Motorists With Spring Fever

Today was one of those spring days when the wind, brisk as it was, felt like a form of light and the mild, almost warm, air held nary a hint that there could be strife in this world.


We, as cyclists, live for days like this.  Actually, I can't think of anyone who wouldn't look forward to such a day.

But every year, on the first definitively Spring day (as opposed to the first day with spring-like weather), some people lose their grip on themselves, especially when they're driving.  Some might be young and have just fallen in love; others simply are intoxicated, perhaps. 


So, along with the lovely weather came some absolutely crazy drivers.  You know the kind I mean: the ones who cut across lanes and make turns without signalling, or simply don't pay attention to the road ahead or beside them.  Or the ones that drive close enough to you to scrape the crochet backing off your gloves and let their dogs bark, drool or chomp out of the back windows. "Awww...isn't he the cutest thing you ever saw..."


I think that such weather, and the beginning of spring,  coming later than usual affets people, including me, in all sorts  of ways.  Sometimes it's fun, but when someone cuts across the lanes, not so much


Oh well.  I made it home from work.  And tomorrow we  will have more l

Kneecapped by Walmart?

It's a conspiracy, I tell ya.  The other night, my flight from Atlanta was delayed by almost three hours.  So I got home late Monday night and didn't feel like doing much of anything. (When I go to my parents', I usually fly to Atlanta, then to one of the NY Metro area airports.)  

Then, last night, I didn't have any internet connection.


Ya no, I got to thinkin' that Sam Wall himself was behind everything.  Mr. Wall, I'm sorry about all of those terrible things I said about your fine retail establishment.  I will never, ever use the name "Wal-Mart" in the perjorative, ever again.  Yes, I promise (as I use Catholic school birth control, a.k.a., I cross my fingers).


So now you think I'm a conspiracy theorist.  Well, not really.  I haven't said anything bad about Obama since he showed his birth certificate.  (All right, I never was a "birther.")  But sometimes I think certain people-- e.g., certain retail plutocrats--have it in for me.  Or could it be that the gods of something are angry--or crazy?


And I haven't done any cycling since I got home.  Something's afoot, and it ain't my old Detto Pietro shoes with TA Anquetil cleats (the kind that nailed onto the sole).  

I know.  I'll get to ride again.  At my age, I should know that.  Still, I worry that I'll lose this spring, the way I lost most of last spring.  Well, not quite:  Last spring, I had infections and other illnesses.  At least this year, my excuses are Life and the weather.  (For a few moments just after noon, the sky grew ominously dark and  I thought we might see another tornado here in NYC.)


At least for the last couple of days I had memories of a couple of pleasant, if short, rides from my parents' house.


  

Buying A Tire at Wal-Mart

I promise:  This won't be merely a rant against a corporate monolith.  However, I am warning you that this post will contain one.  So proceed at your own peril.

Yesterday, as I mentioned, I got a flat.  Since Mom and Dad don't ride, and the bike was borrowed, there was no spare tire or tube in the house.  So Dad took me to Wal-Mart, which was the only store open, to get them.

I bought a mountain bike tire and two tubes.  The total cost, with tax, was $25.88.  That doesn't sound bad, except that I know that I could have gotten something of better quality online, or even from my local bike shops, for less money.  And these tires and tubes were the only ones offered in the store.

The tire and tubes were from Bell, which seems to have become a generic brand of bike parts and accessories without being, or admitting to being, generic.  I've used Bell helmets, which were fine. But I see, at best, a tenuous connection between whoever is making the tires and tubes and whoever is making the helmets. 

So, it seems, Wal-Mart is now taking advantage of the apparent lack of competition in the area by offering a limited selection and inferior quality at whatever prices they can get away with charging.  

And don't get me started on the way the company treats its employees.  That they were working on a holiday, for minimum wage,  was bad enough.  But the workers--even the young floor manager--didn't seem very healthy.  And the cashier--one of those wonderful Southern women of a certain age who calls everyone "hon" and "darlin'"--was missing nearly all of her teeth.

She probably couldn't have afforded the tires and tubes I'd just bought.

Not A Swamper

I've never pretended, even for a moment, that I could be a "swamper."  Even though I was born in Georgia, which has more than its share of swampland, I spent only the first few months of my life there.  And I know that, as much as I love Sweet Home Alabama, I will never have the same feeling for the places figure into that song as the ones who wrote and performed it.

However, spending a few days in Florida, especially when I have the opportunity to ride, allows me to appreciate the beauty of the wetlands I see here.  For one thing, they're full of flora and fauna one simply doesn't find on drier lands, or any lands north of the Potomac.  And, for another, these swamps glisten in the sunlight in ways that no other kind of landscape can.  I suppose that if I spent more time in and with it, I could describe it better.  For now, all I can say is that their perpetual greenness somehow makes the water seem bluer, and gives everything a feeling that is pristine and ancient at the same time.  It's as if those lands, and the water and plants that cover them, could neither reflect nor belie the ways in which the human race has or hasn't touched it.

But when you're out in the middle of one of these swamps--or even riding a bike lane that cuts through it--in the middle of a bright summer today, like the one I experienced today, it's just plain hot.  And it's even hotter when you get a flat and there's no shade to cover you when you're fixing it.

Now, having fixed it and eaten an Easter dinner (ham, baked sweet potatoes, Italian-style asparagus and tomato and mozzerella slices drizzled with olive oil, among other things), I can sit here and celebrate the beauty of what I saw. 

Route A1A and The Nomclemature of Two Wheels

It wasn't exactly jet lag.  But when I got to my parents' house last night, I was exhausted.  And as much as I appreciate you, dear reader, I wanted to spend whatever waking moments I had with my parents.  After all, they're getting on in years.  Then again, we all are, I guess.

Anyway...Today was very much a summer's day:  the temperature reached 90F (32F).  And the sun lit a nearly turquoise sky and a sea that was only slightly more opaque.  The temperature was a few degrees warmer than normal for this time of year in this part of Florida, but some brisk winds tossed flags about, particularly along the ocean.

Along the way, I stopped at Flagler Beach, where an outdoor market filled with people who shopped the produce stands and whose kids had just hunted for Easter eggs in a nearby park.  In the market, a woman who makes jewelery from beads and shells was selling her wares at discounts because it's going to be her last day at the marketplace until the fall.  Naturally, I bought a few items and got into a conversation with the woman, who says she's going to spend her summer in Wyoming, where she is going to manage the Native American jewelery section of a National Park's gift shop.  She can't sell her work there, she says, because it would be a conflict of interest.  However, being there will give her the opportunity to collect some Native beads and other items, as well as some ideas, she might use. And she'll be able to hike and camp in the mountains.

After shopping, I ate a banana, a pear and a Lindt dark chocolate bunny and washed them down with a bottle of spring water while sitting on a bench facing the ocean.  Another woman on a bike walked by; we exchanged pleasantries about what a beautiful day it was.  Her cell phone rang and her family said that they'd finished doing whatever they were doing, so she was going to meet them. 

She motioned to a bar across the street.  "I'm going to the bikers' bar," she explained.  "The one for the real bikers."  Of course--given that we were on Route A1A, about halfway between Daytona Beach and Saint Augustine, she was referring to the ones whose motorcycles, mainly Harleys, were parked outside that bar.

From "Motorcycle and Bicycle Illustrated, July 12, 1917

I didn't have the chance to ask her what made them "real" bikers, as opposed to us.  Now, if she'd said that they were "bikers" and we are "cyclists," that would have made some sense to me because I've never referred to myself as a "biker" and most other people I know who ride bicycles reguarly refer to themselves as "cyclists."  

Not so many years ago, "cyclists" were referred to as "wheelmen" and the first club to which I belonged was affiliated with what was then known as the League of American Wheelmen.  That organization dated from the days of penny-farthing or high-wheeler bicycles and, I guess, hand't yet heard about feminism.  Then again, if they had, what would they have called themselves?  "Wheel men and women?"  "Wheel people?"

Can you tell that I got more sun today than I've gotten in the past four or five months?