This here is CP, and a box of beer.

This past Sunday found the two of us lazing around Oakland, with no particular destination to speak of. In a fit of habitual inspiration, we picked up a twelver and rolled to Dunkans house for some porch sitting and some world-going-by-watching. Well, eventually our host had to depart, leaving us behind with locked doors and full bladders. In a fit of creativity, I entered a thick strand of immense leafy foliage in which I could relieve myself in relative privacy, however, upon emerging from my secret spot, I came to realize that my urine stream had been deflected by one of those big leafs and re-directed onto my pant leg.

My significantly better half laughed when recounting a conversation wed had before I left recently to Minneapolis. "How many pairs of pants are you bringing?" she asked. "One.." I said defiantly. "Im not going to need any more than that."
"You should bring two.. You know.. In case you pee on a pair.."
"Thats rediculous", I thought.
Though the issue never came up while in the Midwest, it looks like her foresight trumped mine yet again.

This should however, stand as testament to just how badass our JMac knickers are. You can piss all over yourself and not even know it until its too late.

Ok now, check this out. Our friend Dylan has recently been hand crafting some really amazing leather goods, such as this wallet he made for me;

Now it should go without saying that Im an absolute sucker for handmade stuff, especially when said stuff is made by the hands of friends. It should also go without saying that as soon as I payed for this wallet, I had no money left to put into it, but thats neither here nor there. He came into the office a few weeks later to show off an apron he had finished for a friend who is a metal worker.

Take note that these are painstakingly hand cut, hand sewn and hand tooled. He is an absolute craftsmen in every sense of the word, from these items all the way up to his custom built choppers. Should any of our metal fabricator friends find themselves in the market for say, a custom welding vest for example, contact us and well lay Dylans email address on you.
Guaranteed, youll be the first, and only one on your block to sport one.

On Monday, a reader posted a comment saying that Id had several weak posts up here as of late, and as I responded, I welcome all forms of criticism as long as its constructive. Further more, I openly invite folks to contribute whatever they like for this device. While I am responsible for nearly all of the content that you enjoy here (or in his case do not necessarily enjoy), ultimately, I am merely the moderator, so if there are points or topics you feel as though Im overlooking, then please by all means take the opportunity to contribute to distance this from being 'my' thing, to 'our' thing.
Thank you for your time and consideration on this matter.

Anyhow, as I eluded to earlier, I spent the weekend in Oakland to take care of a long neglected laundry list of spiritually nourishing activities. I kicked things off right on Friday evening by having dinner with friends and then adjourning to a newish bar called The Trappist that is run by high grade beer nerds who specialize in hand crafted Belgian brews. Three deliciously intriguing samples later and I was on my ear.

Thats what I get for becoming accustomed to my regular brand of swill, but regardless, drinking my face off was one activity that was on my list, so I was able to scratch that off.
At least until the next day.

The following morning, Skinny Bee and I went on a 'blue flame burning' adventure through the hills and valleys to the East;

While I am of the opinion that man truly cant survive on bread alone, and I would probably kill myself if I was forever strictly confined to road riding, the loop in question reminds me that spinning along on a seemingly endless ribbon of tarmac can truly elevate your spirits straight to the heavens.

But despite my feelings, El Gato shared some concern;

"Stevil,

I am concerned that your injuries have led your psyche to become so dark, so twisted, that you are actually rationalizing the joys of road biking. Good lord man, what's next, a heart rate monitor, nay even a Power Tap??

I offer you three ways to avoid the bummer life that;
1) make use of your recent Pilates core work,
2) are devoid of significant impact on your carpal bones, and
3) help you make good use of the by product of brewed goods, Belgian or otherwise, .

El Gato"

No heart rate monitors yet, but I did incessantly yell at Bee to hold his line, complained that he wasnt putting forth enough of an effort, and then when we were climbing, Id put my hand on his shoulder (to get a sneaky pull) and let him know that the team was really proud of him for all of his hard work.

Oh, and even though its a stupid car ad, that first clip reminded me a bit of this;

Anyhow, upon our return to civilization, and while still wearing our stretchy pants and tap shoes, we supremely bummed out the clientele with a visit to the tattoo shop.
Of course our friends who own the shop were pleased as punch to see us, regardless of how clowny we looked, but your average hardened tattoo shop customer just doesnt understand the form fitting superhero costumes, and I cant really say as I blame them.
Then we stopped by to see Sam and Miss MacKay at Manifesto who regardless of how busy they are, always welcome a visit.

Though again our appearance threw the fixed gear crowd that congregates there into a puzzled funk.

Not wanting to subject anymore innocent bystanders to our particular choice of fashion, we returned home to get cleaned up, and begin a whole new evening of cocktails, dinner, friends and hijinx.

So after all was said and done, the score stands as such;
Me- 1. The bummer life- 0.
And thats just the way I like it.

It should also be noted that apparently, as of Sunday, cross season is upon us as I saw no fewer than 25 individuals all aboard their skinny and knobby tired beauties. Upon running into Gina Hall at some point, she mentioned that it was probably because it was a foggy morning, and almost above just about anybody, Id suspect shed know for sure.

Enough about my life though..Howzabout we dip into the mail bag?

This from CZ;

"Hey- We had some visitors this weekend, I believe you are familiar with them.

There was a lot of antics including a skid-comp. The Residude showed us a cupla tricks.

How many drunks does it take to pour a beer.

Gene wins the skid comp.

We did a shop ride on Sat. Hit some dirt, busted Hurl and Brauer out of the prison camp, then went for a dip at Bare-ass Beach.

Later we stumbled over to Cuzzys where we ran into Stanley Kowalski and his brother. Then it was all over and someone left some stuff behind. Thought you may enjoy some photos of the tomfoolery. - CZ"

Again, I reiterate- The Minneapolis Mafia-1. The Bummer life- 0.

It would appear as though the bummer life has taken a sound ass whompin' lately.

From CFO- You know what has two thumbs and loves Jim Potter?

This guy;

And now to continue, A a r o n writes;

"Stevil, I went to the EUG and man, i had a great week ..then, dig tha attached flight #.....

guess what, it was delayed...!

then what? well, flight 7949 from Denver to teh STL...was also delayed...flat on take off, then flaps stuck, then on emegency landing the left wheel caught fire and they sprayed us down with foam. shitty pic attached of that.

12 hours later via CHI o'hare and sleeping in Denver airport, we got home.

back to the desk,

å"

So I was able to wrap my addled mind around the flight number photo and the foam all over the plane photo, but Ill be damned if I can figure out the sand dune number, but then again, in all truth I havent really explored very much of the Denver airport, so its entirely possible that I just missed the part of its interior that is full of sunny, windswept beaches.

Moustache 'winner' Waggle writes;

"Hey in regards to that video of the sloth on the latest blog and the scene where he's drinking on the beach... i saw an episode on the discovery channel where it explained that sloths move so slowly because they eat these fermented berries non-stop so in effect they are drunk all the time. this is no lie. i'm going to find a source and prove this. there was a whole episode about drunk animals."

Ive seen that episode and I have to say, it does my heart good to know Im not the only one one the animal kingdom with a penchant for the grape and grain..

Well, I dont know about you all, but Im pretty satisfied with this latest post. It encompassed the thrill of victory as well as the agony of (peeing on) de feet...
It had tales of planes burning, bikes breaking, Gene bleeding, monkeys drinking, and Sams Van Halen shirt.

I mean come on.. in my world of consistant mediocrity, this was damn near perfection.

Also, I shouldnt neglect to offer credit and a humble thanks to Joe for the amazing fruit of his eye as this weeks header shot. More of his dazzling photos can and should be found here.

And just for the hell of it, heres a shot of Big Dave and Bigger Dave;

We hope that everyone has a stupendous kick off for the week, and can hold on tight till were able do it all over again, again.