Gravel Dad Lord Life

Good lorb, life has been... full... of... stuff and things?

Pictures loaded in no order whatsoever, because that's becoming a theme.

That boring, big brand, plastic, soulless bike has been acquired and is slowly being adapted to Dick-life.  There were many moving pieces to this puzzle, and they're still in motion.  Above, I'm rooting a cable to a drooper (that as of yet has no actuator) because I'm installing a bottom bracket I didn't know I'd need and since my hole was accessible during the process and I should be fiddling with the fit of the bike with a post with no offset as opposed to the stock crabon post with 20mm offset... as if I know how to "fit" a noodle bar bike.

These things bother me.  Ewwwwwww.  They had a purpose.  They do not now.  It would cost money to make them go away.  This bike is a money pit.

I went on my first ride on a bike that coasts without a drooper post since that terrifying day at the Tour de Burg many years ago when I jumped aboard a 49cm Cannondale cross bike with V-brakes.  I'm not a fan.  I like drooper posts, and I cannot lie.  They make bikes better.

Over the entire weekend, I got in one proper fifty five mile garvel ride, a ten mile round trip to a shop party, and a proper in-town Sad Dad™ with beers and such.  I'm liking the bike... I think.  I mean, I don't hate it, and it's closer to doing the job that I want it to do than the Rodeo Labs was.  I fell over once, but that wasn't the bike's fault.  I rode so much my legs were moosh on Monday.

Going out with The Pie the night before the biggest of the rides was only part of my downfall.

This is the bike I won in a raffle where I was hoping to win a $10,000 bike.  This is not a $10,000 bike, but by selling it, I have more doll hairs to throw in the money pit.  Whole lotta robbing Peter to pay Paul going on lately.  I'm still sitting on one wheelset (soon to be two), tires, rotors, seat post, saddle, flat mount brakes with flat bar levers... all of which I'll need to unload at some point.. to make the money pit shallower.

Another piece of the puzzle.  Decommissioning the Flaanimal and the XTR levers move back to the bar bike Stickel, and then getting the Stickel off the trainer and converting the trainer to work with the Crux... because I figure a couple short stationary rides a week will help me get used to noodle-barring again.  Will be nice to have my flat pedal bar bike back and now with gears?*  I currently own an equal amount of bikes with multiple gears and bikes with one gear.

What has this world come to?  I went from one bike with gears (that was also sometimes a single speed) to three in about a week.

This is where I'd prefer to ride my garvel bike, as opposed to staring at a TV screen watching cartoon people.  I'll have more to say about my Zwifting experience at some point, I promise.  I will say having a geared bike on garvel and pavè is much buenos.  Shifting gears makes it easier to ride with frands, as opposed to them waiting for me because I fell off the back or waiting for them because my stupid bike only climbs at one speed.

I've been a basket case trying to squeak in working on bikes whenever I get a chance.  When I'm not wrenching, I'm visualizing which order to do what swaps to keep the fewest bikes non-operable at once or reaching the limits of my attention span and dropping a hundred piece cassette on the floor, losing track of where the big nubbin on each cog is.  As of Monday night, I'm either a half hour from success or three days... give or take.

Here's hoping for good weather this weekend for more trail riding and less garvel/Sad Dad™/cartoon riding.

* No.  Rode it to trivia last night and mebbe Eagle isn't the best option for the streets of Charlotte.