Dude, Where’s My Giant Foam Thumb?

It’s the if-then philosophical algebraic method of cycling.  If you don’t have a spare tube and air, then carry a cell phone.  If you don’t have a cell phone, then ride with friends who do.  If you don’t have any friends…uh…you should either have two Nike’s or a giant foam thumb sticking out of your jersey pocket.

Occasionally I ride with Dude.  Dude’s cool and a steady strong heads up rider.  Dude is new to town and lives in an adjacent neighborhood.  Dude and I aren’t Facebook besties.  Dude doesn’t feed my cats when I go on vacation.  I don’t know Dude’s full story.  Our conversation has never went past paceline pleasantries.  I don’t have Dude’s number nor know his address.  He doesn’t know mine.  We’re like barbell friends, on the opposite ends of the same group ride.  I show up when I need a moderately paced civil ride.  He shows up when he wants to ride with familiar faces.  I’ve been the new dude, dropped between Loveland and Morrow my first year in town and sympathize. 

Dude’s hamstrings and quads are big enough to be featured on the sale poster at the cannibal neighborhood deli.  Friends on the ride marvel at his beef sticks.  Nicknames like Dude-asaurus Rex and Hamhock don’t even come close.  The legs of his shorts should be reinforced with Kevlar.  After a recent ride, he may consider running a motorcycle chain. 

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I equate riding in Northern Kentucky like this.  Take a piece of paper.  Crumple it up in a ball.  Unwad it and there you have a topographical map of NKY.  On your typical everyday Northern Kentucky riser, Dude got up on the pedals, took two stabs and the chain snapped.  Pop.  We turned to see Dude doing the top tube dance of death.  Putting a foot down, he saved it without injury.

“Anybody got a chain tool,” someone asked.

Silence.

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5 riders, an hour and a half from home and no one has a chain tool nor a spare pin nor a quick link.  In our defense, 4 of 5 don’t have the legs to break a chain.  To be sure there wasn’t a pin rattling around somewhere, we checked our saddle bags.  Nope.

“Dude, you got anyone you can call for a ride?”

Nope.

Dude’s new to town, living single in the city.  We’re his friends.  We’re all here.  So we did what any good riding buddies would do.  We left him.

Well not really.  Being at least an hour’s walk from the nearest intersection with a stop light or anything you could remotely call a town, we advised him to sit tight on this tiny road in Nowheresville, KY.  In two hours one of us would come back in a car to pick him up. 

“Dude.  What’s your cell phone number, so we can call and find you when we’re on the way back with the car?”

“I don’t have a cell phone on me.”  Dude quickly added, “Who am I gonna call?”

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We desparately held back the dumb found looks.  He’s serious.  Who’s he gonna call?  Dude was so matter of fact about it.  I tried to wrap my head around the fact that, if it wasn’t for us, he was completely prepared to walk home, like it was no big deal.  We figured he was at least 27 miles or a brisk six hour walk from home in bike shoes, 90 degree weather, with one water bottle.  Dude started asking about the fastest route back by foot.  If that’s what had to be done, he would’ve done it. 

Thankfully, another dude on the ride had enough time in his Sunday schedule to run back out in the car to save Dude’s day.  The thing is, and Dude specified before we pedaled off, Dude didn’t want a ride.  He asked for either a spare chain or the tools to fix it with.  That’s exactly what happened.  After sitting in spandex at the side of the rural NKY road for two hours not looking out of place at all, another dude drove back fixed Dude’s chain and Dude rode home.  

Hoarders: Extreme Water Bottle Edition

The ones I could see, I counted.  2-4-6.  15-17-19.  28-30-32.  Wedged into the plastic bin on the pantry shelf, next to the liquor in the fridge-top cabinet, lined like stout soldiers in front of the cookbooks we possess enough water bottles to outfit a pro tour team for a Hors Category stage of the Tour De France.  44-46-48.  With 6 more in the dishwasher and 4 on the drying rack, I can’t believe what my wife said the other night after a teammate kiddingly scolded her for not having team water bottles on her bike.  Joe takes all the good water bottles.  Who me?

Granted, I do have a habit of leaving two or three rolling around the inside of my 4-Runner at any given moment.  Maybe there are 2 in the bedroom and another pair in my backpack.  On a hunch, I bet there’s a couple on the workbench in the garage.  Oh yeah, there might be 4 I left in the dumbwaiter…yes we have a tall house and a dumb waiter…and okay, I confess, she’s right.  We have 55 or more water bottles in the house and somehow we’re still short on “good bottles.”  WTF?

Having “good” bottles is as key to the bike outfit as a nice watch or matching shoes for a work dinner.  She’s right.  They’re not all “good” bottles.  Some are leaky.  However, I can never remember which ones.  The blue ones look too patriotic on the red and white bike.  A half dozen are still pristine, but not from our team sponsor shop BioWheels…can’t use those on group rides or we’ll get teased by teammates.  Others are lame with flimsy tops.  Small bottles are good for lap races, but not all-day rides.  At least a dozen have mis-matched tops.  The Hydrapak Gel-bot is cool and works fantastic, but if I ever start worrying about nutrition while riding the cruiser bike to the grocery store, please, hit me over the head with a garden shovel.

I’m on my tippy toes.  I know there’s some on that top shelf that I can’t see and that shelf is at least 2 ½ feed deep.  I’m up to 55.  Enough bottles that, for the next month or two on any day-to-day two hour group ride, I could toss them like a pro tour rider over the hedgerows when I empty one.  However, I don’t think property owners along Route 8 in Northern Kentucky would appreciate my souvenir. 

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Hoarders is on TV.  If you’ve seen one episode, you’ve seen them all.  Crazy old coot grows an emotional attachment to what appears to be garbage, crazy old coot’s family steps in and throws away the garbage, crazy old coot rebels but surrenders, crazy old coot and family cry and hug in the newly cleaned house.  Dear Oprah, Tom Cruise and little baby Jesus please help me from being a water bottle hoarder.  I’m still young.  In ten, twenty or thirty years I don’t want people to walk by our house and marvel at the multi colored objects stacked 3 feet high in our window sills. 

Still I can’t make myself part with them.  I won that one for placing 5th in my age group at a sport level mountain bike race eight years ago honey!  I’m protective about them.  With my trusty black Sharpie, I label them with our last name so teammates, friends and strangers named Joe at races and rides don’t mistakenly take them.  How absurd is that!  You probably have more than us.  No you say.  Count ‘em up!  Don’t be scared.  See.  See!  Hoarder hoarder new bottles on order!  

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PRINT your incredibly handsome Flat Joe Biker from this Flickr link or above image.  Click and print the page.

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In the meantime, visit the Road ID website and see all the great things you can get for $35.  From Firefly safety lights and laces to Road ID Wrist ID’s and accessories, you’ll find something you can use.  It’s more than an ID.  Your Road ID can list emergency contact information, even a note to take care of your pets if you get into trouble.  Now get out there and have some fun with Flat Joe Biker and Road ID.  Special thanks to James Billiter for Flat Joe Biker artwork.