Rentolo

The blog is lame of late. I've been too busy to type. Recycled & New Bicycles will be closed next week. I'm going on a long ride, Reno to Logan. I will try to give an update from the library in Austin, NV. If not, wish me luck and strong legs. It will be 700 miles in 6 days.

Easter Sunday

The seagulls waited
Circling, hungry, and watching
Alert for colors

They waited some more
They arrived four weeks ago
Gulls, sans calendars

The children brought eggs
Their parents and their parents
All with Paas hued eggs

Thousands of bright eggs
Blues, oranges, pinks, greens, purples
Easter hard boiled

They threw all their eggs
Down Old Main Hill, USU
A feast of color

I could not watch it
We ate eggs when I was young
Pearl Street, Trout River

They all drove away
Colorful shells on the grass
The seagulls moved in

A feast for seagulls
Yoke-billed and albumin filled
They left only shells

So I pedaled hard
All the way up McMurdie
Post-holing in snow

Up Pisgah Mountain
A stupid-hard long bike ride
They make me happy

Alone with Mother
Sagebrush wet in the snow melt
Nuthatches singing

The end of the road
After the last knee deep drifts
Egg shells on the ground

Some lone woods-person
Happily ate Easter eggs
For sunrise breakfast

Thank You

I got an email from Jasmine today. She lives far away, but reads my blog. I have friends in the UK, reading too. I just want to say thank you all for reading. And, I want to say thank you to my customers. I appreciate you all buying bicycles and trusting me to do your repairs. Recycled & New Bicycles is a very busy shop. There is no waiting list for repairs as of yet, but it's not far off. Thank you too, for your paitience. I have to go back to work now and build JH's new fixie.

Spring Returns, The Reviews Are In

I did a short ride on Sunday. The Logan-Smithfield Canal trail was nearly snow free. Not mud free, but it was nearly snow free. From Smithfield, I did the tour of Amalga (tour of the smelly dairy farms). The flooded Bear River floodplain was full of singing frogs. It's amazing how much greener the bottoms are compared to the benches. It gets whiter as you go up and greener as you go down.

Well, I've been flamed on mtbr.com. I guess that will teach me to yell at people and tell them to get out of the shop. I know, however, I will never change my ways. I sold over 100 new bikes last year and over 50 used bikes. I had a two month waiting list for repairs. "Second rate" they say. Fine with me. Don't come back. I've got plenty of happy customers. Especially the one's that get micro loans and free bikes. I've learned one thing about retail: you can't make them all happy.

Enough. I'm going to work. I have a lot of bikes to build.

Can I Do A Short Rant, Please?

Support you local bike shop. They probably have a lot of knowledge about bicycles and bicycle fit. It may cost a little more up front, but buying a bicycle from a professional will save you money and discomfort in the long run.

Yesterday, I got this call:

"Hey, it's Ringo, I'm a friend of John. I came in there, oh, about a month ago looking for a triathlon bike for my wife. Yeah, I pumped you for information for a half hour, and well, I bought her a bike on EBay. She does not like the bars. It has shifters on the end. Do you have any cheap used bars, you know, road bars. I also need brake/shift levers. I want Ultegra or 105 level stuff. Do you have those cheap or used?"

I lost it. I told him to go look on the Internet for cheap parts and hung up on him.

I never got to tell him that new 105 levers would cost $279, a good bar $79, a stem for proper position (different than time trial bar position) $59, new bar wrap $12, plus $80 labor to take the old stuff off, put the new stuff on, wrap the bars, and adjust the derailleurs and brakes. I knew what his reaction would be. Could you imagine if I had said this:

"Yes sir, it will be another $509 to make your cheap EBay bike ride like a normal bike. By the way, does the bike fit?"

Bottom line: Find a local bike shop run by a professional you can trust (if all you see are teenagers, walk out). Listen to the professional when they tell you to buy a $520 entry level road bike that can be used for everyday riding and that anticipated triathlon. Listen to them when they talk about bike fit and function.

Never mind. You have EBay and Google.

Tour De Gainesville Video, 2008

Here is the updated version, with music. Saturday is the 2009 version. If I had a magic carpet and a time turner I would show up for this year's roll out. Ding.

Tour de Gainesville 2008 from Lindsay Levkoff on Vimeo.