Full Moon Fiasco 31

Full Moon Fiasco 30 true-up

Hey yall. Good times last Tuesday. Once again, we were back on a school night. Looking ahead, July will be on a Friday. August will fall on...ahem...the third Saturday of the month. Those of you who know the Marauders know exactly what kind of brew that stirs.

Anyway, a nice ride through the North Side. Cruised through a couple of parks, then south to Logan Square to land at the Two Way, aptly named for the entrances on both Fullerton and Milwaukee.

On the way, we had Willow cranking the pedals of her little bike as though she were powering the entire northside. We had Craig portaging the Modus Hoperandi. Thanks Craig, it was delicous. We also had a bunch of yahoos that didn't ride with us meet up at the Two-Way. You know who you are. Good to see you anyway. When it started getting late, a few of us fools gave up the seven dollar pitchers and went to Corner Bar for $4 pitchers. If memory serves, we took a photo of our Full Moons inside the bar, but proof has yet to be rendered. See yall next month!

Fiasco XXIX True-up

Fiasco XXVIII true-up

So the Midnight Marauders' rides just kill me. Not figuratively. Well, to be honest they don't kill me but usually make me wish I were dead for the two days following. I woke several hours after my 6AM arrival at home missing a wad of cash, most of my brain, and any vestiges of good health. BUT I had two empty plastic 6-pack holders in my pocket. I threw them away without cutting the holes. Watch out, ducks.

This month marked a special and dangerous occasion: Full Moon Fiasco and Midnight Marauders fell on the same night. The Fiasco was the opening act, teeing up what was to be an over-par course. The kind of course that makes you feel like you're biking under water. The kind of course, that's really damn fun.

Oh yeah, and for intermission between the rides, this photo was taken:

Fiasco 27 true-up

Sorry folks, no pix this time around. There is a FULL MOON Over Byron shot out there on someone's camera, but gave me the 'ol "no response" thing when I asked for it. We'll see.

Also, since there's no pix I can't really click through them to jog my rusty box for events that really stood out.

First of all, it was great to see so many new faces. I brought about 16 spoke cards, and gave nearly all of them away to noobs. Welcome! And a pleasant number of folks I haven't seen in quite a while. Welcome back, fair weather bikers! The rest of you, you know who you are. F-yeah. Keep bringing it big. And getting drunk.

For the third time in the history of this event, I personally led the group ride. For the first time in the history of my leading the ride, I didn't fuck anything up. A little preparation and scouting goes a long way. Or something.

We snaked through the North Branch Riverwalk, which is becoming one of my favorite short stretches of path in that part of town. Good views of the river through the trees in the dark makes it worth it. Also makes a good pee stop for all those fartblossoms that forgot to go before leaving the bar.

After a roundabout tour of Lakeview, we landed at our destination: Wrigleyville North. This has been one of my standby dives for quite a while. There's a good band that plays blues and old school country on Friday and Saturday nights. For years, I had no idea the name of the band, so aptly dubbed them the Beer Guts. As luck would have it, the Beer Guts were playing that night. Sweet.

Without wasting any time, I started priming my belly with beer for the eventual late night burrito. The joint just north of the Sheridan Red Line has what has hitherto been a magical hangover prevention burrito. It didn't work this time.

UPDATE, March 7. The full moon over whatever street that is picture finally arrived. As you can see, the double decker makes it's debut:

Full Moon Fiasco 24 & 25 true-up

--click HERE to see some pix--

Once again, it's been awhile since my last post. Since then, we've ping-ponged at Little Village and slipped into the Malortex of a weekday night. We pedaled through a snow storm and gorged on Korean bbq at 2AM. Also, braved frostbite for this daring photo:

At any rate, it's been a great year! Let's do it up again in 2011. See you out there!

As a bonus, here's a picture of my ride during the last Fiasco:

November's spoke card, replete with roman numeral typo:

Fiascos 22 and 23 True-up

click on the spoke card to see some pix...
First, Fiasco 22 in September:

Greetings from your lazy FBC correspondent. First of all, a sudsy thanks to Sol, engineer of Fiasco 22. Defying all geographic laws of cyclo-physics, he proved that to go North, one can indeed go South. In so doing, upped the ante for future rides and casting a bright flood lamp on how lackadaisical I’ve become in planning out routes. NO MORE, I say. So, I put together and actually led Fiasco 23.

Anyway, Fiasco 22 took us down to Belmont, back up to Ravenswood, far west then North to Roger’s park and ultimately the bar Sovereign. Distance-wise, I think the yardstick should now be that the ride should continue about 2 miles after the first people start bitching about it being too long. Bring some beer for fuel and pee on a tree you wimps. I even witnessed what was dubbed “shrub-piddling” demonstrated by several of our venerated female riders. Well done!

Sovereign is a class-A dive. It simply lives up to its name because it rules. **eyes roll and a sigh** It’s got a sweet curving bar and the whole place is narrow in the front and wide in the back, just how you like ‘em. I can’t remember any jukebox, but surely there was one. We made the bartender’s night. One of his friends bade him farewell with a sarcastic “yeah, have fun on your slow night!” Cheap beers flowed and a full moon rose over, well, whatever street that was:

And then... (click on the spoke card for Fiasco 23 pix)

Learning from Sol’s mind-bending directional prowess, I took Fiasco 23 on a South-to-go-North ride as well. We coursed through Hannover Park, south on California and dove through a small riverside park between Addison and Belmont that I’d never seen until several days before. Wooded and dark it’s a trip at night. During the day, I think there’s even a BMX trail tucked in the trees somewhere. Check it out. We snaked northward without incident and about 50 minutes into the ride, my beer-soaked brain lead everyone astray. Mistaking 6200 north for 6900 North, I hung a right and dumped us all out at Sheridan and Hollywood. It’s one of the biggest and busiest intersections in that part of town especially on a Friday Night. While I contemplated my next move to get us out of the fix I’d gotten us in, PJ darted to the front and led everyone on a left turn that gave me a sigh of relief. To the besotted brain, the simplest solution isn’t the one most easily arrived upon.

The ride zigged and zagged. Streets, alleyways, underpasses and finally, Duke’s Hideaway. SAFE! The main impetus was to check out Roger’s band, Paper Thick Walls. They rocked, so we showed them our asses:

Considering that more drinks were needed and the bar was closing, those with stomachs of iron geared up and made a short trip to Oasis for some darts and brews. You know how you can get a baby to stop wanting the chocolate by pointing out a puppy? Yeah, that’s the way I was with the darts. Everyone was safer after I was distracted from them with big sweaty pitchers of beer.

No injuries, all cool. See you next month!