Got up reasonably early today and put in a short, fixed ride on the
Quickbeam. Got home and out of the shower just as a strong batch of
rain dropped.
They say that we set a record last month - nicking the ~1909 March
which had 23 days of rain. This year the 24th arrived on the 31st in
2006, so it’s clear that there are things we just do better these days.
Folks that watch the network news more than I do were all saying “We’re
getting Seattle’s rain…!”, probably because some creative
weather-personality crowed that particular line, which immediately got
piped into the earpieces of all the other weather-personalities.
I miss Pat McCormick. He would actually do something about the
weather for us.
At any rate, it isn’t like we’re going to melt. Even with the
slightly cooler temps, it’s actually reasonably pleasant most of the
times - these are showers rather than the El Nino deluges, for the most
part. Our dog is a bit pissed, and looks accusingly at me when we go
outside to find rain and wet sidewalks.
Between the Event fabric jacket which I got up in Portland at River
City Bicycles a few years back and the fendered Dawes, the worst
problem is…well, it just isn’t that bad. Californians are such
weather wimps.
Since I had finally gotten the Zeus fendered up, I ended up adding the
rack - makes a fine and useful errand bike with the two Jandd Grocery
Panniers I’ve had knocking around. However, the reach was still
uncomfortably short, so I talked Rivendell into selling me a moustache
bar for it. With a pair of oddball Mafac levers from ebay, it
should have the right “look”. Unless I can come up with a Zeus
branded stem and bars, I’m not really going to worry about that.
Also had the Sunshine-istas install the headset which was left over
from the Quickbeam. Brought it home and put the iBob-supplied fork on,
swapped stems from the original Ritchey to the Salsa that has been
hibernating for too long, put in the front wheel and carefully adjusted
the brake pads, which seemed way off for some reason. Then took the
bike off the stand and realized I hadn’t set the front wheel in the
dropouts all the way - grrrrrr - so I had to re-readjust the
pads. And honestly, there was no enough meat on them to get
proper toe-in. So, I’ll be re-re-readjusting them with the pads I
had to go get. But, the singlespeed did get out on the trails and
enjoyed the ramble. Sloppy, muddy, soaked but great.
Still a couple tech-jobs to go. As I’ve said before, each bicycle
owned increases expontially the possibility that none of them will be
running. Now that the Bridgestone is up and running (well, still need
to install new brake pads, which I just got), the Lemond Brothers are
mocking me - the headset (original Shimano from original frame) in the
open-wheel racer is gone, cartridge bearings oozing sludge and not
responding to repeated flushings/oilings. The cross bike still
has Ritchey Crankset issues - I need to pull it and send it in again,
as the non-driveside crank keeps slipping, even with a new BB
installed. Those bikes should be ready to roll at any time, but right
now they just sit there and sulk.