ChrisCowan.us

The doctor call this morning to see if we could push up the induction to today. Since we are both ripe with anticipation we both thought today would be just as good as any day. Wish us luck!

Last night I mounted up my new rim and tuned up the rear derailleur. I practiced my switch backs by making tight turns in our driveway so that I could turn 180 degrees only using half of the driveway. Everything was running tip top again. I cleaned up my tools and closed up shop for the night. I went to bed with the images of pristine morning single track to comfort my thoughts in to a deep slumber. Amanda and her Mom went out to Santa Cruz for dinner and Coco went fucking nuts when they got home waking me up. I though, "YOU FUCKING DUMB FUCK OF A DOG!" and then I yelled, "SHUT THE FUCK UP COCO!" Then Amanda came to bed and Coco started whining and pacing around like she had to go to the bathroom (the second time is two hours). I finally said fuck this and took Coco downstairs to put her in her crate in the Garage. I didn't want to spend the entire night before my ride getting up every two hours to let the fucking dog out. As soon as I shut the gate an climbed up the stairs she started going ape shit. I ran back downstairs and hit her cage and yelled "NO!". Then went back upstairs and laid back down. Since I was worked up it took me a bit to calm down and as soon as I did someone started snoring like a lumberjack. Totally not her fault. I mean what kind of asshole would get pissed at a 9 month pregnant woman for snoring. So I just poked her a few times and she quieted down. Then Coco freaked out again. So I ran back down stairs and repeated the whole "hit-the-cage-and-yell-NO" move again. After that she shut up for the night. It took me another hour to calm down and go to sleep. 4:40 am... beep beep... beep beep.. my morning ride alarm woke me up, I slid out of bed and stumbled to the bathroom to take my morning shit and read some Mountain Bike Action. I then dragged my ass down stairs to get a bite to eat and catch up on my email and morning RSS Feeds. The whole time I was still pissed off about the dog bullshit. I packed my bike stuff up and meet Tony at REI at 6:00 am. As we drove up to the Gap I bitched and moaned the whole way there about the night before and some other bullshit that's been on my mind lately. I was totally expecting this ride to turn to shit because of all the negative energy I was covered in from the night before. Plus it was kind of gloomy out. As we drove up we noticed the cloud cover was only on the bottom half of the mountain. The top of the mountain was Sunny and beautiful. We got to the top unpacked our gear and hit the trail. Immediately my attitude turned from shit to shinola. My bike rode like a dream. I think it's the first time I rode it where nothing was acting up or irritating me... no squeaks... no loose parts... no crappy shifting... just a smooth ride. I forgot about the bike all together and relaxed into my ride. I kept a lazy pace and just savored this ride. By the first switch back I must have had a look on my face of complete satisfaction. I was in nirvana.

I know this isn't news worthy but I wanted to post my excitement somewhere! I'm going to break-it in tomorrow at the Gap. Hopefully it will withstand my RETARD MONKEY STRENGTH on the climbs this time.

I sent some emails out on Sunday night to Hope and Universal Cycles with a copy of the video of my defective wheel. I got a phone call and email from both on Monday. They both offered to replace the defective part immediately. I decided to just let Universal Cycles deal with it since they offered to rebuild the wheel and ship the replacement ASAP. I got an email this morning letting me know my new wheel shipped this morning and they would be sending me the docs for returning the defective wheel. I'm extremely pleased with Universal Cycles customer service on this issue. They are a model of how an online retailer should respond to a defective product. Not only are they replacing the wheel but they are sending out before they receive the defective wheel back. That's faster turnaround then I've had with most brick and mortar stores. I've always been a little wary about dealing with online bike shops because I felt if something went wrong I could be easily left out to dry. Universal Cycles has completely restored my confidence and I plan on using them for all my purchases in the future.

Tony and I hit Skeggs Point this morning for my "Last Ride Before the Baby Comes" ride. I just got a new wheel set with Hope XC Hubs and Mavic 717 rims from Universal Cycles. I tuned my bike up last night and made sure everything was running perfectly. The ride started off perfectly and everything was running top notch. The shifting was crisp the brakes where hardly making any noise (except some dust on the pads). The wheels where rolling smoothly. Everything was right with the world. Then someone started pissing on my parade, at the end of the ride my rear hub started acting funny. The cassette was not coasting and the chain started kicking back violently. I stop to check it out and my rear hubs basically turned into a fixie (check out the video below)! We nursed my bike back to the parking lot and drove home covered in disappointment. Now I need to call the online retailer that I bought the wheel set from and see what they will do. The problem is their site states the following:

Defective Products
Warranties are issued by the individual manufacturers of each product. Warranties usually cover defects in materials ans workmanship. Damage from any type of abuse or neglect is not covered. The manufacturer may choose to either repair or replace a product they feel is covered under the warranty. Some manufacturers require the warranty item to be sent directly to them other prefer us to handle it. If you feel you have a defective product you may contact the manufacturer for a return authorization directly or you can contact us. It is usually faster to contact the manufacturer directly. Most manufacturers will not accept shipment without a return authorization. We can supply you with the manufacturer contact numbers for all of the products we sell. Shipping and labor are not covered by most warranties. To obtain a Return Authorization for defective products to shipped to us call 800.936.5156 or 503.943.61551 or email us. We must be contacted before we will accept any warranty items.

This is the problem with buying bike parts form online retailers. You can't take things back and say "Hey, What the fuck is going on with this?" I think this is the last time I buy anything online.

So I've been contemplating on writing this post for about a month now because I didn't want to hurt anyone's feelings. But my suffering has gone on long enough. Let me explain... When I was in high school we had this gym teacher that was a one of those old school guys who wore Bike brand shorts and a white t-shirt and looked like the drill instructor from Full Metal Jacket. He referred to everyone as "ladies". "Let's go ladies!" as while he was instructing the boys to run laps around the soccer field, he was old school. He also smoked tons of cigarettes and drank gallons of coffee every day in the teacher lounge. The result of this was the most horrible dragon breath know to man. When we would stretch at the beginning of class he would yell "REEEAACCHHH"! That would burn the hair off the first three rows of student. It was so horrible that you where motivated to work hard so he wouldn't yell at you. It was the most foul smell on the planet and it's what I use to gage stinkiness. Recently I've been reacquainted with this stench. Yahoo! serves all the free coffee you can drink. Unfortunately, they don't serve all the free mints to combat the stank-ass-coffee-breath. The worst is when your stuck in a meeting with one of your coworkers and their breath is bad enough to melt the polar ice caps. I suffer through it in silence. What is the etiquette for encountering a coworker who has stank-ass-coffee-breath? Should I be the one to tell them? Should I just offer them a mint and when they refuse say, "No, please..." Amanda suggested putting a huge candy bowl of Altoids on my desk so that nobody would have an excuse and I could politely direct them towards the mints. My thoughts are you should be responsible enough to do a breath check a few times a day. Just cup your hand a breath in to it and then immediately take a big whiff. If it smells like shit take a mint. This is one of the reasons I only drink water!

Tony and I did the Dawn Patrol ride this morning at Saratoga Gap. We burned 1800 calories according to my Suunto T3. We decided to hit Chipotle for lunch and here is my calorie count.

Chipotle Nutrition Facts Serving Size: 1 Burrito Amount Per Serving Calories 1493 Calories from Fat 579 % DV* Total Fat 65g Saturated Fat 23g Cholesterol 144mg Sodium 2691mg Total Carbohydrate 155g Dietary Fiber 14.5g Sugars 4g Protein 69g Vitamin A 102% Vitamin C 0% Calcium 54% Iron 30%

Chipotle Nutrition Results provided by:
Chipotle Fan.com

I know this thing feels like it died but it's just been in hibernation. I have it in mind to re-fresh my blog to more of a blog/profile page that will aggregate stuff from all over the place. So what have I've been up to? I traveled to India and Singapore last month. I've been participating in a new Flickr group for the last couple of weeks where we take a Daily Self Portrait. I just started Twittering. My mountain bike has been on the mend and I've been riding the Japanese steel to work to maintain my fitness level. Preparing for the impending arrival of our second daughter and trying to have as much fun as possible with our first daughter. That's all for now... Check back to see my refresh.