Singlespeed=Vomit

March is doing me right around here. Two 45+ degree weeks have cleared a few miles of mud-free single track on Jumbo. I got a single speed 29er during Thanksgiving but never got to ride it because of the 2 feet of snow on the ground...this weekend I dusted it off, adjusted the seat post height, obsessed over stem spacers, and proceeded to ride into a relationship with suffering. My orthopedic surgeon would be cringing if he knew this. It's hard folks. I didn't actually vomit...but I could taste what I had for breakfast that morning...and for dinner the night before. There is something wholely satisfying about the experience though. I won't get too far into describing it because I don't want to turn into a cliche. It's very simple and fluid. Instead of thinking about shifting I'm thinking about inertia, momentum, flow, and breathing. It's surprising what you can ride up on one of those things. And it doesn't matter what kind of bike you're on when your pasty white arms are free of their winter coverings, the sun is shining, and there is a ribbon of red dirt framed in sage.

Another thought on riding in the North Fork...bicycle commuting is pretty amazing. It's great puncation for the day. My employer even pays us $1 each way for doing it. It's a good way to rack up some lunch money; but tonight is the first and last time I will ever commute by the light of a cell phone. It is dark here. Blackness. I have a light that you can roast hot dogs over. But I left it at home, hence the "resourcefullness" of the cell phone backlight.

J&C drove over from Crested Butte Saturday. It was so fun to have friends here. I felt like my grandma showing them around (she'd drive us around her tiny town showing us her 80 years of history...they named the elementary school after her). They have 7 feet of snow in their yard, so the greenish grass and shoots of tulips impressed and relieved them. I wonder if they think that winter is this year-round thing.

2 weeks to the next China trip. Interesting stuff going on there. I hear talk of countries boycotting the Olympics. Hmmm. We'll boycott the Olympics but we won't bocyott cheap labor. I don't want you to think that I'm China-Bashing. I'm more like China-Bashing bashing. Before I think about boycotting the Olympics I flip through my closet turning the labels, and then really take a look at the big picture. I heard an amazing show on Alternative Radio about globalization and localization. Check out Michael Shuman and www.smallmart.org. This guy has some amazing research about localizing business; and not just retail. Retail is only 11% of our total economy. This guy has some amazing information - both theories and examples - of how localization can work and how it can be cheaper for everyone. He used the example of shopping at a local bookstore vs. Borders and explained how so much more of the money stays in the community when shopping local...duh, I thought, until he explained how local businesses use local attorneys, CPA's, and advertising. He spoke about a community in a rural town in Wyoming (are there any towns that aren't rural in WY?) and how their general store shutdown. People didn't want to drive an hour to shop at the big boxes so they got together and sold local stock and raised 750,000 dollars to open a general store...it's not a co-op, it's a publically owned store. Cool. There will always be cases where it's too difficult of a decision - like how I went to Radio Shack here in P-towne (you can't get groceries after 8pm, but we have a radio shack) to buy batteries for my cycling computer and they were $5 each. I know REI in Grand Junction sells them for less than $2. I put off the purchase until my next trip to the Geej. I of all people most of all have to be very cautious about all of this. I'm in the most danger of hypocrisy.

Easter was good. Someone today told me that there are a lot of options for churches in town. I responded by saying there aren't a lot of options, just a lot of choices. I picked one based on what time it started. It was as expected. If you're a vegetarian and you go to a chicken shack you're most likely going to go away hungry.

Power to the Peacful