What Are They Studying?

 It may be hard to believe, but the waters around New York City were once the most fertile beds in the world. Charles Dickens, in his journal of his American travels, marveled that the bivalves were so abundant that blue collar workers ate them for lunch.

(That, according to at least one food historian, is how the “oyster bar” was born.)

Anyway, harvesting them from the city’s waterways has been severely restricted for about a century. Since the late 1990s, however, attempts to re-introduce them have been successful. Still, health and environmental authorities warn against eating them.

Rats along the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn, apparently, didn’t get the memo . When an environmental group installed beds along the waterway, the rodents seemed to know that humans spend good money to wash them down with Chablis.  Le vin being unavailable, the gray-tailed grabbers made do with Eau de Gowanus.

So, I had to chuckle when I saw this:

Some students have planted oysters to study the health of the harbor. The sign warns against eating them. Pardon my ignorance, but I think that sign says plenty.

Le Velo De Plume

 If “stationary” stores sell pens and other items for writing,

do “stationery” bikes exist only on paper?

(Now that I think of it, a store—at least a physical one—is, by definition, stationary. But can you ride a stationery bike?)

From The City To The Island

 Yesterday I pedaled out to City Island. It’s not a long ride (about 25 kilometers round-trip) and it’s mostly flat.  So I thought about taking Tosca, my Mercian fixie, but instead went with La-Vande, my King of Mercia.

I was glad I made that choice: I pedaled into the wind most of the way back. Also, La-Vande has fenders, which shielded the bike—and me—from salt and sand the Department of Sanitation spread over the streets during recent snowfalls. And parts of the Bronx River and Pelham Parkway Greenways were mud puddles. 

While most of the bike—and I—were protected, the chain and cassette are a little worse for the experience. I don’t mind; I’m going to replace them in a few weeks.

I regret not photographing is some streets and both Greenways.  Road conditions are usually at their worst around this time of year: The salt and sand, along with temperature changes, result in fissures that make some of those concrete and asphalt ribbons look—and ride—more like broken stairway. Interestingly, it was worst along the stretch of Pelham Greenway from Williamsbridge Road to the I-95 underpass: Its surface was more uneven, and muddier, than along the path through the wooded area just before the bridge to City Island.

Only City Island Avenue traverses the island; the other streets, only a block or two long, are bookended by the Avenue and the water. And the Avenue has only one traffic lane in each direction. So it doesn’t take much to create a jam, which I encountered. The good news, for me anyway, was that I could move along easily.  Perhaps surprisingly, given that it was a mild day (about 12C or 54F) for this time of year, I didn’t see any other cyclists—or pedestrians or scooters.

So, when I reached the end of the island, I felt it was all mine—or, perhaps, that everyone else had forgotten it.

I must say, though, that there’s something I very much like about the light and water at this time of year: The austere, steely clouds and tides of winter are showing the first hints of turning into a more vivid, if still stark, shades of blue that will, eventually, brighten in the sun.

By then, the days, and my rides, will be longer, I hope.