cross, cans, neat old bikes

Minor confession time(this is me 110%): one of the things that keeps bike shop guys bike shop guys and not doing other jobs, is that we (generally) love bikes, maybe a little too much. The chance to work on/own/play with the newest and coolest stuff is a big perk, and sometimes getting the chance to see/work on/poke at some of the older stuff that hold memories and is totally different from what's out there now is a thing that keeps us in shops. Recently a really old Schwinn came in:
Not certain on what year, but Kyle is semi-certain it's a war era, so 1942-46 or so. I personally really like the way the top tube flows so smoothly into the seat stays, regardless of how old the bike is.

The head badge is amazing.

The drivetrain is a defunct system/standard called "skip tooth" not exactly sure what the thinking was, but it's a neat style even if is has gone the way of the wool mammoth and the three martini lunch.
This photo shows off the chain better than the first one, in particular the low portion below the chain stay. Note the odd spacing on the links, visually interesting but maybe not the best idea from the engineering stand point.

On the new bike/cool new stuff front, my awesome cross frame that was supposed to show up, didn't. I'm a little pissed because now I have to punt, and figure out what to do for a cross bike on short notice. Here's how it went down: I check around for cross frames, notice Specialized has a pretty cool frame set for a pretty good price, but it isn't available yet. So I place my order anyway assuming that once the frames get off the boat from Taiwan, it will come to me. The rep called today and said that they only got six in my size, and I wasn't high enough on the list to snag one. Super weak. So yeah, now I gotta figure out a cross bike/frame in short order.

Last thing I wanted to talk about and actually the whole reason for this post(originally), canned beer. There is plenty of pretty good/really good beers coming in cans now. This is a great development for the craft brew industry. What are the two biggest enemies of beer? oxygen and light. Even dark bottles let in some light, and most bottles are sealed pretty well but oxygen contamination is a slight possibility. The can taste is a 1970s (or maybe early 80s) relic, with modern technology imparting no taste to the beer itself. Reportedly the biggest reason more beers aren't canned is that the machinery to put beer in bottles is fairly cheap, but to put beer in cans, it's fairly expensive. But I like cans aside from the cost on the production end of things. Cans themselves are cheaper, lighter, easier to transport, less likely to break, allowed everywhere you can drink, etc etc. Hopefully the future holds more cans of craft beers for us all.

Moose Drool in cans. Neat.