crap

Fixed gear madness

What happens when you unship the chain of a fixed gear bike at 50kmh?

Things stop rather rapidly.

Chain jams between spokes and cog and between bottom bracket and chainring spider. Back wheel locks up. You skid for a few metres. Back tyre blows out and shreds both the tyre and tube. You skid on the remnants and grind off the rim as you skid a few more metres. If you don’t fall off you eventually skid to a halt and your mate – who was 20 metres behind you – says calmly ‘That was lucky you didn’t hit the deck’.

 

Yes it was.

 

TDU16 pix

Where did the ‘WHOOOO-EEEE!’ come from?

Where did the ‘whooo-oo’ get it’s mojo and when did applause become overtaken by mass braying and the organized shrieking of many?

We have all been part of a restive crowd, just waiting for the speeches to finish so that the serious partying can begin. The speaker concludes, the crowd reacts with enthusiasm and a wild ‘Whoooo-heeeee-whoooo’ fills the room.

What used to be a generous round of applause has been replaced by a shrill whistle of acclaim, so obviously it was not always this way. When it did it become acceptable to shout and whoop and holler? When did official engagements and Prime Ministerial announcements become blessed by what sounds like a jet turbine running up to full power? When did insignificant things get the same treatment?

I could ask the Internet, because you can find out anything on the internet. But do I trust it? Or I could resort to memory, and I sure as hell know my memory is faulty. Or I could ask around, or even just plough ahead with what I can see resembles nothing so much as a curmudgeonly grumble.

I suspect I became aware of the ‘whooo-hooo’ in about 1998 or 1999. Thereabouts. At the time I was probably attending four or five official events per week and of those at least two a week were ‘launches’, that peculiar species of self-congratulatory event organized by a PR company to make an ordinary announcement seem like the most exciting thing since. Sliced bread. The last launch. Never. [I’m just listing possibilities here; these events are never interesting].

‘And the winner of the 2015 Award for Cradle Dancing Serbian Style is… ‘

Whooooo-heeeee!

‘So I’d like to officially declare the government’s new non-soggy ticketing solution now open…’

Whoooooo-for-oooooooooo!

You know the sort of crap I’m talking about. The launch of the East-West upside down North South Metro link, which only cost a gazillion dollars and will solve all our existing transport woes.

I blame the PR agents, whose job it is at such events to mingle in the crowd and then raise hullaballoo at the appropriate moment. Actually, I blame us all, for going along with such tripe for years until it became more than ritual. A thing: a birth, death or marriage wasn’t considered properly celebrated until the banshee sirens had sung their song.

I wish, like the screaming jets – oh, so that’s where they got their name from – the ‘whooo-eeee’ would disappear into the sunset and let us celebrate an announcement in the way we saw fit. Or not.