Rainy Day Projects

It's supposed to rain on and off today.  I suppose I could play chicken with the rain again.  However, I somehow feel that I wouldn't be so lucky in daring the weather as I was in chancing it.  Actually, I wasn't even chancing it:  I just had enough dumb luck to be able to ride between rainfalls.

If it does rain, I'll probably do some bike work I'd been planning.  Maybe I'll even build the wheels I had planned for Marianela.  I'm not using any fancy components on it, save for the DT spokes.  (They're going to connect Sun CR-18 rims to IRO hubs which look like they're made by Formula.) But I think that, and the care I'll take in building it, will make it a better wheel than some of the stuff they sell on e-Bay.  

What else?  When I swap the wheels, I'm going to put street tires on it rather than the cyclo-cross tires I've been riding.  They still look good, so I'll save them for next winter.

I also just got a pair of shifter pods from Velo Orange.  Those aren't for Marianela, though; they're for Helene.  I was going to get a pair of Paul Thumbies.  But I found out that the road version works only on the part of the bar that bulges near the clamp.  And the mountain version would be too narrow to fit on the grip area of the Velo Orange Porteurs that Helene has.  The VO pods are made to fit either road or mountain bars, and they'll work with the Dia Compe Silver shift levers that are on the bike.  And I just happen to have a pair of cable guides I saved from the last set of Ergo levers I used.

Now...Which do I do first?  Of course Helene is more fun to work with (not to mention ride); Marianela is my "beast."  But Marianela's rear wheel popped a spoke a couple of weeks ago.  That's usually a sign that a wheel needs to be rebuilt or replaced.  Then again, no spokes have broken since.  I find that on dying wheels, spokes tend to break pretty frequently.

Plus, it's been quite a while since I built a pair of wheels.  I used to do it in one of the shops in which I worked, and I've built a few wheels for myself.  But since I haven't done it in a while, I wonder whether my skills have deteriorated?  I know how to do it; I just wonder whether i've lost the "touch" I might have (or merely imagined) I had.

Oh well.  This is probably one of those decisions I should make after I've made (and eaten!) a crepe or two.

Into A Cherry Blossom Sunset

Somehow I get the feeling I might've better appreciated today's weather had I been English.  Then again, upon realizing how much of the Empire consisted of warm climes, one could just as easily conclude that some English people weren't so crazy about their own meteorological conditions after all.


The day remained overcast.  I thought I felt a few drops on my way home.  I kept my fingers crossed:  I received a very important document in the mail at my second job.  And I was bringing it home in a tote bag with an open top that I carried in one of my bike baskets.  Perhaps if the rain had gotten heavier, I could have stopped in some store and asked for a plastic bag.


But the sprinkle seemed to end not much after it started.  While the sky didn't clear, I was treated to an interesting "sunset" as I pedaled through Flushing Meadow Park.

Now, even if you absolutely detest pink, how can you not love a cherry blossom "sunset?"

Playing Chicken With The Rain

The past few days could teach anyone the meaning, if not the precise etymology (Oh, shit, did I just sound like a linguistics professor?) of the phrase "April showers."


Yesterday rain began to fall when I was a couple of blocks from my class.  Today I woke up to tires hissing on slick pavement that was nearly dry by the time I rode to my first class.  But, when I stepped outside between classes, a glaze of rain clung to the concrete and pavement like a honey drizzle on a baking ham.  And, by the time I left for my other job, the streets were once again dry.


However, I could tell that the rain had gone in that direction and left just before I got to my other school by the fresh, dewy scent in the air, which was still pretty chilly.  I haven't seen new flowers on either campus.  But on my second job, I saw this sign of rain that passes over several times a day:

That's The Pinarello, which I saw for the first time since December.  And the cycling colleague in my department also had a "shower cap" on her bike:

And, yes, I saw everything glistening with raindrops when I went outside after class.  But, once again, I had just missed riding in the rain--or it missed me.

It Looks Like A Lane Now

It looks like a real bike lane now.


Last week, I mentioned the construction I saw on the Queens side of the Edward Koch/Queensborough/59th Street Bridge.  (At the rate it's going, the bridge'll have more names than God has in the Old Testament!)  Well, I don't know whether they've finished it.  But at least now the path is useful, and takes you to a practical destination.


More important, it doesn't force cyclists into this:

This is where the lane from the bridge used to end.  Just beyond the orange barrels, 27th Street dead-ends under the elevated tracks of the #7 and N lines of the New York subways.  Most of the traffic on 27th (which is one-way in the direction of the truck in the rear of the photo) merges onto the bridge ramp; a few vehicles turn right onto Queens Plaza North, where you see the black sedan.  Sometimes those streets are completely full of vehicles, and their drivers aren't known for patience.


So, when a cyclist coming off the bridge can turn left onto the lane, which intersects with 23rd, 22nd and 21st Streets. All of them continue underneath the tracks.  Or one can take 23rd in the other direction to go to Astoria.  That street passes through an industrial area and the traffic on it is usually light.   Twenty-Second is one-way in the opposite direction from 23rd, and 21st is a major artery that serves as part of the route for several bus lines.  


I would love it if the path were extended to Vernon Boulevard, which skirts the Queens bank of the East River.   That would offer cyclists relatively easy and safe access to PS 1, Socrates Sculpture Park and the Noguchi Museum, among other things. 


One can always hope.  For now, I'll suspend my cynicism and be grateful for something that's better than what we had.

They Need A Few Good Bikes. The Women, Too.

A counselor at my second job is a volunteer with Neighbors Link, an organization that helps recent immigrants. He is asking people to donate bicycles and sturdy clothing and footwear (such as jeans, overalls, T-shirts and work boots) to that organization, which will give them to recent immigrants.


The idea intrigued me for several reasons.  For one, I notice that more and more immigrants--mainly from Latin America and Asia, and mainly men--are using bicycles for transportation. I'm not talking only about the guys who make deliveries for various restaurants, cafes and diners.  Others are riding their bikes to work at construction sites, warehouses and other places where native-born degree-holders fear to tread.  Some, I suspect, are also riding to classes at the community colleges, language institutes, trade schools and GED centers in the area.  


As you can imagine, they're not always riding the best of bikes.  Sometimes they're on cheap department-store bikes, most of which are not assembled properly (in addition to being of poor quality).  Others are used bikes of just about every genre.  These days mountain bikes from the early and mid-90's seem to be the most common pre-owned bikes to find their way into the immigrant communities, and there are large numbers of "vintage" ten- and twelve-speed bikes, in addition to some English (or English-style) three-speeds.  (Do you know what makes me feel old? Knowing that I rode "vintage" bikes when they weren't vintage!)  All of these bikes, even the best of them, are in various states of disrepair.  

Image from "The Urban Country"

I think the counselor who's coordinating the collections is doing a great thing. If you're in the NYC area and have anything to donate, I can refer you to him, and he will arrange a pick-up.


But now that I've undergone changes, I've become a radical feminist.  (Ha, ha!) So I notice that these immigrant bike riders are invariably male.  That is not a stereotype or sweeping generalization; I can't recall the last time I saw a Latina or female Asian immigrant riding a bike for any reason.  Every female cyclist I've met here has been native- or European-born.  


So now I'm thinking about why that is.  It seems to me that bicycling, like education, can make such women less dependent on men and less isolated.  I have had many female immigrant students, some of whom were single mothers and others who were married to abusive men.  Even those who seemed to be in happy marriages and families were living in a kind of isolation I can just barely imagine.  I mean, I've lived in a culture different from my own, and I've traveled to others. But I realize now that, when I was living abroad, and in my travels until recently, I had a great deal of freedom simply from being a single American, and from living as a guy named Nick.  But even when I went to Turkey five years ago--as Justine, but still three years before my surgery--I was able to move about in ways that I never could had I been a Turkish woman.

Oh, and I didn't see a single woman on a bike when I was there.  And I wasn't riding, either.


Anyway...Let me know if you want to make, or know anyone who wants to make, a donation to the program I described.  I'm also interested in hearing any thoughts you might have about the situation of immigrant women I've just described.