’m obsessed. What led up to this… extreme interest? I’ll try to tell you.

Back in 1995, my great parents gifted me a bicycle as a graduation present. A sweet maroon 21 speed Giant Iguana MTB with grip shifts. By that time though, I had mostly quit riding bikes when my friends started driving. There was really never any reason to bike anywhere at that point. Yes I went on a few rides here and there alone or to Bunker Park or with the familly. I even ventured out on a couple of Late night downtown aggro sessions with Kinkel (me bud) and Joe S. We would cruise down stairs, jump off things, and dodge through traffic. We were cool. I also used it a bit for commuting when I lived near the lakes. It proved quite useful. But it was purely utilitarian.

Then I got married and we had Preston. After that I didn’t ride much. Occasionally I would throw him in teh Bell trailer and hit Mc’y D’s or we would ride through Bunker. As the years passed the age of the Iguanna started to show. That, in addition to the fact that I didn’t take care of the thing at all. I only ever took it in for one tune up. ever. Thats almost 10 years of abuse with no care given. So one day I was thinking about riding my bike (as usual I was doiing a lot of thinking about it but not a lot of doing) and realized I was getting irritated by my shifting components. They were old and dry and, of course, not tuned. I talked to a guy at Blaine Velo about buying new components. I was also quite tired of the grip shifts as they had a tendancy to shift when I least wanted them to. The gent at BV said “for the cost of new components you might as well buy a new bike”. Typical bike salesman response I thought. But then I looked at the price tag. He was more or less right. So I got to thinking. What was it that I really wanted. 1) a new fangled suspension fork (these were still fairly new when the bike was made) mine had a steel fork. 2) new gears. So I went to eBay and purchased a new fork, a threaded SunTour model. 30 bucks on eBay. I installed it and BAM! I had a slightly better bike. But the front brake didn’t react well to the bouncing fork. Rather I didn’t install it that well :-). So I took that off. One rear rim brake was enough, right? Some time passed and I stil got little use out of the bike. Then one day I was researching gears… because new gears would make me ride my bike right? Not. Anyways… I came accross a little thing called ‘Single Speed’. Huh. Riding with one gear? What sense did that make? Well at that point I wasn’t riding that much WITH gears so what harm could it be to try ONE gear. Plus, its oodles cheaper and for a guy on a limited budget because of fishing hobbies. So I stripped off the cassette, cables, shifters, and deraillures. I added a SS conversion kit for chain tensioning and VWAALLA I had a one speed bike. My neighbor, Jason, used to tell me that I reminded him of an old Coon Rapids bike shop, Flecks. He also told me that when we moved to India I should open a bike repair stand.

Well. We moved and I brought my one speed bike with me. And when I arrived in India, my eyes were opened to a lot of cultural oddities that were VERY DISSIMMILAR to the US. Like a bike is an important part of millions of people lives here. It is cheap, simple transoportation. There are tiny repair stands and puncture shops everywhere. I’ve seen almost everything you could feasibly think of being transposte on a bike.

One other significant oddity is that VERY few people view cycling as a hobby. And everyone wants gears. And here’s me. A well to do (by Indian standards) American cycling on a one speed bike as a hobby. To most, that is craziness. Everyone here wants gears. After all, that is the natural evolution of bikes and people. Everyone wants things that make life easier. Its like cooking over a fire all your life and always wanting a stove. Why on earth would anyone want to cook on a fire ever again after they got a stove? It makes no sense. But as a well to do American with hobbies and time and funds to facilitate extracurricular activities, I was and still am, in pursuit of things that make life SIMPLER. This is why I have stuck to one gear.

I have also really started riding more. I met a group of guys that ride every Sunday. My bud Larrie also has a new found passion for cycling. So I go on quite a few bike tours around our suburb. Its a lot of fun and I have REALLY seen things that I would have never otherwise seen if not on a bike. The terrain lends itself to one gear as well. Its mostly flatish and much of what we ride are footpaths, “single track”, cow paths, cart paths, dirt roads, and things like that.

Simplicity and neccisty were the 2 drivers that caused me to stick with a new SS specific bike when I started considering buying a new one. The whole bike purchase story is another long one and Ill save that for a later date.

Old bike:

New bike: 2007 Kona Unit 2-9 (an oooooh so cool 29er, rigid, Single Speed) Talk about following a fad