Feeling Testy

Last night's edition of FT3 began with a bit of confusion as there were some back channel communications regarding B's roll up and NoCar's request for a Valero pick to Xteric that were not communicated via blog to the larger group of participants. Thus the Mosquito lot departure was slightly delayed, no matter, Newb and I still were the first to arrive at the Knott Lot anyway (now that we have completed the housekeeping items, let's get on with some serious ride reporting). Mosquito lot departure was also delayed by a send off from our own Green Fro who was rocking the recently broken-frame-repaired-Masi-fixed-gear-with-the- hub-flipped-to- 'single speed freewheel' option, and an Unknown Local walk-by with the full fam.

Newb and I arrived and began a belated celebration of his recent 'coming of age' with a Guinness Draught just as the sprinkles of rain became consistent. Appropriately and consistent with new FT3 bylaws he was toting some extra 'weight' in his pack as well. Upon arrival of Xteric, NoCar, and a spirited Charlie dog we further distributed Guinness Draught and began mosh pitting to Wynona's Big Brown Beaver by Primus. It is notable here that this was the first time Newb had heard Primus, which means that New Mexico is not really part of the west coast because Primus is a west coast institution, either that or he is from South Africa. Speaking of 'wes coast', just then B rolled up and began pumping out 80's rap and set the tone for the evening. Charlie dog  took off and NoCar chased him. Once we had appropriately donned our foul weather attire, and Charlie took off and NoCar chased him again, he was finally put in the truck and we were cleared for departure. Oh, but whoops... NoCar forgot his helmet. He was provided with a knit cap and swore with honor to ride safely ...and we carefully departed the Knott lot. We headed out the back and across Sly Park Road and dropped the horse trail, lights off. We headed over the dam for a CCW lake loop. Newb launched an effort to take over ride leadership, but I would have none of it, in spite of his recent 'coming of age' I am still nearly 10 years his elder. Near the east end of the lake we took an extra loop near the Larz-back entrance, then began our long journey up Larz-back, which may need to be re-named Larz-come-back or Larz-gone, or Larz-has-awesome-arms, depending on what the group really thinks.

While climbing NoCar indicated that he thinks we should publicly sell FT3 kits, as he is of little hope that we would really actually sell a lot of them, and I suggested we should develop a spotter jersey with a simple FT3 logo and that we should create a blog where we would post photos of riders we see wearing that jersey. Alas I was chided for not blogging and thusly I am writing this ride report. Neither of these discussion items were tabled for further discussion, rather it was just banter to pass the time as the rain continued to fall and the trail began to get sloppy. Then, Gangsta's Paradise started thumpin on B's speaker and I started to announce that we were about to pass a location where NoHandle had previously crashed and a gangsta from a different gang threw a stick in my front wheel and I straight went over the handle bars and the stick straight jammed me straight in the groin area. I was straight cut off mid sentence and the stick barely missed the more important parts of my male anatomy. Once back up and  happy to be 'with jewels' I began to describe the location where the stick jammed me which is in the location where it is possible to 'tuck' the testy into a pocket of skin. This tucking is something the Shaolin Monks have mastered in years of training, view the vid below for a demonstration of their amazing skill. We continued to climb and climb and once to Park Creek the ground was fully saturated and mud was splattering and sticking to tires. We pressed on to the end of Park Creek, so we could drop the Powerline trail,  now nearly soaked to the core. A low fog was present, rain was coming down and the trails were wet and slick. All made it safely down and we headed toward the qualifier at which time NoCar, a.k.a. NoHelmet now became known as NoLight. The rest of the group, who are by this time soaked to the core and taking notice about how much the temperature had dropped, huddled around him so we could limp back to the Knott without having to stop in the cold rain to deal with transferring lights. After what seemed like the longest ride ever along the lake access road from the bottom of the qualifier to the Sly Park road we finally arrived at the Knott Lot at approximately 10:00pm. Peter was alive and well in the parking lot as each of the riders began remarking how cold they were and how cold their toes were and...it was a good thing we were in the lot finishing the ride... but all will agreed we would gladly endure a hose down from a cold hose if it was present; because at that point it didn't matter anyway.

Once inside an attempt was made to thaw out by the Amish faux-fire but that really didn't work. The bridge was playing on the speakers and both the taco bitty's were in slightly grumpy form. We were chided for ordering 6 tacos each, all of us...as "the rack only makes 4 & 8..." Nonetheless, we were provided with an amazing array of new sauces which we enjoyed thoroughly. Newb limped away at the end of the evening on a further damaged ankle, welcome to your thirties young man, time to let that thing heal properly...see you in May...

Tacostrong!!