Am I really that bad?

The new Meatplow did finally get completely built late Friday night. Some folks might have thought that it took quite awhile as it was just a single speed build, and I'd have to say they're right. As I chronicled the painful build process I received some "interesting" comments.

"Not that you'd ever have time to and I'm sure you are way too self centered to ever bother, please don't ever touch my bike. Hell....don't ever even look at it."

"If you really trusted your life to brakes, you wouldn't use those piece of shit Hayes...

You are getting wankier every day. Don't ever touch my bike."

Ouch, that hurts. Not really, but I guess you have to understand where I'm coming from to grasp the reality that is my life.

Cut and bled like Rambo in First Blood: Part II

Had I waited patiently for this last Saturday to roll around I could have probably gotten up early and had the bike built before I went for a ride later in the day. Since I can be very impatient when it comes to quelling my new bike induced excitement I decided to try to build it while fitting in all my regular family lifestyle activities throughout the course of the work week. That was probably a mistake. The Pie did let me spend three duty free hours disassembling three bikes last Tuesday to get my cranks, rings, bottom brackets, and headsets all swapped to the appropriate bikes. After that the assembly process was catch as catch can. Trying to bleed brakes while making it to the supper table in time, taking a shower, bathing the smallest child, reading bed time stories, trying to wrap things up in time to watch a movie with The Pie... these kinda things are not conducive to keeping a train of thought. I was constantly in a hurry to get something finished, and I ended up making mistakes along the way.

A properly bled 6" front rotor feels like an improperly bled 8" rotor. Brake meh.

I make mistakes every once and awhile, and I have no problem taking responsibility for them. If I was embarrassed of my actions I wouldn't bother sharing them with the class. I do own a small bike shop's worth of specialized tools, and I'm not afraid to use them (although I sometimes hurt myself while using them). I know how to utilize them to make great bike things work in a bike'esque manner, and if I can shut my bike room doors and just focus on the task at hand I'm normally 100% competent with the operation of said tools.

Anti-rub O-rings installed and some skullistic mojo from Thad

When I have friends over to the house in need of bike repair help (or who just want to borrow said specialized tools) my world becomes a different place. The family understands that I want to give my friend's bike the attention I don't necessarily reserve for myself, or at least that's how I interpret their actions. Perhaps they just want me to focus on finishing in a quick manner so my smelly friends will leave as soon as possible and keep their heads outta the fridge and their filthy hands off the cupboards. I dunno, but either way I probably give my friends a much better service than I do myself since I don't want to let them down if I can avoid it.

Fast, fast, fast... more about the bike later.

As far as being self centered I believe I'm as self centered as the next guy. Most of my day is filled with thoughts focused primarily on me just like your day is probably filled with thoughts focused primarily on you. Things like:

"I am hungry."

"I like to eat."

"I need to poop."

"I am bored."

"My foot hurts where I dropped (insert latest projectile here) on it."

"I wonder what Tom Cruise is really like?"

Although that last one may not seem very self centered I am only wondering what Tom Cruise is really like for my own selfish reasons.

I get the "self centered" thing a lot. I also hear words like arrogant, cocky, conceited, pompous, egotistic, cheeky, haughty, and "not very nice at all". At first it stings, but then eventually I get a laugh out of it. Are these people reading the same blog I'm writing? Really? I get my ass kicked on the race course and get circles written around me on the blog-o-sphere, own up to it all, and then get accused of being arrogant when I draw attention to it?

I started to get all introspective, and then I deleted about five minutes worth of blather. I can summarize for you:

I have come to the conclusion that I am not an asshole, but I do play one on TV.

So if you don't know me, but have some pre-conceived ill notions regarding my personality, seek me out and have a beer with me. If you ride a bike I'm sure we'll have lots to talk about, and unless you have a mustache I'll probably treat you like I've known you your whole life. We can talk about ceramic bearings, kids, beer, boobs (if you have your own we'll have even more to talk about), gladiator movies, ceramic boobs... whatever. If you do have a mustache please understand that I may keep my distance at first until I know you can be trusted. And don't worry, I won't touch your bike unless you want me to (or if you're looking the other way).

I promise to get back to bike stuff tomorrow after I go see my therapist. Hell, I've got a built bike sitting in front of me that I've already ridden, and I haven't even talked about it yet... and tomorrow's Wednesday...

and I already have another project in the works...