Free Stuff is Addictive

La, co-owner of Volume and Demolition, is sending me their new F1 stem and a set of their 1.80 Zeppelin tires in maroon. Awesome. Now I have to pick my new bike's colour combo around the tires. The Heaton 2 comes in Burgundy, and the forks and bars come in metallic chocolate. Hmm. Or maybe the secret yellow colour. I don't know.
I'm addicted to the free-ness of stuff. Slowly, but damned surely, my friends are starting to charge me for stuff that I used to get for free. Which of course they should. And it's not so much that the stuff will cost me money. I get a certain amount of my self-worth from the fact that I'm hooked up. It's a status thing: it means I matter. This is a sign of a weak character, I think. I'm not really proud of this.
Still, I'd rather not pay.
Let's see, who flows me stuff still: Etnies, Dragon, Demolition, SST, Dedication (new Montreal company), Ugly Ass Bikes, Profile (except titanium), MacNeil (although this might be about to change), Ten Pack (sometimes, but always fair), and Kink and Solid when I ask. The list of people who should flow me stuff: .........
I should stop asking, but I can't. The boldest ask I EVER went for was to Marco Massei: I contacted Tunney about maybe tagging along on a Road Fools for research purposes, and he said ask Marco. What the hell was I thinking there? To Marco's credit, he denied me respectfully.
I once got a complete Huffy Super Deluxe for Ken Paul. That was pushing it.
Hopefully, this next bike will be my last, and I can stop putting the "dick" in addictive.

breakin' the law

I broke my fourth chain today. Not bad for 23 years. Second one this year, second one on my cruiser. I was about 10km from home, so I scooted / skated. Just silly.
I dreaded fixing the chain. But it was so easy. I pulled out another chain that was slightly used, and it fit perfectly. No chain-breaker tool or anything. Awesome.
I guess it's good that I didn't get hurt. The other two chain breaks were ugly. The first was on the last power-crank before hitting a box jump. I went over the bars and straight to face into the transition. Luckily, it was the era of the full-face helmet.
The second was April 20, 1999. Three days after my mother died. I went riding with the boys at Ten Pack to ease the pain / avoid the grief. I jumped the six foot 90 degree hip, came up short, full to sprocket. Broke chain, folded sprocket, and herniated two discs in my spine. Thought I was paralysed. I wouldn't let anybody touch me for five minutes, and then I let Osato pick me up off the ground under my arms. Damn he's strong: I weighed about 185 then. I straightened my legs, and I could walk. I got lucky.
Now, six years later, my back hurts everday. But that wasn't the chain's fault.

magged

In a wonderful case of perfect timing, four magazines have arrived in the last 24 hours. It’s a bit goofy that I’m excited to get new bike magazines to read when I spend 10 plus hours a day writing my PhD dissertation on BMX magazines. Of course, the idea was that if I had to write a 250 page paper on something, it should be on my favourite procastinatory hobby.
I received the new Dig magazine today (I think from Ride Publishing in the UK), and two copies of John Parker’s new magazine “Sophisticated Rider” and a copy of Dirt (Ride UK’s mountainbike magazine) yesterday. Too much fun.
I guess that the kids watch videos and use the internet as their primary BMX info sources nowadays. BMX magazines were all we had in the 1980s, and I have been addicted since 1984 (although I have magazines as far back as 1979). Luckily, I get complimentary copies of Dig, Ride UK, Dirt, Sophisticated Rider, BMX Plus!,, and BMX Business News. I was cut off by Ride US last year, and have bought it every month since (I have every issue back to 1992, so I have to). I buy RED despite the fact that I could probably get free copies. Dave needs my support, I figure. I don’t buy Twenty, and was denied my request for a complimentary subscription by Kevin McAvoy himself. Seems like a decent magazine, though.
My favourite is Ride UK, because it seems to be written for adults. Dig is good, of course, and I think Tunney does a great job. I think he serves his audience well. BMX Plus really doesn’t suck so bad: it’s for kids, so to say that it blows because it is written for kids is to miss the point. Besides, about once a year, they write the best article of the year (the anti-Euro BB article three years ago, for example). Ride US is what it is. I buy and read it because, in my mind, it picked up from Go: The Rider’s Manual, which took over from Freestylin’.
I have 800 magazines here in Montreal, and I don’t want to take them to England. I’d love to donate them to some sort of not-for-profit museum.

Ti-ght

My new bike will have 91 individual pieces of titanium. Not possible? Remember that 72 can be spokes, and it’s not so crazy. 19 more pieces?
4 MacNeil pegs
4 3/8 Profile axle bolts (Mini hubs)
6 stem bolts
1 LHD 9t driver
1 Profile spindle
2 Profile spindle bolts
1 MacNeil seat bolt

I suppose that it would be possible to get brake lever bolts, a seat clamp bolt, and 4 U brake bolts too.
(Granted, this is all stupid. Jason Enns told me in August that he was proud to be titanium-free now, which makes sense to me, if not my back.)