Since I think Rick may have put me on ignore, I'm not sure he will see this post but I will respond anyway. When I search the word "fake" by Rick, the result list is 4 pages long. Now, I'm sure that not every one of those uses of the word is intended in this whole "busting balls" manner but let me make this distinction:
1. Using here or there? Busting balls.
2. 4 pages of it? Trolling.
That's my assessment. A lot of people I know will agree with that. Rick's posting manner sometimes goes from funny to "haha ok it's old" to "you're being obnoxious" which is why I called him out on it. That and people have specifically said something to me about it, about how Rick has become obnoxious and beyond that, many of the posts seem to be intended to just cause arguments. Again, here and there, it's ok. But if there's a pattern of trolling for arguments, I think that's not ok. Full confession: I do not read enough of anyone's posts to say there is, or is not, a pattern. So I cannot say if I agree or not but like I said before, I thought Rick's posts were detracting so much from my enjoyment of the board that I blocked him for a while. This coming from someone who has actually defended Rick to other people because I think he's a nice guy IRL.
Another point of clarification. My changing Dave's name to Dumbo is/was my last ditch effort to get through to him that being an asshole online is not ok on this site as long as I am running it. Repeated conversations about it have gone ignored. It is not a "haha it's a joke" - in fact, it is anything but a joke. It is clear that nothing I do or say gets through to Dave. Maybe I finally got his attention. But I won't hold my breath. You can argue that I could have gone about it a different way. But let me ask you how well it would have gone over had I put him in the penalty box for a week? I can assure you that Facebook would be loaded with MTBNJ/Norm hate right now. It wouldn't have gone any better. Full confession #2: I am totally at a loss as to how to communicate with the guy. Fuck it. I give up. I don't get paid for this. See the last sentence in this post for clarification.
We're a pretty big collection of people and we're going to have personality conflicts. Honestly this is nothing compared to the avatar wars, nor the original winter shoes threads. Those were nothing short of a bloodbath of badness, when moderators were making each other's avatars porn images. This was when I was just an individual contributor. Let's just say that we have come a long, long way since then. But the point being, we're a very diverse set of people and we're just not all gonna get along. This is just the way it is so we gotta embrace that. I do what I can to be as fair as I can but like I said, I don't/can't read everything and I am just a guy with a real life that does what he can. Sue me if I ain't perfect.
One last point: LOL at making money on the site.
I am going to try and make this only one or two replies on my part and I will start off by saying I have been an MTBNJ fan since I found it. I regularly ride with several members including
@pooriggy ,
@Mitch ,
@BrianGT3 ,
@jShort ,
@Kirt etc. A few of us make pokes at each other and sometimes it goes a hair far but...thick skin. I really enjoy yhe passion, dedication and stoke these guys bring to the MTB scene.
I am really not sure how I ended up at the point where I made this thread but there has been a tension between
@Norm and myself pretty much since day one. Maybe it was my lack of trail etiquette in the beginning, who knows. I apologized for that asshole I was at Mooch Madness in 15 or 16. People will be and I feel
@Norm and I didn't gel so I basically avoided him or said hi and smiled at the races...some small talk here and there. I'll admit I've had far worse forum days in the past. I really try to avoid confrontation.
Ok, so I have said some stupid crap(don't forget I'm not the only one who has said the wrong thing or drank too much on an occasion or two. I'll put a couple noteable bads on my part. I went with the flow a bit too much on the gangbang thread. I get it,
@pooriggy put me in my place. Other than that and the time
@Norm didn't like when I used the word "should" after being frustrated at the Stewart 45(side not: I used the same terminology describing LewMo 2016 as well). I apologize. I'm a racer, not a white collar guy and sometimes it just comes out.
Now, to where we are now. Not sure what I really did this time other than somehow ruffling
@Norm 's feathers. I seriously can't think of one thing I did but to single me out and change my username to Dumbo when we clearly aren't great buddies, that's sort of kindergarten crap. I know you are great at searching people's profiles and finding stuff but I really can't recall one conversation we had where I was "warned" or "talked to". Clearly if it was on the site we can dig it up and I may be wrong but I don't recall them.
I can make this much longer but I won't. I don't hate
@Norm or anyone on here for that matter. I enjoy the site and was a bit offended at being singled out for "not giving back" at all. Honestly, just a quick glimpse back... I have done around 5 TM sessions, the Monmouth county TM class, made the Schilling Memorial and NICA/Schilling award last year. I have endlessly promotoed MTB races as well as MTBNJ and brought several people out to race. Not a pat on the back at all (
@Norm deserves that as well as the whole mtbnj crew) but there are far more people on here who have done zilch and no mention of it.
Lastly, I am overly thankful for all of the hard work
@Norm and the crew put in, I'm also thankful for any member here whether they just ride bikes or dedicate their lives to trail maintenance. I formerly apologize for shitting in
@Norm 's house while he's eating breakfast. I was never going to badmouth mtbnj on FB or IG. Not sure how I became that bad guy. Cheers, let's have a beer and race bikes...and please change my screen name to David Taylor, Turbo, Dipshit , Numbnuts or anything but what it was. Oh, and I weld, sorry for the long paragraphs...it's not my gig...the whole writing thing. Thanks.