Okay - I won't belabor the point too much. But the argument that this is a "slang" or "just an expression" is absolutely hollow. It just means "i haven't thought a lot about what I'm saying, so I don't really mean what the words actually mean, and you should trust me for X, Y, and Z anecdotal reasons." Using gay in a derogatory sense implies something about the way you feel about gay people, even if you don't feel it. And the fact that it's become so normalized in our culture doesn't give us the right (i would argue no matter how many gay friends you have, and would even say if you are gay yourself) to continue perpetuating that. But really, i think these days, it just makes you sound thoughtless.

Same goes for the "chicks" usage with respect to weakness. Just thoughtless, and sure, flippant and careless and maybe you're not a homophobe or a misogynist. So why adopt the language?

As for climbing - i have an 50-34 (chainrings) with an 11-23 (cassette) in back, and I live in seattle. I do hill repeats on Queen Anne, and it's got some pretty steep sections and a solid 500 feet of elevation gain from top to bottom with sections of 20% grade (which correlates to rise over run, not 20 degree angle, i think). I'm on a light bike (17-18 pounds) and I'm light myself, so that factors in, so this works for me. If a triple works for you, most people aren't going to notice, and the people who do are probably going to judge you no matter what - your shoes not matching your bike, your Bell helmet, wearing anything from Primal. So just find what works for the hills in your area, and ride.

And maybe work on cutting the hateful language out of your vocab.