You'd think it would be easy...just sit down and write. Certain stars need to be in alignment before I can sit down and write anything meaningful. My brain needs to be ON...I am thinking that this is only possible during a few hours a day. I can't be feeling guilty about the fact that I am not pitching in with the "real work" that begs to be done around me. And then there's the question that always haunts me...do I have anything meaningful to say? ...and who wants to read it, anyhow? These doubts are the foundation of my personal brand of "writer's block".
You probably didn't notice but, I haven't composed a blog entry for five and a half months. These were my busiest work months at the bicycle shop followed by a six week cycling/camping/driving vacation in France. Now...in the last couple of days...I'm finding time to relax and configure my next essay.
When men ask, "What do you do?"...this happens a lot when you are on vacation, and women never ask that question, I've been practicing with the answer, I'm a writer. It's a sure way to halt the inquiry...but you see it in their eyes, (WTF is that?). On the other hand, if I say, I own a bicycle shop...they are all smiles. It's a handle they can understand. My partner is retiring this week after 30 years of working for the US government...she is now an artist and organic gardener. She was always an artist and organic gardener...and I was always a writer, sometimes it takes decades for us to own who we really are.
Wednesday, October 22, 2014
Saturday, May 10, 2014
Disc Brake Mania
A longtime customer walked into the bike shop this morning and asked, "I'm looking for an $1800 mountain bike, but I don't want disc brakes." I'll see what I can find, was my answer. I checked the catalogs, I searched the internet and I called my experts in the nearest college town...guess what?...there is no such animal, in fact, between $600 and $3,000 you will not find a new mountain bicycle that does not come outfitted with disc brakes. I was shocked.
I've been in the bicycle business for forty years as a columnist/publisher/author and mechanic. I've owned and operated my own bicycle shop for over twenty years. I never saw this coming...the industry has been swarmed and inundated with disc brake technology. It's not as if rim braking was a problem. I've only seen a handful of worn-through rims in four decades of fixing bicycles. What's going on here?
I've been in the bicycle business for forty years as a columnist/publisher/author and mechanic. I've owned and operated my own bicycle shop for over twenty years. I never saw this coming...the industry has been swarmed and inundated with disc brake technology. It's not as if rim braking was a problem. I've only seen a handful of worn-through rims in four decades of fixing bicycles. What's going on here?
Saturday, April 26, 2014
Turn Down The Noise, Get Outside And Sweat.
If I were the Dalai Lama (of course, I am not), and someone asked me what advice I would give Americans (no one asked me), in eight words or less...it would be, turn down the noise, get outside and sweat. Yes, I know several people who exercise with earbuds attached to IPods and the like...I realize they won't hear my valuable advice. Oh well, I'm just imagining that I have something important to say here. I'll shut up.
Thursday, April 24, 2014
The Days We Have Left
What to do with the days we have left....It's a finite number...everybody has a finite number of days. How precious they seem, once you've seen 23, 330 days fly by. Only the very lucky make it to 30,000...my mother will make it and she sounds as if she is enjoying each day, every time I call her. She is only 6,315 days older than me...now, that's a long time to avoid being in the wrong place...at the wrong time. There are lightning bolts, falling trees and distracted drivers galore, out there, so, I'll assume that I won't accumulate that many days.
When you only have 6,000 days left are you going to waste a day? Let's hope not. I'm getting a lot out of each day now but, I'm sure I can do better. This is why old people move to warmer climates, they assume that the quality of life is better where it is warmer. I've never believed this...the lazy, shiftless, addicted, dishonest and unfit tend to gravitate toward, what they imagine is, an easier life. This is not the element that I want to share my neighborhood with.
Would I do anything different if I knew how many days I had left? I would. I'd work a little less, swim more, ride my bicycle more adventurously and hug those I love a little longer. Funny, I never set my sights on making a bunch of money. I'm just happy to stay ahead of my bills and stay in control of my material lust. Wanderlust, on the other hand, is harder for me to control. I love to travel and I'm lucky to have a mate that loves traveling (and bicycling) just as much as I do.
When you only have 6,000 days left are you going to waste a day? Let's hope not. I'm getting a lot out of each day now but, I'm sure I can do better. This is why old people move to warmer climates, they assume that the quality of life is better where it is warmer. I've never believed this...the lazy, shiftless, addicted, dishonest and unfit tend to gravitate toward, what they imagine is, an easier life. This is not the element that I want to share my neighborhood with.
Would I do anything different if I knew how many days I had left? I would. I'd work a little less, swim more, ride my bicycle more adventurously and hug those I love a little longer. Funny, I never set my sights on making a bunch of money. I'm just happy to stay ahead of my bills and stay in control of my material lust. Wanderlust, on the other hand, is harder for me to control. I love to travel and I'm lucky to have a mate that loves traveling (and bicycling) just as much as I do.
Wednesday, March 26, 2014
Cogent Thoughts On "Why The Bicycle"?
A few years ago my son asked, "Dad, why have you focused so much energy on the bicycle and cycling?" I didn't give him a good answer then...I'm sure I said something like; I didn't want to spend my life producing beer or, I'm allergic to chalk dust and teacher's lounges.
I woke up on a Tuesday....after a long bicycle ride on Monday...with the answer. The bicycle is symbol of Respect. Respect for each other and Respect for the environment. The bicycle can be a therapeutic tool. Cycling teaches us what to do with hills and headwinds. The whole body gains a "cyclical knowledge"...each bone, muscle and organ contributing and demanding cooperation and action. I'm not so sure he would have understood these concepts ten years ago but, I'll bet he would now.
Twenty years of actively selling bicycles to my community (which covers Northeastern California) and forty years of promoting, publishing and waxing poetic about cycling (and where that effort will take you in life), I've finally figured out a way to describe what I'm up to by focusing on bicycles and cycling.
To think that I could make a fair living by promoting the bicycle and it's use, is really something special. The promotion of cycling and bicycles in my region is a humble pursuit...I have only convinced a handful of souls that the daily use of the bicycle is a worthwhile investment of their time. It's a start.
When the price of a gallon of gasoline tops $4 my job becomes a lot easier. The rewards are so obvious. It's still a puzzle to me, why wouldn't half of my neighbors be riding bicycles around town when errands call? Don't they see that firing up the motorcar or heavy hauler truck is expensive, unnecessary and harmful to the rest of us?
I woke up on a Tuesday....after a long bicycle ride on Monday...with the answer. The bicycle is symbol of Respect. Respect for each other and Respect for the environment. The bicycle can be a therapeutic tool. Cycling teaches us what to do with hills and headwinds. The whole body gains a "cyclical knowledge"...each bone, muscle and organ contributing and demanding cooperation and action. I'm not so sure he would have understood these concepts ten years ago but, I'll bet he would now.
Twenty years of actively selling bicycles to my community (which covers Northeastern California) and forty years of promoting, publishing and waxing poetic about cycling (and where that effort will take you in life), I've finally figured out a way to describe what I'm up to by focusing on bicycles and cycling.
To think that I could make a fair living by promoting the bicycle and it's use, is really something special. The promotion of cycling and bicycles in my region is a humble pursuit...I have only convinced a handful of souls that the daily use of the bicycle is a worthwhile investment of their time. It's a start.
When the price of a gallon of gasoline tops $4 my job becomes a lot easier. The rewards are so obvious. It's still a puzzle to me, why wouldn't half of my neighbors be riding bicycles around town when errands call? Don't they see that firing up the motorcar or heavy hauler truck is expensive, unnecessary and harmful to the rest of us?
Saturday, March 8, 2014
Welcome To My Morning At Ye Olde Bicycle Shoppe
Broken spokes, wheel out of true, bad chain links, ripped tire bead, loose bottom bracket, bent crank arm and rusty shifting wires..."This won't cost me more than forty bucks, will it?"...Welcome to my morning at ye olde bicycle shoppe. I charge $45. for a general tune-up, which includes cleaning, lubricating and adjusting of gears, brakes, cones, tire pressures and general alignment....parts are extra. This fee is twenty-five percent lower than most of my competition within a seventy mile radius of Chester.
I pass on dozens of free bikes every year (and have done so for the last twenty years), these would be still-operable bicycles that are dropped off at Bodfish Bicycles by folks who are leaving the area permanently (some people will do anything to avoid the twelve dollar fee charged at the waste transfer site for unwanted bikes). I want as many people on bicycles as possible in Northeastern California, a region better known for teenagers (and "manly men") in lifted four-wheel-drive over-powered pick-up trucks and Humvees.
It's not impossible, but it is difficult (and awkward) to mount a gun rack on a pedal-bike. A very large county with less than twenty thousand citizens, Plumas is hilly and many of the highways are narrow and heavy with logging trucks and other eighteen wheelers. Some day I believe the "meek" shall inherit the country lanes of America (you know, those on bicycles, motorcycles and in small electric cars).... when a gallon of diesel costs fourteen dollars and restaurants are selling their spent cooking oil for ten bucks a gallon.
Everybody wants a break when it comes to getting their bicycles back on the road, and I want them to get a break, but when they come in to me with a malfunctioning $200 "big box"purchased bicycle and want me to perform miracles for forty dollars...I just have to shake my head and send them away. Making a "living" at a small rural bicycle repair shop is not possible in this second decade of the 21st century... without a certain percentage of my visitors pulling out their checkbooks (or credit cards) to commit to one of the brand new bicycles that I've gambled on, in hopes that someone in my realm is willing to straddle, fall in love with and purchase... The goodwill that I've built by orchestrating a steady, consistent and honest business provides the momentum that keeps us afloat, but believe me, no one is getting rich here by showing up on Main Street every day.
I pass on dozens of free bikes every year (and have done so for the last twenty years), these would be still-operable bicycles that are dropped off at Bodfish Bicycles by folks who are leaving the area permanently (some people will do anything to avoid the twelve dollar fee charged at the waste transfer site for unwanted bikes). I want as many people on bicycles as possible in Northeastern California, a region better known for teenagers (and "manly men") in lifted four-wheel-drive over-powered pick-up trucks and Humvees.
It's not impossible, but it is difficult (and awkward) to mount a gun rack on a pedal-bike. A very large county with less than twenty thousand citizens, Plumas is hilly and many of the highways are narrow and heavy with logging trucks and other eighteen wheelers. Some day I believe the "meek" shall inherit the country lanes of America (you know, those on bicycles, motorcycles and in small electric cars).... when a gallon of diesel costs fourteen dollars and restaurants are selling their spent cooking oil for ten bucks a gallon.
Everybody wants a break when it comes to getting their bicycles back on the road, and I want them to get a break, but when they come in to me with a malfunctioning $200 "big box"purchased bicycle and want me to perform miracles for forty dollars...I just have to shake my head and send them away. Making a "living" at a small rural bicycle repair shop is not possible in this second decade of the 21st century... without a certain percentage of my visitors pulling out their checkbooks (or credit cards) to commit to one of the brand new bicycles that I've gambled on, in hopes that someone in my realm is willing to straddle, fall in love with and purchase... The goodwill that I've built by orchestrating a steady, consistent and honest business provides the momentum that keeps us afloat, but believe me, no one is getting rich here by showing up on Main Street every day.
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