235: operation volcano

So there is this nasty stomach virus going around the office. A number of folks I work with were out with it this week. Basic symptoms are 24-48 hours of jammed up stomach, during which at some point there is some violent vomiting and diarrhea.

So it was with great joy that I woke up Thursday with a stomach in distress, which pretty much continued through out the day. I spoke to monkey, she told me to take it easy, talked to the coach, who said the same thing, no sense burying myself if I'm on the edge of getting sick, and crossing over the line.

Thursday, I was very careful what I ate, lots of tea, lots of bland, no dairy, no fruit, no coffee, nothing that I though could upset stomach and cause a eruption.

Today, Today however was a different story. I awoke with the same distressed stomach, and might add that I have had the most vicious gas ever over the past two days. When I got to work my co-worker asked me, "any eruption yet?" to which I responded, "nope."

However, today I am taking a different approach, as this is a 24-48 hour thing, and I appear to be in the final half of that, if I'm gonna erupt, I want it to happen and get it behind me. SO today, I have been eating dairy, chocolate, lots of coffee, a spicy cheesy quesadilla, and a donut (so far). All in the hopes that if I am going to erupt, that I can get it over with....

I hope that every hour without said eruption the closer I am to getting rid of this boo boo belly...

let's hope for the best.

I was off the bike again today. The Baker's dozen is not that far away on the horizon, and truthfully I'm a little freaked out. This is the time when I need to be doing exactly what I am not doing, which is ride the bike, not the couch. Factor in the past two days have been 60 degrees and it has not been to good for my mental health.

I was pretty stoked to find these sweet pink fuzzy dice in the mail today, compliment of the Queen of Rock herself. Hell, who cares if I didn't get to ride, I have the fucking sweetest pink fuzzy dice hanging from my mirror now! Thanks Anne!

Well, I'm off to throw some more stuff into the volcano and see if I can't cause that eruption that everyone has been telling me about...

thanks for reading

respect

fm

234: of donuts, and flat tires...

When I was a youth unequivocally my favorite donut was the Boston Crèam. Chocolate on the top, custard filling- not quite as sweet as an eclair, but still a tasty treat. Post College, I had a tryst with the French twist. Although it never really took the place of the Boston Crèam in my heart, it was often the second donut of choice. So, on a two donut day, I’d start with the Boston Crèam, and close out with the lighter, more textured French Twist.

About a year ago the apple fritter (pictured here) became my favorite donut.

It is far more voluminous, often has chucks of apple in it, and oh so tasty. For the record, my preference is from the Giant Grocery bakery across the street from my work, or from Bing’s Bakery in Newark. The Duncan Donut Apple Fritter has a hollow taste, and while decent, is unsatisfying. The $1.75 apple fritter from Starbucks is a totally joke. Overpriced, under flavored- save your money…

But I digress, recently, I discovered a donut that I have not seen anywhere except for the bakery at the Grocery across the street from work. The Croissant Donut. The donut is shaped like a croissant, light, airy and flaky like the croissant, but somehow sweeter, and tastier. Larger in size and weight than the traditional donut, but not as voluminous as the apple fritter. So more filling, but not too filling. Lately, this has been my donut of choice. I also believe that because I haven’t seen this option at any other bakeries, that it makes this donut that much more special. I like to imagine it is the creation of our mad grocery baker. Has anyone ever seen these anywhere else?

Perhaps a product of my recent donut affair, my karma seemed pretty ugly as I slipped out for a ride this morning…

So I was out the door this morning at 6:00am. My helmet light would guide the way. Sure I hadn’t charged it this week, but it’s good for 3 hours of burn time, and I only rode 2 hours last week, I should be fine. 15 minutes later I find myself in the woods in the dark, at 6:15 am.

Curses.

Not to be dissuaded, the trails were frozen and really fun, so I decided to do the “jedi” and ride in the dark, which really wasn’t too bad as dawn was breaking and it really was kinda beautiful out there.

While ripping down a super fun down hill I felt a little saggy in the rear. Sure enough I had a flat tire. 6:34am, I am standing in the heart of the park at least 3 miles from anywhere and I have a flat tire. Because I have my tires set up with “Stan's no flat”, I don’t have a tube to change the flat. Know why I set my tires up with Stan's? Because I hate getting flats, and I hate carrying an extra tube.

Curses Foiled again.

Needless to say, it was a long, grumpy ride on a flat tire back to civilization

Further inspection would show that I had tore the sidewall in two places causeing my flat. Have to hit the tire pile in the basement and see what I can come up with...

here's hoping for a better ride soon...

respect
fatmarc

233: let me be your let down

As if getting my fat, old ass handed to me on every ride I go on isn’t enough, now my dog is punking me.

Riley now refuses to go into his crate in the morning. I tell him to get in the "house" and he just sits down at the doorway and stares at me. Layla the destroyer is safe in her crate curled up at the back sleeping. Riley on the other hand just sits there in front of the crate starring at me.

I tell him to get in, and he stares me down.

It is as if he is saying, “screw you dude, I’m 8 years old- that's 56 in dog years. I don’t get into stuff, my days of garbage diving or gutting pillows days are far behind me. I’m gonna get up on that bed right over there, and I’m gonna sleep. You, you should go ahead and get your ass off to work.”
Frankly, I am weak, tired and slow. Fine Riley you win, I am so weak.

Bilson, JHIII, Rotten, Dennisbike, Monkey and I headed out for a little ride today. It was fun.

Monkey and I dropped off the main group for the final stretch. If you have ever ridden or taken part in an athletic event with your significant other for any extended period of time, you know sometimes the conversations in the heat of battle are less than civil.

Monkey and I had a couple of those exchanges today. In hindsight it's pretty funny. It was a very good ride. In the heat of the moment, I thought she had a bad attitude, she thought I was being an asshole. We were probably both right. Thankfully, it was all smiles as we crested Big Elk Chapel road and headed for home...

A while ago there was a rumor that we were going to take out our kitchen and put in a new sauna. No truth to that rumor, although we have done our fair share of bike wrenching in our kitchen as of late.

Our world is a scary little place sometimes...

respect

fm

232: observation

Here is an observation on the local trail systems:

The trail systems that are the most engineered, the ones that have been grated, and approved and praised by everyone, and have been developed so anyone can ride them take the worst beating.

I have a theory about that. First the trails that are less engineered, or were even originally scab trail, most came to existence because people where using the trail to get from one place to another. That or the trail was a farm path, or was made to be hearty. They have roots, and rocks and other natural features that hold the trail together. Frankly these features also keep the system from being a network of dirt sidewalks.

From my observations, the systems in our area that are the least engineered, the least “paved” are the ones that hold up best to tough weather.

I’d also point out that the over engineered trail system attract a number of people to the system who normally would stay away or at least avoid a tougher more hearty trail system:

First new guys (newbies) who don’t realize that it’s a bad idea to be on the trails after a rain, or when the trails have thawed out. There are days when riding the trail at 7:00am is fine, but by 9:00 when it’s thawed it’s totally inappropriate. For the record you really only get to play the newbie card for a month or so then you become one of the other groups.

The second group of destroyers is the guys who think it’s fun to roost up the trails (morons).

The third type are the guys who realize that there is this sweet totally engineered easy trail system down in Delaware and they have been planning on riding for weeks, so they are going no matter what the weather is. That or they don’t want to have to leave too early, so if we start the ride at 11:00, who really cares, it’s not our trails.. (idiots).

Finally are the guys that know better, that have probably done some trail work in their time that have been around, but are so self-important and selfish that they just don’t give a shit. Worst case they are often racers and if anyone sees them out there all racers take a black eye. (fuckin’ dicks).

So now you have this totally engineered trail system, with no roots, or rocks to hold the soil in place, everyone and their brother thinks it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread, except when the conditions get a little nasty, and you end up having some newbies, morons, idiots, and fuckin’ dicks out just destroying the place. How great is that system of dirt sidewalks now? Build a system that any newbie, moron, idiot, fuckin’ dick can ride, and well, they will.

What is a brother to do?

Nothing. Write a blog about the absurdity of it all.

Oh, and the horses at fairhill? Are you kidding me? No one at fairhill can really complain about anyone riding when the trails are wet after what the damn horses did to the place on that warm February weekend. I would never even consider cancelling a race there if I promoted it. The destruction from the horses will take months to smooth out. And the poor equestrians are oblivious to what they are doing. It's not in their culture at all. It’s just silly.

You know I used to get really upset about it. A while ago, I basically said, “fuck it, it’s the cycle of trails, happens every year, I'm not wasting my energy on it…” I just accept it as the cycle. The same thing happens every year. Life is better for me like that, for too short to be angry every time you drive by the parking lot and see it full of horse vans, or trucks with empty bike racks.

This is another reason why I’d rather volunteer at races, or give back to the sport through avenues other than frankly smacking my head against a brick wall.

Truth is, I ride my mountain bike a fraction of what I used to, and when I do, I prefer the more hearty trail systems to the over engineered. Hell, whilst riding one of the scab systems recently, which has held up quite well thank you, Ted Logic was making fun of an ugly line that I took, and I responded, “dude, I wouldn’t even describe myself as a mountain biker anymore, the fact that I didn’t crash there was a huge victory for me!!” we both laughed…

Wait until the "friends" chase us out of there the dirt sidewalk network. Oh, the irony.

Respect
Fatmarc

231: Bad Economics

Bad Economics:

½ priced Nachos at local college bar: $5
Adding chicken for a little extra kick: $1
Two glasses of water with lemon: $0
Parking for 1 hour: $.75
Tip for the very nice, but not so cute waitress: $3

Total expense for dinner: $9.75

Dinner Economics= Success.

Parking Ticket because of slow service due to lots of college kids liking ½ priced nachos: $15

Total Cost of Dinner: $24.75

Dinner Economics= FAIL.

With the trails kinda being crap this week, Dennisbike, La La, Jebalicous and I headed out for a little urban ride around the university and the greater center of the universe. We got in a little over an hour and had a great time. Sometimes carving the mountain bike around concrete corners can result in unexpected smiles. While I'll admit I was pretty tired and not stoked about an urban ride heading out, very quickly a perma-grim was plastered to my face as we noodled our way around the center of the universe.

One stop was in Brian's office/lab.

later we hit this sweet bank.

then some dude tried to pick me up.

err.. I threw myself at him?

it was a pretty outstanding evening.

respect

fatmarc

230.5: Update

hypothetically speaking.

Taking the advise and philosophy of the commenters on post, I contacted the promoter this morning. The promoter contacted me back with in minutes.

The puncher DID NOT register for the race, but was entered by the promoter to cover an entry from last season. The promoter will be removing him form the race today.

I have pulled down my previous post. I wasn't sure what to do, but pretty much unanimously folks felt I should act, I did.

In the end, I am somewhat relieved that the puncher didn't register, and that he isn't deviously trying to slip into races. This restores my faith....

my apologies to the puncher for assuming the worst in this situation.

thanks again, Matt, E-town, Soupie, Jim, and Bilson for your speedy input.

respect
fm

229: DEVO

This weekend Zach, my C3-Sollay.com cross teammate, brought to town the Fast Forward Racing Productions Junior Development Team for a little training camp hosted by the Bohnson/Webber Clan.

I have already long been impressed with the level head, and vision that Zach brings to the table. The way he pulled the team together, and frankly having these camps has served the team well two fold. First the riders are getting some great training in, second from a team building standpoint, tucking everyone together in one house, eating, sleeping, goofing off together is pretty incredible.It's times like these when I truly admire Zach and think to myself, man for a 19 year old kid, he's really got a grasp on things. Then he buys fireworks and I am reminded that as much as he gets it, he's still got some jackass in him. Which is probably why I love him.

With Jake helping to steer the ship, and the cast they have assembled, it's going to be pretty impressive to watch what these guys can do this year...

Although ideally the plan was to have some really good moutain bike rides this weekend, the warm weather made the trails mush. Anyone riding any of the trail systems in our Delaware area this weekend was the devil, and truly a selfish. But I digress.

Rotten, Jan, Bilson, Monkey and I were privileged enough to be invited to tag along and ride with the FFRP team this weekend. It was pretty awesome. The turkey point loop is one of my favorites, and it's always great to have a team of junior riders to push me over the hills when I am cracking, or trying to climb in general.

Tom drove sag wagon, let me tellyou it didn't suck to be struggling up a climb and have him pull up along side of you and hand you a freshly baked cookie. "here, you look like you need to eat, here's a cookie..." I can't climb, but in a climbing and cookie eating contest, I might be the horse to bet on...

Following the ride we all chilled out at the Bohnson/Webber clan enjoyed some vegetarian chili and a nice sandwich. We talked a lot of smack. Perhaps funniest of all was when all the kids gathered around the computer and used the internerd for what it was truly intended: looking at porn. Okay not really, the kids were sharing powertap files, and seeing who had the biggest output from the morning ride. These guys are totally into it.

I understand Auer is planning the same camp of C3-Sollay just before cross. You know the entire C3 cross team, there's only 40 of us, under one roof. What could go wrong?

Saturday night I met up with Sam, Elk, Buddy, Liz and Robert at Go Vertical in Philly. It was a lot of fun. Good climbing for sure. Great company, and awesome dinner. I want to get back up there and climb again very soon.

Sunday we loaded up the car with old frames and other wonderful product to sell and headed for the Westminster Stop, Swap and Save.

I had never been to a swap meet before, and it was a very interesting time. I did not manage to sell my Spot or my Fisher frame, but Crazy Fatmarc is slashing prices, if you have an interest, I'm ready to make a deal. It was great seeing my teammates Norman and Kennedy who I hadn't seen in a little while.Following the swap meet we had a really mellow ride with our C3-Sollay teammates around a nice loop. It was fun.

Despite the mellow paced ride, the highlight of the day for me was getting my sweet pimpy new road shoes and having Auer have them molded to my feet! That experience was a little weird, I won't lie, I'm not sure I loved it, but I do love the shoes! Pimpalicious...

It was a fun weekend. Monkey and crammed in as much fun as we could into two days. Now I need to go back to work so I can recover.

thanks for reading.

respect

fatmarc

228: eighteen

Today is the eighteenth anniversary of the first time Monkey and I went on a date.

In the morning of our first date we went to the university and bought books, and then went to McDonald's where I only had enough money to get myself a burger, and didn't get her anything. (I was super smooth).

Later that night we went to see Awakenings with Robert Deniro and Robin Williams. Not the best first date movie, but what the hell. For the record I did pick up that tab. I didn't see the book purchase as part of the date. You live, you learn.

This fall will be our 10th wedding anniversary. We actually celebrate our dating anniversary more than our wedding if that makes any sense. Actually who cares, it works for us...

It hasn't always been easy. We have worked very hard at our relationship over the years. Diane is my best friend in the world, and I am incredibly lucky to have her in my life. We grew through a lot together: rotten apartments, Ramon noodles, yellow enveloped electric bills and bad haircuts. Wouldn't trade a moment of it for anything.

I'm gonna defer to Norman Cook this morning.

"we've come a long, long way together, through the hard times and the good, I have to celebrate you baby, I have to praise you like I should..."

love you monkey.

respect
fm

227: thanks for the love man...

So lets pretend for a second that some Jackass race promoter told you that if you could wear the cow wristband that they required for entry into the staging area at their race for a year, he would give you free entry to the next year's race, could you do it?

Well, James C of Landenberg, Pa is right on track to making this mission a success. Here is an updated photo of James's cow wrist band.

Only Three Month's to go!

You know I have to say I’m having a pretty good week in the blogworld.

I enjoy blogs, I love sharing the stories of the adventures or non adventures I get to stumble through, almost as much as I love reading other folks tell their stories and share their experiences.

I have enjoyed writing this blog also as a means to capture things that happen in my life. It’s fun sometimes to look back a year or two and see where my head was, or what I was thinking about.

Part of my character is that I love to tell stories and share experiences. The blog model has been a great forum for me.

In the past couple of weeks I have gotten a couple of really nice emails from folks I don’t know complimenting the blog, saying things like fatmarc.com is motivating and inspirational. My jaw kinda hit the ground.

I started my blog so I could stop spamming my teammates and friends on our email listserves with ride reports and other jackassery we got into. Gwadzilla was my gateway drug dealer.

The blog was a much better platform for me to share stories. I found other ways to spam my friends, (like questions of the week for instance. )

For a while my blog served as a platform for sponsorship. I’ll admit, I didn’t really like when it went that way. In fact it almost killed the blog for me. When folks commented that teams only wanted me because of the blog, I felt kinda sick to my stomach.

But I changed it. It is what I want it to be, and now I get to blog when I feel like I have something to say, or not say.

I recognize that my focus has evolved from single speeds, and endurance racing to an obsessive focus on cross. In doing so I pretty much alienated my audience: Frankly, I haven’t paid all that much attention to the volume that the blog gets anymore. That was nice to know when I tried to leverage it for sponsors. As I mentioned that almost killed it for me.

I enjoy writing fatmarc, and at some level it allows my parents and in laws , who I don’t see enough of to have a window of what is going on in my life. I felt like if folks out there are still enjoying what I put out that was pretty cool too, if no one is reading, well I enjoy writing it...

It is something that makes me happy and allows me in some sick, sad way to express myself.

I guess it's the adult version of the skate zine's Mike Brevoort and I put out as kids (Damn the Defiant and Jabberwocky) For the record I always though Jabberwocky would be a great name for a bike team.

My intent has been to be funny, share a sliver of my life, and to have a chance to tell stories.

Telling stories is essential to who I am, and one of the things I get out of cycling. It just seems a ride is always an adventure, and races always create 100 stories for a 100 different people. I love that part of the game.

I am also lucky to be surounded by a lot of really funny people who are great story tellers. Peaches, who does not have a blog, might be the best. I swear I want to write a book with that guy some day. But there I go digressing again.

James and Jill both had very kind words about the blog, and I appreciate them taking the time to drop me a line.

I am humbled.

Thanks for reading and letting me share my experiences.

respect
fm

No Duponts were hurt in the creation of this blog.

226: that dutch bitch!

That sentiment and many more colorful ones came spewing out as members of the DCCoD huddled in Jan's living room watched the women's pro championship unfold.

Clearly we are all homers and were cheering for Katie, but any of us would have been okay with watching Hanka take the win. At least she raced to win. Vos, well Vos raced a great race. She sat in and took the sprint. Essentially Vos made Hanka and Katie do all the work, and never saw the front until she hit the finish line. Dutch Bitch.

Incredibly exciting race, with a totally heartbreaking finish. Of course we are all very proud of KC, and the race was by far the most exciting of the weekend.

Perhaps the best footage of the weekend was the podium where it looked like Hanka and KC were gonna take Vos around back to the woodshed and teach her some manners.

At the finish I was so shook up for a second, I had to put down my high life and my donut.

again, a hell of a race, lots of fun to watch.

Saturday, went on a ride with these guys.

I should say that really I watched them climb away from me all day as I was just awful Saturday morning. Don't know if it was because it was my first ride on the roadbike outside in like 6 months, or if I was just tired, or damn... I was rode horribly. Luckily, I had a great group of folks with me, and I still had a lot of fun. (thanks Meatball, Hardy,Buddy the keg breaker, Jan, Bilson, and KidChris)

Thank god I don't have to be fast until September

Great Job Katie!

respect

fm