My trip to Boston

Soooo, I was invited to Indpendent Fabrication's 13th anniversary party last Thursday by Matt "tough customer" Bracken, the Indy Fab president. I followed Tyler Evans around, IF's master welder. When I say I know a bit about welding, its like 1 page of a book that Tyler wrote. This guy works the tig torch as if it were a pen and he was a master poet. I have never seen such speed and consistency as I witnessed with Tyler. Almost have a man crush on the guy... Now to the party...Thursday night at Belmont Wheel Works. IF had the party and customer appreciation night. A few days before the party, they asked all of their local customers to drop off their bike and they would wash it, free of charge, and get it pretty for the party. 30+ bikes came in for a cleaning and they all ended up at the party. Matt even gave away a couple bike computers...one for the cleanest bike that came in, and one for the dirtiest! It was quite a scene with over 100 IF fans and owners hanging out drinking beer and such. Then, Matt dropped the bomb. He introduced me...it mainly was a wave and smile type of thing, but it was odd having all the locals voicing "bring the show to Boston!"...maybe he had planned that...? Anyhow, I.F. has a good group of people that truly love what they do. They totally fit into the NAHBS mold and I am happy to have them not only as my colleagues, but as my friends.

On Friday, I went and visited with my good friend "Ant Bike Mike" Flanigan. Mikes operation is much smaller than I.F., where he was a founding member. His bikes are utilitarian and very well thought out and executed. After the visit to his shop, we rolled to a nice restaurant in his area and sat down for dinner and a few beers. The conversation seemed to fly by as we sat about 5:30 and didnt realize it was 9:30 because we were chatting about NAHBS, marriage, dating, life in the Northeast, and of course, building bikes...after an hour or so, Mikes lovely better half, Betsy showed up. This only added to the depth of the conversation and many, many laughs were had by all. I had a great time with both Mike and Betsy and cannot wait to see them again at NAHBS in Indy!

After that visit, I went to west Roxbury for Tyler and Clints B-day party. It was hosted by Jill, the talented painter at IF. In what seemed like a mansion, the 3 story house was set up apartment like with Jill's place on the top floor. I stayed until about midnight before my "old man" street cred kicked in and said I needed sleep. The music was bumpin, provided by Lauren, Jill's partner in crime and a bandmember, if I heard correctly. Shout out to the folks who braved the cold, rainy night to come say Happy Birthday to two of the hardworking folks at Independent Fabrication. One last thing, I would like to say a great BIG THANK YOU to Matty "tough customer" Bracken for allowing me to stay at his place and for the use of his 325 wagon, and of course the GPS, without it, I would have been clueless as to driving in that town...