It’s Tuesday, which means it’s Treat time (no, not Chipps in Frankie’s leathers). Unfortunately the usual provider of early mid-week goodness is off sick (get well soon Jamie! 🙂 ), so we thought this might be time to wheel out that stalwart of Singletrack’s intermittent but still magical mystery tour: the Singletrack office kitchen.
This is where the staff gather to drink coffee/stew tea/cook bacon/eat fish and chips for lunch. It’s also where we welcome the bike trade stalwarts who come to Singletrack to show us new stuff (Ian from Wildcat Gear and the Madison peeps are this week’s visitors), chew the fat and drink our coffee. Scheduled visitors and random passer-bys always get a warm welcome – obviously those who arrive armed with Krispy Kremes/pies from Oddies/a box of posh pastries from Patisserie Valerie get an extra warm welcome, but we’ll still be pleased to see you if you’re on a narrowboat holiday and were moored up in the lock out back when you recognised the building (this has actually happened), or have broken your chain but can’t be bothered to take your bike to the bike shop half a mile up the road (so has this…).
The kitchen is also where we keep office essentials like our special custom-made boardroom table/magazine rack/bacon sandwich serving platform (from lovely local craftsman and Five-rider, Jim Leach), our comprehensive and probably quite valuable by now collection of vintage bike trade promo mugs, the hard-working Singletrack coffee machine (Wega Nova single group, non-automatic, plumbed-in, currently wired to single phase power and capable of three phase, 2700 Watts [!], fact fans) and the Singletrack Corporate BS List…
We are a proudly independent company and so get to make up our own rules: therefore certain items of management speak that might otherwise be in regular use in other offices without the batting of an eyelid, are banned and subject to a fine if anyone is caught using them in anything other than an ironic context. Though, this being a crowd-sourced document, the contents are sometimes subject to some rather heated ‘discussion’…
Which brings us neatly to the treat bit…
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See the nice coffee mug that you sell…is it meant to be dishwasher proof? All the writing came off my blue one after being in the dishwashe…still a nice chunky mug though…
There was a small number of an early batch that had this problem with the glaze. Send it back to us and we’ll swap it for a good one.
My blue mug has had the “coffee, ride, coffee..” writing come off just from being dried with a tea towel. I don’t have a dishwasher. The logo on the other side seems to be tougher though.
I have a feeling it’s not going to be the last time I see that top photo.
And surely is should be; Who coined the phrase “the smell of Singletrack”?
Where’s the emergency tin of beans?
Has Jon taken it with him to Future?
OOh sounds like not enough flux in the colour used on that batch or a bit under fired or possibly too hard a flux.
Good to see how far ahead Mark is on the BS score board (or do the others cheat and stick their strikes against you Mark)?
The smell of Singletrack is Freedom. If freedom smells like chamois cream, the inside of an old helmet and the faint tang of week old badger roadkill coming from the hedge in the lane on the way to the good bit by the ford.
Added by your office cleaner.
Mark ahs a handicap in the BS stakes a teacher in a previous life and senior management. Tough break.
‘The Smell Of Singletrack’
That faint aroma of a pine forest after a light summer shower,
The waft of the Cows as they chew the cud in the field beyond the fence
The Sweet sickly smell as ‘Dave’ downs another Torq Forest fruits Gel
The deep musty scent of decaying vegetation as ‘Bob’ brushes of his arms after yet another ‘STACK’ !!
the distinct lack of anything which is good clean mountain air!
the overpowering assault on the nasel pasages of the new rubber queens!
and alas, the coma inducing wretched stink as you take the ‘forgotten about’ cycling top out of the plastic bag where you put it 2 rides ago!!!
Mmmmm Lovely!
“The smell of Singletrack” is the follow up to the controversial “Smell the Glove” album by Spinal Tap [Singletrack].
Who wrote it on the list? The office Spinal Tap enthusiast (obviously).
I’m being victimised via a targeted campaign of ‘Write anything Mark says on the board and stick a line next to his name’. It’s not fair.
What it boils down to is one per cent inspiration and ninety-nine per cent perspiration. Except in summer when the canal is like forty percent, maybe forty five.
Chipps? As for the smell; spray lube, damp merino (Dont believe the hype kids), strong alcohol, coffee, touch of mid-life crisis & if winging it had a smell I’d wager a dash. I’m in.
‘The Smell Of Singletrack’ reminds me of one thing and one thing only….. SHEEP DOO thats splashed up on the snot wipe part of ya glove and not knowing it is there…..Nice, unforgettable!
“Singlet-rack” – The stench of sweaty odorous base layer which has lain in car wet for a week after last weekends ride and is now drying on clothes horse in front of radiator.
Mark, he writes everything up there.
The fragrance: A mixture of rubber, damp dog and take away… or “essence of lindsay lohan” if you rather.
Tuesday Treats 19:some books and a t-shirt
Treats? Sounds more like a disappointing Christmas present. Where is the coffee promised by the title?
The smell of Singletrack is sweat, grease, lube and whatever you landed in after that last ‘tactical backside to ground interface’.
The “Smell Of Singletrack”
The pearly nectar, wrung from a newly moistened Chamois after the self indulgent pleasure of a crisp spring morning…
Spoken by the Master of Flowery ****, Dave Anderson
the smell of singletrack around my way is normally dog crap, and that normally is thrown up and stuck to my face!
still love it tho!