14 Todd Hollow Road

While 14 Todd Hollow Road may just appear to be a street address to most, to me it was the location of my initiation into the world of the outdoorsman, the naturalist, and the writer. I was raised from infancy at that house, and was heart broken when I moved from there as a preteen. To give you a little background, the house was built, by hand, by my mother’s grandfather without blue prints, outside advise, and, most likely, proper permits. As a result, the house was imbued with a character that is largely absent from modern day homes which contributed to its playground-like qualities as a child. The basement, built by hand from the jack-hammered ledge it was carved out of, was home to a partitioned storage unit which later became my “shop”. The two upstairs bedrooms (one my sister’s, the other mine) were connected by the closets, permitting back entry…something that routinely gave rise to sibling antics. The property sported an immense four bay garage that rivaled the house in size, and was my father’s and my retreat. The piece de resistance, however, was the property. The house was situated on a large 2 acre plot of land that was abutted by a large 3 acre pond, and a 14 acre tract of woodlands that we were permitted free and unhindered access to. It was host to countless hours of play and adventure, and will always fondly dominate my memories of childhood.

Its difficult to catalog your thoughts as a young boy, so I’ve thrown any attempts at recounting the following tales in chronological order out the window. So, in that case, let’s start with the pond. The pond was home to countless creepy crawlies, and its dark detritus littered waters presented it with a very mysterious sense of eeriness. The water was of questionable quality, which resulted in many talking-to’s when being caught by my mother as I slurped greedily from the cold waters of the brook that flowed from it behind our house. Amongst the inhabitants of our pond, was a legion of snakes so numerous, that even the former Crocodile Hunter would have a mighty large task on his hands. For my mother who hates snakes more than any person I have ever met, this presented a unique challenge. Walking anywhere in the yard surrounding our home was a task fraught with constant hyper-awareness. If you ever met my mother and don’t think she can sprint on a Olympic level, then you’re dead wrong.

As our house was pretty secluded, playing with other neighborhood children was rare, so I spent allot of time “playing” (more accurately, fighting) with my sister. I did share a brief friendship with another little boy in the neighborhood, but it was cut short when I was banned from his house after setting their lawn on fire with a bottle rocket launched from his bedroom window. Anyhow, while I had my basement “shop”, my sister’s play area consisted of a yellow jacket infested shed. While larger, and considerably more opulent that my dirt floored “shop”, I was quite content with my digs. These spaces ended up serving as bases from which many a war was launched, after violations of the demarcating line running down the middle of the lawn were made. I remember one such instance in which (this was totally by accident, seriously), my sister was clothes-lined while riding her bike by a home made “traffic light” that I had strung across the driveway. I’ve also run her over with my bike, gotten a RC car tire wound in her hair, but in my defense, she did drop a 12 pound rock on the back of my head at one point.

Not all of the torments lobbed at my sister were physical, however. Even at a young age, I had a flair for the dramatic and, as such, had woven stories so horrendously terrifying, that my sister’s ventures into the 14 acres of woods surrounding our home were made with extreme fear. Can anyone honestly tell me they wouldn’t be scared shitless if they ran into a marauding bigfoot or the icy grip of a grim reaper, both of which inhabited the depths of the property? The house wasn’t free from horror, either, though. A carefully constructed rig involving fishing line and a floating fan power cord served to quickly convince her that our warm little nest was in fact plagued by ghosts.

While inflicting grief on one another was a past time treasured by my sister and I, nothing would top the mutual grief we both endured late one winter. Our front yard was home to a glittering jewel of an above ground pool where we wiled away hours upon hours of our summer days. It was the same pool that I had jumped in feet first wearing flippers and, upended by the act, was thrashing about madly screaming “I’m drowning! I’M DROWNING!” while being laughed at by parents and uncle. I was later informed it’s not really drowning if you can still scream. Anyways, there had been a particularly warm spell this one fateful winter that began to melt the water frozen within the bowels of the pool. This served to create fractures in the ice, a large and very sharp piece of which ended up spearing through the side of the pool, dumping its innards all over the front lawn. My sister and I stood with tears streaming down our cheeks as we watched the final trickles of summer aquatic fun pulse from our dying friend.

Unfortunately, however, all good things must come to an end. My parents began to realize that their property value was beginning to decline, and felt that it was time for a needed paradigm change to a more child-friendly neighborhood. It wasn’t the National Guard battalion plugging down our road to their training ground located at its end, or even the contingent of roving child-mauling dogs that was bringing down property values, however. It was Ally McBeal. Okay, well maybe not she herself, but she had something to do with it. So one house over from ours stood one of the dumpiest most run down homes I’ve ever come to see. Every neighborhood has “that house”, but in this case our neighborhood had it in spades. The house was supported by a large timber leaned against one side to prevent the structure from toppling over after a leaky roof had served to rot out a good portion of the supporting framework. Toppling over would have actually been the best thing for it, but apparently its proud owner didn’t see it that way. The owner I speak of is Gary Flockhart. Now at this point you may be asking yourself who Gary Flockhart is. Gary Flockhart is the unemployed owner of the condemned house that blighted our neighborhood. More importantly, he is Calista Flockhart’s brother, the actress who portrayed Ally McBeal in the television sitcom bearing the same name. In a tabloid article detailing the whole affair (and thusly casting much unwanted attention on our neighborhood), it was explained that Ally, whoops, sorry, Calista had made numerous attempts to help her brother out, but had failed when funds were diverted to the purchase of illicit substances. My sister and I didn’t really get it at the time, and thought our parents were trying to stymie our happiness, but in our later years we began to see the prudence of, what was, a tough decision.

However, the absurdity of the events that played out down the street from us never left a blemish on the fond memories I have, and always will have of that place. Oh and by the way, the Flockhart family was later evicted and that piece of shit knocked to the ground.

The Bagel

So, at work we have one of those conveyor style toaster that escorts your bagel or a baked good of your choosing between two heating elements. I have the settings for the speed & heat perfected so that my bagels come out perfectly every time. Like I do every morning, I put my bagel in and go to fill my water bottle. I return to the toaster and find that this guy I hate* had put in an English muffin behind my bagel and had lowered all of the settings. I make a futile effort to return the dials to their original positions, but its too late.

So the bagel emerges, half of it toasted to heavenly perfection, the other half a spongy pale white disappointment. Now I have a dilemma…do I re-toast the bagel and attempt a bold maneuver with the heat controls in an effort to homogenize the Frankenbagel? I ultimately chose not to and, out of spite, I max out all the dials on the toaster (still housing his English muffin) and walk away. I now sit here munching on the bagel, experiencing moments of extreme delight, interspersed with moments of intense loathing.

* I detest this particular individual not solely as a result of this incident, but rather a long chain of similar instances that display his blatant disregard for his common man. I have been working in the same building for four years, and for those four years I’ve been both a victim and a witness to this guy’s rude and inconsiderate behavior. He routinely fails to acknowledge people when they say ‘hi’ or hold doors, never holds doors for others, cuts in line, and is a general douche bag. The fact that he’d choose an English muffin over a bagel only serves to contribute to my lowly estimation of him. I have no idea what his name is or what department he works in, and nor do I care to.

E-Mail From Corey

From: Corey
Sent: Friday, April 24, 2009 11:56 AM
To: Dan
Subject: The breakfast ride

I had an awesome ride this morning. The kind that makes you walk in to work humming your favorite song and wearing the kind of grin that make others think you just took someone else's car joyriding. It started off with a couple frustrating events. First, I roll up to the bike rack at work to deposit my backpack and find that someone else, whose bike I've never even seen before, has forced there bike in to my rung on the bike rack, where my lock already was. This aggravated me grately, but I was able to make the lock reach my backpack anyway. Then I continue on my way up talcott mountain, but right when you pass the farmstand on your left and begin up the steep grade, a bug flys right in to my eye / contact lense. Mind you, I was not wearing glasses because I already packed them in my riding bag for Sunday and safely stowed it in my car. While im trying to rub my eye and get the bug out, I careen into the curb. Luckily I think I just scuffed the side of my pedal and didn’t crash or have to stop. By this point the bug is out of my eye, but im tired and frustrated and only 1/4 the way up the hill.

I make it over the top and cruise down to simsbury and down iron horse boulevard. I was expecting that bakery/breakfast place I wanted to check out was going to be right around the end of the blvd. I get to the end and start riding on rt 10 and see only trees around me, I get nervous that I missed the place because downtown simsbury is behind me at this point. Im almost to the point of turning around when I see a small shopping plaza and signs of civilization, so I keep going. I spy a sign designating the harvest bakery and pull in to the plaza and lean my bike against the bench. Before I even open the door, there is an ominous sign "$10 minimum on all credit card purchases". Of course all I brought was a credit card. I go in and start gazing at the glass counters full of cupcakes, scones, muffins and other delicacies. I wait patiently to be helped by the cute girl behind the counter as she rings up someone's bill. Then she asks if she can help me with anything. I begin asking her if she would make an exception to the credit card limit just this once, since that’s all I brought on me. She asks me what I want, so I see if they have any cinnamon bread or something of that nature since they are known for their homemade breads. She told me they only sell them by the loaf, but I could have some toast if I sit at the counter. I tell her that I just need something quick since I have to get back to work, so she says "there are more bike friendly foods over here". Meanwhile im telling her how I came out here to do some recon since I heard this place had great breakfast and I wanted to come here before work sometime and maybe for brunch on the weekend. She brings me over to the scones section and shows me a cinnabon bun scone, which I think looks delicious. I say I'll take it. She wraps it up and gives it to me, along with a take home menu so I can peruse their offerings. Then, the shocker. She says "I'll cover it this time". Woohoo! I thank her numerous times and say I'll be sure to come back often. I then ride home, even taking the bike path through simsbury, happily munching on my free scone. I barely even felt the ground rise as I went up and over talcott this time, my stomach was far too content.

I think we know the destination of the first breakfast ride. By the way, the scone was delicious.

Bike Nerddom Nirvana Achieved

So I cast off into the land of dreams the other night, a warm spring breeze blowing through my window and the merry tones of the dying party at the house next door. I note the pleasant soreness in my legs from the day’s hammer fest and sink them lower into the welcoming tender embrace of my memory foam mattress. I slowly sever my ties with the waking world in excited anticipation of the nocturnal picture show featuring me as hero, heart breaker, and hardcore bad ass. Even those dreams not featuring me as a larger than life protagonist will normally take on themes so utterly bizarre that they’re nearly incomprehensible by the waking mind. I mean, who hasn’t joined a biker gang whose weekend past times involves drinking bourbon from the bottle and watching winged golden retrievers play soccer outside the back window of their favorite watering hole?

I woke up the next morning to the scent of brewing coffee and the sizzle of eggs. As sat up and began to catalogue my night’s cognitive adventures I realized, much to my shock, there were none. I had had one dream, and one dream alone. I dreamed that I had bought a ’09 SRAM Rival gruppo to replace the ’08 Ultegra gruppo currently on my Madone. Then (and this is where the dream really takes on life) I was met with the decision of whether or not to sell the Ultegra gruppo on eBay, or to initiate a new build. I ultimately decided to purchase a Pedal Force RS2 frame and build it up as a crit bike. That was it. That was my dream. The dream theatre normally showcasing flicks about shagging super models and taking out opposing factions with effortless judo chops was now showing instructional reels on making prudent recreational purchases. What’s next, a friggin’ feature film on baking an apple pie? I feel that I may have achieved an all-time low where my dream life is commensurate, and may soon surpass, my real life’s degree of regularity.

The Saga Continues...

So the saga continues on my local MUP. Yesterday I was riding home from work which brings me around the back half of the loop so elegantly portrayed in my previous post. Unfortunately my map fails to capture the level of detail necessary to demonstrate the fact that there is a small climb present on the loop that finishes on a blind right hand corner obscured by dense brush. I like to hammer up this particular climb as it’s a waste to drop into the smaller ring, not to mention its just plain fun. As I am rounding this corner I almost run head on into a teenage girl of pretty generous carriage. I pull a death defying maneuver and avoid creaming her by a margin perceptible to only those with the keenest of vision. I mutter a curse under my breath which, much to my chagrin, was audible to the girl’s father now only 10 or so feet behind me. He unleashed a maelstrom of insults upon me, a mistake I am sure he later regretted. With this week’s prior events and an already ill disposition towards these bumbling peds, his words served to whip up a tempest within our dear and humble narrator’s psyche the likes of which no online venting could ever serve to quell.

What ensued was a akin to a sermon delivered from up on high. I quickly wheeled my bike back around and begin to animatedly explain the dynamics of the bike path, and how utterly both he and his daughter had failed to adhere to them. Much to my surprise, I must have located the one ped whose brain hadn’t been reduced to a thin sauce as a result of their primitively jarring and rattling means of locomotion. He began to see the wisdom in my words (believe me, this is a very rare experience in any arena of my life) and even went to the extent of apologizing for trespassing upon us cyclists’ hallowed ground. Content from having done my part to cast a little light into the darkest corners of the pedestrians’ collective store of knowledge, I wheeled off basking in the cool afternoon sun and my own ego stroking.

LOOK, dog!

Each day on my 12 mile commute to work, I travel over about 2 miles of a local MUP that bisects the angle of the two main roads that lead to my destination (see professionally rendered map below). These 2 miles are always hopelessly rife with frustration and hand wringing as I struggle to cope with the rambling mass of brain dead peds. The MUP, about 10 feet wide, is (in theory, not in practice) pretty well laid out and includes a dedicated uni-directional bike lane that takes up about a third of its total width. Each morning I ride the lane in the correct direction and do my best to keep as far over as possible. Each morning it never fails that some hoard of middle aged women, pony tails swinging side to side in sync with their wagging hips and flapping gums, trot four abreast in the bike lane leaving the ped path void of traffic. Each morning I give a friendly but loud “on your right” to alert them to the fact they’re encroaching on cyclist turf and, every morning, these same pony-tailed adorned skulls come whipping around bearing a look on their face like they’ve just caught me sodomizing their 11 year old. On those really special occasions I am met with a heart-filled “ahole!” or an alarmed “Jebus Christ!”, to which I merrily respond “it’s a bike lane, dipshit!”.

A new phenomenon has been introduced to the bike path as of late in that there seems to be a preponderance of peds accompanied by their canine pals. Now don’t get me wrong, I love dogs and, as a dog lover, I feel it’s a responsible owner’s duty to ensure their dog doesn’t pose a safety risk to itself or others. Besides the mild frustration of having to dodge our furry friends’ ‘leavings’ whose less fastidious owner’s couldn’t be bothered to collect, I have now become accustomed to dodging the beasts themselves as they range, unleashed, into two-wheeled territory. I handle their owners much like I handle any other imbecile ped and deliver a friendly “there’s leash laws for a reason, asspipe!”. Unfortunately, however, it would appear that my wisdom has went unheeded as is apparent in the episode in which I was involved in on this particular morning.

I was coasting towards the exit of my beloved MUP, breathing a sigh of relief at having survived yet another morning of assured peril when all of a sudden a ped and his dog appear from around the corner. I quickly realize that this particular German Sheppard was moving towards me at an astonishing rate, unbound by any sort of tether. Even more quickly I realize that this dog had every intention of gnawing on our narrator’s god-like pistons. As its jaws almost inevitably locked around my leg I was able to unclip and deliver a swift and authoritative shove to its right shoulder with my foot. Instantly confronted by a feeling of pity for what I had to do to this poor animal as a result of its owner’s negligence, I shout at the offending ignoramus that he better get his shti in order lest his companion someday engage a less sympathetic soul. The guy saunters off clearly embarrassed, so much so that he fails to even respond.

As my local MUP’s judicature, I feel personal responsibility for the enlightenment of my dull witted fellow users. It would seem, however, that despite my best efforts I’m clearly just not getting through to them.

On Getting Dropped by a Fred

The sport of road biking is inherently a dorky one and, as such, its divided into varying degrees of dorkiness. The racers are the cool guys, and the dudes & dudettes with all sorts of knick knacks bolted to their bikes and sporting white cotton gym socks are referred to as “Freds”. Freds are routinely teased but the cycling community is a close one, so its all in good fun. A road racer’s pride can suffer a small degree of bruising when being passed by one of these Freds, which is exactly what happened to Corey and I yesterday. I wrote a short little blurb about it on a forum I subscribe to, and I thought I’d share:

So I met my buddy on my afternoon commute yesterday and we decided that a 40 mile loop on such a beautiful day would be just the thing for loosening up sore legs after the previous day’s intervals. We’re tooling along soaking up the rays when we hear a whooping “How yaaa doin’?!?!” on our left. Overtaking us is this bike covered with more gadgets than I could even assess with a single glance, piloted by a rider clad in knee high red wool socks, a helmet from 1976, and a long salt and pepper beard blowing horizontally across his face. He drops in ahead of us so fast that I looked down to make sure I hadn’t flatted.

As I see him become smaller and smaller on the road ahead of us, his t-shirt fluttering madly in the wind, I smiled to myself and took pleasure in sharing the joys of such a wonderful pastime.