A Star Water Bottle Carrier

Every once in a while, shopping for some small part or another will lead me to something I not only didn't realize existed, but didn't know that anybody would even conceive of.

I mean, how many of you have wanted to attach a water bottle cage to your Wald (or other wire) basket?  Perhaps I'm odd in that I tend not to use baskets and water bottles (at least the kind that fit in water bottle cages) at the same time.  You see, I tend not to ride my basketed bike(s) over long distances, and if I do carry libations, they are likely to be in the basket.

But, now that I think about it, I can understand why someone might want to attach a water bottle cage on a basket.  The curved frame tubes of many city bikes or beach cruisers, for example, make it difficult or impossible to mount water bottle cages.  And, I guess that if you're not carrying other things in your basket--say, your beach towel or lunch--the bottle might rattle or roll--or bounce out of the basket if it's not restrained with bungee cords or a net.

I'm not sure of whether Wald still makes their Bottle Cage Bracket #8088:  I couldn't find it on the company's website.  And I am not sure I would use one.  But because it is, like other Wald products, inexpensive, it's almost tempting to buy one just because they're so unusual.

(Yes, the title is a riff on what you think it's a riff on:  possibly the greatest film about bicycle racing ever made.)

Where Have We Gone In The Last 130 Years?

I have to admit, once or twice...well, okay, maybe three or four times...I've attended concerts, readings, plays, lectures or other events because I liked the advertisement for it.

Now tell me you wouldn't attend a lecture after seeing a photo like this.  Of course, it combines topics as close to my hearts as my Mercians:  cycling, history, women's history and gender identity.  Tessa Hull, who gave the lecture, didn't come to her topic--summed up in the lecture's title, "Women, Trans and Femme Riders in Early Cycling History"--through a women's or gender studies program.  Instead, she encountered it while on her own journey, literally:  She's cycled alone from Southern California to Maine and in Alaska, Cuba, Ghana and Mexico.  She said that, wherever she went, people were generous, but she heard the same warning:  "You know, a woman can't travel alone."

Well, I know that's not true!  And so did some women in the late 19th Century, during the first "Bike Boom."  Although there probably are more women cycling now than then, she believes that the culture around women and bikes has retrogressed in some ways. In the old bicycle ads, she explains, "you see packs of women riding bicycles, and women riding on the front of tandems," none of which is "really a norm now."  She feels we are "trying to get back to where we were in the 1890s " and warns, "[I]f you don't keep pushing for the advancement of culture, things can quietly digress."

I have to admit, even I--who, if I do say so myself, knows a thing or two about the history of women and cycling--was surprised to see women attired as they are in the photo. And they have rather athletic builds.  These days, it seems that most women in bike ads are there to entice men and look as if their limbs would break if they actually tried to pedal.

Were They Entering Or Exiting The Gate Of Hell?

If you've been reading this blog for a while, you know that my daily commute takes me over the RFK Memorial Bridge, which gives me a perfect view of the Gate of Hell.

All right, it's Hell Gate, and the Hell Gate Bridge.  But it's fun to tell students that I pass the Gate of Hell on my way to class!

Anyway, this morning I saw the trail of a boat zigging and zagging to--or from?--the bridge:

I can't help but to wonder:  Was a boat skittering away from, or rumbling toward, the Gate of Hell...I mean Hell Gate?