Thursday, December 18, 2008

Champ

You'd of had to be crazy to be out in a car this Thursday night on Seattle’s icy streets; on a bike, you just had to be determined.

In spite of the weather—or maybe because of it—the Greenlake Race of Champions was declared ON this afternoon and so anybody with an ounce of self-respect wouldn’t have missed it—and me neither.

The scariest part of the evening was just making it down the back alley from my house; once I was out on the streets, I felt progressively safer and safer as the evening wore on, an emotion only partly to be explained by the usual; additionally, as fewer and fewer automobiles attempted to navigate the roads, the real danger out there diminished. While there were a couple times during the evening when I skidded out, the only really frightening scenarios involved cars.

A good dozen-plus congregated at Westlake and spanned the gamut from Chase on his fixed gear with skinny tires to Lee on his Pugsley bedecked in Christmas lights which Featherhead, test-riding, wheelied on the bricks.

We had a sort of shakedown cruise along Westlake and Eastlake to the Zoo for warmth and prize pick-up then proceeded apace to Greenlake where we were welcomed by a reasonably impressive Roman candle display which may or may not have been for us, but sure seemed like it.

I raced in the preliminary December race and pulled a total Rosie Ruiz. Dropping back from the pack, I circled around behind the grandstand to the trail and hid, until I could just see the racers approaching.

Then, I hopped on my bike, and panting furiously, sprinted the last 50 yards or so of the course, arriving to amazement and cheers.

It was all I could do release the dream and come clean, but it sure was fun while it lasted.

The thing is, I probably could have pulled it off, and then even “beaten” two-time champ, Padraig, in the main event.

Friday, October 24, 2008

Lost

My favorite part of that unexpectedly early evening last night was splitting off from the taco bus and riding around on streets in Mount Baker, most of which I know not quite like the back of my hand, but which I’ve been on plenty of times before, yet which looked—under the influence of a perfectly dry and cool fall night—delightfully unfamiliar, so much so that it took me way longer than expected to circle around from El Asadero, north by magnificent-looking Franklin High, then east, I guess, up the hill which it occurred to me must be what the neighborhood takes its name from before finally wending my merry way through streets of nice houses to downhill and the Rainier Safeway where I bought batteries for my tired light, then pedaled back to meet up with the ride just as it was leaving the food stop.

But I also liked pacing along Lake Washington Boulevard even though a trio of cars found it necessary to flash their high beams at us in what I couldn’t tell whether was a friendly gesture to light our way or an angry message that we should get the hell out of the road—at least until at the first opportunity which presented itself, each one roared by, which seemed sort of silly given that, if they were driving anywhere near the posted speed of 25, couldn’t have earned them more than five miles an hour, and maybe even less, given how we were (at least it seemed to me) flying.

And I was riding the Tournesol, which I haven’t been taking out the much of late, so that even final goodbye hill up Madrona Boulevard unspooled strangely gentle, and so unfamiliar that I failed to recognize my own street the first time past it and had to circle around the block to return to a place I see every day but which rarely ever get to be so sweetly lost in.

Monday, October 13, 2008

Hobo

While we were meeting up for the .83 ride at Westlake Center last night, there was this guy in full Cletus garb—dirty white overalls, no shirt—raging around the fountain flapping his arms, and those of us who saw him remarked that he seemed to be setting the bar for crazed hobo behavior pretty high, but predictably, before the evening was out. that sort of thing would seem pretty tame by comparison to any number of the antics of those assembled to ride, and ride we did, reasonably far south, way past Georgetown, to a brand-new little corner of the universe overlooking the Duwamish, dubbed, IIRC, the “Hidden Hobo Fire Pit” (or HHFP), where much booze was drunk—(and a good portion spit, in flaming blasts into and over the fire)—several pies were eaten, and at least one used condom was scooped up with a stick, waved around threateningly, and then dropped into the flames where, thankfully, it disappeared, never to be seen again.

And although, at first blush, the place seemed hardly a destination nightspot, its charms, once the fire was burning and the bourbon and tequila started flowing, were revealed: with the fast-running Duwamish all silvery in the background and only so much space to maneuver in on the hillside, plus a sweet little bench for the most inebriated to sit on, the HHFP has to be the coziest of all the places we’ve been to around town for burning shit outside at night.

One of my favorite moments was when, as we were gearing up to leave, Miles went all Stinky Pete/Walter Brennan/Walter Huston and called those who were dawdling something like “goddamn douchebag motherfuckers” (now I remember: douchecock sonzabitches! which, in hobo-speak has got to be a term of endearment, but I also liked, at the end of the night, discovering a new taco truck, El Trompo Loco, next to the nightclub El Gallo D’Oro, whose veggie tacos are the new favorite of this douchecock sonzabitch bike hobo, anyway.

Friday, October 3, 2008

Predictable

photo by joeball
Life is full of surprises, which is why the predictable can be such a comfort.

Even before I arrived at the Little Red Hen, after watching the all-but-scripted Vice-Presidential debate, and following a route from school could practically do in my sleep, I knew that the night would include more drinking than pedaling, somebody starting up “Livin’ on a Prayer" while riding and others joining in on the chorus , at least one instance where wrestlers would be pulled apart from each other, and eventually, a fire that at some point would get jumped over and/or into.

And events did not disappoint.

Were I, like Spealunker Sean, only in town for a brief period before heading out for who-knows-what-might-happen, nothing would make me feel better than to see how the wheels and cranks keep turning with some regularity and that the Thursday night checklist gets checked off, including, but not limited to: pretty much taking over some divey tavern with beer-swilling cyclists, arriving en masse at some mini-mart to load up on PBR cans, inviting some random stranger—this one, who of all things, played the saw—to join us in our revels, and as another long-time-no-see familiar face, the speedy Jillita points out, some banked-upon opportunity for Henry to be down to his skivvies before the night is out.

Much is made, of course, of novelty and indeed, the new and different is to be cultivated as we grow, but, still, there’s something to be said for knowing more or less how things will transpire, the unspooling of events like pages in a flip book animation which, when recalled with a few gaps the next morning, nevertheless has scenes one has seen and enjoyed before.

Which isn’t to say that all of it was old hat: for instance, I’d never witnessed anybody in .83 slow-dance to Patsy Cline before and I can never recall a Thursday night in early October being so warm and dry, ever.

Friday, September 26, 2008

Assclowns

When an evening of bicycle riding includes an interlude where somebody agrees to launch not just one, but two—(consecutively, not simultaneously) bottle rockets from his ass and it’s still not the most memorable part of the night, you have to chalk it up as a bona fide disaster (in the old sense of the word, the one that refers to the alignment of the stars, which must have been exerting a truly strange attraction on us all to result in such an odd and calamitous collection of events).

Or maybe the shortbread space cookie I had before leaving home had something to do with it.

In any case, more than once I got to feel like Walter Brennan meets Mr. Magoo as I stood slightly apart from my cycling comrades both dismayed and elated at the behaviors that swam before my eyes, which included surreal karaoke singing, random tossing of things that gosh darn it you kids, you better stop throwing, so help me, don’t make me come over there, fisticuffs, which I completely missed, thank god, the wearing of orange rubber fishing overalls, and a surprising amount of bicycle riding when you tallied it all up in the end.

And it was one of those times when, in some ways, the best part turned out to be the long solo route home, where the combination of sensory stimulations over the course of the night came together to make for an especially delightful ride, the front of my front wheel eating up the pavement slowly but surely all the way across town.

We had set out for Nickelsville, the homeless encampment near Georgtown, to bear witness to the authorities evicting the residents, but never made it past Goldies on Airport Way, which turned out to be just fine since the threatened removal didn’t take place although it did seem that, at some points, our butts were this close to being kicked out from where we were, too.

Friday, September 12, 2008

Fries

Is this a great fucking country or what?

Where else could some three dozen idiots ride bikes from a downtown meet-up, where already park rangers were on to them and their open containers, to an inner-ring suburban shopping mall for a takover of a “family” restaurant in order to stage a French (call that “freedom”) fried potato-eating contest that would result in some among their number regurgitating publicly, and then to top off the evening, pedal furiously down shuttered freeway express lanes only to be stopped, upon exiting to city streets, by a phalanx of law enforcement vehicles, some State Patrol, some Seattle’s Finest, and still manage to walk (or more accurately, ride) away from arrest, imprisonment, and even water-boarding?

Fuck you Osama Bin Laden, the terrorists have not won, not so long as such adventures remain in the realm of possibility, although thankfully for people’s intestines and police records they only come once a year.

The second annual .83 9/11 Never Forget (How Fat You Really Are) Bike Ride and Freedom Fry Eating Contest went off last night in fine form, which is more than can be said this morning of the competitors’ distended bellies.

And while, as has been noted, one might interpret the event as disrespectful of the tragic events that marked the date back in 2001, a more accurate reading—and I would argue more consistent with the true spirit of the night—would see such inspired stupidity as a celebration of the liberties upon which the American Dream is founded.

Moreover, I would bet that if only we might have gotten those misguided fanatics away from flight school back in 2000 and onto bicycles, they never would have carried out their fateful mission, but instead, would have been right there with us, singing “God Bless America” and gorging on deep-fried starch, feeling nothing but pride (and maybe a bit of dyspepsia) to be in the land of the fry, home of the brave.

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Pilot

In the land of the sightless, the four-eyed man, the one eating shortbread space cookies, is—not king, but can at least unlock his bike, untangle its spokes from the other bike’s SPDs and make it home, wet, but none too worse for wear, all told.

The band we went to see was called Blind Pilot; the theme on this rainy late-summer Tuesday was blind drunk.

Problem—or make that opportunity—was: there were at least 45 minutes between the time we arrived at the High Dive in Fremont to meet up with the band, (whose claim to fame, apart from their musicianship, is that some of them—the bass player with his custom trailer for sure, the guitarist, and I think either the banjo and dulcimer-strumming female vocalist or the drummer or both—tour via bicycle), and when they were to start playing.

Meanwhile, by this time, our little August monsoon was in full swing and so the reasonable course of action seemed to hit the nearby Nickerson Street Saloon for their five dollar “dirty birds,” a shot of Wild Turkey with a PBR chaser.

I myself did not indulge, (already being adequately taken care of by the aforementioned baked goods) but I marveled at the alacrity with which my colleagues, Derek and Ben, went through a trio each.

And so, it was a swift half-mile ride back across the bridge to the venue, and another two-drink wait for the band to go on

I’d say it was worth it, Blind Pilot, led by their really quite good singer/guitarist, Israel, sounding to my ears very reminiscent of fellow-Portlanders, The Decemberists, winning over the crowd and casting a musical spell that kept drunken hijinks to a minimum during their set.

I left soon after they finished playing and so, in all likelihood, missed the inevitable storm a’ brewin; instead, I took on the steady deluge outside, which fortunately, was warm enough so the ride home while sodden, was fine.

Friday, July 4, 2008

Whirlwind

A couple years ago, I rode my bike from Seattle to San Francisco. I was thinking I was all gnarly until, about halfway down the Oregon coast, this Danish kid, cycling in Birkenstocks on a mountain bike with knobby tires, caught up with me and, while riding together, I learned he was on his way from Prudhoe Bay in Alaska—where he’d started in the 24-hour a day sunlight of high summer—to Tierra del Feugo—where he expected to arrive some months hence.

That’s where it became clear to me that there’s always someone harder core than you; and that’s how I felt last night when the second crew of riders showed up at our Green Mountain camp on the Kitsap Peninsula in the pitch darkness, having blindly scaled the two-mile rocky and washed-out logging road that I’d been thinking I was all bad-ass for successfully navigating earlier in the daylight.

It was a whirlwind adventure, though, just the thing to usher in today’s fireworks.

First, fourteen of us were on the ferry boat to Bremerton; then, the sweaty ride west and generally up towards Wildcat Lake; then, we bounced along and occasionally walked and pushed for two miles past clearcuts made lovely with wildflowers; space cookies were eaten and then there was fire and food and beer and lies and laughter and eventually, sheer amazement when the second wave of sixteen or so arrived out of the darkness —including Kat on an Xtracycle and wide-eyed Alex, who had showed up at Westlake Center just expecting a typical Thursday night ride but who came along, anyway.

I stayed up as late as I could to bask in their awesome before finally succumbing to those same molecules that knocked out practically all the cookie eaters like bowling pins falling down although not too early to have it already be dawn and just about time to get up, bomb downhill to the ferry and be home in time for family breakfast.

Whirlwind.

Friday, June 27, 2008

Adorable

According to the OED, the word “adorable” stems from “ador” + “able,” meaning “worthy of worship;” which is exactly what I was thinking as I watched the crew of miscreants pedal down First ahead of me while passing the safety stick among the usual suspects and admiring Brandon’s spinning cranks—and that just for starters.

Because there was plenty more to fall to one’s knees and shout “hosanna” over before the night was out, including, but not limited to:

• Single-filing through the womb bridge on the Longfellow trail to eventually emerge on a different kind of urban path, Marshall's sidewalk in Westood Village, with nary a broken collarbone in sight.

• Corn on the cob slathered in mayonnaise with grated cheese, cayenne pepper, hot sauce and lime—on a stick! “Get that corn into my face!” Nacho Libre!

• Fire in the shelter at Lincoln Park, stoked so mightily with Dane’s Xtracycle-carried store-bought plastic-wrapped wood bundles that marshmallow toasters had to crouch to the side.

• The long, flat way around Alki, which always seems shorter the later you ride it, especially when there’s that fingernail sliver of moon to admire on the way.

• And, shit! I almost forgot: pitchers, I think, at the O&T, and catching up with lazybones Derrick, I think.

• Some sort of clown race through Belltown failing to find open beer merchants but then a regroup outside an apartment building in lower Queen Anne that yielded many cans and a bottle of Malibu coconut rum.

• Feeling like “this must be Portland” (in a good way) as we rode into a deserted South Lake Union park, right on the water and then, chilled by the offshore breeze, busting out a game of tag to get warm which worked so well it enabled the hearty to carry on until dawn began breaking over Lake Union and those fucking birds started singing and riders split up, heading home after another adorable evening on bikes.

Friday, May 16, 2008

Nice

Here’s a reasonable criterion of success in bicycle-combined mood adjustment: you’re outside in a humorously lovely Hobbit-land of a city park, so charming even angry 9-toed hippies admit they love the place; the waxing gibbous moon bathes the lawn in silver through fingers of pine while a couple dozen cyclists tell lies to each other between slugs of beer; you take a fancy hot dog bun from its bag, slather it in squeeze-bottle mayonnaise, yellow mustard, and ketchup, then crunch up some Harvest Cheddar potato chips on top as substitute for one of the meaty-meat sausages sizzling over the nearby grill’s charcoal-bag flame, but then here’s the thing:

It tastes fucking awesome!

You scarf it up, making that “num-num” sound, sharing just one bite with a friend, who himself, even without having imbibed your own particular combination of flavor enhancers earlier in the evening, has to admit it’s not bad.

If all’s not right with the world at that point, it never will be.

It was almost too nice on last night’s .83 ride, the kind of perfect weather with the dangerous potential of spoiling folks so that they never again want to ride bikes in the far more typical gloom and wet of Seattle, so fortunately, there was Derrick, on his Stinky McStinkster Huffalicious Stinkbike perfuming the air all around as he loudly escorted us on our path—except when we were ON paths—from downtown, through Interlachen, the back way around Husky stadium to University Village for supplies, then up to Ravenna and the aforementioned sylvan glade, before eschewing the Knarr in favor of the College Inn Pub where the Evil Mike and I had one beer each, just the thing to prepare for mashing up the hill to Louisa Boren Park and one final safety meeting of the night, admiring the view across Lake Washington to the east, on this, a night of cycling almost too nice to be believed, much less lived.

Thursday, March 6, 2008

Stinky

Derrick drove his Stinky McStinkster Huffalicious moped thing and what was most striking, aside from just how fucking loud and stinky it was, was how when he disappeared off onto some other route, it took me a while to realize that I wasn’t hearing or smelling it, that the buzzing in my ears and itching in my nose had gone and only the relative silence of gears clicking and chains turning remained.

But it’s an adorable toy and I even enjoyed skitching a ride along Alki after beers at the Beveridge Place Pub where it was old home week for a pitcher or two with the crew from ABR and Aaron and Joby in the same room without hardly an epithet hurled or past action begrudged—just another expression of the evening’s open-arm policy of welcoming all, even the motorized.

We had climbed the super steep but not too long “Snake Hill” to Langston’s home among the forest of new condos on High Point and then bombed down to Fauntleroy and I was marveling how what had begun, on my commute home from Bothell, as a cold and rainy winter night, eventually turned into a lovely spring evening. And apart from misplacing my wallet and then having the adreline rush of being sure it was gone followed by the sighing relief of finding it again something like three times in a row, I wouldn’t have changed a thing.

I took it very slowly from West Seattle to Magnolia for Ben and karaoke at the Boxcar, but not so much that I didn’t catch up twice, once during plastic cheese nachos at the Seven-Eleven and once as the folding bike’s tire was attended to just east of the bridge. No nine-toed angry hippies were drunk enough to sing and me neither, so ultimately it was over the Ballard bridge behind the Huffalicious all the way to Fremont where it ran outta gas and I headed home in blessed silence.

Sunday, February 24, 2008

FHR2008

This guy wearing black polyester spandex tights and a brightly colored neon top rode past me and Mimi and said something like, “The good thing about those pirate flags is that you can easily grab onto them,” and I retorted, “Yeah, man, hang on and I’ll pull you up the next hill,” after which what I thought about was awkward moments between human beings who dress differently, but mostly what struck me about today was how different Bainbridge Island looked on a sunny day in February, one example of which, right off, at the beginning of our ride around the island, was how you could see downtown Seattle, and then, how rather than being a mysterious tour of some sort of windswept spit of land on the edge of the continent, it was more like a spring ramble through rolling hills, but mostly downhill when you tallied it all up, even at most points during the ride.

And I was all smug at the start of the race when Kalin’s tandem broke a shifter cable, thinking “Hah! I just tuned our baby up, spending an hour and a half the other day on a 5 minute job,” but the Universe had the last laugh as we snapped ours with 3 hills to go.

To tell the truth, though, I was glad to have an excuse to walk the last few rollers and even Mimi, who otherwise wouldn’t have let me, could see the sense of it, especially since not a single racer passed us while we pushed the bike, enabling us to finish respectably and more importantly, while there was still plenty of chili left and plus, right about when the winning group of riders, led, not surprisingly by Stanglor, had just returned from a beer run.

Hooray for Derek for organizing another reason to live through February and oh my god my heart when his mom called him “darling” as we carried trash to his truck.

Friday, February 15, 2008

Sweet

I generally think that something is better than nothing.

Like, if it’s Valentine’s Day, giving your loved one something commonplace, like a bottle of wine, is better than ignoring the occasion altogether. Or if you really should be grading papers instead of puttering about with self-absorbed essays, then at least downloading one of the pieces of student work to your computer is to be commended. (There, that’s done.)

Or a few miles with your bike gang to a nearby tavern and just a couple beers instead of the usual long slog and alcohol poisoning is enough, at least, to tide you over until next time.

And in the process, because the moments are fewer, you get to savor the memorable ones just a little more.

Stopping for freshly-frosted cupcakes in a driveway/parking lot off of Westlake was not to be missed, especially when the Jamieson’s whiskey came out, prompting visiting Irish rider Joe to break his pledge not to drink anymore.

And I always love riding on the deck of Fremont Bridge, something I only do in groups; pedaling next to the Pugsley and feeling the subsonic bass hum of its tires on the metal grating was especially fine.

We congregated at Mike’s Chili in Ballard, where FHR organizer, Derek Ito, could work his strangely effective brand of salesmanship on the owner in the attempt to acquire free food for the race. And lots of uncomfortable laughter from being bombarded with the Tourette’s-y vocal stylings of the inimitable J while downing a couple pints in my defense, then, as I was leaving, falling prey to the oldest trick in the joint: above the bar is a hand-lettered sign that reads: “YCJCYADFTJ.” “What’s that mean?” I asked the waitress. “Your curiosity just cost you a dollar for the jukebox,” was her reply.

I ponied up, happily enough; after all, I had already gotten my money’s worth: the menu says clearly that the price of “Abuse” is “free.”

Thursday, February 7, 2008

Waffle II

I like a ride where you just show up on your bike and you’re invited.

Everyone brings something—at least an appetite—and shares in the end.

My tradition (two years running) for the Waffle Ride is to take the bus to Bellevue from an evening in Bothell and then pedal through that unfamiliar yet nightmarish downtown across the magical intersection where cars can’t go straight and suddenly, you’re cruising through wooded suburbs to the lake.

I got a tiny bit lost, as is also my pattern in the suburbs (and, for that matter, the city), but eventually found my way from the QFC to the park, where—a good deal earlier than I expected—many were already set up and serving waffles; thus, my sense of urgency as I dished out ice cubes to plastic glasses and filled them 1/3rd to the rim with vodka, then almost to the rim with orange juice, floated Galliano on top, before finally dropping in a marischino cherry, yum.

I had read in the Times that the Harvey Wallbanger was making a comeback, so I got the fixings, and lo, Jen and I were completely underwhelmed with a batch the other night, but this evening they worked very well: with the juice and the proprietary formula, each one tasted almost healthy; I could imagine why it may have been the surfer beverage of choice for a while.

A fancy drink also contributes to the festivity of the event; I know that after the several rounds it took me to get (or taste as) the mixture just right, I sure was more animated.

Although I wiggled, too, because I was freezing. A dry evening, but as we stood near that crest on Mercer Island, the wind whistled through my bones.

Even fortified by 70s cocktails and geometric cake, I needed to get home, and a reasonably frightening windy crossing of I-90 was the very Galliano afloat my own fancy drink of an evening with .83.

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Family

I like hanging around people who are related; when you’re in a situation where you have no choice but to stick with someone, your personality really comes out.

It’s all about family.

Derek apologized in advance for bringing the South with him but he’s blameless—on that score, anyway. If there’s anyone he should apologize to it’s the South themselves; but on the on other hand, they were so game he ought to have charged admission.

I know I would have paid to see it.

But didn’t have to!

And that’s another thing about bike riding: cheap thrills.

The rain that started falling a bit harder at Westlake Center was free. And no cost for the real winter storm we rode through to the Aboretum. And the only price of admission for the thrilling ramble through park trails and passageways to a secluded shelter was my headlamp when Sketchy's hijinks led to a little crash but no fall.

Ah, family.

My own family is visiting Minneapolis, so it was nice to have a dose of real family on tonight’s ride, sisters and husbands to remind us how to do that with each other.

And I think we did pretty well: Idaho Spud confections and gin all around!

That’s family.

The way back to Lake Washington Boulevard was way more an adventure than the way there; I felt a little lost but knew I’d be okay when Pete starting singing out “There’s a hole in the bucket” because in that moment, I heard family coming from all directions.

Which is why, of course, I bailed on joining for the next part of the evening at the CIP. When you can choose your family, you have that option.

Nothing, though, is nicer than seeing folks who have no choice to be together also be happy to be with one another: I’m never more satisfied being in a bike gang than when it feels like family that wants to be.

Thursday, January 3, 2008

Signs

It started pouring down rain just after halfway on my ride home yesterday and I began to think that the message was to not go out on the Thursday night ride; I even got a flat tire at 6:15 at the bottom of MLK and Madison, a good half hour walk home or 10 minutes at least to change the tire in the dark plus another 15 minutes uphill, meaning I’d never make it to Westlake Center in time; but as it turned out, I think, what the Universe was trying to tell me was not to take the trailer on the Saluki, because no sooner did I pull the panniers off the bike, undo the brake straddle cable, and pull out a spare tube, did a bus pull up and the driver even waited to establish eye contact with me before he didn’t pull away but rather, let me load my rig on first and then make a second trip to the curb to retrieve my bags and then, too boot, didn’t balk when I told him that my wallet with my U-Pass was in my handlebar bag; no sooner did all that transpire that there I was, home safely with plenty of time to wonder about what it all meant before drying out and deciding that since the rain had all but stopped and since the clothes that I needed—my gloves and gaitor—were dried out, it made sense to at least ride down to the meet-up and see if anyone else would show, and at first, it seemed like me, Sketchy, and Rogelio were going to be it, but before you knew it, many of the usual suspects appeared and some 16 or so, including Lee with the trailer set out to Ballard and only got separated once before sustenance at the Lock and Keel, wood with the fubar in Freelard, and fire at Gasworks Park, all of which apparently communicated the Universe’s message: “Ride.”