Loves "Bicycle Thieves." Hates Cyclists?

Nobody has an unbiased opinion--well, all right, nobody has an unbiased opinion, right?

So let's just say that nobody can be, um, neutral when it comes to Woody Allen.

As repulsed as I was by his affair with, then marriage to, a woman decades younger than he whom he and his ex-wife adopted as a baby, I was--still am--willing to admit that I enjoyed Annie Hall and Manhattan when they came out.  I thought even Hannah and Her Sisters and Stardust Memories were pretty good.  All right, I'll admit that part of the latter film's appeal for me lay in my uncle's bit role in it.

Emma Stone and Joaquin Phoenix in Irrational  Man

But almost nothing he's done since Hannah has appealed to me.  Irrational Man, which came out last year, was torture to see:  It felt like a murder mystery written the way some self-absorbed sophomore imagines how Jean-Paul Sartre or Soren Kierkegaard might have written it.  Or, perhaps, it's Woody Allen's own idea of how he might have made Dead Poets Society (a favorite of mine) were he up to the task.

I know, I'm not Pauline Kael.  So why am I ranting about a would-be auteur whose time has come and gone in this blog?  Well, I have recently found another thing to further becloud my judgment when it comes to Mr. Allen:  He's anti-bike.  More precisely, he's anti-cyclist.

Woody Allen at the Community Board meeting n which he voiced his opposition to bike lanes on Manhattan's Upper East Side.

He didn't become that way overnight, although it became plain for all to see when he opposed the city's plan to paint a bike lane on East 70th Street--which just happens to be the street on which he lives.  (A little bit of NIMBY, wouldn't you say?) For years, he's been blaming "out of control" cyclists for making the city a worse place.  Why, he even blames them (us:  He thinks all cyclists are "out of control"!) for everything from making the streets more dangerous to--are you ready for this?-- that there is no "graceful" way for any street on the Upper East Side, where he lives, to accomodate bike lanes.

He made his prejudices known at his local community board's hearing in May.  But not everyone who attended that meeting agreed with him.  And, apparently, not the city's Department of Transportation, either:  While they decided not to paint lanes on East 70th and 71st Streets, they are going to put them on East 67th and 68th Streets as well as 77th and 78th, and 84th and 85th, Streets.  Traffic on each of those streets is unidirectional:  eastbound on the even-numbered streets of each pairing, and westbound on the odd-numbered ones.  All of them run from Central Park (at Fifth Avenue) to the East River.

For what it's worth, Allen still says that Bicycle Thieves is still one of his favorite films, but admits that he doesn't have it in him to make anything of its magnitude.

Get Well, Ely!

I was going to write another post about another Lovely Fall Ride.  Today's trek was different from yesterday's LFR in that I didn't leave the confines of the Five Boroughs. In fact, I traversed only two of those boroughs:  the one in which I live--Queens--and neighboring Brooklyn.  All of my ride covered streets that are entirely familiar to me but were accented by the clear mid-October afternoon accented by hints of the impending sunset and the crisp air.

Yes, I could write about today's ride which, while shorter and less varied than yesterday's ride to Connecticut, was still soul-satisfying.  Funny that I should choose such a term given that I wended along the side streets of the Hasidic enclave in the southern end of Williamsburgh.  Wooden booths enclosed balconies and building entrances; tents were erected in lots and alleyways:  I then realized that today is the beginning of Sukkot, or the Feast of Tabernacles.  People gathered inside those booths and tents to commemorate the Exodus; those structures are meant to invoke the gathering of people who, so often, have been dispersed.

But I am not going to talk more about a Jewish observnce, of which I have very limited knowledge and experience.  I also won't talk about my ride because, well, I can do that whenever I want to.  Instead, I want to tell you about someone who's been part of my cycling life over the past three years, even though I've never met him.

We've talked on the phone, exchanged e-mails and responded to each other's post on Facebook.  I made a promise, sort of. to come out his way and ride with him.  And, if he's ever out this way and he has time, we're going to take at least one of the rides I've described in this blog. 

(Once, about a year or so ago, he was here in NYC, but only for two days, and had a commitment with a relative.)

So, aside from his good cheer and inspiration, how else has he affected my cycling life?  Well, he's made some things that are on all of my bikes.  They have become some of my favorite accessories, ever.  And now that they're on my bikes, I can't imagine my bikes without them:  They work so  well for me and the way I ride, and they highlight the beauty of my Mercians.

I am talking, of course, about my Ruth Works bags:  The Brevet bags on the handlebars of Arielle and Tosca, my Mercian Audax and fixed-gear bikes respectively.  The Randonneur bag on Vera, my twin-tube Mercian mixte.  The clutch on the handlebar of Helene, my modern Miss Mercian.  The seat wedges on all of those bikes, and the shopping panniers I use on my commuter.  And a large seat bag I sometimes use, and the panniers he made but which I haven't used yet.

Ely Ruth Rodriguez made all of those bags for me.  After he made those first bags--the Brevets and seat wedges--I fell in love with his work. And those bags just seemed to belong on my Mercians.

Today I found out that he suffered a heart attack while out on a ride.  I don't have a lot of details, but we exchanged e-mails and he says he's resting now.   

I hope he recovers quickly and well.  After all, I want to ride with him and, well, I might ask him to make another bag for me when he's up to it. But most important, he's a nice, engaging person with a family who loves him.  

Another Connecticut Ride, And Why I Did It

Another Beautiful Fall Day today.  If I don't have some really urgent commitment, and I am not out and on a ride, someone should check my pulse!

"Ride me!"

Seriously, it was just one of those days when I couldn't have not ridden, even if I tried.  And I don't know what would have motivated me to try.

Anyway, I did the most quintessentially fall ride I could do without taking a train or plane--or accompanying someone who was driving a few hours out of town.  You guessed it:  I rode to Connecticut again.  On Arielle, my Mercian Audax, of course.



This time, though, I changed my route a bit.  I've found more segments of the East Coast Greenway I hadn't ridden previously:  Today I took it all the way from the Bronx to Rye, which is near the Connecticut line.

Most of the route follows secondary roads that are commercial strips or main streets of residential neighborhoods in several Westchester County towns.  Some parts of it are two-lane streets with cars pulling in and out. The drivers, thankfully, seemed cognizant of cyclists and gave me as much of a berth as they could.  I also noticed that they were very careful before opening their doors and didn't honk or yell at me when I was just ahead of them and they were trying to pull into a parking spot.  Maybe they were in a good mood:  After all, it was Saturday and most of them were shopping or getting waffles or ice cream in the cute little stores.

And, where I couldn't find any more ECG signs--near the Rye train station--I followed a hunch and took a left on Purchase Street, which I rode for about a kilometer to a fork, where I decided to hook right onto Ridge Road.  Not surprisingly, I had to climb a couple of hills, though they weren't terribly steep or long.  And it brought me to Port Chester, where I know the side streets well enough that I could follow them over the state line.

So,on today's ride, I managed to avoid US 1--and the entrance and exit ramps for I-95 and other highways--altogether.  That alone was enough to make me happy.

Even better was the opportunity to see the changes in foliage.  In just over a week, I saw more reds and yellows in the trees and bushes.  

And, interestingly, some flowers have come into bloom.

Some years, there is a week or so when the Fall seems like a second Spring. The colors are, of course, different, but no less vivid.

To think that I was offered such treats during a ride when I felt really, really good!  

Today I also realized another reason why I've done my Connecticut Ride so often.  It's like one of those meals that offers a nice combination of tastes, textures and even colors.  This ride takes me from my block of brick houses, across the park that is Randall's Island, through the industrial areas and shabby but lively tenement-lined streets of the South Bronx, along tree-lined streets in Westchester County and around the vast estates and horse farms of Connecticut.  And back again.  Pretty good for a day ride, wouldn't you say? 

Is This The Year Of "39er"?

Bigger is better.  Height makes right.  Size matters.

You've heard all of those ridiculous notions before.  Of course I don't believe any of them:  If I did, I never could have undergone a certain medical procedure that has allowed me to become, completely, the person I am.

There was, however, a time when I believed "bigger is better", "height makes right" and "size matters".  When I was a kid, I wanted to "graduate" to bigger bikes.  That meant going from a bike with 20 inch wheels--like most "choppers" and other kids' bikes of the time--to one with 26 inch wheels, like the kind found on three-speed bikes.  Later, I would believe--as many other people did--that 27 inch wheels were one of the things that made ten-speed bikes "better" than other kinds of bikes.

Now we have "29ers"--which are really just 700C wheels with wider rims and tires.  That size is used mainly for mountain bikes, though I have heard of a few other kinds of bikes made with it.

Not to be outdone, Patrick Ng has designed a "39er":

Yes, that bike has 39 inch wheels.  Of course, such a bike cannot have the same frame dimensions as a 29er, let alone a 26 inch mountain bike or 700C road bike.

As an example, the chainstays measure 637 mm and the total wheelbase is 1487mm.  To put that into perspective,  a typical 29er has chainstays of about 440 to 465 mm and wheelbase of 1160 to 1220 mm.  Touring  bikes with 700 C wheels have similar dimensions, while racing bikes are shorter.

Perhaps the wildest part of this bike's design is its steering:  The handlebars are nestled inside the main triangle and control the fork by a pair of cogs linked with a chain.  The handlebars are so placed to give a riding position roughly similar to that of a 29er bike and to prevent massive toe overlap with the front wheel.

Perhaps you are scared or appalled by this bike. Or you might want to be the first kid on your block to have it.  If you're of the latter category, you're out of luck:  This bike is no more than an artist's rendering of Patrick Ng's whimsical design, and there are no plans to produce it.

This bike, however, is not the first far-fetched machine Mr. Ng has designed. Check out his Ridiculous Bikes--Roost Carbon:



Only the 28 inch wheels bear any semblance to current standards.  Its 188 mm rear axle spacing (vs. 130 on current road bikes and 135 on mountain bikes) is needed to accomodate the 13-speed cassette with a range of 11 to 53 teeth.  And, with its 1500 mm wheelbase, I can only imagine (as if I want to!) how it handles.

Patrick Ng may have designed these bikes tongue-in-cheek, and we can laugh at them. But one thing we should have learned in recent years is that no idea is so ridiculous that it won't become an industry standard.

If anyone decides to produce 39ers, the marketing campaign could include one of my favorite Queen songs:





Now, if someone wants to outdo Mr. Ng, he or she would have to design a "49er".  That person could get rich by linking it to a certain San Francisco sports team.  Of course, it would have to be painted red and gold!

No Clear Skies Ahead--Or For The Ride Home

Maybe, even after all of these years, I'm not a real New Yorker after all:  I still enjoy the views when I'm crossing some of this city's bridges.  This morning, as I wheeled across the Queens span of the RFK Memorial/Triborough Bridge, a woman who I thought was out for her morning run stopped mid-span to take photos of the skyline.  I didn't mutter "tourist" or any of the other epithets a jaded resident of the Big Apple might hurl at such a person.  

In fact, I stopped to snap a picture.  But I didn't take one of those photos that includes silhouettes of the UN Towers and the Empire State and Chrysler Buildings.  Instead, I turned my camera (my cell phone, actually--the woman was using a real camera) in the opposite direction:

The Hell Gate Bridge, which carries Amtrak trains to and from New Haven, Providence and Boston, winds through the Bronx and upper Manhattan.  They are to the west (and north) of Astoria, where I live and begin my commute. 

You can see the skies turning gray to the west.  That meant, of course, that the clear skies I was enjoying as I crossed the bridge would, more than likely, move across the river.  And, depending on what time of day I went home, I could contend with rain while crossing the bridge or on the other side.  

Most of the commutes I've done to jobs I've had in the past have taken me along streets in residential, commercial or industrial areas.  I get to sample all three during my current commute.  However, riding to my current job also involves riding over the Queens span of the RFK/Triborough Bridge which, at mid-point, is separated from the East River by about 90 meters (145 feet).  It's a bit like riding in a helicopter:  It allows me views I never had on previous commutes.  It also allows me to see incoming weather in ways I never could before.

I still listen to the weather report before I leave and prepare myself accordingly.  As useful as that is, there's still nothing like seeing a real-time video of the day's conditions unfolding.  The raingear is in my pannier, but literally seeing what's on the horizon prepares me in a unique way for a ride home that could be very different from my ride to work.

Playing Chicken With The Sunset

In earlier posts, I've written about "playing chicken with the rain".   On days when precipitation the clouds look ready to drop buckets, I might for a ride, all the while daring the sky to deal me a deluge.  I feel I've "won" the "game", if you will, when I arrive home (or wherever I'm going) just as the first drops plop against my skin.

Today there was absolutely no risk of rain.  It was one of those perfect fall days, with the kind of sunlight that feels as if it's trickling through leaves even though the sky is blue.  And the wind and the waves echo a softly crackling flame.  At least, they seem as if they should.

The waves...Yes, I took an afternoon ride to the Rockaways.  Although the water is still warm enough (at least for someone like me) to swim, the air was cool enough that nobody tried.  In fact, the only people in the water were a few surfers.

But I was playing chicken.   You see, I started in the middle of the afternoon and lingered on the boardwalk (actually, it's concrete now) at Rockaway Park.  A month or two ago, I could have lingered--or ridden--even longer than I did.  Well, actually, I could have done that today, too.  But I was also thinking about the time of day--or, more precisely, the time at which the day would end.

After lingering, I rode some more along the boardwalk and, after crossing the Veterans Memorial Bridge into Beach Channel and Howard Beach, took a circuitous route through streets of wood-frame houses--some with boats in their driveways--away from the ocean and bay and up the gradual climb to Forest Park, right in the middle of Queens.  From Forest, I rode streets I've ridden dozens, if not hundreds of times before as the sun began its descent just beyond the railroad tracks and the East River.

Yes, I got back to my apartment just as the twilight began to deepen into evening and the street lamps were lighting.  I had lights with me--  I always keep them in my under-seat bag--but I didn't have to use them.

In other words, I played chicken with the sunset.  And "won"!

Caught On The Train

Every city's mass transit system has its own rules about bringing bicycles onto trains, buses and other vehicles within the system.  Here in the New York Metropolitan area, each part of the system seems to have its own regulations.  For example, on PATH trains, bikes are allowed only in certain cars on the train, while on Long Island Rail Road and Metro North and New Jersey Transit trains, bikes are allowed during certain hours and in certain areas of each car.

On the other hand, in New York City subways, there don't seem to be any rules at all.  At least, I haven't found any, aside from a prohibition against locking a bicycle to any part of a station, such as a gate.  But there is a certain unwritten etiquette which, from what I've seen, nearly every cyclist follows.  Mostly, it's common courtesy:  Don't block doorways or get in people's way, and try to keep your grimy bike away from passengers' clean clothes.  And try not to bring your bike on the train during rush hours!

I try not to bring my bike onto the subway at all, not out of fear, but mostly out of pride.  I prefer to ride the entire length of my route whenever I can; I'd rather be riding my bike on even the busiest streets than wheeling or holding it in a crowded subway car.  If I've had a mechanical breakdown or some other problem (thankfully, these things have been rare for me) and have no other way of getting to a bike shop, home, work or wherever else I have to be, I'll get on the train.  Also, if I stay out later than I'd planned and I don't have lights with me, or if it's a cold day and it starts to rain heavily, I'll get on the train for safety and health reasons.  But I try, at all costs, to avoid "bailing out" because of tiredness. That, to me, is an admission of defeat.  I can't remember the last time I did that, but I can recall one or two occasions when I got on the train because I just didn't feel like riding anymore.  

I wonder what this guy was thinking and feeling when he got on the train:

Fall, And What I Needed

Some have called last night's debate "depressing".  

I was too much in shock to be depressed.  The last time I felt that way about an event in which I was not personally involved was on 11 September 2001. 

Like many other people here in New York, I was stunned for days, for weeks, afterward.  Then came grief, a sense of loss:  Even though I didn't lose anyone I knew in the events of that day, I felt a sense of loss.  When a complete stranger cried on my shoulder, I held her until she got off the bus we were riding.  We didn't speak and I never saw her again. Each of us understood, I believe, and gave each other what we needed in that moment.  

I had not thought about that encounter in years, until now.  Some have seen that time as a kind of Fall, when this country lost its collective innocence.  The days and weeks that followed--which, as I recall, were unusually warm for the time of year--did not feel autumnal.  

The holidays, like the days that preceded and followed them, passed through a kind of gray storm in which needles of ice rained down even on the clearest of days.  Those first glacial spears stung; the ones that followed stunned; after that, I was too numb to feel the rest, for a long time.

There may have been a Fall that year.  But the season that followed did not feel Autumnal:  that October and November felt just like the following January and February, in no small part because those months were--up to that time--the warmest winter months this city had experienced.

Today, in contrast, felt exactly the way some of us might have, at some time in our lives, expected a day from this time of year to feel.  Today began overcast but turned, rather quickly, into an afternoon with a blue sky lit by intense sunlight that hinted at the sunset that would tinge the horizon a few hours later.  The morning's chill had, by that time, turned into a nip.

In other words, it felt like the Fall day it is.  It was that day when one realizes that the season is well underway:  It's no longer possible to say that summer has just passed, but winter, though everyone knows it will come, does not yet seem imminent.  

Fewer cars and taxis and buses plied the street on which I live, or the avenue around the corner or the other streets that branched from it, than one sees on a typical Monday.  The reason, of course, is that today is a holiday (as I like to say, for a guy who got lost):  the one that always seems, to me, the one that signals that it is indeed Fall.

On this holiday last year, I was in Montreal, where--ironically--it was warmer, more like a September day here in New York and the leaves of the iconic maple trees that line the city's streets blazed in the sun.  Montrealers, like other Canadians, don't celebrate Columbus Day.  Rather, the second Monday of October is, for them, Thanksgiving Day.   I certainly was thankful for having such a wonderful day to ride and interesting places to explore.  

I had those things, today, too.  So of course I went for a ride.  I didn't plan anything, not even which of my bikes I rode.  As it turned out, I took Tosca, my fixed gear Mercian, for a spin.  Perhaps I chose her because, somehow, I knew--my body knew--that I needed to keep my feet spinning.  But I was not riding for escape:  In fact, it was quite the opposite.  

Where did I go?  I know I pedaled through various parts of Brooklyn and Queens; I think I even popped into Nassau County, briefly, and back again into the borough I now call home, into the one I called home The Day The Towers Fell, and back home.

That ride gave me exactly what I needed, for I did what I needed to do.  And I am satisfied now.

(Note:  I didn't take any photos during my ride.  The image you see was made by Matt Hyde.)

"They Had Beauty But No Licenses"

I've heard that certain women are attracted to male authority figures.  All right, I take that back:  I've known a few women for whom such men exerted a pull.  That magnetism was all the stronger if said authority figure wore a uniform.

Now, of course, I don't mean to imply, let alone say, that such women represent the rest of us.  Like any other group within a larger group, they are of and among us, but they are not all--or, most likely, even most--of us.

But I think more people in my parents' and grandparents' generations--women as well as men--believed that all or most women had that desire, or even a need, for such men in their lives.  I am living in different times; also, I have enough experience with authority figures of both genders so as not to be overly awed by them.  Plus, I have an innate skepticism of authority and institutions--which may seem paradoxical when you realize that I have spent much of my working life as an educator and, as often as not, avoid conflict and change when they are on the horizon. Moreover, I lived the first four and a half decades of my life as male, which, I believe, has magnified my skepticism, sometimes to the point of cynicism.

Now, I don't mean to say that I am disrespectful--at least, not deliberately.  On the other hand, I rarely, if ever, "play up" to power, in part because I am not very good at it.  Certainly, I don't think I'd be--or even try to seem--as happy as the women in this photo:

According to The Denver Post, which published this photo:

They had beauty but no licenses, and so the young women shown here had to walk back from their bicycle ride.  Two police cars halted the cyclists at 2551 West 26th Avenue in Denver after they had received a complaint that the bicycles had no licenses.  The bikes were returned to a dealer in a truck.  Left to right are Doris Weeks, Virginia Huke, Clodagh Jones, Genevieve Strauss, Patrolmen H.W. Gibbs and L.R. Wigginton, Elouise Downer, Marietta Grange, Lois Hale and Rita Carlin.

That photo was taken and published in 1939.  I wonder whether any of those women are still alive and, if they are, whether I am dragging their reputations through the mud.  Really, I don't mean to!

I just can't get over how they're all smiling.  Were they coerced into it, or were they genuinely happy, or at least content, to get the attention of Men In Uniform.  (A few years later, in a Hollywood movie, I could see any one of them would fall into the arms of a soldier or sailor disembarking from the war.)  And, I wonder:  How did whoever tipped off the cops know that those young women were riding without licenses?  


It would take a far more serious offense for me to call the police on them, let alone take them into custody. I guess that's one reason why I never became a police officer!

Fitting Man--And Woman--To The Machine

Note:  This post contains a frank discussion of a female-specific cycling issue.

Perhaps I am the last person in the world who should criticize anybody for having a surgery.

Still, I couldn't help but to cringe when I heard about women who had their toes shortened to better fit into sky-high stiletto heels.  To me, it sounded like a version of foot-binding that has the imprimatur of the medical establishment.

I mean, it's one thing to go under the knife, or to be bound and stitched to look the way one wants to look.  Countless people, including many transgender women I know, have had surgeries to lift cheekbones or chins, raise eyebrows or lower hairlines, or to change the shape of their noses or ears.  Still others have had their breasts augmented and buttocks lifted and firmed or had that most common procedure of all:  liposuction.

It's sad when people are cut, broken, bound and stitched to fit some Barbie-like "ideal" that no real woman meets.  Most such people look perfectly good the way they are; the others are simply unique.  But I won't knock anyone who has surgeries or other procedures if it makes them happier and better able to function in the way they wish.  After all, some people would say--wrongly, I aver--that my gender reassignment surgery fits into that category.  Certainly, I could have lived without it:  after all, I did, for decades before I had it.  I just don't know how much longer I could have lived, at least as I was.

What disturbs me, though, about toe-shortening is that it's done in order to fit a device, i.e., high-heeled shoes.  (A device for what?  I'll let you answer that!) How many of us would have our hands surgically altered to better fit our keyboards or our bodies reshaped to the contours of a chair?

Now, you are probably asking what this has to do with cycling.  Well, I'll tell you:  There are women who are having parts of their inner labias removed because they rubbed against their saddles.  This sometimes causes chafing, bleeding and even infections, as it did for me when I first started cycling after my surgery. 

Sometimes I still feel pain, as many other women do.  But it has been less frequent for me, as I have found saddle positions that work for me, most of the time, on each of my bicycles. And I have been experimenting with ways I dress when I ride, especially when I wear skirts.

But I am not about to undergo what some are calling "saddle surgery".  For one thing, my labia was constructed by a surgeon.  She did a great job (and it cost me a bit of coin), so I don't want to undo it.  Also, I simply can't see myself altering my body again to fit a machine, even if it is a bicycle.  If anything, it should be the other way around:  the machine should fit the human.

And my identity--the reason I had the surgery--is not a machine.  

Also, the pain I experience these days is really not any worse than the pain and numbness I sometimes experienced after long rides before my surgery.  Besides the equipment I have now is a lot less noticeable under form-fitting shorts than my old equipment was!