31. Compete in Costume
Because nothing takes the edge off like making a fool of yourself. The trick is an outfit that lets you finish with a time you can live with. Crested Butte, Colorado, mayor Alan Bernoltz has entered ski races as a sumo wrestler, a trash can, and (his personal fave, pictured) Evel Knievel, among other things, for going on 20 years. His advice: How much are you willing to suffer? If the answer's "not much," just wear a cape or a FUNNY HAT.
(1) Avoid face paint. It will sweat off and BLIND YOU.
(2) Will the wind shift your balance? DITCH THE WINGS.
(3) Cotton doesn't keep you warm in STORMS. Incorporate performance fabrics.
(4) Make sure you have full range of MOTION. And visibility.
(5) Test everything BEFORE the race.
(6) When you're dressed like a cartoon character, it just makes the people you pass go that much HARDER. Remember this.
—MEGAN MICHELSON
CAPED CRUSADES
2007: Nashville's I Run for Music City 5K & 10K Run/Walk (July 4; irunfortheparty.com), Seattle's World Naked Bike Ride (July 14; worldnakedbikeride.org), Chicago's Muddy Buddy Ride and Run (August 5; muddybuddy.com). 2008: Crested Butte's Al Johnson Memorial Uphill/Downhill Telemark Ski Race (March 24; aljohnsonrace.com), Jackson Hole's Pole, Pedal, Paddle (April 5; polepedalpaddle.com), San Francisco's ING Bay to Breakers 12K (May 18; ingbaytobreakers.com).
32. Buy a Wetsuit
The trick is a Speedo and two plastic grocery bags. Seriously. The Speedo is for hygiene: Think of the many (hairy, promiscuous) surfers and divers who may have tried that wetsuit on before you. Boxers and boardshorts will just bunch up and throw off the fit.
(1) Pull the bags over your feet to slip into suits easily, and try several different brands; each has a unique shape. Also, peeling yourself out of a wetsuit is sweaty work, so don't plan to try on more than three per outing.
(2) The fit needs to be very snug, since your suit will stretch out in water. Make sure neoprene isn't piling up around your elbows or knees. The neck should be comfortable, and watch for tightness in the underarms. Swing your arms around to simulate paddling. Feel rubbing? Don't buy.
(3) Once you've made your choice, lose the Speedo.
—MARK ANDERS
33. Ski the Beach
I live on an island off North Carolina, and I'm the freak of my neighborhood. I'm the guy who skis the beach. It started one day when I was jogging along the shore, knees and back aching. Since moving from New England, I'd missed snow and mountains, and as I stared at the flat sandbar I found myself longing for cross-country skiing, with its velvety rhythm. I looked at the sand again and thought, Why not? Step one is getting over any embarrassment. (Hey, Bill Koch, winner of Olympic cross-country silver in 1976, skied beaches in Hawaii.)
(1) Classic wax skis work best, but don't overspend; sand and shells are HARSH.
(2) Choose your beach WISELY. You want long, rockless stretches.
(3) Ski at the water's EDGE or on the finely crushed shells that can accumulate below the wrack line.
(4) The glide on a beach isn't quite as GLIDEY as snow, so spray silicon on your skis. [See Gessner in action; head to youtube.com and search "skiing the beach."]
—DAVID GESSNER
34. Pull Off a Mustache
Phil Olsen, founder of BEARD TEAM USA, which competes in the biennial World Beard and Moustache Championships, says: "Don't shave at all for a few weeks. Allow the mustache to freely extend beyond the corners of your mouth. There will be a point when the hairs get in the way of food or drink—you'll have to deal with that."
(1) As it gets longer, Olsen says, choose a style and start experimenting with gels, waxes, and unscented hairspray. What works best depends on your facial structure; small facial features warrant smaller mustaches, a big nose can handle a real push broom, square faces should sport squared-off cuts, and round faces need to go round.
(2) The most important ingredient in a 'stache is ATTITUDE: Be proud of your mouth mane! "The majority of women don't like it," admits Olsen. "But the minority who do ... well, they really do."
—JASON DALEY
BONUS SKILL
Shave Like a Gent
Scraping your face with some ten-dollar, six-blade landfill fodder and calling it shaving is like squirting ketchup into hot water and calling it tomato soup. Get a SAFETY RAZOR: One blade, two edges, genius. The best—vintage Gillette Adjustables with nine settings—are all over eBay for cheap.
(1) Get some GLYCERIN SOAP: Colonel Conk's almond, with avocado oil and vitamin E, is tops (3.75 oz, $5.50; col-conk.com—you can pick up some mustache wax while you're there).
(2) Get a BADGER BRUSH: Sheared winter coat is best, and pricey, but drop $50 to $100 on any nice pure badger, like a Vulfix (classicshaving.com), and you won't be sorry. Get a stand and store your brush bristles down; treated right, it'll last decades.
(3) Get your SHAVE on: Take a shower or soak a washcloth in hot water, slap it on your acreage, and percolate a while to soften your beard. Run a couple of pints of hot water into the sink; wet your brush, give it a shake, and swirl it around on the soap cake to get some lather going; then paint your face up and down, lifting hairs and creating a barrier between blade and skin.
(4) Get the TECHNIQUE right: Using little strokes, and not pressing down, shave with the grain of your beard, as if sweeping; alternate edges and clean your razor by swirling it around in the water every few strokes. Rinse your face with cold water, to close up your pores, then pat dry. Simple witch hazel makes great aftershave.
(5) BID ADIEU
to razor burn and ingrowns.
—JEREMY SPENCER
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(Illustration by McKibillo)
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35. Tune Your Derailleur
It looks pretty scary: cables, gears, chains, grease, and springs. Who wants to mess with that? But the majority of shifting issues (jumping chains, rough shifts, clacking) can be fixed fast with zero tools. So next time your shifting goes, follow these steps from cycling guru LENNARD ZINN, a former U.S. National Team rider and the author of several books on bicycle maintenance:
(1) Determine whether you need to tighten or loosen the cable. Shift up until the chain is on the smallest cog (a) in the rear, then downshift one gear. If the chain doesn't climb to the next cog, or if it does so slowly, you need to increase tension. If it overshifts, you need to reduce it.*
(2) Find the barrel adjuster (b). It'll be at the rear derailleur (most likely) or by the handlebars.
(3) To increase tension, turn the barrel adjuster counterclockwise (when viewed from the end where the cable housing enters the adjuster). To reduce tension, turn clockwise. The barrel adjuster will click as you turn it. Go one or two clicks and recheck the shifting. Repeat until the chain moves easily in both directions.
*This holds true for most derailleurs. But some, called "low normal," work in the opposite direction, with cable tension moving the chain away from the wheel, instead of toward it.
To determine which kind you have, pull on the cable and watch which way the derailleur moves. If you have an LN, start on the largest cog and reverse this whole process.
MY WAY
36 Extract a Tick from Your Junk
You consider yourself a gentleman, and so it's important, when you wake up with A STRANGER IN YOUR UNDERPANTS one remorseful summer morning, that you manage the matter with due delicacy and grace. What complicates things is that it's not a fellow Homo sapiens you brought home last night but a Dermacentor variabilis, which translates roughly to "moody flesh nibbler," a.k.a. the American dog tick.
Yes, you exercised poor judgment, but it's too late to worry about that. She's already gotten herself attached—way, way too horribly attached—to the tenderest organ known to men. You hate to be caddish, given the intimacies you've already shared, but be honest with yourself: You two simply don't have a future together. Don't be drawn in by that transparent "Oh, but I'm so tiny and vulnerable" routine. She's a parasite, no two ways about it. She knows she's got a good hustle going here, and she won't leave you alone until she's bled you to a husk.
You both could use a drink. Pull that pint of Kentucky Gentleman out of your liquor cabinet (no need to waste the Knob Creek). Take a strong dose yourself, then tilt the lip of the bottle against your little visitor. Hold it there for 90 seconds or so. Give her a nice long slug. Never mind the sting.
Ah, now she's feeling no pain. If her head weren't buried in your special purpose, you'd see a little woozy smile dawning on her face. Head for the bathroom. Take out your trusty Revlon needlenose tweezers. Now get a good grip, close to the jaw, and pull. That's a good girl. Let it go.
Now she's gazing at you, pinched in the tweezers' grasp, her eyes dark with the fury of the scorned. But a quick goodbye is what the occasion calls for. Grab the book of matches on the back of the commode and set her tactfully on fire.
WELLS TOWER stresses that he has never hosted any other type of insect within his trousers.
BY WELLS TOWER
