I'm Running a Temperature of 94

A hip dip on a bike.
What's a hip dip?
I'll go over that in a future post, but for now, it is short for hippie dippy.
You know - a hippie who acts dippy.
I mean, c'mon.
His guitarcycle is out of tune.

Had a decent Pachaug rock'n'roll pile ride yesterday.
No crashes or heart-stopping moments, but plenty of concentration required to do a good job, rewarded with plenty of good feelings and feedback from the bike.

The reason it was decent and not fantastic is because it was the first time I'd worn my new Sidi Crossfire T&As on the bike, and since they're still being broken in, working the gearshift and rear brake pedals was more difficult and a bit clumsy.
This slowed me down a notch, and there were times I consciously backed off a bit on the speed because I knew I wouldn't be able to control the bike exactly like I'd want.
This is because the stiff, new boots require riding time to soften them up a bit, and after the next ride or two, I'll be in much better shape.
The new boots are very good in how snug they fit and how good they feel, and other than the still-new stiffness that will gradually go away, my only gripe is the trade-off that was made with the ankle pivot hinge.

The boot in encased in what is basically plastic armor on the outside.
So much of it, that where the ankle needs to bend, a pivoting hindge joint was made, and there's a hinge pin on each side of the ankle.
On each side where the hinge is, there's a burly cone-shaped protector covering the hinge pin, which allows the area to slide back-and-forth over the side of the bike as you ride.
The down side of this design is that it effectively spaces your ankle out a little bit.
I'd rather not have to get used to this, but, after one ride on these boots, I already am adapting to it.
I have worn Sidi Vertigo Corsa street boots that are similar to this for years (and still have a pair in excellent condition), so I'm not totally foreign to the concept.
It's coming along.

All this goes to show how much the feeling the rider gets while riding the bike matters very much, something that the casual, long-haired hip dip on his guitarcycle probably doesn't consider.

-Off to jerk,
-John