An Apple A Day

You go for a ride on a hot day.  Then, at your destination--or simply a stop along the way--you sit under a tree, even if only for a couple of minutes.

Now, who wouldn't like that?  And what would make it better?  How about picking something from that tree and eating it?

I've been fortunate enough to do that. You probably know that even the best apple, grape, cherry or pear from your favorite farmer's market--let alone anything on which you can spend half of your paycheck at Whole Foods--tastes quite as good.

Needless to say, whenever I've had the chance to stop for the freshest possible snack,  I wasn't riding in my hometown.  Nor was I in any big city or suburban area.  On those days, my ride took me into the countryside--whether in Vermont, the southwest of France or upstate.  If you find a fruit tree in a city, chances are their bounty isn't edible:  That tree is, more than likely, ornamental.  Or they are grown for other purposes--like the orange trees I saw in towns along the Turkish Aegean coast, whose bitter fruit is used to make marmelade.  

Imagine what it would be like to take a city ride and pick your snack off a tree.  Better yet, imagine what it would be like for some kid in a urban ghetto to get a healthy snack or lunch from a tree in the schoolyard.

That is what Brett Lehner and Sonali Rodrigues have in mind.

They are medical students at the University of Connecticut who believe that access to fruit, and all other healthy food, is "a human right" that "should be available to everyone", in Lehner's words.

So, he and Rodrigues are about to embark on an "Apple A Day" bike ride.  But it won't be just any old bike ride:  They're going to pedal the 3500 miles (5500 kilometers) along the northern tier route from the Pacific coast of Washington State to Connecticut. 

Of course, the purpose of this ride is to raise funds--"seed money", if you will--to start their project.  Their goal--apart from getting back to Connecticut for the start of the school year--is for their idea to spread to as many schools as possible.  They are collaborating with the Northwest Conservation District, which will receive their funds and applications (presented by students themselves) for trees to be planted at their schools.  Those with the greatest need will receive first priority, according to Lehner and Rodrigues.

Riding bikes and planting fruit trees:  Those sound like good practices to me!

P.S.  I rode to Connecticut yesterday. More about that later.

Picasso Can Park His Bike Here--And Have A Beer

If you go to 5, rue Thorigny in the Le Marais section of Paris, you won't find this:

While this piece looks as if it's inspired by Picasso's famous "found object" sculpture, if you want to see it in person, you'll have to go to 1519 West Main Street in Boise, Idaho.

The reason why I say "you'll have to" is that the establishment where you'll go to see it hasn't opened yet. Its owner says, however, that the HandleBar will be up and running by the end of this month.

And while you can't see "Guernica" or "Les Demoiselles d'Avignon" in the Boise bar, it does offer two things la Musee Picasso doesn't:  beer, for one.  But more important (at least to the audience of this blog), you can park your bike inside the premises.  In fact, they'll even let you leave it overnight.

Be careful, though: It might just end up becoming part of the decor.  All right, I'm exaggerating a bit:  The HandleBar, as the name indicates, will be bike-themed.  Not only will bikes and art inspired by them adorn the walls, different fixtures will be made from, or accessorized with, bike parts.  For examples, the handles of the beer taps will be wrapped with bicycle chains.

Owner Ezra Jackson is, not surprisingly, a cyclist.  And his brother was a racer.  He says the idea for HandleBar came to him when he was fixing his bike and "hanging out" with his buddies.  They were drinking beer, naturally, and as he says, "having a good time".  So, he thought, "Why not make it a little bigger?"

And, yes, customers can work on their bikes in the bar--even if the work stands, um, won't always be used for their intended purposes.

Last time I checked, they didn't have anything like that at Les Deux Magots!

The Real Crime?

The Brooklyn neighborhood in which I lived until I was 13 was mainly Italian-American.  There were, however, a number of Jewish people, most of whom were at least somewhat religious, though not to the degree of the Hasidim.

Anyway, many years later, I would be married to a Jewish woman and teach in an Orthodox yeshiva.  Yes, I wore a yarmulke and dressed more or less like my students:  shirt and tie, the latter of which came off, along with the yarmulke, as soon as I left the premises.

Needless to say, I learned all sorts of interesting things from those experiences.  For example, I found out that when a Torah scroll is destroyed or simply rendered unusable, a funeral service is held for it, as if it were a person.

When I learned about that, it actually made perfect sense to me.  For one thing, the Torah and the Bible both say that in the beginning, there was the word.  So, treating the Torah as a sentinent being is an acknowledgement of the power of words (or The Word).  If I didn't think words had such potency, I probably wouldn't be a writer or English teacher!

But it also made sense to me in another way:  Sometimes people treat objects they value highly as if they were people.  Thus, one way to retaliate, get revenge or simply to upset someone is to damage or destroy something that person values.  Sometimes one member of a couple will do that to, say, the other member's favorite possession--or a thing, like a musical instrument, on which the other member spends a lot of time.  Of course, a spouse's or partner's devotion to it, or any past time, is blamed for the state of the relationship.



I was reminded of that when I read about Leeann Nicole Hood of Fort Walton Beach, Florida.  On Saturday, 3 June, her boyfriend "dropped the bomb":  He said he was breaking up with her.  During the ensuing fight, she took out a knife and stabbed---his bicycle.

Yes, you read that right:  She stabbed his bicycle.  

Then he took the knife away from her, but she managed to grab his own knife out of his pocket--and stab him in his left arm. 

Ms. Hood was arrested and is currently in Okaloosa County Jail on a $5000 bond.  She's been charged with aggravated battery with a deadly weapon (the knife), which is a felony.

I wish the boyfriend--who wasn't named in the article--a speedy recovery, for him and his bike.

Speaking of which:  I have to wonder where on the bike Ms. Hood stuck her knife.  For the sake of the young (I assume) man--and the bike--I hope it was some easily repairable or replaceable part like a tire.  That would certainly be easier to deal with than an arm wound, however superficial.

This incident begs the question (at least in my mind) of whether the boyfriend regards the attack on his bike, or his body, as the greater crime.