bike

Texas Mamma Jamma Ride Update: All Aboard the Big Pink Bus

~ A Dude Abikes ~ 5 Comments

Your bike dude here has participated in six charity rides, raising over $12,000. That’s my proudest accomplishment as a bike rider starting back in 2015 B.B. (Before Blog). Well, riding around the world in under five years probably ties that. Many of those miles came from TMJR and other training rides. Three of the charity rides were for the Texas Mamma Jamma Ride to raise funds for breast cancer treatment and services. Thanks to the coronavirus, the non-profit organization has had to adapt and reinvent itself to survive. And it’s done so quite smartly by becoming the fundraising arm for the Big Pink Bus, a project of the Lone Star Circle of Care (LSCC), which operates 24 health clinics in half a dozen Central Texas counties. This seems like important news and sharing is caring, so read on!

Continue reading →

A New Abode in Which to Abide for A Dude Abikes

~ A Dude Abikes ~ 2 Comments

A year ago today, on Cinco de Mayo, I wrote a post about having to move. I called it Moving A Dude’s Abode and Body: A Buddhist View. In it, I reflected on stuff, attachment, cravings, and even death. You might be expecting another installment, all kinds of new pearls of wisdom after a year of THE VIRUS!, but for the life of me, I can’t think of any at the moment. So I’m going to write about the things I will miss in this place. I know the title is about the new residence, and I can hear you saying, “That’s not what was advertised in the title.” To that I’d say, “Well, that’s just like, you know, your opinion, man!” But I’ll get to that, just cool your jets, pump your brakes, and slow your roll, OK? Good.

Continue reading →

Rents and Temperatures: Things That Are Rising in Austin

~ A Dude Abikes ~ 11 Comments

Spring in Austin, Texas is usually a short-lived affair. Now, after a week of rain, the heat is on, and the humidity is high. Or as I call it, the stupidity. If all the rich idiots from California moving here with their First World dollars did their research, they would not come here. It’s very hot (and not ofttimes, not a dry heat), there’s bad traffic, cedar fever, other rich Californian idiots, and oh yeah, the homeless. Our so-called liberal city chose on Saturday to ban camping, sitting, or even lying down in public again after 23 years. Hypocrites. It does nothing to house the houseless, which I’m always on the verge of becoming, as I recently detailed in my post Homelessness Has Him House Hunting; Hounds of Hell at Heels. With tempers flaring from that political battle and the rising thermometer, plus ample reasons for my own head to get hot, I figured I would blow off a little steam. Trigger warning: “Bad words” ahead!

Continue reading →

Sophie the Fairdale Gets a New Drive Train from Clown Dog Bikes (Again)!

~ A Dude Abikes ~ 9 Comments

If you’re a loyal reader of A Dude Abikes, this may seem like a little deja vu. On October 24, 2019, I wrote Sophie Gets a New Drive Train, and She Rides Like Buttah. Many thousands of miles later (6,666.66 in 2020 alone), she was past due for another replacement of some very worn and pretty filthy parts. You could say that Sophie has been a dirty girl. Grit and grime attach themselves to the oil on the chain, chain ring and cassette. The teeth or cogs wear down, the chain stretches, and tends to slip off when changing gears — especially on hills or high pressure. So I took her to the friendly neighborhood shop that’s been serving the University of Texas for about 20 years, and let the pros at Clown Dog Bikes take care of bidness.

Continue reading →

Lean Into It: When Bicycling and Life Throw You a Curve Ball

~ A Dude Abikes ~ 5 Comments

One day maybe a year or so ago — the pandemic has proven that time is a human construct and has lost all meaning — I was talking with my father, who art in another town in Texas. I must have been griping about some problem or another when he just blurted out, “Lean into it.” I was taken aback that he would know this phrase uttered more by hipper millennials. For a moment, I didn’t know what to say. I gathered my wits and said, “What do you mean?” I don’t remember the exact words but they were along the lines of “go with the flow,” or “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em,” possibly an explanation, “just accept that’s how things are and do your best, don’t worry about it.” Good stuff, Dad!

Continue reading →

What to Do When You Don’t Feel Like Writing Your Blog

~ A Dude Abikes ~ 7 Comments

You know how sometimes actors will look into the camera and talk to the audience? It’s called “breaking the fourth wall.” Well, this post is similar to that. I’m pulling back the curtain to say, sort of like when you’re out on a long bicycle ride and your body just isn’t up to the task and you turn to your fellow riders (or yourself) and say, “I just don’t have it, today, mates.” Everyone has off days; nothing wrong with that. We’re not human bicycling machines. (Yet.) Sure, I could come up with something bike-related, or talk about some picayune detail of cycling, but I’m just going to go wherever this writing about not knowing what to write takes me. I don’t know what you do when you don’t feel like writing your blog — of course, you do you. But I know what I do: I write my damn blog.

Continue reading →

The Writers League of Texas: Membership Has Its Privileges

~ A Dude Abikes ~ 2 Comments

After a number of years of hearing about WLT, attending some of their pre-pandemic Third Thursday events at Book People (the largest independent book store in Texas), and meeting some folks at Owen Egerton’s One Page Salon, I finally joined up. I don’t know why I didn’t do it sooner. I suppose it had to do a bit with the Wayne’s World motto: “We’re not worthy!” When actor-director Tate Donovan asked me at a OPS if I was a writer, I said yes for the first time. Hey, that makes me one degree of separation from Jennifer Aniston, whom he dated after playing her boyfriend on Friends. As we all know, she’s well known for her books. Strike that, reverse it. I mean looks! Humunuh humunuh! No, it’s her mad acting skillzl OK, that’s tangential, but it was diversionary. Mmm, more big wordz!

Continue reading →

Homelessness Has Him House Hunting; Hounds of Hell at Heels

~ A Dude Abikes ~ 8 Comments

In last Cinco de Mayo’s post Moving A Dude’s Abode and Body: A Buddhist View, I ruminated on what it means to have to go live somewhere else. Two abodes later, and I’m having to do it again, as I alluded in my previous post about Mark Cavendish. Who, by the way, put a cherry on the cake and made it four wins in eight stages at the Tour of Turkey. The alternative is homelessness, or more accurately, houselessness, both of which, like the hounds of hell, bite big time. What’s a dude to do? Well, keep on searching, for one thing. And write a blog about it for a little anger management and stress relief, for another.

Continue reading →

Resistance Is Fertile: Body Building with Bands

~ A Dude Abikes ~ 9 Comments

The great debate between lifting weights and using resistance bands comes down to personal preference, and whether you’re training to compete as a weight lifter. Basically, you can get a good workout from both. You can read an article at Livestrong and another article at Fit Simplify. Both cite studies and mention the pro’s and con’s. I’m just going to tell you a little about my experience over the last six weeks using the bands.

Continue reading →