Indoors and out of mind

It's been a cold and wet couple of days, with the Langster laying dormant in my shoebox disguised as a flat, and only the landlady's cat to keep me warm. It's a real struggle to get up and put on bike clothes, layers and layers of them, at 7 in the morning to ride the 3 k's to work in the rain (or at least on a wet road... fixie scares me in the wet). So the old Laser has been getting a bit of a run for the last few days. I always feel like a wuss though when I'm driving and see some 50 year old guy in shorts and a t-shirt pedalling along Oriental Parade into the southerly chill.
So I've done what any lazy bastard bike rider who is afraid of a cold, wet arse would do. Sit on the home trainer. Of course I don't have a home trainer, or a home big enough to house one, so I set up in the shop and spin for as long as I can stand without going completely insane from boredom. Usually half an hour. The other night after my brain had been sufficiently numbed and my legs 'fixed', I was loading the Langster into the car when I had the brilliant idea to see if I could teach myself skid stops. The smooth concrete in the upstairs carpark was a perfect learning pad, and I was soon locking up the rear wheel at will, albeit assisted by a healthy dose of rear brake, but I was doing it, and felt like a real fixie rider before reality snapped back in. There's no way I'm going to attemp it on the road for a while yet, but that carpark is gonna get a few more 23mm rubber marks laid on it for sure.

The cooler weather has also brought a downturn in customers, well it's dead to say the least. So with three guys standing around having looked at every cycling and soccer website imaginable and going stir crazy, there's only one thing to possibly do....
CHOPPER TIME-TRIALS!!!
Stevie G rails the Lube Stand Chicane on the way to another sub-standard time.
Now, Matt might be a former Pro, Olympian and still holds the British 30mile TT record, but on the ill-handling, under-sized Raleigh, I own him. Might be the fact that he's 6'3" and his knees hit him in the chin on every pedal stroke, but I don't care. He may own the bike leg in his gay new sport, but I'm taking the glory, baby! A full second faster. ONE second! Not just once either, but half a dozen times. Stevie G has all the handling skills and showpony antics of a BMX whizz, but like all BMXers he has no top end at all. But he has the coolest tatts out of us all. Well, the only tatts out of us all. Matt didn't want to be embarrassed by a picture of him riding a Chopper, so I dug up these ones instead. Not embarrassing at all eh big fella!
Run Forrest, run!!

Just got a call from Josh, telling me his shop blog is up and running. Check it out.