The Greatest Show on Dirt

I just lost an entire post I wrote this morning, but it sucked anyway so no big deal.

The important thing to remember here is that Northwest Airlink is going to pay for what they've done to me. A cancelled flight left me stranded in Memphis Friday night, sequestered in a top secret hotel for angry people listening to the sound of planes taking other people to their destinations all night. I smell a ticket to San Diego in the offing. I just have to control my temper (which has a very long fuse for the most part).

Ma and Pa Ingalls from Reddick came up over the weekend. Pa has no respect for our local trail system because he has never ridden anything but Munson, which is tame unless you haul ass like the locals.

After a long late night at the Toasters concert, www.toasters.org sweating in the pizza oven-like venue, Pa and I stalked each other through the graveyard and the neighborhood, twisting ankles and missing tackles on the long walk home. Good clean fun.

After 3-4 hours of sleep we rolled out for ride time. It was a surly, swarthy-looking crew to say the least. Pa needed to be taught a lesson-- a long, slogging, hot lesson.

The Live Oak Connector collected much tax with Pa skewering himself on a broken pine stump, me flying over the bars to avoid crushing Taco, and Shins ripping his shorts half off his ass without noticing. A lot of guys spent time in the dirt yesterday, and I don't mean on their bikes.

Around mile 15 I knew we had Pa's attention. He prefers the quick and dirty singletrack loop, complete with a drive to the trailhead if necessary. We gave him 4-lane highway traffic, concrete stair drops, bum trails, peloton smashing paces, singletrack, powerlines, and the like.

He was digging it. We agreed Tally has an excellent 'wanderability' quality to it.

When we got home that boy loaded up Ma Ingalls and hauled ass like the Indians were trying to take Laura and Mary.

Circus aficionado, Riverboat, has hung a shingle out over at:

www.riverboatadventures.blogspot.com and believe me, I am afraid.

I'm out of here tomorrow for the week so you know the deal; stale popcorn, broken Ferris wheel, fake giants, and shitty prizes for the rest of the week.

Juancho to go, biggie size it yo!