Category Archives: Biking

On the bike: Over the weekend

I started my Saturday with a short trip to a meeting about school options in St. Louis City.  It’s a pretty hot topic if you have kids and want to stay in the city, and I appreciated our neighborhood group going to the effort of getting representatives from a number of school options (public, charter, and parochial) all in one place.

A local Catholic high school hosted the event.  I was disappointed when this sign greeted me upon arrival.

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Ugh!  So much for my hopes of finding a nice bike rack at the main entrance to the building.  While I know this is not an uncommon occurrence, I feel like the tide against this type of signage (and the policies they represent, which discourage active transportation) is turning.  This school needs to get with the program!

[A physical activity related side-note: One of the school reps at the event was excited because her school had PE and yoga once a week (as well as 50 minutes/day of recess).  Perhaps I remember wrong, but I feel like I had PE every day in elementary school.  I know this is one of the first things many schools cut, which is sad, for both the physical and school performance/behavior ramifications.]

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I resisted locking Baby Jake to the column with the sign on it only because this column actually had a narrower metal pole behind it (hidden in the photo), which worked better with my U-lock.  Fortunately, despite the sign, Baby Jake was still there, unmolested, when I returned.

Hot bike hair
Saturday’s biking in mid-80-degree temperatures was also my first experience of warm (hot, really, in my book) weather biking with shorter hair.  As I suspected, this in-between length (long enough to be on my neck, but too short to pull back completely) is not going to fly during hot weather.

If I let it keep growing, I could probably pull it back by June, but I think I may take the plunge and really truly chop it for the summer, then, unless I want to keep it very short, I’d hope it would grow enough over the winter that I can pull it back this time next year.

Sunday, rain day, bike day
Since Matthew spends most Saturdays at the garden, Sunday is the only day all three of us have together, and we like to make the most of the time.  We decided to laugh at the rain and bike to the Botanical Garden for a morning outing.  We departed under looming rain clouds, and it was starting to spit just a bit when we made a doughnut detour a few blocks from the garden.

After locking our bikes up, we had time for a little outside stroll in light drizzle, before ducking into the Climatron.  While we were in the Climatron, the skies opened up, and there was a decent little shower, but we were nice and dry inside.

I was wishing we had smartphones so we could check the radar and look for a break for biking home, but a quick peek outside showed clearing skies to the west.  Not sure how long it would last, we headed back outside for a bit more walking before rendezvousing with our soggy bikes (well, mostly the helmets were soggy).

We also had to dump the water out of the IBert (it pooled in both the back of the seat and in the foot rests — guess they need drainage holes!), but it wasn’t a big deal.  We had great weather for the ride home, and I was glad we didn’t let the clouds scare us into the car.

Where did you ride over the weekend?

 

On the bike: Entrenched edge rider

When I started this blog (almost 6 years ago!), I thought I would be recounting a lot more tales like the one I’m about to share, stories in the “brave cyclist vs. rude, ignorant motorist” genre .  Fortunately, that has not been the case, but every now and then . . . .

Saturday morning found me riding in two central St. Louis neighborhoods, Southwest Gardens and The Hill.  After a quick stop at the library, I headed to The Hill to pick up a couple of items at DiGregorio’s Market (really hope I can get them to add some bike parking!).

The scene: The Hill is a dense, urban neighborhood, mostly single family residential along one-way east-west streets, and small businesses along Marconi Ave.  When traveling north on Marconi, as I was on my way to the store, there is a significant downhill for the first few blocks.

TheHillMap

Marconi is narrow two-way traffic (i.e., barely enough room for two small cars to pass one another when cars are parked on both sides), with street parking on both sides of the street, no center stripe, 25 (or 20?) MPH speed limit, short blocks, and all-way stops at every. single. intersection.  So, despite the downhill, this is not exactly the type of street you zoom down, whether in a car or on a bike.

A couple of blocks after turning onto Marconi (and only a few more short blocks to my destination), I picked up on a motorist behind me, giving off an impatient vibe.  With the parking lane pretty solidly full, there was no place for an obvious release, not to mention that, with the downhill, I was already traveling pretty close to the speed of traffic.

Even with no oncoming traffic, the effective width of the street (what was left after accounting for the parked cars on both sides, plus five feet between me and the cars parked to my right), there was really not room for the motorist to pass me on my bicycle.

But pass me he did.  And then I saw this (picture taken after we had both pulled over)  . . .

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. . . not just a rude pass, a rude pass by a “fellow” cyclist.  Whomp, whomp, whomp.

As I expected, given the road and traffic conditions, I followed him more or less at his exact same speed for two-and-a-half short blocks, until he arrived at his destination.  As he put on his blinker to park, I pulled up next to his window, and po.lite.ly asked him if he was aware how close he had passed me.  (I had rather been expecting a young whippersnapper, but the face looking back at me was a man in his 60s.)

He helpfully informed me that he “didn’t pass as close as I thought he did” (I am the one who judges that, not you, sir.), and “if [I] had been riding by the side of the road, where [I] was supposed to be,” I would have had more space.

I responded that the side of the road was the [mostly-full] parking lane, not a travel lane.

He went on with his parallel parking (with a bit of performance anxiety).  I took a deep breath, pulled my bike up onto the sidewalk (my destination was just a half-block away), and reached into my purse for a CyclingSavvy card.

When he joined me on the sidewalk, I noticed his “Bike Vermont” hat, and asked if he was from this area, or just visiting.  He replied that he was from St. Louis.  I handed him the card and suggested he check out our courses.

He replied that he knows about “people like me,” and the “claim your lane” idea.  He went on to inform me that he knows better, having written “13 books on cycling,” and that it was “cyclists like me, taking up the ‘whole’ road, that make motorists upset.”

At this point, I’m not sure anything I could have said would have made a difference, but I didn’t get a chance to find out, as he rather rudely excused himself to “go get a sandwich.”  He was clearly in a rush to get that sandwich — good thing he arrived at his destination a whole ONE second ahead of me!  (See Reality of Delay.)

I walked my bike to my destination down the block, shaking my head.  I usually don’t engage motorists in situations like this, partly because I often don’t quite catch up to them, but as much because it’s often an exercise in futility and a way to cast an unpleasant shadow on a nice outing.  But sometimes doing nothing is hard, and you never know until you try, right?

This was one of those frustrating, futile encounters.  He was so sure he was right and I was wrong.  Never mind that he was THE only motorist, in over an hour on streets big and small that morning, to object to my cycling.  Never mind that he has probably never been on his bike and had a motorist go out of her way to thank him for the way he was riding.  Never mind that we arrived at his destination at the EXACT same time!

I realized later, as I was biking home, that I could hardly expect this man to respect my space on the road, when his “right way” to cycle involves not respecting his OWN space on the road.  Sad, but true.

Birthday, biking bodies, and a new doc in town

Let’s start with a mystery photo, shall we?

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Make your guess now . . . and all will be revealed later.

Birthday
Early April through early May is a big birthday month in my family.  This week we celebrated Matthew’s birthday with not one, but two, homemade pizza dinners (now Sir thinks we should have pizza for dinner every night), and two rounds of birthday cake.

I made a chocolate chip banana cake with peanut butter frosting.  I used this recipe for the cake, omitting the orange zest and adding about 2/3 c. chocolate chips.  The cake was not bad, but it seemed more banana bread than banana cake.  I’m not exactly sure of the difference between the two, but it wasn’t quite what I was going for.

The frosting, however, definitely said “cake!”  If you’re into peanut butter, you should definitely make this frosting (or perhaps not, as it may be hard to avoid eating the whole batch!).   I started with this recipe, and made a couple of tweaks: 1) reduced peanut butter by 1/8 – 1/4 cup, 2) replaced the missing peanut butter with 1/8 – 1/4 cup plain, whole fat yogurt, 3) omitted the milk, 4) added 1 t. vanilla, 5) sifted the powdered sugar.  It was tasting good and starting to come together, but an extra couple of minutes with the highest speed on the mixer really elevated this frosting to the light and airy level.

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Then I got all fancy and melted chocolate to decorate the cake (I almost never bother with the “decoration” step, but I had fun here).  Also, there is extra peanut butter frosting, to be eaten on chocolate graham crackers.

Nothing like a birthday to make us reflect on health, right?

Matthew’s Knee
After I wrote this post, Matthew saw an orthopedic specialist who ordered an MRI.  The doctor expected to find some cartilage that needed to be removed, but the MRI came back clear, so instead of surgery, Matthew got physical therapy, aimed at correcting muscle imbalances in his leg that are making his knee cap rub when he bikes.

He has returned to biking, but the pain is not gone.  Both the physical therapy (an hour of exercises ev.er.y day) and the warmer weather seem to help, but in all honesty, surgery to remove some deteriorated cartilage would likely have been a quicker fix.

He’s also experimenting with clipless pedals again, so he can balance his muscles while biking, by getting the “pull up” motion, as well as the “push down.”  He used birthday money to purchase a pair of Keen cycling sandals, which, while not nearly as roomy as biking in Birks, have much more toe space than a standard bike shoe.

My Back
My back is my back.  After two visits to a chiropractor (the first followed by intense neck pain, that I tried to attribute mainly to sleeping wrong), I’ve decided that is not the route for me.  On the second visit, I gently mentioned the neck pain, not blaming her, but suggesting we stay away from that area.

This seemed like a perfectly reasonable request to me, given that the issue that brought me to her office was pain in the MIDDLE of my back.  I mean, I know it’s all connected, but still.   Unfortunately, this chiropractor (and I suspect most others would be similar) could NOT stay away from my neck, and my neck doesn’t seem to like chiropractic care.

I discovered that some sun salutations seem to help (if not cure) the pain, so I’m trying to do those daily, along with a few of my previous PT exercises.  That’s the current plan, given that the pain, if annoying in duration, is usually quite minimal and doesn’t really limit my activities — I can live with it.

If it gets out of hand, I can always go see our new doctor . . . .

DrGabe

. . . . Dr. Gabe!  He’s definitely into alternative healing; little pink super balls can work wonders, apparently.  Or maybe he just has a healing smile!

And now, to return to our mystery photo . . . perhaps not all that mysterious — if you guessed winter squash, you get the honor of being correct!  I love working with this variety of winter squash — a long, solid neck and very sweet flesh with a nice texture — and I loved how it looked on the tray after slicing.

What’s in a bicycle name?

We heard on Monday that Xtracycle will start shipping out the new batch of Edgerunners mid-month.  Since we’re just getting the frame, it will likely be at least another week beyond that before our bike is ready, but it should be road-worthy by the end of April.  I have to admit that when they pushed back the date from March to “early to mid-April,” I was hoping for more on the “early” side, but at least this is better than another delay.

My least favorite thing about the Edgerunner (and I say this having never seen one in person, much less ridden one) is the name.  It conjures up images of scooting along on the very far right side of the road, absolutely the last place you ever want to operate a bicycle.

Riding far to the right (i.e., at the edge of the road) makes you invisible and irrelevant to other road users.  It is also the place you encounter many of the dangers that cause the most common kind of bike crash (a solo fall) like debris, grates, pavement imperfections, wet leaves, sand, etc.  This is not how I ride and this is not what I teach.

So I am less than excited about the implications of the model name of this bike, but I’m also not huge on naming bikes.

I oh-so-creatively dubbed my Kona Jake, “Baby Jake.”  BUB (short for Back-Up Bike, my Schwinn Voyager) never really had a name, until I needed a way to distinguish between Baby Jake and BUB when writing here.  Before that, I may have also referred to BUB as “Baby.”

At any rate, I don’t really use the names I give my bicycles.  I don’t wake up in the morning and say, “Hmm, which bike will I ride today?  I think I’ll take BUB.”

I may just end up referring to the Edgerunner as “the longtail,” which easily distinguishes it from any of our other bikes.  I could also rename it “Roadrunner,” which deals with my main objection to the name, although I’m also not sure “runner” is terribly appropriate, as cargo bikes are not really built for speed (maybe it would deserve that name if I had electric assist!).  Another option, in a continuation of my not-so-creative names, would be “Blue.”

We’ll probably wait to settle on a name, if any, until we actually have the bike, so we can get a feel for her (his?) personality, but it’s not too early to start brainstorming.

So, what do you call your bike?  And, any suggestions for a good name for a blue Xtracycle Edgerunner longtail?

 

 

 

 

 

 

House hunting by bike

Well, we’re back on (or still on? — not sure we ever really fell off) the house hunting horse, though conditions are questionable: inventory is really low right now, good properties are moving fast, it’s a seller’s market, etc., etc.  Not to mention that interest rates (on loans) are rising.  (What really gets me is that interest rates on borrowed money are going up, while rates on savings, like C.D.s and money market accounts, are still pitiful –grr!)

Anyhow, a new property of interest (let’s call is a POI) popped up on Monday.  What with properties moving fast, I was more than a little anxious, and we got in to see it by Wednesday afternoon.

I planned to meet Matthew there after work, and since I’d been a bit under the weather, my initial plan was to take the car.  However, Wednesday was rather nice, weather-wise, the destination was just over 3 miles away, and biking worked, timing-wise.  In fact, in making my plans to bike, I rather forgot that I was feeling sick.  I readied my bike, picked Sir up from childcare early, and we headed over.

ThirdAcreLot

The Good

  • Almost a third of an acre (12200 sq ft lot) with good sun for gardening
  • A decent kitchen rehab
  • A crazy master suite that took up the entire 2nd floor, and included a wall of windows looking out onto the huge front yard (i.e., the garden)
  • Decent location for bikeability
  • Closet space

The Bad/Weird

  • The 100+ year-old house had some additions over the years, which seemed rather random/haphazard
  • There was a small basement under part of the house; the rest was some weird combination of crawl-space, subbasement, and slab
  • In one of the crawl-spaces, they were using jacks and bricks to support part of the house.
  • The entrance to the basement was through one of the first floor bedrooms
  • The kitchen, living, and dining areas had been refinished with laminate flooring, which is known for off-gassing some nasty stuff
  • The paint (or other?) fumes — both my lungs and head were unhappy; I had to keep stepping outside to get fresh air
  • Potential plumbing issues

The “Eh”

  • Pretty dismal for public transit
  • Not particularly walkable
  • On the very edge of StL city limits, meaning we would have to deal with “the school” question

The basement issues made it a no-go, a decision we arrived at rather quickly.  As our realtor pointed out, lifting a house and adding a basement is neither an easy nor a cheap fix.

We biked home together, and on the way, I pointed out a house with a huge lot (assuming that it was, in fact, a single property) that I’d noticed earlier.  After dinner, a bit of house-stalking turned up that it was, in fact, a house on half an acre.

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A-freaking-mazing.  And, distinctly NOT for sale.  Bummer.

Due to various timing and logistical issues, we’ve driven to most of the properties we’ve looked at over the past few years, which always feels wrong, since bikeability is one of our big criteria.  I have to admit that part of my motive in biking to this house on Wednesday was hoping to create some good house hunting karma.  Despite it not being “the one,” I really enjoyed seeing the house, and I think biking there helped my mood and improved the whole experience.

**Satellite images of POIs courtesy of Google maps.**