Category Archives: Uncategorized

Nuts!

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I have a plate of cold chicken, an avocado, a hunk of well-aged cheese, and a batch of raw mustard greens before me on a cutting board. I am eating it all with my hands yes, while typing- tearing leg from thigh and wing from breast. Crunching the cartilage and chewing the sinew. Scooping up buttery slices of the avocado, which tastes like the warm sun and folding it in a leaf of too late picked extra spicy greens, called greens but deep red along all but the spines. I’m staring over the next few days like the unengaged battlefield, polishing the grey gun-metal of my Titus Racer X.

I might get pummeled and driven afield, or I may plant my damn flag where I please.

Juancho

to the core

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I mixed it up and checked out a different yoga class tonight. I did this as part of my New Year’s resolution to take more positive risks in my life. My bike ride on Saturday took me well into the take more risks realm, but the positive impact of that ride is questionable. I figured a new yoga class was a safe, little, non-risky risk.

This was of course completely untrue. The risk was profound, and not just the risk of writing about yoga on a well-established hardcore cycling blog that ventures into the history of gangster rap, murky manifesto-esque meditations, and outright falsehoods. The real risk happened in that merciless sweat-box about the moment the instructor ubiquitously named John, aided me in my self-flagellation by pushing my own left ankle into my own left hand as I arched on my belly hopelessly for it, groping like a turtle trying to right itself on a scorching highway. Now I know how the Guantanamo prisoners feel when the guards let them adjust the blindfold for comfort. The gratefulness of the brainwashed.

I hope it is okay to mention that this John had the demeanor and build of a Jason Bourne like character who has aged through many battles. Missing the ends of his digits on his right hand I feel certain this happened as a result of frostbite on some remote 28’er peak, or intimate combat for the highest stakes. He was brusque and demanding, yet compassionate in a sense. We did yoga to Sammy Hagar and the Rolling Stones. You could hardly hear the music for all the moaning and wailing going on.

Namaste dawgs,

Juancho

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He said he wanted to show me something and that he knew the way. Things happened differently than expected. Saturday’s ride was a series of unpleasant and poorly considered decisions that resulted in a hard-fought victory for Mystery and me. The day itself held significance as both the day of the Felasco 50, but more importantly it was Elvis’ birthday. Not a day for a lap around the standard trails. A statement was needed. Besides, I felt like I could take anything he could conjure up and still be riding tall at the end of the day. That’s pretty much what happened.

My attorney recommends against any discussion of the route, especially any mention of 10 ft. tall fences, ankle deep mud, or the smilac maze. I can say that we didn’t see a proper trail until hour 3 of the ride.

We didn’t get 50 miles, but we got the suffering of 100.

How as your weekend?

Juancho

The Look Back

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This time last year I was deep into the pre-Felasco 48 hour regret and dread cycle. I saddled up for that ride in 13 degree weather 100% certain that I would not make it to lunch. If the cold didn’t get me, then it would be the legs, or maybe the lungs or the gut that would take me down. Like Saddam at the gallows though, my step never faltered. I went down miserably, and willingly. I felt I deserved it. I ended the ride at 15 miles with a solid ice flow down the crack of my ass from my leaking Camelbak. I do not remember crying, but I should have.

Today I am considering purchasing a Swiffer. They seem magical and handy.

What sweet relief to be free of that event! Although this will surely cause some of your eyes to roll, I must say I feel entirely capable of completing the ride. I just feel I deserve better. I intend to enjoy some art tomorrow evening, sleep in my freshly laundered sheets beneath the weighty comforter and allow it to comfort me. In comfort. I will then wake refreshed, prepare a nutritious breakfast and find Mystery (the other Mullet)for a ride that will be more than 20, but less than 50 miles.

If others have come to similar conclusions, let’s hook up after cartoons are over.

Juancho

Everything was just lovely

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I broke my new year’s resolution today.

I was at the dentist having my teeth cleaned and the young woman scraping my teeth was a terrible communicator. I just never knew where she expected me to turn my head, or why I had to get in the closet that turned out to be an x-ray machine. She was pushing and pulling me around like she was the detective and I the fresh collar. .

My new year’s resolution was to let no poor service experience go unconfronted. That’s right. When I resolve to do something I don’t waste my time on the little things. I go big and bold. The problem was, I wanted to make it out of there in time to go for a bike ride. I also didn’t trust myself to stick to the second part of my resolution, which was to provide constructive feedback politely. The words wouldn’t come to me, only the image of me yanking the scraper out of her hands and poking it into her robust and healthy gums. I just sat there, and took my mind to a happier place. It was all over quickly and I made it to my bike ride.

That’s the trouble with my resolution. If we all confronted every transgression of manners and breach of service standard, nobody would get anything done. I am probably somebody’s poor service experience myself. A non-returned call, a flip email response, the proverbial dropped ball.

Then again, you have to draw the line somewhere. One can’t just take it all the time right? Am I the only one concerned about these issues?

Have a pleasant evening and thanks for stopping by-

Juancho

Two Mullet School

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Mystery and Me? We are a two mullet school lately. Just two fish swimming in the water. The rest of the school has done been caught up in the great cast net of life.

We just got back from the forest where the pace was swim for your life the Osprey are coming!

I’m pretty sure we would have dropped all of y’all, especially Dogboy.

Juancho

Efficiency

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Sarcastic greeting followed by some local colloquialism. Introduction of topic. Immediate tangential segue away from topic. Return to topic. Observation made avoiding popular cliches in favor of new cliche if time permits. Description of corroborating evidence to support cliche. String of metonymic cleverness. Barb targeting known reader (S’quatch, Mystery preferred)then first closing statement.

Second closing statement.

Universal Truth.

Juancho
(more efficient in 2011)

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This has been a great break for me, and it ain’t over yet.

I rode some new terrain at Robinson Preserve in Manatee County, and Alafia River State Park (full review to come). I ate Stone Crab Claws and swapped books with my momma, and stared out to sea for an hour at my favorite windy beach where the cold winter water shines like a polished suit of armor. I attended a yoga class where I was related to every single person in the room. I enjoyed a chicken salad at grandma’s swank retirement community and admired her fancy manicure. I caught up with the left fullback from my first soccer team (The Blue Sharks, we went 0-10). It wasn’t the left fullback’s fault, she always did a good job. I walked the old 5k course at Highland’s Hammock- the scene of my victory in the 1980 10 and under category. I laid down in commune with armadillae. I left a few more lbs of butter on the trail. I lobbed a pitching wedge shot that plopped 2 feet from the cup and it made the sound the pros make when they plop lobs. My brother did the same from 200 yards further away, but this is my blog so we aren’t talking about that anymore. I spent last night with one of my oldest friends and some favorite relatives playing remember when and as often as not I did not remember when or pretended to have no knowledge of the incidents for which I was being impugned (lots of references to parachute pants.) Now I am loading up and rolling north in my mobile toy box, the GMC Safari- which carried my mother 40,000 international miles before it carried me. I could be riding at Santos by noon, and throwing wood on the fire at Bard Owl Plantation tonight, or I could be home in my own bed by 8:00 P:M. I could be riding San Felasco tomorrow morning or climbing my first tree using non-injurious passive anchor techniques. I could be anywhere, doing anything, as long as it is a tank of gas away.

For 2011 all I ask is more of the same, and maybe a little more.

Happy Hew Year Y’all! Don’t take no for an answer.

Juancho

A Date with Density

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Will tomorrow be the day I finally rendevous with Alafia River State Park? Many times I have driven within 50 miles of it to east or west. Something always happens, unless something doesn’t happen. Either way I end up with a fresh justification, rationalization, or excuse. Here I am a Florida native, a mountain biker, and a professional traveler who has found and ridden Butt Park outside Jackson, MS and I have yet to ride what many would rate the #2 trail system in Florida. I can find the time to dally out to the likes of Hannah Park in unrelenting stop and go traffic. I have ridden the 4.5 mile single track behind Troy State University in Dothan, AL. Two summers ago I stopped in Macon, GA and rode the Orphanage trail in 103 degree heat. It is probably 3 miles long and not close to the interstate at all.

Yet Alafia eludes me. Tomorrow might be the day. The weather is ideal. I have to go within 15 miles of the trails to get to a scheduled appointment. I have plenty of time to get there and ride everything I am able to ride. I am fit. I am motivated.

It could be the day.

Juancho

Hold Steady

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2010 knocked the wind out of me so indulge me if I need a few days to pass it through my psycho-alimentary canal. This, the Year of the Snuggie in Subsidized Time (2010 b.s.) still has a few days left to continue the re-education it has provided for so many of us. I, for one, have learned my lessons well.

Juancho