found something

 Well... i dunno if I found it. 

But lets walk back to last tuesday. Took the old Concor off, a 90s vintage one, taped up nose, worn out corners, stuff just wearing out. Taylor gave me a bag of old ones and in there was a cool black and while logo Concor. Looks good on the Black and white Blue that I've been riding as a road bike.

Swapped it. Straight up just took the old one off, put the new one on.

Road it all week like that. Back felt kind of weird at the end of the week.

Check the saddle height. I thought pretty carefully, read the tape correctly, looks like it was 5mm high. So I rode to work yesterday, then dropped it at work (was running late, forgot about an service engineer's planned visit - he was a no show - other emergency system visit for a down tool, ours was working so lower priority, fine, not a bit deal). 

Rode home and I haven't slept so poorly in ages. My glute on both sides was fucked up and in pain. Almsot got up and stretched and rolled in the middle of the night but I was too tired. Did that in the morning and it helped. Then really got in and close. Checked a few bikes. 

I fucked it up somehow. Needed to drop it another 10cm. So it turns out this Concor is 15 mm taller than the old one. 

Funny that a full 15 mm didn't really cause any issue, or mostly just a minor one. But going to 10 mm high cause MASSIVE pain (after the fact). 

But now I think i managed to acutally measure it properly and get it right and it feels right, low but right, and it is still a couple MM taller than the MTB, but that has a dropper and is much more dynamic, but also is the 24hr seat height so maybe I need to go even lower? 

It seems there's more forgiveness with the drop bars than the flat bars in terms of angle (makes sense with all the different hand positions), but got me wondering if there's an exclusion zone of sorts in the middle. It is okay above a certain point and below a certain point. The odd thing is above usually causes knee issues, but my knees have been better than ever so maybe another week at the high mark might have started to cause problems.

oh and when i dropped it yesterday it didn't want to move, at all. Not good. Took it out this morning, scrapped a bunch of aluminum oxide off the post, put some grease on it and in the seat tube and put it back together.

Remember folks. Annually remove you seatposts from the bike and put more grease in there. Esp carbon posts and frames. There can be so much friction in the carbon that the resin melts and basically glues itself together. AKA you're never getting it out. 

ANYway. I managed to catch up on some of the sleep deficit this weekend... only to slip back in the hole last night. We'll see how smackdown goes tonight.

heddwch
G

Coming up on 5 years

 Thinking about that quite a bit lately. Timmy Jackson just hit his nine year anniversary, Brad is on his all of them as in straight edge for life anniversary, PTC aka Pastry just had his 40th anniversary on the day he turned 40. So me being almost 5 years in, no big deal. But in some ways it is a big deal. My dad went from 1978 or 9 until he passed, that's a really long time. He had a more catastrophic incident around his 40th birthday I suppose. Looking back, 10 years ago could have been that for me, but somehow when he turned his rage outward, I turned mine inward. And then stopping didn't change anything. But it also changed everything, for both of us. Me in much less dramatic fashion. 

Wrapped up in all that is just the fatigue of everything. Carrying a lot of weight. Stuff that's visible is too much, the stuff no one can see is a pretty manageable burden alone, but when I'm so far beyond it becomes pretty heavy. 

Today was interesting. Mostly because of yesterday and last week and fuck the last whenever. 

Long week, recovering from being sick, not sleeping well then just as I was getting caught up on sleep E picked up on this virus and started having disrupted sleep and then the weather has been weird and I haven't had a good night sleep since wed. the only one? Sleep is important. But hey at least I'm not falling asleep terrified I'm not going to wake up. Although, gotta wonder this is one hell of a mess I've left for everyone if I don't. Yikes. Better start working on that. Weird way to get your shit together isn't it? I'll get right on it with my next free moment.

So plan was bike shop on saturday, but we also planned to ride early. I was thinking it would be a short 5-10 miler, just to get out there.

at the 10 mile mark i thought about heading back to the car but kept at it. It was good. I had no snap, my legs were low on glycogen i think, and the fatigue was very much there, noticed by the HR numbers, down. On the singlespeed I should get close to the max, but i was at least 10beats lower based on the effort and no sign of going up to where it could go. Check, fatigue. The lack of snap, fuel. I knew from the day and dinner it would be a close call for fueling but just wasn't hungry or couldn't find anything i wanted to eat and well...  it is what it was.

THEN i got in the car, and headed to the shop. built a token couple bikes, i was out of it. tired. it was kind of commical how bad it was. So bad in fact i had no idea where I put the car keys when I got there. Went to leave and no keys. tossed the place. dug through the dumpster looking for the trash I threw away when I walked into the shop, found it but no keys, went through my backpack three times. Scoured the whole shop, everywhere that I was, anywhere I could have put them down, asked if anyone had picked them up in the lot. No where. Went back and looked through the bag a fourth time, carefully spreading all the stuff inside aroudn the inside of the car. Last pocket, a pocket i never use, a side one, for bottles or coffee mugs when traveling. there they were. Like no idea how they got there, when I put them there or why. I know I'm getting old but this is like a black hole of a normally pretty indelible memory (still).

Fatigue is a motherfucker.

Made it home, realized there was a lot of coffee left and so yeah also low on coffee for the day. Watched a bad heist movie with terrible improbilities at the end, made pasta, ate, tried to sleep, poorly. And then the low coffee meant good morning earlier with low dull potential of headache lingering and, well, guess I was up and drinking coffee early. 

Instead of riding (it looked so good after the rains, temp was perfect) but still tired, so I went to help do some much needed maintenance on the East Bay Rowing sculling equipment. should be quick. 3 hours later and a really good sunburn. Time to come home and do the super fast shopping for the week and get to the train station in time. I think I missed a few things but whatever.

made dinner and 

now, afraid to go to bed now because i'm not going to fall asleep, not looking forward to E getting up at 3:30 to drive to boston to volunteer at the big race. 

And then there's class tomorrow and no. break. in. sight. Some how I have to find two days before the end of the month to take off. NO CLUE how the fuck that's going to happen.

Not to mention everyone seems to have gone to the mix tape. except me and Jason B. Is there anyone I don't know on that start list? I mean of course but seems like everyone was there. And I had no desire to ride it. I don't get it. I mean people are having fun but it doesn't look fun to me. Gravel rides like that? I dunno. Gimme the RdR RRRR, Greasy Joe's stuff, small group of friends/a team, a route, figure the shit out adventure have fun. Not a big curated circus. But then things like this have been really popular for a while and I've just never done any of them. And as much as it would be great to see all those people i know, it feels wrong to call them friends, in my definition, kind of sad but the list of people i'd call a friend is really really small. But of course that's probably because I'm much more autistic than anyone ever recognized (even me). And, yeah, if I'm going to load a bike up in the car it'll be the MTB, either one, and I'm going to go ride trails, hopefully with a few others, but worst case just by myself. 24HOGG is supposed to be a big social party, it is pretty much me, being alone with everyone else and that's kind of okay. 

I wonder what it would be like not to be so completely destroyed all the time.

What is it like having balance, rest, harmony? I know most of the people that seem like they have it don't and appearances are just that a surface skim, hiding who knows what.

10 years ago I was chasing a kid in a fluor green jacket up Rocky Hill a couple weeks in a row. 

I hope I can rest up enough to make it out to Smackdown on Tuesday. Would hate to bag it two weeks in a row, but also, no point showing up in shitty form when rest would be the smarter choice.

I really actually had somewhere else I was going with this. 

Not so much a point but there's something missing and I don't know what it is.

maybe I'll think of it tonight

Amor Fati Motherfuckers also #beepbeepmotherfucker

heddwch
G

what was I saying about being happy with my 1965 Pentax?

 Last couple days I've been trying to decide what film to buy next.

Lots of options, what ISO... I dunno... 

and then last night I saw all this press:
https://us.ricoh-imaging.com/product/pentax-k-3-mark-iii-monochrome/

Sturdy, weather sealed, waterproofed, ergonomics, big viewfinder

smaller sensor than the Leica but it still has plenty of pixels

but most importantly no bayer mask... and lower price point than the new M11m or Q2m or a used M10 or previous versions from the red dot.

that 16-85 or 16-50 lens? Kind of sounds perfect

It is interesting, hearing all the same things said about the monochrome sensor, but now w/o the Leica price or ease of dismissal.

That one Leica guy who does all this black and white on a color chip, i still think his images suffer from it, esp when you listen to these three talk about it and use it. Maybe because these three are color photographers, pros, they make a living, based on the car a comfortable living and they have very specific and clear reasons why monochrome is different.

Of course analog is also different, and with the 16-50 lens or 16-85 lens it is still a few thousand dollars, and that buys a lot of film and chemicals. But it also would be a big shift from manual focus and developing film. 

increased sensitivity means being able to push the fstop wide open much longer, and virtually eliminates photon limitation of film.

But still preserves the beauty of the process.

Sure, color is more difficult, but also so different it is work to switch between the two, being a good color photographer doesn't make you a good black and white photographer and just applying an action to make it black and white doesn't make for a great photo.

my cousin had a family portrait session, i'm not sure who make the clothing selection or the location selection but i saw the black and white shot first and thought it was odd looking, then saw the color, even weirder. 

I got sick for real last week. Not covid, well, i tested negative and the symptoms are more RSV/Rhinovirus than Sars-Cov2, or influenza. But it still knocked me down for the weekend and now two others in the house finally seem to have gotten it. I'm 90% better, small residual stuffiness but okay. Hopefully able to ride this weekend.

Also have been just ramping things up and up and up. Dramatic drop in social media time and the odd spare moments i've been working in photoshop or other aspects of the film project.

Still have to decide what film to get, maybe this is the sign to move to JCH stuff just for the hell of it. But lemme say, as quickly as using the film quenched the flames of desire for a Leica monochrome, this latest announcement from Pentax/Ricoh has dumped some gasoline on it. Part of it might be the increasing use of the SLR. That process, the viewfinder... all that. A phone is just an automatic range finder without a view finder in many ways. I like this SLR process to be honest.

But who knows, I should get a road bike before a camera, but flying with film is cumbersome and tedious and x-rays and scanners are sometimes not friendly to the emulsion and digital cloud backups can happen anywhere.

Life is short, what's your passion, and why does it matter to fully chase it? Or does it matter? Is chasing it a pure position of privilege? Or one of escape?

Who knows. I had planned to go to ship street right after lunch, then go home. Got part way through this, and with a handful of other stuff, made it back up here after all. And still, there's a possibility of heading home sooner than later.

Okay commence video link dump.
have a great weekend and sorry for being erratic and eccentric and just fucking weird

Heddwch
G

And this one so...  Hey

Also, aren't Embargos amazing? Such coorindated launch of media

(it also shoots video)

been crazy

 like extra extra EXTRA

at least I had a really good smackdown ride before all the wheels fell off and I crashed and burned.

feels like a relapse of january but different. about 2am I started getting a fuckton of stuff in my throat,  not my nose. No fever, just thickness and junk. Negative rapid so it is something else. Really had hoped I'd have been able to muscle through. But yeah that didn't work.

Plans to take today off failed, had to get up early and rush through the morning, then absolute non-stop endless stuff until 5. then rode home, fortunately there was a tailwind, not sure I'd have managed to push through with a headwind. 

Planned to head to gansett, then over to see steve's opening in westerly, and then planned to go back to gansett tomorrow but i think that's off the table, I need to rest. maybe just watch some TV, eat all the food and attempt to recover.

before the insanity starts again bright and early on Monday.

Kind of thinking of loading up the last roll in the Pentax with the 85mm lens for Easter. Photos of everyone, fuck it - who better to subject to the torture of photographing them than family? The photos I shot at Dirt Church are pretty okay IMHO, really digging the octagon shape the light flair takes on.

I DL'd it from FB to post here:

Figuring this whole photo thing out all over again. But different this time. very. different.

okay now i'm going to try and sleep and hope to rest, may the extended release mucus stuff work to help me sleep tonight.

heddwch
G