I hereby declare today the 14th Day of Christmas.
Why?, you ask. Well, for one reason and one reason alone: so I can post another Christmas bike photo.
Actually, it's not technically a Christmas bike photo. At least, it's not intended as such. But it's hard to deny the austere, if stark, northern Yule beauty of this Negatone image, which was taken on the main campus of the University of Michigan by "Image MD".
Have you ever seen a bike parked somewhere, day after day, and wondered about its owner?
I guess I'm weird that way. Sometimes a bicycle (or, for that matter, some other object) will catch my attention and I'll start to imagine some detail or another about the person who owns it.
Ever since the fall semester began, I've seen this rig on the campus bike rack:
A bike in a color like that is pretty hard to miss. It's also a pretty good bike: a Specialized Allez. However, it's not terribly remarkable, as it's one of the most common racing bikes today.
But seeing it parked in that very same spot on the rack every day has got me to musing about its owner. Does he or she come to school before everybody else just to get that spot? A student or faculty member? Or a staff member, perhaps--in administration? Does its owner race or take long rides?
And, of course, there's this question: From whence does its owner ride? What route does he or she take?
For all I know, it may belong to someone who lives down the block. Or, perhaps, it might be ridden by someone whose commute puts mine to shame.
So far, this winter hasn't brought much snow up this way. However, we still have a couple of months to go. You never know what can happen.
That's the reason why you never know whether you'll need this bike:
The fellow who posted the photo uses the bike to train for triathlons. Seriously, he does triathlons and lives in Minnesota. Maybe he's using that rear wheel to grind the grain he'll use to make one of his training foods.
