Big Bikes

My Name is Thom Parsons and I'm Here to Recruit You

Before I get on with whatever I'm going to yammer about today let me throw this out there. International Bicycle is looking for a couple good folks for our Service Department. If you yourself would like to work for IBC (which I have to say is a really, really great place to work) or you know someone who might want to work there, jump on over to our website and hit the "E-mail us" tab.

And something else while I'm at it. The IBC Elite MTB Team is looking for one, maybe two female riders to fill out our roster. It's a pretty damn good deal. We're putting our clothing order in soon so email me at thomp at internationalbike dot com if you're interested.

This is really important, I probably should have mentioned it first. The film Wanted is totally unrealistic. I mean there's one point in the film where the protagonist, Wesley Gibson, Googles himself to illustrate what a totally meaningless and inconsequential life he has lead up until that point. The result comes up 0. No occurrences of the name "Wesley Gibson" appear on the entire world wide web.

0? Try 2, 200,000. That's a lot of zeroes.

I Googled "Wesley Gibson" and you know how many results came up, minus any related to the film Wanted? 2, 200,000. That's how many. That is pretty damn far from 0. My suspension of disbelief let go at that point in the film. My disbelief crashing into the icy, shark-infested waters below. If not for that piece of ridiculousness I would have bought all the lateral flipping of cars with people shooting out of their sunroofs, bullets "bending" around sides of beef, and Angelina Jolie brutally beating people with her arms of sagging skin stretched over chicken bones.

To get a 0 result from Google these days you need to really contort yourself to make something up which is so made up that no one in the entire world, no matter how much paint they have huffed or how many head injuries they have had, could have ever thought of it. Something like"Borgledonk Geegleblatz".

And even then you get the "Did you mean" message, Yes, you're right Google, I am remiss. I did mean "Borgledonkgeegleblatz". Silly me, it is one word, isn't it?


No, no it's not. 0 results for "Borgledonkgeegleblatz". Until someone else Googles it and they find themselves here.

I did have things that aren't totally insane to talk about today...
let's see.

I wanted to point out how awesome it is that Mass native John Foley is also a member of the 29er Crew this year. So it's Andrew, John, Michael, Brad, Rickey, and Me. If we all show up to the same Root 66 race at the same time (which will likely happen at least once this season) that might be kind of terrifying. We could potentially make up over half the Pro field. The statistical likelihood that the win will be had by a 29er Crew member is incredibly high.

We'll have to talk MTB team tactics before the season starts. "OK, so you go really really fast while I try to go faster than you and then I'll pass you and then you try to go faster than me and then maybe you'll get tired and I'll go faster than you but them maybe you'll rally and start going faster than me again, but then maybe you'll flat or I'll crash or...". Johan Bruyneel would be proud.

One last piece of super-wicked-awesome-importantness. I shot an email to 29er Crew member and Endless Bike owner Shanna Powell and basically said "I really, really, really like your products, I use them, I think they're awesome, I ride a single speed against geared riders so I have an excuse for why I suck so bad, and I have a blog that three people read". She was like "I talked to Marshall and he says you talk way too fast, you looked like a gaping idiot on Farlow Gap during The Swank 65, but you don't seem to be a USDA Approved Grade A total douche, so ya, you can be on the team".

Now I've got a killer Cog sponsor for '09. I'll have even more potential gear combos to geek out about. Lucky you. If only Dunkin Donuts and Dale's Pale Ale would sponsor me, my life would be complete.