howsyouredge.com

If you don't follow my life very closely, you won't know that I had jaw surgery a while back -- May 6th, to be exact. It involved sliding my jaw forward and loads of fun times. Oddly, I never felt an ounce of pain. In fact, the most painful experience involved a catheter removal. Oooh, fuck that.

As part of my recovery, my mouth was wired shut for 6 weeks. Yeap, 6 whole weeks. You saw what I ate, how I ate. Well, here is the last meal I had blend. Yay. I believe it was a strawberry fruit and soy smoothie.

And here's a shot of my mouth on a face only a mother could love. You can see the wire that held my jaw in place. That wax prevented the wire from cutting up my lip. Good stuff.

Then the wire came off. I was pretty freaking stoked. Of course, my mouth muscles had atrophied and I could only open my mouth so wide. I have a measuring device that I use to check on my progress. Before surgery, I was a 53. In this picture, I am a 20. This is a face only a wife could love.

I no longer was forced to drink from a straw or through an enema bottle. But that didn't mean I was ready to shred a burrito. Nope. My mouth wouldn't open wide enough for that. And also, my jaw didn't really recall how to chew so well. But here is my first "solid" meal. Note how happy I am.

For the curious parties, it's bbq tofu (pan fried tofu smothered in trader joe's bbq sauce. You may or may not recall my love of trader joe's bbq sauce. I still have 3 bottles left. Only 2 are unopened). For the most part, I ended up sucking it off the straw, mashing it some with my teeth/gums and swallowing it semi-whole. Good thing those pieces were cut up small. I don't think I could have fit anything larger than 1" cube in my mouth at that time.

Please also note the goodfoot shirt. I strongly suggest you support this store AND brand from the great white north, Canada. They always come strong with product and their in-house brand is always at the top of it's game. Check their site, and if that isn't good enough, hit up ebay for some gear you may have missed.

Remember last week when I was talking about karma? Here's why.

Needless to say, I was psyched all week. I just got it back today, and the ride is smooth! Now let me give you the back story that lead to my "deep" karma discussion.

It all started about 3 weeks ago. Summer was here, and I wanted to get out and ride my bike. Of course, I don't own a bike. That was the problem. The wife and I began visiting every LBS (local bike store for the uninitiated). I would peruse the bikes and even got a kid to measure me out. I'm a 56cm if you are curious. We went to every bike store I can think of in the area. We even hit up the big city of Boston (and got an ill vegan shake too). Most of those bikes were out of my price range. I had loot but wasn't willing to blow my load on some super fancy bike. I just wanted something I could kick around on.

I also began lurking ebay and craigslist religiously. I would check once an hour on a busy day. And every 20 seconds on a slow day. Maybe not that often, but DAMN often. I came across a ton of viable bikes. Some were super expensive, some required ridiculous shipping. Most items on craigslist were "sorry, already sold" or not the right size.

I kept digging. I soon started looking at fixed gear and single speeds. I figured a mutt/conversion would be less expensive than a fancy road bike. I did plenty of digging, checked out bikesdirect.com and all those sites. Saw some good deals, but nothing that jumped out at me. The one item that came highly recommended was back ordered (it's available in my size now, fyi).

Then one day, Casali asked me if I wanted a Wishingwell logo shirt. He knew some guy who was selling one. I told him I couldn't buy one (despite how awesome it looked) because I was focusing all my loot on a bike. He was surprised and asked what kind of bike. When I said "road bike," it all started "coming up Brian."

He commented that his brother in law left a road bike in his basement. He couldn't ride it because it was too small for him. Too small for the brother in law, not Casali. A bike too small for Casali would assuredly be too small for me. This was his brother in law who I remembered was a semi-giant. I asked what kind of bike it was. He told me "it was only rode twice and not for a very far distant." Not exactly the answer I was looking for, but apparently the bike was in the basement. He didn't want to go down there just then.

He eventually went down and came back. It turns out, it was a Specialized Allez bike. Now that frame is probably a $800 setup. I wasn't sure if I wanted to drop that kind of loot right then and there. I asked him what size it was. He didn't know. He didn't want to go down to the basement again.

I drove home in a happy fog. I found a bike in my friend's basement but wasn't sure if it was my size. On the ride home, I got a text from Casali. "56" Who could fucking believe that? Then later, he told me the brother wanted $500 for it. Bike, cage pedals, clip pedals with specialized sneakers, helmet, gloves and a roof rack. I was a little astonished. I didn't really want the rack and threw back $400. The brother accepted then tossed in the roof rack "just because."

I drove down the next night and picked it up. And the last bit of karma, the sneakers were size 11.5-12. Yeap, they fit like a glove.

And now the previous karma post is explained. Full circle.

ps. If you have a fixed gear bike in a 56-58cm and want to trade for hardcore vinyl, I'm game. Hit me up.