I'm a lasagna boy!

In which the word is 'burly'!

Gerry Kraynick has choice words, of course, for the riders of the Dirty Dozen hill-climb in Pittsburgh.

"You go past some of these guys and think what's wrong with these people," said Mr. Kraynick. "My idea of nice ride is finding the best 13 hills to go downhill."

The Dirty Dozen -- the name deceives us for the sake of superstition: the ride actually consists of thirteen grueling climbs, including Beechview's 37º Canton Avenue -- began about twenty years ago, and relegates to second place the ten nine ascents of Fillmore St, a mere 18%, that form the main challenge of the San Francisco Grand Prix. "Back in the early years (the 80's) a macho attitude prevented any rider from using gears lower than a 42x24. In recent years, the ride has gotten easier due to lower gearing and several of the hills being paved (asphalted) which used to be rough cobblestone or wavy blacktop killing what little momentum the rider had." I am a little shame-faced to note that Negley between Fifth and Dunmoyle, one of the toughest climbs I ever finished in Pittsburgh, checks in at a sissy 18% for two blocks or so, and does not figure in the Dirty Dozen route (great illustration!) at all. Sycamore St, for many years the heart of the Thrift Drug Classic professional race, fits in the Dirty Dozen just past the half-way point.

Ad-propos of gruelling climbs, Aram reports that he made it up the exhilarating 35 miles and 10,000 vertical feet, from beach to peak, of some volcanic mountain in Hawai'i. Details to follow ...

compere

com·pere (k?m'pâr') Chiefly British. n. The master of ceremonies, as of a television entertainment program or a variety show.

compere, a word I first noticed in the Tour Dates section of ol' Big Nose's web site. I just dusted off the two-record set of "the first 21 songs from the roots of urbane folk music", it makes me want to polish up the ol' dancing shoes and go find Maggie's grave. It was'n't until the difficult third album and the poignant (really!) love songs that Billy Bragg became more than a protest singer to my still-young ears. The politics and attitude enchanted me first and foremost, and, feeling justly disenfranchised from the machinations of the Reagan government, I soured on the establishment. I snuck two tape recorders and several cassettes into the pockets of my parka one wintry evening when he was playing a concert, again with Michelle Shocked! and dutifully bootlegged the proceedings. After I wore that recording to shreds, I found myself becoming dissatisfied with his politics when he started selling out stadia -- emphasis on the selling -- and although his albums still bore artwork, not HMV stickers, insisting that the weary consumer "pay no more than £5.99", he struck me as more commercial and less activist. Shades of Jimmy Thudpucker, but not Bob Dylan. He still wrote and sang great songs, and won some measure of redemption when he researched the unpublished Woody Guthrie material that eventually formed the two glorious two Mermaid Avenue albums.

In which we do the hump-free dance

What do you call a camel with two humps? Bactrian.
What do you call a camel with one hump? Dromedary.
What do you call a camel with no humps? Humphrey. Or, in this case, Rodney:

Camels are one of the more difficult animals to anesthetize,” Cranfield said.

They were lucky Rodney reacts well to low volumes of drugs, he said.

“The other problem with large animals like Rodney is you don’t want to have them down too long because they get cramps in their legs,” Cranfield said.

Aside from those challenges, Rodney is moody.

“He’s not the easiest creature to work on. He’s a little grumpy. Well, he’s a lot grumpy,” Sallaway said.

In which no-one has a handgun

The Chronicle reports that "Two men were shot to death in broad daylight today in San Francisco's Western Addition, just yards from an elementary school where children were attending classes."
Search Google for news on the San Francisco handgun ban.

shiv

shiv, a mellifluous word that never ceases to amuse me when it reaches my ear, means a razor; cited in 1915, variant of chive, thieves' cant word for "knife" (1673), and is of unknown origin. It may be from a Viking word, shiver: (n) A splinter, a small piece of wood. Shiver is the diminutive of shive (a thin slice). Ice skífa (a slice). Compare with Yorkshire dialect (to split, to pare - especially of leather) and the E slang shiv (a knife).
And, of course, there's always the Don Cheadle take on it, from the same film as "You know, in a situation like this, there's a high potentiality for the common motherfucker to bitch out. "