feeling so much better

Thanks for all the well-wishing. About 24 hours after taking my first dose of Doxycycline I was feeling tremendously better. Though the treatment is hardly simple--I think it's a 21 day antibiotic cycle, which is at least twice as long as anything I've ever had before.

...

Stories I've heard from others about Lyme disease:

(1) Lyme disease is the consequence of some kind of biological weaponry experiment gone bad.

(2) An acquaintance (of the person telling me the story) failed to complete his antibiotic cycle, the stuff came back, and now he's pretty bad off. (Though it's not clear what was meant by "pretty bad off.")

...

I piddled around a couple of times last week on the mountain bike, then got out for a 68-mile road ride on Saturday (down to Chambersburg, Apple Way west to Fort Loudon then up to Cowan's Gap...north on 75 to Fannetsville, over the mountain (two mountains) to Upper Strasburg and back home). I felt better than I had in, well, a month. Even with so little riding of late. Remarkable.

Old Lyme, Connecticut

So I've been sick for pretty much most of the month. Fever, chills, aches, pains, and monster headaches. But no coughing, no sneezing, no congestion. It came on strong the night before Longsjo (July 2nd)...and that pretty much ruined it for me--with alternating doses of ibuprofen and acetaminophen every three hours I was able to ride (but hardly race) the TT on Thursday and RR on Friday...Johann crashing out of the RR gave us the green light to come home on Saturday. During that first wave I was out for about eight days. Then I started feeling better, rode a bit, but the punch in my legs just wasn't coming back.

Then I got sick again. The fever, the chills, the aches and pains. Same as last time. After ten days of this (yesterday) I decided to see a doctor. She right way noticed several tell-tale circular rashes on my legs, back, and stomach that I hadn't. Lyme disease. Awesome.

So it sucks to have been sick all month, but it's a relief to have a diagnosis and a treatment.

...

In other news, there's this. Nuts. Two seconds of bad decision on that cop's part is going to cause him and the NYC police department a world of hurt.

I wonder, was it a sympathy tackle for Novak's encounter with the vigilante bicycle commuter? (Watch the clip--the Novak one--sucks to be famous, eh?)

crazy conservatives

Novak plows through pedestrian.

My favorite bits:

As he traveled east on K Street, crossing 18th, Bono said "a black Corvette convertible with top closed plows into the guy. The guy is sort of splayed into the windshield.”

Novak's reaction?

“I didn’t know I hit him. ... I feel terrible."

Didn't know you hit someone when he was splayed across your windshield?

Novak:

"He's not dead, that's the main thing."

Really? That he's not dead, that's the main thing? Wow.

Anyway, I love that a bicycle commuter chases him down and hangs out in front of his car (because he "keeps trying to get away. He keeps trying to go.") until the cops show up.

ho hum

Rest days are boring.

...

I'm pretty excited about Tuesday and Wednesday, though. My fantasy tour team is in second place overall and second in the polka dot competition...and I'm pretty confident that after Wednesday I'll have a comfortable lead. However, the time trial could be my undoing.

Really, I'm probably more excited for my fantasy results than I am the real thing.

I'm not sure what that means...

work

Michael just posted something about stacking wood for the winter.

Reading, I was reminded of childhood.

Sometime in the late 70s my dad decided we'd save money with a wood-burning stove. So we got the stove. And we got a lot of wood.

Except we didn't have the wood delivered. That would have been too easy (though it should be said that in the later years my father relented and had the wood delivered...however, I recall this change in protocol being blamed on the forest service not opening enough land for personal use wood-cutting). We had to go up in the mountains and play with chainsaws until we'd loaded up a pickup truck and trailer full. Once home, we split the wood with a rented wood splitter. Then we piled it beside the house. And piled. And piled. The next weekend more of the same. I'm not sure how many trips we had to make each year, but collectively it amounted to a lot of work. (Fortunately, I was young enough to get a pass on the trips spent actually cutting down trees. My work began once the truck pulled into the driveway. I was not too young to procure similar truck and trailer loads of manure, however. But that's another story.)

We also had a stack of wood in the basement by the wood-burning stove. This stack had to be replenished weekly. We used a 50-gallon barrel strapped to a hand truck to haul the wood downstairs.

Crushed fingers. Sap-covered clothes and hands. Dinged-up sheet rock. Dirty carpets. Ten year-olds aren't particularly handy with hand trucks loaded with 100+ lbs of split wood.

...

For the past several days Val's been dipping beeswax candles. This keeps half the house smelling like burnt beeswax. Which for her is a delight. For me it has prompted a surprisingly confused emotional reaction.

At home, we had a pretty decent sized orchard--or a pretty decent sized orchard for people who lived in the suburbs and didn't farm for a living. Half my parents' acre lot was garden. About a forth of that half acre was a raspberry patch. Another forth was fruit trees. Close to 20 fruit trees in all. We also had a nice long row of grape vines.

All of that fruit needs pollinating, so my dad became a beekeeper. For two long hot days at the end of each summer I'd find myself in the garage (as closed off from the bees as possible) with a centrifuge machine and an electrically heated knife...up to my ankles in honey and honey-like substances. The smell of Val's hot beeswax takes me back to the smell of cutting honeycomb off trays with that hot knife. I can hear (I can feel) the sizzle and crack of bees and bee parts under that knife. And it was like 130 degrees in that garage. And the stifling smell of burnt beeswax...

...

It was my understanding that a powerful motivator behind my parents engaging in these projects was to teach their children "the value of work." Upon reflection, I'm not sure what that means. The value of my work was exactly $0. At least, that was its value to me. I only knew dreading to wake up in the morning because it meant at least an hour of weeding the garden. Value to me? Frustration, resentment, guilt. From my perspective, I didn't see any money saved...nor did I ascribe any aesthetic pleasure to having to scrape off slivers of a rock-hard honey-like substance from the inside of a wide-mouth quart jar that, try as you might, never spread evenly on your toast (the wheat for which I had the honor of grinding in the basement), making one bite too sweet and the next too bland. I would have much preferred to squeeze my honey from a plastic bear-shaped bottle purchased at the supermarket like everyone else.

But what I'm sure I did learn from all of that is how to avoid work. And thus the emotional confusion at the smell of burned beeswax in my house the past couple of days. I'm aware, shifty-eyed, guilt-ridden... I feel myself expecting at any minute to be enlisted (through stomping of feet and waving of hands and mild verbal abuse) to engage in some sort of hot, tiresome, unpleasant task for which I will garner no benefit.

I think it's time to go for a bike ride.

clairvoyance

Yesterday, July 16th at 8:35pm, I sent an email containing the following text:


Predictions for the remainder of the tour:

Look for Frank Shleck to clean house in the mountains next week.... Look for Ricco to test positive...for something...[and] get booted.... And look for Valverde to take out another big stage win, even if he remains a non-factor in the GC.


Not twelve hours later and I'm one for three.

horner the sherpa

I really love this.


The captions from cyclingnews:

Leave no man behind: Chris Horner (Astana) didn’t do enough work out on the road so he carries in a fallen rider.

Chris Horner (Astana) gets some support from the fans as he carries another competitor to the finish line.

More.

What a stud.

mountains, death, and the adventuring lifestyle

A mildly poignant opinion piece from the Times retreads old waters.

My own feelings could probably best be summed up as such: Safety is boring.

The trip you didn't take because of the accidents you might have had is nothing worthy of a story. And it's not the stuff that makes a life meaningful, for you or your family.

crush

I think I have a bit of a man-crush on the Bike Snob. The dude's a genius.

This is unbelievably funny. "Unbelievable," you sneer? Yes, it is. Because prior to reading it I would never have believed I would laugh so hard. So funny.

tour of pennsylvania

I invited the neighborhood kids over and armed them with noise-makers in preparation for stage three of the Tour of Pennsylvania, which came down from Camp Hill on US11 right past our house.

We made noise.

Then I piled my girls and two friends into the car and we headed for the second KOM, just off the turnpike about 25 miles this side of Bedford.

We made more noise.

We also tried to get noticed. But no one seemed to care much that we were there (two thumbs down to the douchebags in the Slipstream car), though late in the caravan someone tossed the girls a couple of water bottles. Which was cool.

Anyway, we tried to get noticed. But not as hard as this guy.


I thought of dressing up, but I have to tell you I would have never thought of dressing like that... Nice. Really nice.

cry, the beloved country

I just finished Cry, the Beloved Country, a much more readable novel than I had anticipated. I was expecting poignancy, significance, a little gut-wrenching...but I wasn't expecting the simplicity of method for getting me there. I'm very impressed. A new favorite.

A couple of favorite passages. First, after Kumalo and Msimangu first meet Kumalo's brother in Johansburg. Msimango reflects on the visit:

He stopped in the street and spoke quietly and earnestly to his companion. Because the white man has power, he said. But when a black man gets power, when he gets money, he is a great man if he is not corrupted. I have seen it often. He seeks power and money to put right what is wrong, and when he gets them, why, he enjoys the power and the money. Now he can gratify his lusts, now he can arrange ways to get white man's liquor, he can speak to thousands and hear them clap their hands. Some of us think when we have power, we shall revenge ourselves on the white man who has had power, and because our desire is corrupt, we are corrupted, and the power has no heart in it. But most white men do not know this truth about power, and they are afraid lest we get it.

He stood as though he was testing his exposition. Yes, that is right about power, he said. But there is only one thing that has power completely, and that is love. Because when a man loves, he seeks no power, and therefore he has power. I see only one hope for our country, and that is when white men and black men, desiring neither power nor money, but desiring only the good of their country, come together to work for it.

Simple. Almost obvious. But poignant. A passage which has nothing to do with race, but everything to do with social class, injustice, and power.

And this bit about love... The meta-lesson of Christianity, no? What tragedy that two millenia of pastoral corruption and pious self-righteousness has stripped the institution of Christianity of its Christian moors.

(I want to write more on this, but I'm fearful of being misunderstood. So I won't.)

...

A second passage. From the writings of Author Jarvis, who is killed by Stephen Kumalo's son.

It is hard to be born a South African. One can be born an Afrikaner, or an English-speaking South African, or a coloured man, or a Zulu. One can ride, as I rode when I was a boy, over green hills and into great valleys. One can see, as I saw when I was a boy, the reserves of the Bantu people and see nothing of what was happening there at all. One can hear, as I heard when I was a boy, that there are more Afrikaners than English-speaking peole in South Africa, and yet know nothing, see nothing, of them at all. One can read, as I read when I was a boy, the brochures about lovely South Africa, that land of sun and beauty sheltered from the storms of the world, and feel pride in it and love for it, and yet know nothing about it at all. It is only as one grows up that one learns that there are other things here than sun and gold and oranges. It is only then that one learns of the hates and fears of our country. It is only then that one's love grows deep and passionate, as a man may love a woman who is true, false, cold, loving, cruel and afraid.

I was born on a farm, brought up by honourable parents, given all that a child could need or desire. They were upright and kind and law-abiding; they taught me my prayers and took me regularly to church; they had no trouble with servants and my father was never short of labour. From them I learned all that a child should learn of honour and charity and generosity. But of South Africa I learned nothing at all.

I relate deeply to this passage.

As an American, I might write, one can read, as I read when I was a boy, the textbooks which extol the virtues of founding fathers, a land of plenty, of all; of the intelligent, the innovative, the moral, the courageous, the right; and pledge allegiance to its flag, with dignity and respect; and feel pride in it and love for it, and yet know nothing about it at all. It is only as one grows up that one learns that there are other things here than...the good.

And I might continue to write, I was brought up by honorable parents, given all that a child could need or desire.... From them I learned all that a child should learn of honor and charity and generosity. But of America I learned nothing at all.

my response to butterworth

This is how I replied (to this):

You ask what can be gained by boycotting your events. Quite a lot, it would seem.

From where I sit, the problems lying at the heart of all this, or at least contributing heavily, are (1) the profit motive--that you, or Rich, or whomever were trying to make a living out of promoting amateur bicycle racing--and (2) the cycling community’s reliance on (nearly) a single provider of racing events…rather than a loose conglomeration of events put on by nearly as many promoters as events.

A race calendar filled with events organized and managed by different groups of volunteers--cycling clubs and others--in a non-profit paradigm seems to me a much stronger, interesting, and aesthetically desirable calendar than one filled almost exclusively by one or two for-profit promoters. Why?

(1) Lower entry fees.

(2) Higher payouts.

(3) Charity motive (not always, but often).

(4) Events with charity motives promote both participant and spectator attendance AND…

(5) …make more sense for potential community sponsors (which can bring in both money and manpower).

(6) The culture of the whole thing feels community-oriented, not transaction-oriented. (The difference between a state fair and Six Flags. Who wouldn’t rather race at—or even just come to watch—a Turkey Hill vs. a Kirkwood or a Mt. Joy?)

(7) Club-run events provide opportunity for more racers and other cycling enthusiasts to get involved in organizing and promoting events (see prior point), balancing the 'take' vs. 'give' equation.

(8) When each event is organized by a different group or promoter, if one group has trouble and an event disappears, there are still plenty of other events left on the calendar.

This year’s Red Roses Racing calendar, and past years’ Pro-Am Cycling calendars, have done much to discourage cycling clubs and others from promoting their own events. That, to me, marks an unattractive trend. A trend, however, that will no doubt be reversed if you (and Rich) would give up on monopolizing the race calendar and only put on a very few events (if any at all).

Sincerely,

[signed]

butterworth's side of the story

Regarding the Red Roses Racing controversy (for more on the on-going saga, click here, here, here, here, here, and here) I got an email today from Dave Butterworth outlining his version of the story. I've reproduced it here (see my response):


As you may know Red Rose Races.com, Inc. has suspended operations and Rich Ruoff resigned from the company. Rich has been a friend and great cycling enthusiast and it’s terribly unfortunate that his business and personal debts got out of control to where things could not continue. People have asked to hear my side of the story, well here it is.

There seems to be a lot of misinformation going around in the cycling community about what happened and although this letter will get a little long for some, it may be the only chance I get to try to set the record straight. Remarkably there are even a few people holding onto the idea of a conspiracy theory, believing that Pro-Am Cycling Events, Inc. (David Butterworth) engineered the demise of Red Rose Races and Rich Ruoff. Quite to the contrary. In September 2007 Pro-Am Cycling “sold” the majority of its events to Red Rose Races and intended to exit the road race promotion business. Pro-Am Cycling received little of any money in this transaction and most of that was invested into additional equipment to assist Red Rose Races.

Background. Our two companies have worked side-by-side in Lancaster since 2003 organizing bicycle and multi-sport events. Going back to late 2005, Rich wanted to expand his menu of events and actually licensed and produced Kirkwood, Mount Joy, Union Grove, Millport, Peiffer Hill, and Brownstown for Pro-Am Cycling in 2006. Problems arose when I noticed Rich was spending the pre-registration credit balances in the BikeReg account to pay debts incurred in the prior season rather than using the money for current expenses, which then nearly bankrupt the company. I took over as treasurer for the rest of the season and we did not license our events to Rich again. Nevertheless, Rich and I stayed on friendly terms and helped each other out when needed.

Last spring Rich was threatened with a suit by Adecco for unpaid traffic marshaling and by the Pequea Fire Company for $1,330 in delinquent services fees from July 22, 2006. Pro-Am Cycling loaned Rich $1,500 to pay the second bill, but nevertheless that was the end for Mt. Nebo. In June 2007, West Earl Township told Rich to “pedal his bicycle elsewhere” due to past problems dating to 2004 and that was the end for Farmersville. Pro-Am Cycling also paid Rich’s past due fire-police bill to West Earl Fire Company ($600) and Farmersville Fire Company ($900). All of these loans were eventually repaid. Unfortunately, there were other strained relationships in Fulton Township and Christiana that made continuation of these events tenuous, although the later was likely to go on with or without Rich Ruoff. And there were half-a-dozen other cycling and multi-sport events that failed and were discontinued along the way under Red Rose Races as well.

Although we had talked of combining our events on many occasions in the past, I was wary from my experiences working with him and unwilling to yield complete control to Rich as he had insisted. The events acquired in September 2007 by Red Rose Races from Pro-Am Cycling were Strasburg, Kirkwood, Mount Joy, Union Grove, Millport, Rapho, Bird-In-Hand, Peiffer Hill, Brownstown, Mount Penn, Deodate, Stony Run, and Wonderland, and in large measure what could have made Red Rose Races a successful business that was able to provide Rich with a reasonable income and long-term career.

Transaction. In August 2007, Rich wanted to purchase Pro-Am Cycling’s events and although I was skeptical I was willing to consider the idea because he had a co-signer for his loan and it looked like a serious proposition. This would let me recoup my cycling “investment” and get out of the road race promotion business without any worries; or so I thought. On September 28 we signed a Sale Agreement, but Rich’s loan was looking sketchy as his co-signer needed more time to negotiate with his bank or possibly he was just reconsidering whether to participate in the loan after giving things some further thought. Rich insisted he could make the deal happen and promised to get a loan elsewhere if necessary. He said he knew finances would be tight and he agreed to keep expenses and his salary to a minimum for the next two years as Red Rose Races absorbed the transaction and looked for a major sponsor to underwrite the Pennsylvania Super Series™. Pro-Am Cycling agreed to finance the sale on a short-term basis if Rich’s bank loan or investor financing fell through with no payments due until March 2008.

By year-end nothing had changed and Pro-Am Cycling was committed to working with Rich. At the outset, the cyclocross events were money-losers and Pro-Am Cycling contributed $1,250 towards the expenses for Stony Run and Wonderland. Things turned around and by March 2008 the season was off and running with strong, record-setting numbers for Strasburg and things continued incredibly well for Kirkwood and Mount Joy. The business should have been successful.

Recent developments. Other than being a major creditor of Red Rose Races, David Butterworth and Pro-Am Cycling had very little to do with the management of the company. I discussed external issues with Rich, like making a cat. 5 race into a cat. 4 & 5 race, and helped him with the course set-up and tear-down on race day (for which I was considered paid staff). During the middle of the day I worked as a USA Cycling official.

On May 28, three days before Millport, Red Rose Races defaulted on the loan it had with Pro-Am Cycling as had been anticipated by our recent conversations and then – only then – became a majority owner of the company. There was no hostility between Rich and me with this turn of events and we talked of getting things back on track to the point where I could make a second exit and leave him to run the business on his own again. I still believed in Rich and the grand ideas he had for the Super Series.

After the note default, I was elected as a director of the corporation and became Treasurer. On May 31, 2008, Rich told me to bring my (Pro-Am Cycling’s) check book because he has no money to pay bills for Millport and wants a $4,000 loan. I had recently heard rumors of riders and officials having been given post-dated checks for payment at the Tour de Ephrata™ and Union Grove and I was concerned. Apparently he was now using his personal checking account to pay bills, not the Red Rose Races corporate account, in the hope that even if all of the prior checks bounced maybe he could settle his bills for Millport. If in fact Rich had again spent all of the Super Series ($17,200) and pre-registration ($3,900) credit balances on the BikeReg account, I knew he was in serious trouble and things were far worse than in 2006.

On June 2, 2008, Rich, Dave Felpel (Christiana promoter and mutual friend), and I met for lunch and to give Rich a check for the loan he requested and to discuss Red Rose Races business and financial situation. I questioned Rich on where all the money had gone and presented him with a list of liabilities I could plainly see were accruing against Red Rose Races. The company was essentially bankrupt. Rich really had no answer, but insisted he just needed more time and would make things up. His “plan” was for me to write him a $20,000 loan to get caught up on his bills, continue business operations, and pay himself an even higher salary than he’d taken already. I was willing to advance Rich the money needed for Millport, but not $20,000. So I said no and Rich abruptly resigned.

Now at that point things changed and perhaps that's what people need to understand because it wasn't any longer just about Millport, but it was now a question of everyone owed money getting thrown together into the creditor pool. We were now in a bankruptcy situation. Riders who paid for the full season, anyone pre-registered for a future event, cycling officials, and other creditors were equally entitled to getting something, not just the folks from Millport. There was no chance of me running the series as envisioned, both from a time/labor standpoint and due to the fact that with more than 20% of the projected income already siphoned off by Rich from the BikeReg account, each event was guaranteed to lose money. That would only make the problems bigger and so I canceled the remainder of the Red Rose Races series. I am now getting some bills paid and hopefully I’ll be able to retrieve more equipment from Rich to sell and refund everyone’s money. Please support my efforts to sort things out with Red Rose Races.

Where do we go from here? There are a few events in Lancaster County like the Turkey Hill Country Classic and the Cargas Criterium unaffected by this situation and they will likely continue as always, but there are about seventeen cycling events that could very well disappear. Christiana will be held, but it’s going to be a smaller event. Rich and Red Rose Races aren’t coming back. I talked with Rich earlier this week thought maybe we could work something out, but Rich has decided he’s moving on with his life and so I wish him well. Although I have no interest in promoting seventeen events, if given the opportunity, I will again organize ten to twelve of them through Pro-Am Cycling, which is ambitious but manageable. We are also willing to license several of the remaining Red Rose Races proprietary events for others to produce and can provide services and equipment as needed. A local club has already expressed interest in holding the Lancaster County Triathlon™ in July 2009.

Hopefully some very outspoken critics in the local cycling community won’t continue to be short-sighted and vindictive for the perceived inequities against Rich. An attempt to boycott our events just makes everyone a loser; what does it accomplish? Where will you race this season, next year, and the year after that? Don’t let these guys ruin it for you.

And that brings me to the Brownstown Road Race™, which is scheduled for Saturday, June 28. I have organized this event for the past five years and it’s always been a favorite. The Men 1, 2 & 3 and Men 4 races are PCA BAR races. The flyer can be found at: http://www.bikereg.com/events/register.asp?EventID=6695. All riders registered for the Pennsylvania Super Series™ and individual events under Red Rose Races will receive credit for an entry in the equivalent category; please email me to be re-registered. Be advised there is NO DAY-OF RACE REGISTRATION. PRE-REGISTRATION ONLY. You need to be registered by Thursday, June 26 at 8:00 PM. I hope you’ll come out to race. Thank you.

Sincerely,

David S. Butterworth
CEO
Pro-Am Cycling Events, Inc.

diaspora

This is where the last 100 people who checked my blog live (minus New Zealand and Malaysia):

Ninety percent of them I know.

Ten years ago I would have never thought my friends would be so scattered. I think it's lucky. (Not because I don't want them around--that would be good too--but because their diaspora is the consequence of the kind of people they are. Talented. Ambitious. Educated. Professionally competent. Adventurous. Interesting.)

it's a boy

Unmistakable proof of masculinity (an obvious protrusion from between little legs) revealed itself Monday when vfg (I wanted to write "the blooming purple petunia," but that seemed a bit much) went under the transducer probe.

So, a baby goat. A baby male goat. Cool.

...

As I've been working on names it strikes me as a pretty good idea to write them down. I'll likely regret this later, but for now this post is my worksheet.

For years we've been saying our boy name would be this:

Reuben Wilde Goates
[my maternal grandfather/Oscar Wilde/Surname]

This name is attractive for many reasons. Wilde Goates. I mean, that's poetry. There's also a nice symmetry, both with the 6-5-6 letter combination, but also the Wilde-with-an-'e' and Goates-with-an-'e' combination. We also really like the name Ben, but aren't super keen on Benjamin. We keep coming back to this as our first choice, though my wife has at times expressed reservations about "Wilde" (because she doesn't want a wild child, and because of moral reservations about his namesake).

Ralph Waldo Emerson Goates
[Emerson (of course)/Surname]

I've always sort of liked those names where someone is named completely after somebody else. Like George Washington Carver, the slightly more romantic George Washington Hayduke, or from my daughter's current favorite movie, Benjamin Franklin Gates. The trouble is thinking of someone you admire enough to give your kid that person's whole name. Ralph Waldo Emerson fits the bill as a personally deeply admired poet, philosopher, theologian, etc. A quintessential American thinker. More Mormon that most Mormons. And I think "Emerson" would be a great name. He'd go by Emerson.

Other full-name possibilities include Thomas Jefferson Goates or John Steinbeck Goates, but (really, no offense to anyone) Tom and John just aren't really doing it for me.

Utah Anders Goates
[a really cool place/a sort of family name (Anderson)/surname]

Louis L'Amour fans will recognize Utah as the name of one of his more Clint Eastwood style characters, Utah Blaine. No doubt in part from that influence, the name to me conjures up images of stone-hard masculinity. Adventurism. Toughness. Red-rock landscapes and snow-covered peaks. All that good stuff. But when I suggested it, Val blew a hole through my sail, "Utah's a girl's name." Is it? Has it become that? Sad...

I also like Anders. It's sort of my own invention. Well, it's obviously an old name, and I like Ander better than Anders, but if I said I was naming him after the Andersons in my wife's line, anyone who knows anything would know that the father of the son from which "Anderson" came was named Anders, not Ander. Plus, there's already a Zander in the family (a cousin), so that would get confusing.

Those are the most complete names I've come up with. Now for the rag-tag list of name possibilities that are somehow attractive that could get incorporated somehow, first, middle, something:

Anders
Emerson
Kimball
Michaux
Noah
Reuben
Utah
Wasatch

It's not a very long list.

I've been trying to come up with a couple names that are somehow bicycle related too. A name of a bicycle part, a race, a classic climb or something. But there's nothing too romantic in crank or spoke and I don't know what a Roubaix is (other than a place in France).

I'm also running through plant names, geological terms (mostly mountain-type stuff), places in Brazil I know, and cool Portuguese words, but I'm coming up empty. (I think one of the coolest Portuguese words is vergonha, but I can hardly name a kid that!)

One last thought. I remember when I was a senior in High School ('91) that I had decided to someday name my kid Eddie (or Edward) after the three great Eddies: Eddie Merckx, Eddie Van Halen, and Eddie the dog on American Flyers. (A few years later I would have added a forth Eddie, Eddie Vedder.) That no longer seems an attractive idea.

I welcome your thoughts.