"You're the Reason Our Kids Are Ugly"

We moved to Alabama from Minnesota when I was a kid. It would have been less of a culture shock to move to Canada. Among the many things I found different about Alabama, aside from the sometimes incomprehensible accents and inability to call pop of any variety anything but “Coke,” was the more formal way [...]

Fate and a New Old Bike

Fate has intervened to bring me a blue beauty.
Iciclebicycle found a bicycle at a dumpster while recycling, took it home, and blogged about it. I read about it, wanted it, and let him know. Voila, the vintage almost-mixte Bridgestone Kabuki will soon be mine, after he fixes it up a bit and ships [...]

What's in a Name?

In  my imagination, my French mixte was a girl. Her name would be Simone,* and she would be the perfect thing to ride to cafes to sip coffee, or to bars to drink gin martinis or sidecars while discussing feminist theory, boys, bikes, existentialism, travel, politics and our cats (what do you talk about at [...]

3 Feet Please

I really want this shirt (see at link). Also, this related news clip is definitely worth watching. The best local news story I’ve ever seen on bikes, except a bit spoiled at the end with the whole “dead right” angle. I need one of those camcorders on my bike. Drivers very [...]

Love My Bike

Love my bike, love Chicago.
That is all.

Bike Theft Paranoia

I might be suffering from post-traumatic bike-theft stress syndrome. Every work day I park my bike at the McDonald’s Cycle Center, a city bike garage complete with showers, lockers, maintenance, and secure parking. I pay $25 a month for use of the entire facility, but there’s also free secure parking in the basement. [...]

More Chicago Fun

On Sunday, we borrowed a bike from the neighbor for me and set off down the Lakefront Path to go ice skating. I’d ridden the path in the summer before, but was eager to give Dottie’s winter commute a try. It was below 20 degrees when we set out, but the day was clear, sunny [...]

How Cool Is This?

I’ve always loved sidewalk chalk. It would be fun to use these on a group ride as shown, but I also like the idea of putting one on for my commute. Unfortunately it looks like it’s just a concept for the time being.
Via

Retroveloing: Trisha

This bike only weighed a little less than Pinkie, so I figured it couldn’t be *that* different…a bike is a bike, right? Not when one bike is a Retrovelo, apparently. The Paula was so fun to ride — and fast! Biking seems so much easier in Chicago, and I can’t quite put my finger on [...]

Biking (and Blogging!) Together at Last

What happens when you put two bike blogging friends together in the same city? Lots of bikey goodness. We visited Dutch Bike Chicago and tried out a couple of really cool bikes, the Retrovelo Paula and the Workcycles Bakfiets. The snow was falling pretty hard with already a few inches of accumulation, but that [...]