Best in Show, and Tell

Seems like I received an unexpected promotion today–or at least a hell of a lot more work. Not something I’d planned on, or even seen coming, and we’ll still have to iron out that whole awkward “compensation thing,” but I’ve been asked to handle pretty much all marketing operations for my company. Er, one of my companies. I’m going into a particularly busy patch at the other one, too. And just getting a possible third, that might turn into two separate companies, off the ground. Life’s complicated.

Sadly, that probably means fewer words here on Canootervalve.

I started this blog after a particularly rough experience left me suddenly–breathtakingly–free of work. As all too many of us know, that kind of freedom is a little like being “free of gravity”: liberating for a short period of time, less so as you get closer to the ground. I ended up writing this thing to tell strangers about stuff. Turned out to be stuff some of you cared about, and I’ll forever be extremely grateful for your poor taste in entertainment. It also, directly and indirectly, led to four of the projects I’m working on right now.

So things might get a little sparse, but I’ll keep trying to scribble a few words here and there, and this will still be where I work out the details of Project Danzig and some other new stuff that’s coming up. Daily posts were probably getting a little old for all of us, though, really.

So I threw myself a softball entry for today. After–let’s see–fourteen hours of work, I’m just offering you some photos of the best damn looking bikes at Interbike.

One up top there is a Santa Cruz Tallboy that appeared in the Capo booth (along with a very fine pink Parlee). Not entirely un-Cannondale-like, but special somehow, just the same. It spoke to me. What it said was, “Take my picture,” and then it said, “You’ve somehow disabled auto-focus on your fancy camera app, dumbass,” and then it said all sorts of unsavory things I’d rather not repeat. Still: sharp bike.

Here’s the other best finish in the show.

That’s a BMC Impec. BMC has survived dopers and crappy designs and just keeps powering through any adversity with insanely stunning bikes like this. The finish is a mix of “we took the time to come up with our own distinct carbon fiber weave, bitches” and Lamborghini orange. Works.

I’ve sold a Lamborghini orange Indy Fab bike before and have always liked the color, but I don’t remember thinking if the price tag were 32 teeth I’d be riding that bike with the biggest toothless grin ever.

Actually, I do remember thinking that about the Indy Fab, too. So nevermind.

But the color combination on this Impec is pretty freakin’ amazing. I need a sixth job, or more teeth.