Mama and I have been commuting on the bus since we found out about Baby in mid-August. I love to cycle, but I’d much rather ride with Mama. Now that she’s on bed rest, that’s not an option. On the bright side of this week’s rollercoaster, I get to cycle more now, to work at least. Winter cycling is rewarding, and I could really use the exercise. Soon, Mama will get to ride again, too. And, in a year maybe, Baby also!
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Of someone riding my old (2005) bike. I found this photo on my old hard-drive (the one with Windoze). It’s my Dad. It’s during our move from Carbondale to Baltimore in August 2006. When our bikes were sitting by the little trailer, ready to get packed last, my Dad snatched my bike and took off. He wound up buying the 2006 model a few weeks later. Cycling is so damned fun that no one can resist and unattended bike.
There I was in my office Friday, trying to get out to lunch for crepes. My bike was pissing me off, and I was having a very terrible week. Low and behold, my phone rang while I was covered in bike grease. I pulled it out of my pocket, didn’t recognize the number and threw it. At the floor. In a fit, like a little kid. Of course I broke the damned thing. We’re due for new/free phones anyway, but being without a cell phone is weird. It works, sans speaker and screen. Well, that isn’t working. I can, following my wife’s identical phone, forward my pictures to her. It’s taking a lot time, though. No more fits for me. Not this week. Friday, we’re off to Washington for the weekend, for a Tori Amos concert (my early 30th birthday present). Ordered a new phone tonight, one reviewed well for durability.
Planet Bike Superflash Stealth. OMG. Best taillight ever. I run two: one steady, one flashing.
Photo Friday: Shiny.
I’ve been behind on Photo Fridays and very late now. These days, this is my favorite spot: on my new bike. Seen here Thursday night when my buddy and I took a nice ride from the Watertower to Fell’s Point and then to Canton and back through ArtScape.
This morning, there is a gorgeous bike and a coffee maker in my office. Since my helmet is still en route, I didn’t want to jinx the chance of my bike not being here after leaving it locked in my office all weekend by saying anything. Monday morning, here it is. Waiting for me. And my coffee maker, too.
Picked up/bought my bike Friday, with nice accessories and very friendly folks at the new bike shop. I’ll use some lunch hours this week to put on my fenders, lights, rack, computer and change the tires to the slightly wider ones I bought. When my helmet comes in, I’ll ride it home and, once again, start pedaling my ass all over town.
But I don’t have a photo yet. This photo is of a pipe-cleaner bike I made at my VISTA training in August. It stands on the jacket dealy from a cup of coffee I was drinking at the time. It resides in my office.
I picked the Novara Buzz V for a number of reasons. It’s simple and practical. I like the low-fi looks and anti-theft aspects like locking skewers and no quick-release anything. It has custom fenders. It’s STEEL. It was in the price range of the insurance money I got for the wrecked bike. I really, therefore, paid for it in September 2005 when I bought my first bike, which was replaced with insurance money when it got stolen in fall 2006. The insurance folks paid for the lights, fenders, rack, computer, etc. Everything that got destroyed but my helmet. I was buying a new helmet anyway, so I didn’t want to go after them for that.
The biggest “fault” I’ve noticed so far is that the paint is junk. It’s matte and flakes off. Mine has several chips already from the trip from the factory to REI, and the one locked near the train station looks like it’s been through a wood chipper. I suppose this is to make it less steal-able? Or just a consequence of the matte finish? I feel like I should be annoyed that my shiny new bike is not perfect (or shiny). But you can’t get a perfect bike. I know that for sure now. And bikes get scratched up when you ride them. Even if you got a perfect bike, it would eventually get dinged up if you rode it. I was being stupid, yes. Thing is, you don’t care when you’re riding regularly. I’m not.
But screw it. I refuse to be a prisoner of my own neurotic and compulsive tendencies. I always need all my shit to be perfect. Forever. Like you can buy perfectly-crafted goods. And like you can use them without wear and tear. Nah, if I resist the urge to be a stupid jackass, I feel particularly…invited to put some stickers on now. I still have some that my cycling pal sent me in 2005 when I first got into cycling. It’s all good. In a few weeks, I’ll be riding my bike and laughing at the witty stickers on it.
We did have a bit of an adventure to get it, though.
Tuesday, I had an early appointment with my hand doctor and a big meeting all afternoon. It was already a weird day. I wanted REI to leave my bike in the box so that I would not be tempted to ride before I’m physically ready and get hurt again. But they couldn’t, and it came in Tuesday, rather than Friday. Our glasses were also ready early. So I walked from near Penn Station to Charles Village after work, met the Mrs., walked to the Rotunda, got our glasses and walked to the light rail. Took it out to Timonium, walked to Baja Fresh and ate amidst sad yuppies. Walked to REI. Picked up my bike, some spare inner tubes and an under-the-seat bag. Walked to the light rail and took my bike on it. Walked about a mile home. So my bike’s first trip was on a train and being walked. Not as cool as being ridden, but much cooler than coming home in a car or truck.
Memorable night, though. And I would be a douchebag to let such a fun-ly-gotten bike be less awesome because it wasn’t perfect when perfection wasn’t even possible.
Perhaps by airing these stupid mind-fucks I play on myself, I can kick them?
In other news, after we got home, we went shopping for prenatal vitamins for Mrs. P. (More on that later, of course).
I am pissing myself with excitement over Obama stopping in Baltimore Saturday. Transportation and anxiety are keeping me from the Inauguration, even though I wanted to cycle down there badly. I was beginning to feel badly about missing out.
But in Baltimore City? I would not be able to live with myself if I missed it, pending a real and serious and dire emergency. I am willing to walk if I have to. I’ve walked downtown from North Baltimore before. It’s a fun walk. But I’ll likely ride my bike with Mrs. P to UB where my office is and leave my bike there and walk the rest of the way. (I imagine bikes locked near the event or the train station will be frowned upon.) But if UB is locked up because of its proximity to Penn Station, well, like I said. I’ll walk.
I’m going to weep like a pinched baby Saturday, too. I can’t help it.
My brother and a friend of mine are going nuts because they work in transportation and supply for the National Guard, who are all on call already this weekend for the Inauguration and then Saturday on top of it. I don’t envy their stress, but I’m glad that very competent people are working to protect Obama and to protect all of us. Okay, fear mongering over.
I’m not scared; I’m excited.
I guess it’s sometimes a post-holiday or back-to-school thing, where you have a bunch of new stuff all at once. Maybe I just don’t shop a lot. I don’t know. But I rode to work this morning with a new Thermos of coffee in my backpack with my new planner, a new book, wearing a new vest, new socks, new gloves and being kept dry by new fenders. The only thing I bought was the planner and the book, and those were to fill voids left by an old planner and all the books I’ve already read. I feel spoiled somehow, like I don’t have the right to be toting around all this shiny new shit that I didn’t buy but instead just took out of a gift box. The people I care about do give me some wonderful presents. So maybe I am spoiled in a way.
And of course having a bunch of new stuff makes a lot of people (myself included) re-examine their relationship to material possessions. I really love my new gloves and fenders and Thermos, but it’s the cycling in winter weather and not dropping five bucks a day to have good coffee at work thing that I really like. I suppose that’s a healthy relationship to gear, right? Using it?
I do have the tendency to pet my things though and often get very upset when a new scratch joins the dozens of others on my bike or when dust gets under the screen cover of my camera. Then I think about my bike and not riding and my camera and not taking pictures. Then, as Tyler Durden would say, the things I own end up owning me.
I’ve always struggled to have a healthy relationship to possessions, my body, my health. You can’t just ignore your pains or bike maintenance, but you can’t get attached to them, either. Tricky, I tell you. Tricky.
Photo Friday: Meditation.
I think I’ve been not much in the holiday spirit because I haven’t been shopping much at all. And also work business. But I think it’s largely a lack of shopping. What?
Christmas came early for my bike though. The seatpost clamp that is not QR doesn’t fit, but that’s Okay. The seatpost does, and the saddle’s on, too. The stitching is wacky on my seat. But. Whatever. At least I can ride it today. While staring at my maimed bike all last week across my desk made me ache to defy death in traffic, The Duke sitting here while I work has made me excited today for the chance to ride home. For all it’s annoying quirks and imperfections, I do love my bike.
I think that my old (stolen) bike got me out of my car and into the fun world of getting around without four wheels. This bike was under my butt when I really got into cycling in traffic and to get places that people look at me funny for riding to, like weddings, job interviews and community meetings in questionable neighborhoods.
There have been times I’ve badmouthed it myself, for all its hyrbid dorkiness, but I’d be beside myself if someone stole this one.
So he’s coming to the office with me until my workplace threatens me. And I’m prepared to fight them, given what little anyone does to prevent bike theft these days. (Though a UB detective tells me that they are getting siren locks to lend folks….)
And seat post! There I was last night at around 5:30, heading to a community meeting in Barclay. I went to get my bike outside UB, and the seatpost and seat were gone! I thought I must have forgotten to lock it, but the tiny little cable was cut. I use a U-lock, with a thick cable on my front wheel and a tiny cable they make for seats and other small stuff to lock my seat, since both are quick-release. I never thought anyone would steal it. Nor that the wanker would leave the light and computer on the handlebars which were worth far more money. Stupid crackhead.
So I spent my evening fetching the vintage monster I sorta found and couldn’t find the owner for, discovering how much work getting it ridable will entail and ordering a new seat/post and a clamp that bolts closed(!). It wasn’t that expensive, and I’ve been meaning to get rid of my heavy suspension seatpost and overly-cushy seat for a while. But, you know, I wanted to still be riding until my replacements were in. Now my poor bike is in my office, seatless and sad.
And I’m taking the bus this week.
My bike is getting rained on right now. And there’s nothing covering the seat. I am going to have a squooshy ride home.
A few weeks ago, my friend and I embarked on a milkcrate installation and tire/tube replacement on a quiet Saturday afternoon. It was very spur-of-the-moment and got more so with the addition of snacks and beer. I got some photos of Mr. D doing funny things with his knee brace, but I’ll keep those to myself.
This probably makes it look like we’re whinos. But this was definitely a treat for both of us.
Photo Friday: Spontaneous.
(I know; we have a bike blog. But I’ve been dominating the posting lately and have been neglecting this blog, so here you go.)
It’s a bee-otch. I have been having a lot of tire trouble lately. Or, maybe, I’m just riding more and getting more flats. I officially blame the Jones Falls Trail, particularly the part under the Howard Street bridge. Of my recent flats, three were caused by glass from right there. And after my recent adventures, I’m rocking Kevlar-belted tires. That didn’t help yesterday when three huge slivers of glass that looked like quartz stems stabbed my tire. I came out from work and suspected someone was messing with my lock and noticed my rear flat. I didn’t feel like patching, so I put my spare tube on. Those tires are pain to get back on, so it took a bit for me to figure out the trick. I was running low on air, so I stopped to put some air in when I got to the trail and realized why: busted valve stem. While I was examining this, some dickhead wizzed by me on his bike without a word, bell, etc. (I hope your trunk bag fell in some mud, wanker.)
What’s up with the rude cyclists lately? Are they pissed that they have to ride because of gas prices or something? I mean, I love the greater number of cyclists. But there was a time when most of the people I passed greeted me back or even first. You know: last year!
Anyway, I went to some shade to patch my tube after taking off this new and busted tube. Some old guy came over and silently watched my work. Told me I have a nice bike. That I should get some tire strips and that I would have payed less for my bike at the bike shop he likes. I didn’t feel like getting into how tire strips rub and then cause flats, how the price of my bike did not differ (in fact) from the different Giant dealers in the Baltimore area in October 2006. I just finished, thanked him for his company with a handshake and went on my way.
I was stupid enough to try to plug the hole in my tire tread with rubber cement. Did a number on the rest of the rubber. I think it’s Okay for a while. But I patched the inside of the tire, ordered two spare tires and some more spare tubes — just in case. Overhauled my brakes last night, too. Replaced my front pads, which were doing a number to my rims. Poor things.
I rode a different way to work this morning, avoiding my usually sylvan ride in favor of riding through traffic the whole way. In some respects, I like it better. Though I’m probably upping my chances of getting hit. When I was on the Maryland Avenue bride this morning, I turned around and saw four other cyclists riding to work and school. Five bikes on that little bridge at once!
Biking in Baltimore is coming around.
I wish I could sit home with a good book on a day like today. I like my job. Here I am, hyped up on coffee and with a few minutes to spare. And I’m blogging on company time, on a computer that is supposed to be “monitored.” But, like I said, I like my job. A lot. Being a VISTA is great, and I have a nice little office with nice people in nice little offices up here on the top floor. I have a lot of lunch meetings, but not today. Today, I get to do my favorite thing aside from biking up to Charles Village to meet Mrs. P.: get a coffee/snack and hole up in my office for an hour reading a good book. It’s a good way to spend lunchtime.
I wussed out and took the bus to work today. I rode the bus three days last week, but that’s because The Duke was tire-less. I’ll ride my bike in the rain, and I have. But “severe storms” — no. Not if I don’t have to. Not today. The bus picks me up outside my apartment building and drops me at Penn Station, across Charles Street from my office. It’s a good deal. I am soaked now from a coffee run with a co-worker. My sandals are on the AC vent drying. My bike is at home with new rim tape, new tubes and new tires with frikkin Kevlar in them. I feel like I’m cheating or being disloyal.
I am tired. I went to see Candlebox with my brother Sunday night, tickets to which show (along with a Tshirt) were my birthday gift. It was a hell of a lot of fun, but I was beat yesterday. Yesterday, I worked from 9am – 8pm and ate pasta and green beans when I got home and watched TV and went to bed. I’m still tired, but that could be the weather now that I think of it.
This blog got all “this happened, and I did this, etc.” all the sudden.
But it’s still only 9:30pm, so it’s not over yet. So I’m going to enjoy it for a while longer, before I spoil it all by writing about it.
Even my journal’s lounged since Friday morning.
I’m going to have some tea and watch 300 with my wife.
Two weeks ago, Dan helped me put a crate on my bike. He even traded me this frikkin sweet red one. I should write about it more for the bike site, but it’s perfect for this particular Photo Friday: Exercise. Because riding four miles home from work, all uphill, with weight in this baby, is exercise! I’ll write up directions/how it works on the bike site. There you go.
Now I can take all my crap to work without getting sweaty. Plus, I wonder what effect it is having on potential thieves. It’s not all that cool looking, unless you’re a Fred. But it’s awesome just the same. A family member saw me riding home one day and identified me by that big red red red crate. And it’s a great canvas for stickers, which adorn it currently.
Dan’s awesome backpack he’s taken everywhere, even to the hospital when his adorable daughter was born, with a Czech army bag I bought in Philly two weeks ago. I might need to rethink my baggage for going to work. Rainy days where I need to bring clothes and my big Klean Kanteen require a second bag, which is a pain.
[Larger.]
Not my bike. (My rims are black.) This is what happens when you don’t notice there’s no air in your tire and then try to ride off. Busted valve stem; Slime didn’t help. I sanded this rim for this person. Because I like playing with sandpaper. And because I like this person. A lot.
Photo Friday: Awful.
In celebration of Paps’s birthday today, NBBB is having a casual ride to Fell’s Point. Here is the poem I will toast with:
I’m off’n wild wimmens
An cognac
An sinnin’
For I’m in loOOOOOOOve!
~ E.H. Paris, ca. 1922.
This is a neat article on the environmental benefits of being lazy. Funny, I didn’t know that I have been saving the planet my whole life!
Yeah, but, uh, just so you know, person in article: not buying stuff does not make you a “transcendentalist.”
From the same source, a piece on kids never going outside. This is strange to me. When I was a kid, not going outside to play was a punishment or my parents being strict because of rain. We rode bikes, created our own baseball league with stats kept in copybooks, played guns, got into minor trouble, socialized sans playdates, etc. But the kids I work with on cycling, most of them, don’t do anything like that. If they go over one another’s houses, its by car and their parents’ permission. Two made it to thirteen without learning to ride a bike at all. But with cycling, you have to go out, learn, risk, engage. It’s very different from the online video games these kids use as social interaction.
I think that’s why they’re taking to cycling like they are. One young man has taken his bike as transportation a few times that I know of, trips of a few miles for which his parents would usually drive him. I think that’s awesome. A few of them seem to enjoy learning how their bikes work, and most of them are amazed when I tell them something like, “That wasn’t hard, was it? We just rode thirteen miles.”
There’s hope! And, ahem, it seems like bikes certainly help.
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