Waking Up And Finding A Bull's Head In Your Box

Today's weather was just like yesterday's, just a couple of degrees warmer.  Still, I did a shorter ride:  I got off to a late start.

But I enjoyed it nonetheless.  I rambled through some Brooklyn and Queens streets.  It's funny how I can roll through neighborhoods I know well, yet as I pedal down a particular street, I might think, "Hmm...haven't been here in a while.

So it was as I cycled down one of the major streets in a pocket of Brooklyn that no one seems to agree on whether it's in Williamsburg, East Williamsburg, Bushwick or Wyckoff Heights. 

("East Williamsburg" is an actual part of Brooklyn.  It's not just something you say when you're trying to impress someone--a potential date, perhaps--but you don't want to say you live deep in the heart of Bushwick.  For that matter, "Wyckoff Heights" actually exists, but about the only people who've heard the name are the ones who use it in reference to the area I rode through today!)

The street is bounded by the Broadway elevated train line and a cemetery.  On one side of the avenue I rode are projects and a senior center; the other side is lined with old factories, warehouses and storefronts.  If that doesn't sound like the sort of place in which artists live for about a decade before the neighborhood gentrifies--or becomes Hipster Hell--well, it is.

Not surprisingly, there are "vintage" and "antique" stores that charge more than most of those artists can afford for things other people threw away.  I stopped in one because it  had a couple of interesting-looking bikes and trombones (How often do you see them together?) outside the door, tended to by a rugged-looking woman in a long black skirt whom I took for one of the Orthodox Jews who live nearby but who, in fact, is the wife of, and co-owner with, a who looks like he could be one of the artists.

The woman was actually nice to me:  She invited me to bring my bike in.  The man was dealing with a haggler--actually, someone who was trying to shame him into giving her something at the price she wanted.  "I just bought property in this neighborhood.  I have a stake in it," she said, stridently.  Yeah, you're going to price all of the artists out of this neighborhood, I said to myself.

Anyway, there was some rather interesting stuff in the store.  This caught my eye:

I wish I could have better captured what I saw:  The curves of the handlebars and trombones.  It wasn't so surprising to see the latter.  But a box full of handlebars?  Even though a few bikes were for sale, that was a surprise.  I asked the female co-owner.  She didn't know how he came upon them.  "Probably they were getting tossed out," she speculated.  Perhaps, I thought, by some bike shop.  Most of the bars were cheap steel and alloy dropped bars, so I'm guessing the shop had them from old ten- and twelve-speeds that were "hybrdized".

Given all of the artists in the area, I wouldn't be surprised if at least one of those handlebars ended up in a sculpture or installation.  Could the next Picasso's Bull's Head be sitting, embryonic, in that box?

The Point Of Today's Ride

Today I took my first 100k ride of the year to...where else?...Point Lookout.

The day was fairly warm, topping out at about 18C (64F), though the temperature dropped a few degrees as I neared the ocean, from which brisk breezes blew. I didn't mind:  along my entire ride, scarcely a cloud cluttered the sky.

The last time I rode to the Point, I saw almost no cars along the roads.  The playground and playing fields were deserted.  As I recall, it was a Suday not long before Christmas, and people were at home or in bars, watching (American) football on TV.  Apparently, one of the local teams was in the playoffs, or was vying for a spot in them.

Today, though, more cars and even vans rumbled down the streets leading to the Point.  And, when I got there, the parking area was full.

I soon realized why.  It's Saturday in mid-April, which means kids are playing baseball.  Someone told me Little League season had just begun.

While some kid on the ballfield did something to make his family and friends cheer, other kids perched on rocks jutting out from oncoming waves, terrified at their mother or grandmother or somoene who was screaming at them to pose for a picture.

They all left, but I would have been happier, I think, if just the grown-ups (alleged) had gone.  Whatever.  I got to hear the surf throbbing against rocks.

There is absolutely no reason to use a kickstand with a fixie!

Tosca, my Mercian fixed-gear bike, enjoyed everything at least as much as I did.  I chose her for the ride because I actually hadn't planned to go to Point Lookout--or any other place in particular--when I got on my bike.  I reasoned that if I took a shorter ride, I'd still get a good workout from spinning her fixed gear.  As it happened, she took me to Point Lookout today.  I am happy.

One Out Of Ten Europeans Can't Be Wrong! Right?

One of the most common problems with old English three-speed bikes is that the hubs (and, in some cases, bottom brackets) have not been oiled in a long time.  I am guessing that British working-class people and farmers, who used such bikes regularly, if not daily, knew enough to drip some oil into their Sturmey-Archer SW hubs every month or so, depending on weather and other conditions.  Was that knowledge that was passed on from parents to children, or taught to them in school?

Most Americans have never had such knowledge.  (I know I didn't, until I encountered it in Tom Cuthbertson's Anybody's Bike Book.)  So, on this side of the Atlantic, Raleighs and Dunelts and Robin Hoods and whatever-other-brand three-speeds were ridden with Sturmey Archer hubs that had less oil in them than Japan or Western Europe. 

For that matter, the chains on those bikes--and others ridden, or at least owned, by the vast majority of Americans were just as dry.  One day, while parking my bike, I recognized the bike of a co-worker and saw that its chain was almost as orange as my safety vest.  The following day, I brought a little bottle of Tri-Flo with me and, finding the bike parked just a couple of spots away from where I saw it the day before, dripped some lube into the chain.

As it happened, that night we left at the same time.  On such nights we rode together, as her place was along the way to mine.  About ten minutes into the ride, she said, "My bike feels different tonight."  I could barely suppress my grin. "Why does it feel so much easier to pedal?"

From that night onward, she lubed her chain. And kept her tires inflated.  It may not sound like much, but it's more maintenance than most other people do--or want to do.

For that matter, in oiling her chain and pumping her tires, she's doing more than the average IKEA customer would ever do.  Someone at the home furnishings store chain figured that out.  Actually, that person (or group of people) came to realize that the fact that chains have to be lubed is exactly what prevents some IKEA customers from even buying a bike in the first place:  They're afraid that oil or grease will stain their nice new furniture, or simply clash with the décor.

So, the company--on whose beds one out of every ten living Europeans was conceived--has just announced that it is going to start selling the Sladda--a unisex bicycle "designed to fit an urban lifestyle"--in Europe this August.

The Sladda will come equipped with a sealed internally-geared rear hub and a cogged drive belt that, according to company literature, is good for about 15,000 kilometers (9,320 miles). 

Now, of course, a bike with such a system is not new:  Trek introduced one nearly a decade ago, and other bike-makers preceded and followed them.  But the Trek District and Soho are available only in bicycle shops, as are (or were) most of the other belt-driven bikes.  Some clever marketing person in IKEA's employ recognized that the sort of person who's put off by chains or hubs that require oil will probably never set foot in a bicycle shop. That realization, more than the design or even the seeming novelty of the bike itself, is probably what is motivating IKEA to offer the Sladda.

The bike-- designed by Oskar Juhlin, Jan Puranen and Kristian Eke of the design consultancy Veryday--will also have what the designers describe as a "click system" for attaching accessories, including  a basket, a rack and a cart.  Juhlin hints that third parties might create others:  "Sladda is like tablet apps:  you can add endless accessories to enhance ease of use."

That statement, I believe, says as much as anything else about the intended market for the bike.