vote

This just in from those Pennsylvania nutjobs:

Not the first sunday in december
THE SECOND SUNDAY IN DECEMBER, THE 12TH!!!!!!
OUTLAWS
COME TO THE
15TH ANNUAL PUNK BIKE ENDURO
SUNDAY DECEMBER 12TH, 2004
11 AM SHARP
DORSEYVILLE FIRE HALL
A 8 TO 10 STAGE STAGE RACE FOR FUN AND POINTS
MOST POINTS WINS
OVERALL
WOMEN
DOWNHILL
UPHILL
CATAGORIES
NO FEES, NO NORBA, NO RULES
EATS & PARTY AFTER IT'S OVER
WE'LL BUY SOME BEER (AND SOFT DRINKS)
YOU BRING THE EATS, (OR GO HUNGRY)
KITCHEN AVAILABLE
COURSE VOLUNTEERS NEEDED
DRESS FOR COLD, WET WEATHER
YOU MIGHT WEAR A HELMET AS THERE IS NO INSURANCE
PLEASE PHONE:
412-767-9910
TO REGISTER
OR GET DIRECTIONS
SUNDAY DECEMBER 5TH
SATURDAY DECEMBER 11TH
TRAIL MAINTENACE PRE-RIDES
BE READY FOR ANYTHING

Do you ever watch the weather on TV? Do you believe that it's going to be sunny and 74 degrees tomorrow when they say it will be. Are you ever dissappointed when they are completely wrong? Then start wondering why they spend money on fancy equipment and schooling to predict something that is rarely predictable more than 6 hours in advance? Why do they try to predict the weather 7 days in advance now, when they cannot get it right 2 days in advance? Why does the weather consume almost half of the local news programming on TV when they are often not telling you the truth? Shouldn't this be called something like "Guessing The Weather" or "Rolling Dice To See If It's Going To Be Nice"? How much money do these people make for lying to you? Are they lying, or just dead wrong?

Do weather people remind you of anybody else on TV that might be misleading you? It should. We're being fed a huge line of BS by our politicians about what is really happening in the world. Why wasn't the 380 tons of "missing" ammunitions from an arms stockpile in Iraq on the front page of our local newspaper this morning? That's BS.

Why do I keep writing about non bike related stuff on this bike blog? Because when I ride my bike to work, I think about all those lawn signs for one politician or the other and wonder what is going to happen in the next four years. I also wonder why I watched the weatherman lie to me last night when he said it was going to be 63 and sunny, when it's 49 and rainy.

Oh crap, I almost forgot: tonight at One On One Bike Studio/Cafe/Art Joint/Repository For Crusty Bike People is another art show opening, featuring the work of local artiste, cool rocker chick and all around total sweetheart Mary Gibney. 7 to whenever the cops show....er...til late. Be there, daddy-o, don't be a square.

Thanks to Zito for the reminder. He sent an email about this and was also the only person today who remembered the name of a film I haven't seen for a while but was thinking about (Return of the Living Dead). Who knew your recall would be better than mine? Strange world...

OK, another non-bike related rant about voting here. Are you registered to vote? Do you have a current drivers license or state ID? Do you know where your polling place is? Do you know who you are voting for? Have you come to this conclusion with the aid of well-rounded information from a variety of sources? If you haven't decided, take my advice and don't base the decision from a lame TV advertisement for one candidate or the other. Turn on the radio, open a magazine, read a small local newspaper, then another local newspaper, and talk to others. Educate yourself before voting.

Think of this, your vote is EQUALLY as valuable as your neighbor's vote, which is EQUALLY as valuable as the current President's vote. Wow, how cool is that? Your vote could negate your worst enemy's vote! Not to mention, your neighbor's vote could be negating your vote. So there are two things to think about here:
1- have you spoken to your neighbors, friends or family about the candidates and issues at hand?
2- have you decided who you are voting for? because America needs every single eligible person to make it to the polls November 2nd. That's just 13 days away.

Another cool thing besides your right to vote, the state of Minnesota where we live has a policy to allow 1/2 day of paid work to eligible voters to get to the polls. Make our country a reflection of yourself. Do it!

Hi. Live in or around the twin cities metropolitan area? Like to ride single speeds and maybe quaff a few beers? Gonna be here on the 30th of October? Show up for the Homie Fall Festival. Always a good time, and lots of crappy prizes this year!

Good morning y'all. We've had quite a few e-mails lately about a product we displayed in our Interbike booth that unfortunately, IS NOT OUR PRODUCT. It's a fancy little flask holder that mounts to the water bottle cage mounts on your frame. If interested, please contact Joseph @ahearnecycles for pricing and availability.

3 weeks till meltdown and so far the ONLY photo I have seen of a presidential candidate on a Surly is of Green Party candidate David Cobb astride a Crosscheck in (hand over hearts, everybody) my neighborhood, NE Minneapolis. Behind him is local Green Party congressional candidate (and my neighbor) Tom Taylor.
Now of course this means nothing politically but it sure is cool and definitely something to consider when choosing the lesser of the evils. And no, I did not arrange this photo, nor did I loan them the bike. Hell, I don't think Tom even knows I have anything to do with Surly, nor was I aware he knew anything about our little thing here. The photo was sent by independent third party and concerned citizen Molly (who did not include her last name).

Hey hey, my my
Interbike just won't die

Yes, we made it out alive. Our ears are ringing and our livers are swollen, but we managed to escape mostly unscathed (physically, anyway). So back to the ranch for some real office-type work. That said, there are some local events we'll be attending and you should think about too:

1) One On One Studio, a bike shop, cafe, and gallery is hosting another one of their swap meet deals. This Sunday, Oct 17, in the alley behind the shop on Washington Ave in beautiful downtown Minneapolis. Swap meet and Grand Prix. Also, two -count 'em, two!-- bands. For all you need to know, go to their website.
2) The Homie Fall Fest, local big daddy of single speed rallies, might have been dead this year if not for the interest of the BrauSovCor Collective. After breathing some beer breath into the wheezing entity, the Homie is reportedly ON. Flyer to follow, but figure on Oct 30. New location this year, riding the newly rebuilt and now maintained trails of the Theodore Wirth Reserve. Thank the MORC people (and mayor Rybak) for their hard work on these trails by showing up at noon (or earlier) and helping finish off some work they've been doing there (no tools or experience necessary), then hang out and ride the feel good fall fest of the single speed culture in MPLS. Like I said, I'll post the flyer later, but consider yourself warned. Extra prize for anyone showing up dressed like GeneO.

We're happily back from the Interbike tradeshow held in Las Vegas last week. The Dirt Demo was, in my eyes, a huge success. The most ridden bike for the second year in a row was the Karate Monkey, which makes me happy more people are discovering 29" bikes. We also had a 1x1 frame with Large Marge rims that got the weirdest looks and quite a few test rides. After two days of being outside in the sun and blowing dust, my nasal passages were overloaded and my eyeballs needed a bedai to clean them out.

The expo lasted three days, with the first and second being extremely busy in our new 10x40 foot booth. Most of the excitement was generated by the new Pugsley prototype bike, seen in previous blogs. I expected more of a "what the hell am I going to do with this?" kind of reaction, but we got more of a "when can I get one?" response, which is good. As I mentioned in the previous blog, we still are not sure when these bikes will be available, but I've been telling people maybe next summer, like June 2005. We have a lot of work yet, and do not know the price on these either. Definitely more than a Karate Monkey, but not unrealistic, you know, still in the Surly price category. We are glad you're all excited, so please stay tuned to this BLOG as we get more info this winter and start testing these beasts out. And NO, we do not need any more product testers. But thanks for thinking of it.

Other buzz's in the booth were the new colors for 2005. Since Surly doesn't have a design philosophy of introducing all new models or colors for a given new year, these are more like running changes from the current specs. The Karate Monkey in Campstove Green will be replaced with a Skidmark Brown Metallic, the Blood Red Cross-Check will be replaced with a Dark Bile Green Metallic and the Dave Gray Steamroller will be replaced with a Charcoal Metallic. Why metallics all of a sudden? Because powdercoated paint technology has gotten so much better in the last few years and this has trickled all the way down to us. We expect these new colors to be available before X-mas of this year.

Another product in our booth we were asked about wasn't even our product. It was a flask holder that mounts to your bottle cage mounts on your frame. E-mail Ahearne Cycles
for more information on this cool must-have thing.

Our cogs have gotten redone as well. All the track cogs have a wider thread base and new look from the chrome plating. We also have a brand new splined cog that fits onto any Shimano-type freehub body. We'll have more details up on the site soon. The fixed lockring has also got a wider thread base than the original. All three of these items should be in stock later this fall/early winter.

Racks, how could I forget racks? The rear Nice Rack will start production soon and we should see these in 90-120 days. The front Nice Rack still has a few modifications, so production will not likely start on these for perhaps a month or two after the rear model. So far, the testing on these has been quite good and the reaction from people at the show was amazing. Again, thanks for all your excitement with these new projects. It really makes working much easier knowing there will be happy people enjoying them soon.

I'm forgetting something else, perhaps those late nights killed a few brains cells. I know my liver is a little deader. If you were there, it was great meeting all of you and/or good to see you again. Thanks for stopping by.