I understand that this little slice of badassness recently sold at auction for $840.00. That means if all of the people who read The Bummer Life pooled their resources, you all could have gotten me one for only $140.00 a piece.

That would go smashingly with my slot cars.

Picasso sent us a clip. You wanna watch it? Of course you do.

"Hey Stevil;

I’m a big fan of your blog. I’m guessing you’re always looking for new material so I thought I’d pass along the following clip from YouTube:



This is a pretty funny clip of a guy acting stupid while dressed up in a kangaroo suit. You could say it is done in Jackass style sans the anal insertion, mindless midget comedy, or vulgar language.

Enjoy!

Peace out,

Picasso Bull"

Firstly, of course you're a big fan of this blog. I mean, why wouldn't you be? Secondly, I liked that clip, but the anal insertion and vulgar language is all that I ever watched Jackass for anyway, and thirdly this was reminiscent of Whisky Snowboard's old 'Boozy the Clown' mascot.
Does anyone remember those videos?

One of my most favorite stories about Boozy happened at the Action Sports trade show in Las Vegas many years ago. There was a huge crowd in front of Treasure Island watching the old pirate battle show that they used to have, when suddenly the bad pirate's ship was somehow boarded by none other than Boozy himself, and he began fighting all of the bad guys. Then realizing that their fellow actors were in peril, the good guys began mobbing this errant clown as well.

So there's the scene-

Pirate galleons with cannons booming and the clash from the crossed swords of swashbuckling buccaneers all of whom are getting sucker punched as they begin to jointly mob a totally shitfaced man dressed up as a clown.

Life just doesn't get much better for me than that.

You know what happened this weekend?
The third annual Supermarket Sweep Race, that's what.
And you know who didn't put up the flyer?
Me.
However, in my defense, this information was sent to me two months ago, and has been sitting in my inbox, waiting for me to remember, hopefully a day or two prior, which obviously didn't work out so well.
So, for those of you who have a bike rack on your Delorian, and can get back to the future for a day, I offer you this;

And to the organizers, I offer my most sincere apologies for being off the back with this one.
Next year I promise to organize my bongs in the Spring time, allowing my full attention to be focused on you.

One race that I didn't totally drop that ball on however was the Ann Arbor Cranksgiving event that Andy just wrote in with some highlights from;

"Stevil -

Thanks so much for your support of Ann Arbor's Cranksgiving. This year it exceeded expectations and we more than DOUBLED the amount of food collected during the event (compared to last year). The weather was colder than some would have liked and affected turnout, but committed bike people are committed bike people, and regardless of the temperature and we had about about 40 folks contributing a total of 1005 lbs of food to benefit Food Gatherers.

That works out to *25 lbs per rider* on average.

Talking to people at the finish line, I heard reactions ranging from "this was really fun" up to "it's my favorite race of the year", and while some people show up to race just to put the hurt on their buddies,
some come out because they just want to help people in need. Overall, impression were that it was a resounding success, and with your support for the prize pool, it worked out better than I could have expected. For that, thank you.

The overall scheme was to have incentives for hauling lots of food, and doing it fast, and making it fun - your contribution to the prize pool made that possible. I hope that the promotional exposure and good karma in this corner of the cycling community is good for your business as well.

If you haven't had a chance to check in on the results, the times/weights and links to photos are up at our blog.

Thanks again for your support, and best wishes in the holiday season.

- Andy"

I'm glad we could help, and at this stage in the game, we can use all the good karma we can get our hands on.

Our boy Zeke out K.C. way sent an email a couple weeks ago concerning the opening of a new bit of land thats legal for bikes, and/or bicycle related hijinkbaucherty;

"Last weeked was the offical opening of some sweet new dirt in Kansas City called Swope Park Trails.

Thanks to a super boss I got the day off to go check out the loop on a beautiful 60 degree day. The loop is only phase one and there is more planned.
Its short but super sweet. Some of the best single track I have ever ridden.
An added bonus is that I could ride there from my house.

I rode 4 laps (2 each direction) and was suprised to discover that I had only ridden a little over an hour.
There seems to be quite of bit of climbing at first since the trail head is at the bottom of a hill,
but its well worth it.
I had been told that it wasn't overly single speed friendly but I didn't seem to have much problem once I got in the groove.
In the coming years this will be another destination mountain bike location in the KC area.
Here is a link to a few photos I took on my afternoon ride.

Cheers!

Zeke"

The looks of that place make my palms feel all itchy, and a gigantic debt of gratitude goes out to the hard working folks that are making Swope a reality.

Now then.. In other news- I'm not sure if I've mentioned this, but my folks have finally pulled up steaks in Oregon, and have made their way to the little town of Lynden Washington, (presumably to get further away from me).

As much as I'd hoped that they'd moved into a windmill there, I'm afraid thats just not the case. I will be making a trip up in the coming weeks to inspect their new compound, so to my friends either in Lynden, or in nearby Bellingham, give your boy a shout, and when I get to town the first round is on you.

Ten years ago or so, I spent some time in Bellingham, and actually partook in a mountain bike race in which Michael Golinski, formerly of Spot Bikes fame and I were the only two one speeders.
I had a lock on victory at that particular event, but I stopped racing due to the fact that I'd lost count of the laps, and apparently ended the race one short.
By the time I'd finally recognized my error, Michael had another half lap on me and for all of that effort, I ended up receiving a single pair of Kona socks.

Always the bride's maid, never the bride.

Anyway, in the coming year I hope to return and resume my exploration of the lovely loveliness that is that region, perhaps with some locals in tow.

Say, here's a shot I've been sitting on for a while of the Australian mens champions at last month's track Worlds proving that they are well endowed with a high sense of class and humor;

Well played fellas. Well played.

Now then.. Not that you all probably don't have enough stuff to occupy your time on these interwebs and I'm sure I'm the last one to figure this out, but I've recently have been turned on to another bike blog that tends to be a damn fine read. Should you find yourself with a little extra time to burn on your coffee break, I recommend you spend it with The Bike Lemming.

Well, aside from the standard nincompoopery that I generally immerse myself in over the weekends, I finally got the opportunity to catch the hugely powerful rock trio Who Rides The Tiger at Oakland's Stork Club, and it was everything I had anticipated it to be.

*Photo by Bob Moon*

Secondarily, one of the opening acts was an Oakland based band called The Worship of Silence. Now understand- I've been seeing bands for a very long time, so at this point, I suppose I would consider myself a little jaded and hard to impress. Having never seen nor heard of this band, I was a little taken aback to be so completely transfixed by them.
While the headliners were no slouches themselves, and put to shame what all power duos before them have spawned, I would have been content with the performances of just these two acts, and in turn most likely spent a lot less money on drinks.

*Photo by Josh*

Anyway, The Worship of Silence were absolutely one of the finest acts I've ever seen, and I highly recommend you check them out.

From the bar, we melted back into the night to find some place to rest our weary and throbbing heads.

With ears still ringing and a blinding hangover, I then woke up at the absolute ass crack of Sunday morning to get up into the hills to take a bite of some forbidden fruit that comes the form of a trail network I had not been on in about 15 years.

Any time I get the chance to get back to 'my roots', as it were, I jump at it.

The trail is as perfect as I remembered, and the nostalgia was running deep as I recalled my first trips through there while in college with my pal Danny, who back in 1989 was actually the one responsible for getting me on a mountain bike to begin with.

It's a sweet piece, that one is.

On that note- as the plug is pulled on yet another installment of The Bummer Life, on behalf of all of us here at Swobo, I hope all of you had a great weekend.
Clench up for five more days, and then we call all have a repeat.