Fit For A King (Or Prince, Anyway)

Mention "British bicycles" to aficionados, and names of classic builders like Jack Taylor, Mercian, Hetchins and Bob Jackson will come to our minds.

However, the first name most people will think of is Raleigh.

Apparently, that is one way in which members of the Royal Family--at least some of them, anyway--are like commoners.

If you' think you've seen him before, you're not thinking of  a cheesy way to start a conversation.  While not as famous as some of his relatives, Prince Edward indeed has one of the world's most familiar faces.  In this photo, he's pedaling to one of his classes at Cambridge University in 1983.

Speaking of family members, here's one some would rather forget:

Yes, he is none other than Prince Charles.  To be fair, I have to say that he increased my capacity for empathy:  I never thought I could feel sorry for a member of the Royal Family until I watched Lady Diana exchanging vows with him in 1981.  

Ambrose Bierce wrote, "For every sauce invented and accepted, a vice is renounced and forgiven."  I suppose we can forgive a prince for something when he takes a spin on one of his country's classic bikes.



 

How Would My Childhood Have Been Different?

When my family moved from Brooklyn to New Jersey, I found myself taking turns at a new chore:  mowing the lawn.

Frankly, I thought lawns were the stupidest things in the world:  the grass grew, and you cut it every couple of weeks.  You couldn't eat, drink, smoke or do much of anything else with it.  And, if the weather stayed dry enough for long enough to lie on the grass, it was too coarse and wiry.

But, to tell you the truth, what I hated most about lawn-mowing was that I had to do it on Saturdays, when I could have been doing all sorts of other things--like riding my bike.

Maybe I would have been a more obedient and less cranky kid had I had one of these:

From Pink Bike

 

When You Can't See Liberty

Today's post hasn't much to do with cycling, perhaps.

But I thought I'd share two photos someone passed on to me.  They were taken today in lower Manhattan:

From here, you can't see the top of Liberty Tower, the building that replaced the twin towers of the World Trade Center.   

Here's another image that will give you an idea of how low the fog was today: