Thanks.

Hey, whoever it was that bought me the Jens Voigt - "What Would Jens Do" clock from CafePress - thanks! It just showed up in the mail, which was weird, but pretty awesome. I really, truly appreciate it. I really like Jens a lot (Duh, who'd have ever guessed?) and that clock is teh kuhl. It's going to go in a place of honor in my office, to remind all my co-workers of my irritating bike obsession, and to remind me that at 6:00 every night... Jens would Ride, so it's time for me to ride. I don't know who sent it - I'll fantasize that it was one of the VanderKitten girls, for sure ("yeah, he's fat and slow except on mostly flat ground, and between the belching and ze farting, he is repulsive, but damn, the boy gives a good draft so I like him, I can't help myself, I'm a 105 pound pure climber, you know," she purred).

But if you're a reader or riding buddy, you're as good as a VanderKitten girl as far as I'm concerned. It's very generous of you, and I hope that I get a chance to give you something in return, whether it's laughs, a ride to a race, a draft on a training ride, a swig from my water bottle, or a hard time at the end of a crit.

Now here's a thing about why I do what I do, and how I think. I write this blog for myself, but also for all y'all. I get tons of fun from the riding community, and I try to give a little of the fun back, to share it and help y'all discover the fun that sometimes is lost amidst the suffering and hectic training schedules and everything else. I have a lot of fun reading your comments, following your links, enjoying stuff y'all clue me in on. But that clock... that will give me joy about 25 times a day *forever*. I'm the kind of guy who keeps kids toys on his desk at work to play with while thinking. I can't watch the Three Stooges without pulling a stomach muscle laughing. Every time I see The Big Lebowski I laugh harder than the last. I have a simple lizard brain that is constantly amused; if something is funny, I will laugh at it as hard the hundredth time I see it, as the first.

So there's simply no way I can pay you back for the chuckles that simple little Jens clock will give me.


Again, thanks. That's a frickin' awesome thing to do.

I gotta run now. The trainer's loaded up, I need to do a couple hours of zone 2, and Jens... Jens says it's Quarter to Ride, so I gotta get pedaling.