Bicycling in the Old Pueblo

(just found this in an archive - wish I'd sent it then. In the meantime I've been riding the Pondersa a great deal, have accepted (nay, EMBRACED) tubeless and have yet to ride Golder) So I finally upgraded and have moved Old Blue to the role of hack. I now have a Novarra Pond 29er and I must say: they've come a long way in 25 years.

My issue is this: while Tucson has never been known for the safety of it's streets or the awareness of it's drivers (at least not in any positive light that I can ascertain) the city and county have been working on making the bikelanes more defined and extensive, setting up the 'Urban Loop' etc. Somehow, I'm still not comfy with taking CaeliBug or Zoo or both out on the road - too many stories of hit-and-runs (notably on Silverbell), still WAAAY too many impaired drivers rushing from one chaotic lifestyle choice to another.

For Nerdist

@nerdist had a birthday today. I've never met you, Mr Hardwick, but happy-trip-around-Sol to you and may you enjoy many more. You laid out a challenge, so I'm going to try and pick up the bits from here. See, I've been thinking a lot about what to put in this blog -seems obvious on the face of it, but with Tucson Weekly doing it in print and all the relevant Twitter reports, it seems hard to imagine that my spin would be anything worth, well, re-reading. So I'll try this. The whole of my experience of Tucson. The fact that I have become a real fan of mountain bikes (and my Ponderosa hasn't (really) let me down yet, nor have I broken it irreparably) and am blessed to live so close to so many great rides. That I have gotten so far away from the riding my motorcycle for fun continuum that it is beginning to make me think that Tucson drivers scare me. That I have been without a consistent gaming group for going on a year now with no real hope in sight, even though I have discovered that some gaming opportunities exist in relatively easy reach. That while I have happy memories of good food in Tucson, I have not really partaken of any recently....no, wait: Casa Vicente for our anniversary. That place is fantastic. And as an update, I'm not only no longer working for a solar-panel accessory manufacturer, but I have job-wise moved to the extreme opposite end of that pendular swing: I work at a test site doing engineering validation on heavy mining equipment. How the worm turns indeed. Going to see if I can do updates via Twitter as well, though I don't know the extent to which Blogger is so integrated.

Yes yes yes, long time.

And now the reason I really started this little sporadic thang is back on my 'dar.

Looks like the former Muse lot is actually (gasp) being worked on! They're in there with trucksm and loaders, and AMG they're making the hole biiger and more uniform just in time for monsoons!

I can hear the little mosquitoes buzzing with demented glee!

In other news, though I don't get what exactly isafoot in the 'Rio Nuevo' (but not really) site west of I-10, i will say that the tacquiera  there is pretty satisfactory, and if yo uget a table in the breezeway then, heck, breeze on - survivable even at triple digits.

There was a bunch of other stuff that since I've been released from my duties at Schletter I've been thinking I wanted to put here, having had the time to ruminate. Alas, they're not on tap at the moment or not relevant to the topic at hand (our Fair Pueblo). Suffice it to say, though: I do love living here. I do not love the summers.

Sen Giffords (D/AZ) Shot, reported killed with at least 6 others

So. This is how politics are done in US now?

And it started in AZ.

We should all be ashamed that it has ever been allowed to go this far. Civility apparently is no longer a standard to aspire to.

(Blogspot is not updating?) My lack of input has been noted.

i'vebeen more than a little remiss.

It has been months and much has happened that has occurred to me would go well here. Stuff in my life, stuff in the life of Arizona, stuff in the way of Tucson...lots of stuff. This is like that moment when you realise that the house REALLY needs a top to bottom cleaning, but the "OMGWTF This is too much for one mortal I'll go check my email instead!" demon drags you off. Willingly, yes, but dragging can be implied.

A pivotal point: The Hole is still there. Muse That Was is still just a forlorn hole in the ground, the mosquitoes that rise up from it a reminder that sometimes the 'annoyances and eyesores' that don't bite you and spread disease are very good eyesores indeed.

Also: The Family moved, AND we got a new member. Zachary Dawson was a noisy arrival back in November and has been charming the pants off of people ever since. He's still short on the full-night-sleep ethic, but this will come. He just learned to crawl with a purpose, can pull himself up and stand and cannot for the life of him understand why his feet won't do that magic thing that everyone but his can, namely catch him from falling so that he does that subtle thing we call 'walking'. In very short time, I suspect, he'll be charging through the house with all-fours a distant memory but still a useful tool in his repertoire.

We Moved,a s I said. The West Side of Tucson still has the most to offer us and we are still rollin the '45. I got a freakin' awesome patch of dez to call my own, a garage for my shizzle and a dedicated room (with a/c, canyoubeleiveit). I am a happy piglet in very choice poo.

Also, Arizona got a really petulant law. SB1070 has all the trappings of a typically ill-considered rant-made-law that the AZ legislatuture has made into an art form. Don't get me wrong: rule of law is a fine thing, when it applies to all. That includes the people who see fit to hire people who are here illegally but when they need something to lash out at target those same people with laws and protests. I'm far from saying I have a solution. I'm even further from saying I can come completely down on one side of the issue or another (being a fairly poor absolutist, as it turns out). I am saying that making what amounts to racial profiling the gold standard is so few hues away from something that was broadly called Jim Crow as makes little difference, at least to me, is bad policy. But don't take my word for it - the currently conservative Supreme Court seems to be in my camp as well. We'll see how they play their cards and to whom when it finally gets as far as that, assuming it does.

I got a new job. Yep, proof positive that there is actually a Green Economy and by the way, the Europeans have been at it for decades. I work for a German company that moved an arm here a couple years back to set up shop and see if the US needed a mature technological base to help it move into the 1990s. Turns out that we apparently did, that the competition seems to be spurring actual innovation and clever solutions in the US marketplace. Lets see if the domestic market can lobby those silly Euros back to the continent where they belong. Oh wait, minus the name, we're 99.4% Made in the USA as far as product goes. In other words: Suck It, faux-free-marketers. Man Up and compete.

Awright. The love of my life just got home from work & I need to go get some sleep. Be good to each other.

I did it. I finally did it.

I rode the bicycle to work today.

To look at the raw numbers, it's nothing. Piddle. The anxiety about route, would I be up for it, would I get smoked by some hotshots...anyway, i did it.

And it wasn't half bad. The throat is hella dry still but the temp, for as cold as it was, was actually nice. Need to suss out a quicker, legal route through campus once I'm up there so I can ride all the way to the lockup for the vehicles, but yeah, was good.

Going home may be a different matter, what with the traffic and the looking-into-the-sun, but we'll see. Speedway under the tracks is still a grinder, though I'm of a mind to say frak the signs and ride on the sidewalk under there: road is too narrow on first blush.

But Thank You Dept of Transport for having widened under I-10: that used to scare me on the motorcycle, nevermind on a pedalbike. Now, not so much.

anyway, my plan is Tues/Thurs and Fri as a possible, depending on schedule. Gotta spool up the metabolism somehow ;-)

The Gift that keeps on giving

Tucson is officially flu central this week. At least one (and possibly three) of my co-workers have been knocked down by the wonder that is this flu season, and I am NOT looking forward to sharing in their experience.

The janitor accuses me of giving him his illness (though I never had a fever), then he gave it to The Man Plague. Somehow Tirebiter got it (and he actually has a confirmed case) and now its all my psychosomatic self can do to not be convinced I have it too.

No temperature, anyway. Crossing my fingers.

Fall, after fits and starts, is here. It is chilly at night (for us) so the urge to get out and play paintball/go on longer bikerides/camp out with The Grrrls is strong. Of course, Mystery Man is arriving on or about the 16th of next month and we have all but one weekend jammed to the jugular between now and then, but hey: was a nice thought.

For those of you thinking of moving to Tucson: Phoenix is nice this time of year and they have waaay more freeways to careen around on. Go there. Even better? They have an Ikea. Run along. Visit if you must, but just know that Tucson is a dirty little dirt town (without an Ikea! The nerve!) full of liberals and some REALLY crazy right-wingers (but they all want to move to Phoenix) to even it all out.

I only bring this up because the number of interesting almost-accidents I had with out-of-state-plates on the 4 mile drive home tonight was beyond compare. Seriously: go to Phoenix.

October so far

So much to tell, so much to tell.

Buckelew Farms has an annual Halloween pumpkin thing that the Family Fearnow attended today, with our long-lost mates Ving and Ruth (but sans Rafa). Wendy, Ash and Jules rolled out as well, and overall a good time was had. But man it was HOT.

Wasn't fall projected to be happening around now? Oh, wait. That was last week. On or around Wednesday we had winter, i hear, and Spring was typically fleeting. Yay! Back to summer!

Also, whats up with people letting their brood roam and steal pumpkins from people who have already suffered the slings and arrows of the little gourd gloccids? Some well-to-do plastic surgery nightmare ripped off My Pie's pumpkin and then airily denied it. Kind of a bummer since everyone by that time was too tired to properly deal with her and hide the body negotiate the situation. Ah well: as Ruth pointed out, she has to live with it (though my sense is that these Mrs Thurston Howells (is that right? hows that for a possibly mangled olde skool reference?) are so used to scrubbing their conscience clean with alchohol nightly that they have no inkling of the debris their lives create).

Anyway, it was overall good fun. I hope the 4-H animals get to spend the night in a cool spot coz they were looking pre-cooked when we got there.

Last weekend was RinCon09, the local 'con put on by SAGA (Southern AZ Gamers Assoc). In short, it was goodish, though still rocky. Friday was a fine game by Chris B of the THGS crew: he threw down an amazing spread of Wild West town buildings and we had a good ol' shootout, until the zombies showed up. Then it got REALLY fun until we succeeded in eliminating them, and and then I got right back to losing the game headlong. Still, a hoot. The rules are simple, fast, and easily resolved. Its nice when the rules really are so unobtrusive that they don't warrant their own book and analysis. Thanks to Shannon for running the zedz, and I hope your Ninja gets out of it's slumber soon.

Saturday was good from a gaming perspective: Played a homebrew version of Munchkin using Firefly as the basis and wound up having Chris, Shannon and two drop-ins for my game of Moto Grand Prix. Thanks to Mr Lopez I now know that I've been interpreting the rules incorrectly, but we had a fine bout regardless. For the first time, though, I won a game I had just taught people. I'm sure, someplace, that something Very Bad happened and that I am directly responsible, but HTG I've never rolled so consistently well. Later, I was almost killed my Wil Wheaton rounding a corner in a made dash to (presumably) lighten his load in the loo. My brush with greatness, outside of the TCC toilet. Downsides to the day: Hat getting behind the microphone every 10 minutes with a garbled plea to do something or other for someone he knows/games with/feels he owes something to and interrupting the people who are actually already gaming/trying to explain games to.Also, the 'Rincoin' reward system needs work: just because I'm not blowing sunshine up the arse of Hat or Bo or the like during the week doesn't mean that I don't get a Coin as recognition for running game(s) at their 'con. Maybe a signin sheet for GMs and Players that gets submitted for 'Coins? Anyway, my favouritism flags got all worn out from flying on that one.

Supposedly we go back to something like (but not identifiable as) Fall tomorrow night. In the meantime I have to go to work on a Sunday to change the ring. Whee. I'm thinking of riding The Bucket just to have fun on the hill but we'll see.

Caeli is awesome and getting moreso daily. Sarah is a rock and is about to explode - enjoy the quiet, luv. Once you do burst the nights they will not be so silent. more later.

Is it just me, or....

Sarah thinks I'm a complete nut, but I drive in Tucson without airconditioning on in the car.

This is not to say that I revel in the burning sensations of exposure to hot plastic or that I gain any pleasure from the sense that someone, somewhere nearby, forgot to turn off their hair-dryer.

I do it out of honesty, on one hand. We live in the freakin' desert, for starters. I also do it because in my preferred mode of transport I have no choice, and few things are more jarring than having just slipped out of a cold vehicle to pull on a hot jacket and subject oneself to exposure to 100+' temps in a helmet while riding a motorcycle.

So I get all sorts of weird looks from fellow drivers when I'm driving in to towne from Kitt Peak in the UA van. I sweat. I drink about a litre of water in the 55 minutes it takes to get back to campus from the hill.

So Ka. I live in the desert.

When it rains, there is happy

I woke up this morning to wall-to-wall grey, with measurable precipitation falling as far as the eye could see. Not that cleans-the-gutters stuff that comes later in the year but a good, soaking rain. One could almost hear the dirt (and all the roots beneath) making a great slurping noise.

Sarah and Caelibug were sitting on the front stoop when I stumbled forth, eating their breakfast. "the desert is happy about this", I offered. "We are the desert" said the One True Desert Lizard in response.

Good Times.

Fat, wet birds up under our awning in the back.
Our meager catchment running over.
The bike eagerly stomping from puddle to puddle on the way to work.

Maybe we can compromise and turn the Hole in The Earth That Was Muse into a serious water reservoir for the neighbourhood over there. Lawd knows it's doing nothing else at the moment.

dang, it has been a long time.

Note that I really didn't start this just to bitch all the time, but lawd knows theres a bunch to bitch about (esp since last post)..

Happy Inauguration Day tomorrow. Birthday for me, too. Yay that.

The Bitch: The grrrlz and I went on a walk this morning up at Starr Pass....or that was the idea. Now I know that all the money that got poured into that resert and the surrounding housing sorta made them royalty in the eyes of the city, but how did they get to plop all that Gatted Community cah-rap on top of all the trailheads and not make public accessible paths around their McMansions?

Once we got on top of the hill with the abandonded round house we saw the trailhead at the extreme south end of the park, and thats good to know about, but the trailhead up behind the water tank? Gone. Yeah, it was probably like a year plus ago when it got built on (I've been a slacker, I admit), but damn.

Also: Zack at BICAS is a good egg. He even knew of some of the Alpha Thetian weirdness from Hanover so good on him.
And if you don't mind getting a little greasy and learning a whole lot, do your bike repair at BICAS. You'll save money and may just improve yer knowhow AND yer karma.

All Roads Lead to Hell

It be official - Tucson is pretty great.

Not just being pollyanna, just sayin'. Was out just now in the backyard, the breeze is warm, the sky is that black-blue with stars starting to peek out...frakking brilliant.

Of course, having found a great posse helps, too.

So whats with the colouring of the highway construction? Looks kinda cool, i guess, and the art does (almost) make me forget about the construction and congestion and bottlenecks and...what was I saying? Oh yeah, that we may be at the halfway point for this road construction, but DAYAMM - it had better do my dishes and clean my room to be worth this much PIMA (...er, i just made a funny).

Interestingly, I'm seeing waaay more Dem stickers around than McCain stuff. In fact, the only McCain sticker I've seen lately was on a 'big ol loosana truck' with open pipes and stoopid tires. The only thing that could have made it even more typical would have been a honkin' set of truck nads hanging off the bumper. And maybe some mudflap pr0n. That would have been cool.

Then again it is possible that I'm not hanging on the Eastside as much a I need to be to work up a big head of steam. Of course, I'll be out there tomorrow so I can head up to Mount Lemmon for work: I'll keep an eye out for single occupancy Escalantes. etc.

Other than that, though, I'm pretty OK with Tucson. I get to go to my first Supermoto race this weekend, Mom's Day is Sunday and maybe more Heavy Gear on Friday.

All in all, good times.

One last thing: Tucson Roller Derby is a fine time. My mate Brian says in years past it had a certain WWE stench to it, but at my first viewing this last weekend I can only say good things. Unless you bring up the announcers - they sounded like arse nuggets. The jams though? Rockin, literally edge-of-your-seat stuff. The midway band (Bricktop) was half an hour of pretty darn good reminding Yours Truly why he likes old school hardcore and that he should have a look about for some of his Black Flag vinyl.

Two things, right now: I just saw the picture perfect case of how to deal with these Paranoid Times, these days when FISA courts are just too much trouble to bother with and the guv'mint outta be able to just download any gorram thing they want, right outta peoples' heads if need be! Yep, Sarah and I were out today and saw a gent walking down St.Marys Blvd, wearing the Hieronymous Beanie (ask Ti, he'll tell ya all about it) and carrying a mirror in one hand so he could check his six at any time.

That man was uber prepared!

Also, Little Poca Cosa is some of the best food in town. And if you don't believe me, you're missing out in the worst way. More for me.

(Aluminum Beanie Guy was later sighted hurling invective at the I-10 overpass. Chagrined by the lashing, i hear it is due to be rebuilt.)

Sorry, should be more proactive. Thats how it goes in a lazy towne like Tucson...

The Gemshow got it's 1.5 days of rain, as is traditional. The quality of driving hasn't suffered as much as in years past, but then the authorities clamped down on the speed limits around the show(s) so that may have helped.

Tanias"33": a fine little resturaunt on the West Side, on Grande. The decor is monochromatic-converted-autoshop but the food is great. one tip: DO NOT ASK THE OWNER ANY QUESTIONS. Don't get me wrong: he's a SUPER friendly guy, but he also gets a little overboard in the "I haz a menu scheme...let me showz it to you!" mode. Just decide what you want, tell the man, and enjoy your good food. Unless you're lonely: in that case, ask him to explain the A,B, and C options for Burritos and let him explain the sizes offered when he comes up for air.

It being Valentines Day, the House of Pies travelled to Ghandi's for dinner (its a tradition: if it happens to be a holiday, head to Ghandi's). You can tell its going to be a big night when they have white guys working there. And the food? I tried Rogan Josh for the first time- -tasty goodness!

now off to batten down the hatches: the wind is picking up (we gusted to 75mph on Kitt today!) and we're expecting rain tomorrow.

I really do like this towne.

Inspiration on 6th

It just came to me. I was driving down 6th towards I-10 and had just crossed 4th Ave, saw the usual Trustafarians and all, walking dogs...and then I came up on the former site of Muse:

I just wanted to ask a question: "So, Tucson - WTF? Why tear down Muse, local purveyor of community artspace and performance space and dance space and what-have-you? Oh, right, some condo-cum-Starbucks outlet, designed to bring the 'urban-living' vibe to the coming denizens of the revitalized downton. At least thats what I recall hearing, what, a year ago? Sure is a sexy empty dirt lot now! Whole lots of vitality and mud running into the streets after a good rain, you betcha!"

Okay, not so much a question, but a rant. So thats what gave me the idea of 'So, Tucson' - funny little things I see in my varied travels about town that make me just go 'huh'.

Lets see where this goes.