a recent clinton strategy meeting

FLASH!! chris matthews gets SOMETHING right!!

chris matthews, left, and keith olbermann

let me know if i ever begin to sound like this kevin james idiot.

bike to work week in LA

i was away from the orphanage, doing the grandpa thing today. upon my return, i had received links to this from all over the country. i LOVE that you folks send me this stuff. read this, and watch this video. crazy shit, kiddies.

forty years ago today in chucktown

not surprisingly, i remember this. it's not EVERYday an F5 strikes. [i remember well the monster F5 that wiped out jordan, too]
me and the missus--and the mistress and her dog--just barely got into the cellar before that killer took away the family farm.

we rebuilt in a different part of the state.

that, my friends, was the birth of the orphanage.

and now you know the rest of the story...

modern math

okay, so gas prices are inching up; are you following me so far? it's gone from maybe 35 cents a gallon to what, nearly four bucks for a damned gallon of gas? alright then, get this: my volvo wagon gets maybe 25 miles per gallon, with a 12 or 13 gallon tank. i don't let it get completely empty, so it usually takes--lately--forty bucks to fill 'er up. so i get maybe [without thinking too much] 250 to 300 miles per tank. then, boom, another $40 to refill. that shit pisses me off.
so i have this old scooter, got it from my dad when he died. it's a little honda elite, nearly 25 years old, a 125 cc, goes nearly 45 to 55 miles per hour, and gets maybe 68 to 70 miles per gallon. 2.2 gallon tank: 150 miles later, another 6 bucks or less [i never let THIS one run out, either].

so, the solution? simple. get one of THESE!

jack and the magic bean bus

chapter 33 - late night escape

Jack stood in the cold garage and stared at the Late Night on Ragbrai tee shirt. Memories were pushing their way back into his consciousness. He turned to the back of the shirt and read:
Memories came pressing in on Jack from all sides. There were visions of crowds and bikes, and Jack was selling tee shirts in small towns across Iowa many years before. There were memories of beer gardens, sales pitches, and the pressure to close the deal and move on. There was also the constant sense of danger, of being tracked and chased through the crowds and campgrounds.
Officials from the Des Moines Register newspaper tried to catch him all that week but Jack was too quick. He would make a sale and then vanish into the crowds like a guerrilla soldier in the jungle, only to reappear a block away to make another sale. The hit and run war lasted all week until Jack had finally gotten rid of his inventory, but he had been driven underground in the process and ended up on the doorstep of Sister Kim’s orphanage.
And now, years later, the big computer program used to audit the Des Moines Register had detected a tiny bit of missing Ragbrai profit, $120 to be exact, and somehow linked it all the way back to Jack’s tee shirt sales from long ago. Curiously enough, Jack remembered that his profit was indeed about $120 after figuring in supplies, printing, gas, and labor. The much-maligned computer auditing system was surprisingly accurate.
Jack also understood that the brewing companies Miller and Anheuser Busch were attempting to take over Ragbrai and its profits using the computer, a bunch of thugs in the Special Collections Branch of the paper, and an army of raccoons addicted to barley, hops, and newspaper ink. They were searching for Jack in order to recapture Ragbrai profits. No missing revenue would be tolerated.
Jack’s heart was pounding. He couldn’t stay with Mr. and Mrs. Karras any longer. They had taken good care of him but Jack was putting them in danger just by being here. He tucked the Late Night on Ragbrai tee shirt in his pocket and checked for the magic beans
to be sure that they were safe. Then, Jack quietly crept out of the side door of the garage and into the deep snow and cold moonlight.
He was wearing the very same clothes and shoes he had arrived with, and they were no match for the cold, but that wasn’t enough to stop Jack. He chose to avoid the road he had used to get to town with snowshoes over the past four days and, instead, plunged over a snow bank and down the steep slope of the mountain without a clear plan of what he was doing.
The initial shock of the cold weather gave way to warmth brought about by a mixture of fear and the physical exertion of running, sliding, dodging, and jumping as Jack descended through the boulders and trees at break-neck speeds. Jack was soon far away from the Karras home and still moving quickly.
Suddenly, a ravine opened up right in front of Jack, but he was moving too fast to stop in time. He jumped and flew through the cold night air in what felt like slow motion before finally landing in an icy snowdrift on the other side with an impact that knocked the wind out of him.
Too stunned to move, Jack lay helplessly as the entire drift gave way and rumbled down the far side of the ravine in a miniature avalanche, tossing Jack around like a rag doll until he finally came to a stop in a clearing at the bottom of the mountain.
Jack closed his eyes. He was tired, he was cold, he was bruised, he was losing consciousness, and he thought he could hear the familiar sound of a camera shutter clicking over and over again nearby.

to be continued... [a serial by little orphan dbax]

andy's sunday bike ride

our european correspondent andy cornelison tells us that he is going to ride with some of his friends. do you recognize any of his friends? he tells us that he hopes he finishes.

bike to work week SALUTE!

ANKENY POLICE DEPARTMENT

chad shares this story:

Today a guy I work with was riding into work and got buzzed by a car. It was witnessed by an Ankeny police officer. The police officer chased the car down and when my friend got up to them the police officer told him the driver was being charged with speeding, illegal pass and reckless driving. This is great news. Hats off to the Ankeny police. --Chad Vande Lune, Des Moines

.....

orphans EVERYWHERE salute this officer,

and recognize the entire ankeny police department

for the positive bicycle-supportive image this creates.

this IS great news, and is practically unheard of!!

giro update

zabriskie has crashed out.

[perhaps he'll be available a little sooner for my radio show, eh?]

i am sorry to learn of your crash, man, after riding so well yesterday.

jack and the magic bean bus

chapter 32-dedicated to bobby lewis

[play this while reading this chapter]
Wednesday morning began with yoga, breakfast, and vegetable juice, just as the other mornings at the Karras’ home had. After breakfast, Jack made the long trek down to the car wash and back with the latest copy of the Des Moines Register. Both he and Mr. Karras were disappointed not to find any news stories or clues to help them unravel the Ragbrai conspiracy.
Mr. Karras and Jack spent that afternoon in the garage, where Mr. Karras began cleaning his bicycle. “You wouldn’t think a bicycle could get so dirty in just a week, but Ragbray really puts wear and tear on everything pretty quickly,” he explained while shifting to the smallest cog and dropping the rear wheel out of the frame. “Filthy. Of course, it didn’t help matters for the bike to be lost in a warehouse for months. Look at this rust!”
Jack was sitting on a milk crate and Mr. Karras handed him the wheel, saying, “Here, clean this up. I’ve got some shop rags around here somewhere.” After rummaging around under the workbench for a moment, Mr. Karras said, “Ah-ha! Here they are,” and he tossed an old tee shirt to Jack to use as a shop rag.
Jack went to work on the rear wheel while Mr. Karras wiped down the frame and started pulling the cables. As they worked, Mr. Karras began telling Jack stories about how he first got started in journalism and what the early days were like. Jack paid attention at first, but the box of shop rags under the workbench kept pushing its way into Jack’s thoughts.

The tee shirt that Jack was using was covered in grease and grime within a few minutes after beginning to clean the rear wheel, but the next tee shirt in the box of shop rags hadn’t been used yet, and there was something very familiar about it.
Out of caution, Jack had not told Mr. Karras about the magic beans in his pocket, and it was out of this same caution that Jack kept quiet about the curious nagging thoughts he had about the tee shirt. It wasn’t that Jack didn’t trust Mr. Karras. Jack was just worried that the Ragbrai conspiracy might swallow him up if he didn’t stay a few steps ahead of everyone else.
Jack waited for a break in the story telling and then asked casually, “Where did you get these shop rags? They’re really good.”

[a sample from the orphanage collection of contraband ragby tees]

“Contraband tee shirts,” muttered Mr. Karras, absent-mindedly. “Confiscated bootleg Ragbray merchandise produced by people who didn’t get the Register’s permission to use the name. I got a box load several years ago, and I use them in the workshop.”
Jack shuddered. There was something oddly familiar about it all.
For the rest of the afternoon, Mr. Karras and Jack worked on the bicycle, tearing it down to the frame in order to clean everything thoroughly before re-greasing and reassembling it all. They finished by supper, and Mr. Karras hung the bicycle on a hook next to the workbench before turning off the lights and closing the door behind them.
Jack had been sleeping well every night since he had arrived at the Karras’ mountain home, but this night proved to be different as Jack tossed and turned. He couldn’t take his mind off of the box of contraband tee shirts in the garage. It seemed that an old, long forgotten memory was pushing up from his subconscious.

Finally, around midnight, Jack climbed out of bed and carefully crept to the door leading to the garage. He slowly turned the handle and passed through the door without a sound. Once the door was closed again, Jack felt along the wall for the light switch and clicked it on.
Like a moth drawn to a flame, Jack approached the workbench. He reached into the shop rag box, pulled out the tee shirt that had caught his eye earlier, and held it up to the light.
The front of the tee shirt had fancy lettering that followed the style used by the Late Night with David Letterman show, but instead of naming the TV show, it said,

“Late Night on Ragbrai”
to be continued... [a serial by little orphan dbax]

watch for the parrot on mccain's shoulder

uncle bike wants YOU!!

we need YOU to volunteer to work some saturday mornings
at the kollective from 900 am to noon.
all ya gotta do is be there, accept bikes,
and take orders from new folks.
seems simple enough, doesn't it?

let me know in the comments section,
or stop by the shop sometime, and just sign up!

tuesday, may 13th, we will be hosting a little breakfast

from 600 am until 830 am as a part of bike to work week.

ya got something against free food?

617 grand avenue is the place.

i KNOW what's he's thinking...

"check THIS shit out!"

"they think it's funny if they swerve into you"

from the denver post, may 6, 2008:

Six days after a friend of hers was struck and killed by a mail truck while riding his bike on West 32nd Avenue near Golden, Denver bicyclist Shelby Katz was nearly run off the road by someone driving a lawn-maintenance truck.
Katz believes the driver deliberately tried to frighten her and says motorists are getting "meaner and meaner" when confronted by cyclists.
"They honk at you, they think it's funny if they swerve into you — not intending to hit you, but intending to scare you," Katz said. "They're spitting on you, they're yelling at you, they're throwing things at you. I had a boyfriend who got a Big Mac thrown on him. That is just disgusting, it's horrible and rude, and it's not right."

read the entire story here.

check out the comments section at the end, too.

for my art-loving friends at the aristocrats

these are but a few of the reasons why we love bicycling
and bicyclists.

but i am also a big fan of ice cream.

watch out

i've figured out how to shoot AND upload videos!

you're doing a heck of a job, brownie [pt.2]

way to demonstrate you've learned, dubya;

have fun at the farm wedding this weekend.

what WOULD richard feynman do?

i LOVE flawless logic!

[click on image for the solution to life's problems]

a funny thing happened on the way to ...

ihop...

this morning, i was killing time while my car was being repaired. i was getting a new tire at tires plus, and a new exhaust at midas, compliments of a bad stretch of road south of slater a few nights ago. i rode my bike just down the road to ihop, after learning the car would be done in less than ah hour, rather than the all day i'd expected. i went in, wanting breakfast. the place was packed with what even i refer to as "old folks." it was 900 am.

pouring a cup of coffee from my $1.69 "bottomless cup," i scanned the menu. everything came with pancakes. EVERYTHING. so i looked at the senior menu: gotta be 55 or older to order, and i really wanted just two eggs, sausages, hashbrowns and toast. i dug out my usa cycling license, verifying that this year i would be 55, and therefore, "eligible" to order from the menu, as long as the waitress didn't look too closely at the license.

she didn't even question me; she just took my order.

i've been 50 nearly five years, and i STILL don't accept it.

this is not pretty, folks.

jack and the magic bean bus

chapter 31 - the search continues

[can you find the hidden face?]

Jack stared at the list of car parts once again and saw that the first letter of each item could be used to spell out the words magic beans. Instinctively, Jack felt his pocket for the beans, which he always kept with him. The night of Jack’s escape, Sister Kim had entrusted the beans to Jack and told him to deliver them to a person named Kelby who lived out west in the mountains. Since then, Jack had been through many misadventures, but he still had the beans.
But could they be magic beans? Jack seriously doubted it. They looked like ordinary coffee beans in an old SIDI cleat bag, but at least Jack could take some comfort in the fact that Sister Kim was still sending Jack messages.

The rest of the afternoon and evening proved uneventful in the snow-bound mountain home. Jack got another good night’s sleep and awoke the next morning for another round of yoga with Mr. Karras. It was surprising how many poses the tough old newspaper writer could perform. Some poses, like the Revolving Half Moon, looked silly to Jack. Other poses, such as the Firefly, seemed impossible, and Jack couldn’t figure out how Mr. Karras was able to do them.
After yoga, breakfast, and a big glass

of vegetable juice, Jack bundled up once again and made the long hike down the mountain to pick up the newspaper at the Mr. Kar Wash car wash. By now, most of the roads in town were cleared, and people were digging out from the early blizzard.
The car wash was open for business when Jack arrived in the parking lot, but no one appeared to pay any attention to him as he picked up Monday’s edition of the Des Moines Register newspaper from the doorstep and began the long hike back up the mountain. That afternoon, Mr. Karras and Jack studied the newspaper but found no new leads.
On Tuesday, the mountain road to the Karras’ home still hadn’t been cleared of snow, so Jack made the trip to the car wash and back for the third time. There weren’t any big news stories about Jack or anything that could be linked to the Ragbrai conspiracy except

a small statement in the Corrections section that said:

Register’s Computer Audit Revised
Representatives from the Special Collections Branch of the Des Moines Register explained that the computerized audit which initially linked orphan Jack Piper to $120,000 in missing RAGBRAI revenue was incorrect. According to officials, bugs (errors within the paper’s new computer system) have been fixed, leading to a revised value of $120 of missing revenue. The source of the missing revenue has been narrowed down to the area of RAGBRAI marketing while the search for Piper continues.

“How do you like that?” exclaimed Mr. Karras. “From a hundred and twenty grand to a hundred and twenty bucks. That must be some screwed-up computer system they’ve got.”
“But I still don’t have any idea why they think I ripped off $120,” said Jack.
“The way things are going with their computer program, you should just wait a few days and see if the amount drops to twelve cents,” joked Mr. Karras.

“Wait long enough and they might even owe you money.”

to be continued... [a serial by little orphan dbax]