Vague Idea Racing: Dick Punching

What can I say? Work has been punching me in the dick so hard that I clock out at 5:01pm, ride home, waste an hour and a half ruminating on the day, following that with a half hour of anticipating the shit show that will be tomorrow, and then staring off into space until I fall asleep.

There have been bright moments. A not completely rained out trip to Knoxville with Türd to play bicycles. A weekend of the same same up in Pisgah with Bill Nye. A Black Metal Friday Cyclocross brewery crawl. Leaf management...

Stellar moments.

I took today off so I could at least write a blerhg post and ride around in the sunshine later... and also avoid work.

Since I just glossed over the past three weeks like they never happened, here's some good news.

I had a flat tire in Pisgah going too hard in the paint down Trace Ridge... well, sorta. I heard a pretty loud KA-TUNGG from my rear wheel, and then things felt a bit squishy, but instead of stopping, I just rode on hoping to make it down to the bottom before I needed to address the issue. Upon close insptection, I could only see a small amount of sealant near the bead, an obvious indication of a pinch flat... do we still call it that with toobless tires?

Anyways, dump some water on it... no bubbles... commence to hitting it with CO2 (once I got done being flustered by an inflator head I've never used), and voila.

TruckerCo sealant. This stuff just works. I don't know how many times it's sealed a puncture without me knowing it, but it's definitely taken good care of me over a dozen times that I am aware of. Aside from some sizeable tears, it's only not worked when I forgot to check to see if there was any in my tires.

Have you checked your fluid levels lately?

You should.

The brass'ish looking bit on the lower inflator is a "coupler" which serves no other purpose than keeping the inflator from piercing the CO2... the same as the clear bit of plastic the other inflator uses... which doesn't get seized in the inflator rendering it useless.

I've made it known that I hate to ride with a pack. A hydration pack. A fanny pack. If it straps to my body in any fashion in order to greaten my cargo capacity, I dislike it for one or more of my catalog of reasons I despise them.

I won a Tsuga hip pack at the Ridge Runout Gravel event back in... September? Seems like a year ago at this point. Anyways, I'd also won an expensive (to me) Rambler Tote (also from Tsuga) that I've used probably ten more times than the zero times that I've used the ass sack.

Since work was stressing me out so much that the idea of packing for two cold days of Pisgah garvel and trails was overwhelming, I just started throwing shit in a bag to be sorted out later. I made lots of bad clothing decisions on Saturday's garvel (and also Pink Beds, no recommendo), and I paid the price. I ended up strapping on the Tsuga hip pack just so I could have an increased ability to carry more wardrobe options.

It doesn't hold a whole lot, but it did the jerhb. The best part was, I'm assuming due to the wide flat supportive bits that sit on my hips, I barely noticed that I was wearing it at all. Also.... two cold rides in Pisgah reminded me that I should most definitely be carrying an emergency blanket AND fire starter shit.

All that said, I guess I can recommend it... because the one I got musta been a prototype or earlier version of the Pivot Pro as it is absent of the bottle swaddling component.

Nevertheless, I had spare winter gloves and neoprene toe covers strapped to the outside, and thought nothing about the security of their storage for most of the day.

I'm heading out for a ride at the warmest part of the day, and probably stopping at a brewery (or two) to pour one out (into my mouth) for my recently deceased high school frand and former college roommate, Biff.