Grant: If you publish stuff, someone, somewhere, will be offended. Guaranteed. Don't be sorry. The other side of balance beam is that you give voice to a lot of ideas / opinions / thoughts that bubble around in a lot of our heads but never make it into print. I don't agree with everything you've written but always enjoy reading your articles.
FWIW, my copy of Just Ride was the on-board read of choice for a van load of bicycle tourists between So Cal & the Canadian border last summer. The bike load as everything from an old steel MTB to CF racing bikes, plus my Atlantis & a LHT. Even some of the racy people commented "hey, this guy has some good ideas". You're doing a tremendous amount of good. Keep writing & I'll keep reading. dougP On Tuesday, December 11, 2012 3:47:00 PM UTC-8, gep7...@gmail.com wrote: > > I never TRY to offend people, but it sometimes happens and I'm always > sorry for it. My opinions about bikes are about bikes, and not the people > who ride them, but of course---I'm this way myself-----I tend to take > equipment-comments personally. When I set out to do the Reader--and > catalogues and JR--always up front among my concerns is to not attack > people, but anything goes on the bikes or parts. But even so, I try to > tread lightly while talking straight about it, and if I were really good, > I'd be able to pull it off better than I do. > > I knew (and said this exactly in the into to JR) that many would find the > book offensive, or might feel threatened by it, in some way. But what I > find offensive (that may be too stronga word) are the notions that > "serious" riders dress, ride bikes like, and train like racers. I know not > every non-racer does that, but it is common enough to almost be > invevitable--in the absence of a good argument for doing otherwise. > > Anyway, PB, I'd be happy to send you a copy of JR free. It's only 34,000 > words. You might agree with 27,000 of em! > > Best, > > Grant > > On Tuesday, December 11, 2012 12:44:27 PM UTC-8, pb wrote: >> >> I do not have a dog in this hunt, I really don't care one way or the >> other, and I didn't read the book, but I will note the following: >> >> - The story of George is interesting (click through the photo to read >> about him). The guy rides a bike, and I suspect that Grant would enjoy >> meeting him. >> >> - Grant managed to offend me at some point in most issues of the >> Reader. Over the years, RBW lost a good amount of my discretionary >> spending as a result of various things I read in the Reader. I was baffled >> and confused by positions he took, and comments he made, which seemed >> snarky to me -- earnestly snarky, determinedly snarky, unecessarily snarky, >> rather than good-humored, witty observations. I was a guy with a dozen >> bikes in the garage, in a wide variety of flavors, all of them expensive, >> all of them with lots of miles on them, some of them very racy, some of >> them lugged and Rivvish, virtually all of them subject to ongoing >> replacement (in other words, each of those hooks was potentially a business >> opportunity for RBW), and I had the means to be able to buy the products >> Grant was offering... and he repeatedly told me that I was clueless about >> my almost lifelong avocation. I gather George had a reaction to Just Ride >> which was along the same lines. >> >> I recovered from my reactions to the Reader a long time ago. Water over >> the dam. Shrug. I own and have owned Rivs. Yes, I appreciate Grant's >> positive aspects, and contributions, while shaking my head at some of his >> idiosyncracies as well as at what I think are poor business decisions -- >> hey, none of my business except that someone needs to finally tell him that >> he tends to build top tubes that are too long (and too numerous, but I >> digress). I'm not surprised that someone else might respond to aspects of >> Grant's writing as I did. An analogy to Grant's style of >> communication that occurs to me is a soccer coach who tells kids that they >> should play soccer instead of football because football is stupid, and >> people who play football are fools who have been tricked. Wouldn't it be >> more productive -- and overall much more positive -- to invite the kids to >> play soccer because it's a great game and they're going to have a blast? >> Some of them might even wind up playing both football and soccer! How cool >> would that be? (No, I'm not a football fan. It's an analogy. Substitute >> "baseball" or "swimming" or "cycling" or "video games" in place of >> "football", if you don't like the football analogy.) >> >> I'm grateful that, unlike George, when I am reading for pleasure, I >> have learned to toss something aside if I don't enjoy it. You'll never >> find a review on Amazon from me that reports, "I hated this book from the >> first page, and steadily hated it more and more until finishing page 742." >> (Or worse, a one-star review that says something like, "I have tried this >> in the past, I have always hated it, and yes, I still hate it and it still >> sucks, and it gets one star!) On the other hand, occasonally I will go >> back and check on something that I haven't liked in the past. BSNY is an >> example of the latter, and references to him spurred me to wander over that >> direction. Today's column confirms for me that, unless I take up pot >> smoking on a Rastafarian scale, his writing will likely continue to hold >> zero interest for me, although I did note his admission that his sense of >> humor stopped evolving in the 8th grade, which helps to explain a lot of >> things. >> >> And now, back to your regularly scheduled programming. :-) >> >> pb >> >> >> >> >> On Monday, December 10, 2012 8:29:09 AM UTC-8, numbnuts wrote: >> >>> >>> http://georgethecyclist.blogspot.com/2012/12/grant-petersons-racing-acumen.html >>> >>> Regards, >>> Chris >>> Redding, Ca. >>> >> -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/rbw-owners-bunch/-/cTV6Sg6nFQIJ. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. 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