Bang the Shitty.

 

     I can taste failure, and its bittersweet aroma fills the air with a stench akin to roses strewn amongst a million decaying skunks: success is only properly measured by the poverty of attempt; pleasurable recreation achieved only through a suspension of acumen. Hereby and forthwith, I am converting to Scientology and marrying a forth wife, siring 17 more offspring and drinking only herbal teas made from the mint growing in my beard...I fear this is the only solution to an extended childhood, a prepubescent stasis that has poisoned every cell left in my cerebrum, a cavity that is so empty of all things responsible and Gawdly, that I shall be arrested for crimes against huFEMity. Butt, all good things come to those who wait, so maybe I'll postpone my transition until The Pirate arrives this Sunday, and the Crew of 8Lumens has their quarterly sacrificial Bored Meeting, wherein beer will be abused and single-track and single-speeds will be ground to a bloody pulp....

This last weekend, the powers that Be held what ended up being called Shitty Shitty Bang Bang in the West Bottoms of KCK and KCMO; and it turned out to be a vainglorious amalgam of hate, love and FUBAR'd bikes: truly the best time the Boner Ghost has had in a fortnight or millennium, whichever came first. Below are a few photos that I snapped, and also a few that I stole in order to document said occasion - Dan and his Bro, along with Michelle threw quite the shindig, folks. 

And now a litany of random, inexplicable images to clear the palette...

...Mr Cowan is sure running a kick-balls speakeasy down in the Crossroads, Thou Mayest

is the joint to end all joints. 

...raced some 'cross in the heart of Brownbackistan - Topeka KS - and the course ran through the grounds of the abandoned Menninger Psychiatric Hospital..creepy shit - Googles it.

...this gorgeous tank is in my bike basement collecting dust unfortunately, still bedecked with full racks and panniers, awaiting her next voyage - so sad, indeed.

...hit the Kaw Sandbar in KCK Sunday with the kiddo, still a blast after all these years.

A tale of too many trails.

    So...boobs, beer and illegal Oxford comma usage aside, it has been a fortnight and then some since my stinky little middle fingers have laid themselves upon the keyboard of least resistance, and that might just be a check in the positive column for all humanity; or at a minimum a net negative on the abacus of calculating an infinite number of possibilities, wherein the mountain bike-cycle is concerned. Whilst the Southeast coast was drowning in two feet of rain and Cali-pornia was being buried in an apocalyptic level of mud and condom-laden goo, we here in the KC area have been blessed with 3 weeks of hero-dust-perfection on the track of single - no doubt a bit less funnerer than my single-speed brethren throwing down Sake in Japan at SS Worlds - but then again, I fucking hate raw seafood more than I despise John Boner and any other Republican that has a pulse. Butt, this post is not intended for public usage, only for those who find their personal Zen in the forests here in the Central flyover states; therein a true meditation on the myriad miles of earthen tracks that one's knobbed velocipede can become two with Satan's great creation.

     It's 9:05 on a Sunday night, and in all likelihood, this trash will not get posted until the wee hours of Monday morning, which is for the better, since my blood/alcohol limit is blatantly illegal - not that I wouldn't ride a bike down to the Power and White District in order to punch a brah - and in the vein of the Member's Only jacket from 1984 we can only assume that my depths of perception are horribly altered. That being said, lettuce take a shallow dive into a palpable, first-world problem: I have yet to hit an IMBA Epic in North-Central Arkansas, known as the Upper Buffalo Wilderness. 

Yes, I am well aware that I will more than likely miss the grand opening of the Slick 80, a new trail system cut by Tylor and crew a stone's throw from Branson, MO. and this pains me to no end, but in reality - a dimension that I rarely have the ability to visit - I cannot in bad conscience attend such Saturnalian frivolities without losing my tenuous grip on virtuality. 

For the sake of my 100% Christian Fundamentalist readers, I will annotate any list of the trail systems within a 4-hour drive of the city center of Kansas City - and it's lackluster menu of Chilaquiles - and birth a commentary on the plethora of dirt that is available directly on the doorstep of yours liarly: yes, we ( The Whitest of Mike) paid Two Rivers Mt. Bike park a visit this last week, and, though its flow may be legendary, Landahl is still the King of the Hill, the Cock of the Roost. The omnipresence of Swope Park may take the mainstream media attentional focus for KCMO -and that is with justified justification - still, my all-time favorite blow-job is  the aforementioned Blue Springs/Indep-Mo system that never fails to dissappoint. Not only can one find orgasmic #rockybukake in droves at Landahl, but all can experience the bloody, hardcore goodness that promotes proper dental care as well as holistic nocturnal emissions.

This dude -who shall remain nameless - had a minor spill at one of our oldest trails ( SMP )

and, since he was solo, I cannot speculate on the over-arching reasons that lead to his ER visit; the metaphor I am searching for is not unlike Alanis Morissette's false irony: rocks are hard, even if you are soft. 

Train Wreck, Car Fire and a Yard Sale: Pub n' Pedal 9

    There are certain, definable elements to ascertain a successful life, and one is whether or not a person can be inebriated enough whilst the sun is still afloat in the Western sky to throw a $3000 bikey with wild abandon; in the process bending a disc rotor and a wheel beyond repair. One other element is challenging one's sexuality by choice, or dare, and in the process realizing that men really are disgusting creatures with death-breath and hirsute-hell issues: Team Penistitties/8Lumens won hands down.

Momma said cock you out, a wise man once never said, and so, the pre-dark shenanigans set forth upon Pub n' Pedal with a vengeance unlike any 4 hour hairstyle session with The Donald. Bikes were eventually ridden, only after the Danimal's Boxwine acoutremount was attached with a scientific furvor to the rack on El Blanco's Boner Stem racer:

And, this aforementioned hinderance would be the Captain Cuntwat's ultimate tool for a hastened demise: problematic at best, tragic at worst, short-bus reject at worster; 3rd person narrative is always the litmus test for all things chary and  mental...

...pre-party Sprints.

And now back to original programming...