For my friends

Since I now understand that two of my closest friends whose names start with A detest onions and mushrooms, dinner two nights ago is a call out to both of you, A and A2:

Let's start with some white onions, shall we?

And how about some red onions?

Let's get those red onions up close, yeah?

And let's cook em! (not that raw red onions aren't DELICIOUS, since they are.)

Okay, sure: since you asked, we'll add the white onions to the cooking red onions.

Then toss it all together.

Then caramelize it all. YUM.

Let's cut up some delicious bell peppers: yellow, orange, red, and green.

And hey, how about some more ONIONS?!?

If A2 felt left out so far, here are some MUSHROOMS!

Oh, yum. Let's make a MUSHROOM based curry sauce.

WAIT! MUSHROOMS! YAY!

And if the MUSHROOMS weren't delicious enough, let's add some ONIONS!


And here is the DELICIOUS finished product: an ONION and MUSHROOM vegan curry! WOO WOO WOO!

Bicycling West Virginia with google maps: another cautionary tale

Despite some torrential downpours in Ohio, I made it down to West Virginia fine, and then my difficult relationship with google maps, discussed here, and here, and here, had another flare-up.


Above is part of the "road" I was touring on.

See, I went back to google maps for some more abuse, and she obliged by telling me how to ride my bike from Charleston, WV to Rock Creek, WV. Take a look at this routing, and pay special attention to Location B.

Location B, the intersection of County Rd 77/1, aka Fields Creek Road, and Public Road 77/3 near the tiny town of Winifrede, WV, is important because, in a nutshell, Public Road 77/3 isn't public. Right where that weird little dogleg starts, going east on Fields Creek, there's a guard shack. For a massive mining operation. That is very, very not open to the public. The security guard was pleasant, but there was absolutely no way I was getting in. She recommended that I talk to the people at the top of the hill (continuing east on Fields Creek Road.) But she had never heard of Fields Creek Road, or County 77/1, or Public Road 77/3 (which he guard shack is situated on), nor had the next three people I asked: a coal processing plant worker walking along Fields Creek Road, aka 77/3, nor the trucker driving coal out along Fields Creek Road, aka 77/1, nor the West Virginia Department of Transportation employee driving his pickup along Fields Creek Road, aka 77/1.

(Confidential to the West Virginia Department of Transportation: it'd be kinda neat if your employees knew where in the fuck they were, or at least the name of the road they are driving on, or the names of any of the roads anywhere near it, or maybe just which county they are currently in.)

I was faced with turning around and riding back to Marmet, WV (which is a southern suburb of Charleston, about 20 miles back) or chugging up the dirt hill. In the rain. With minimal cell phone coverage. Of course, I chose to chug up the hill. Hell, yeah: let's do this. I mean, I had food and camping gear, an endless supply of energy, and not a little recklessness.

So I rode, roughly following the blue line from the top of this image, to where I have the cursor and the little circle:


Right about where the cursor/circle are, things got interesting. The road actually ends, notwithstanding the lies, damned lies, and statistics that google maps would have me believe. A guy was driving along in his pickup truck, and was happy to help me out by asking several different neighbors who live in the half a dozen or so houses at the end of the road what the best way was for me to get down to Route 3.

After several conversations, where I learned that rural West Virginians love to give directions, and fortunately, are happy to repeat them over, and over, and over, and over, clearly understanding that my dumb ass has no idea where in the hell I am, I ended up here:

The other option, which was vaguely tempting, was to turn around, go back down the hill to just before the intersection of 77/3 and 77/1, cut across the railroad tracks and through the coal processing plant, and bushwhack through the forest back to 77/3 toward Bloomingrose. Unfortunately, this almost certainly would have required cutting through the part of the mining operation that is active, so it didn't sound all that great.

A neighbor at basically the end of another road directed me past his house and gave me clear directions on how to take the above-pictured dirt road until it turned into an ATV trail, and descend into Kanawha Eagle Coal land. Woot woot!

This involved, more or less: go straight, stay on the ATV trail, and when I get to the gate:

climb down into the ditch (sound familiar?), lift my bike over or around the gate (I chose over), turn left (and make sure you don't turn right, even though you'll think you need to, or you'll just go in a big circle), go down the hill, turn right, and pass by the guard shack.

Guard shack? Oh, hell, yeah! Another guard shack! But he confidently clarified: "the fuckers gotta let you out. They just won't let you in." He was quite pissed about the above-pictured ditch, which the gate picture doesn't really do justice to how deep it is. It was cut by "the fucking company" with a bulldozer to prevent access to the ATV trails he and other locals had been using for decades. He was not pleased. Another of the roads that google maps tried to send me on near there also had a ditch cut into it, and had been allowed to overgrow. (I found out later that the state and counties let these roads go to hell, and then abandon them, to allow Big Coal to buy them and turn them in to private roads.)

This was getting good.

Fortunately, at the crest of the ATV trail, deep in overgrown woods and riddled with poison ivy, I got some cell coverage, and confirmed my directions and location on the map. Google maps thought I should take another route, and get to Joe's Creek, but I was not then on speaking terms with google maps, for obvious reasons, so I decided to ignore it, and go with my friend of "the fuckers gotta let you out" school of thought.

So I do all this, and show up at the guard shack with the road barrier down. On the inside of company land. The security guard looked at me like the bike-riding-Martian I was, and I said "Bet you didn't expect to see me here!" with a big shit-eating grin, doing my best I'm-A-Stupid-Bike-Tourist routine. He sure didn't expect to see me, but he was friendly, and lonely, and wanted to chitchat. So we did for a while, and he gave me some water, and asked a couple times, more apparently out of curiousity than anything else, how I'd arrived there. I answered vaguely, 4x4 trails, blah blah blah. It was true, but I was uninterested in discussing it at any kind of length.

Finally, I rode on, made my way down to WV Route 3 near Orgas, and continued on my way, being passed every couple minutes by overloaded 20 wheel coal trucks:


Google maps and I remain in therapy, and while I'm genuinely trying to make progress, I just don't know. I might might need to quit her.

More bike delivery

Here is another shot from the same set of trips as the charcoal delivery:


It's blurry, but the point comes across. Yes, the boxes were all full of food.

Drive nicely

A nice sign on a nice milk crate, spied in Jamaica Plain, Boston, June 2010:


I'm downloading and processing pictures from the last 2.5 months of traveling now, so more pictures to follow. Woo!

Phew: as amazing, intense, wonderful, difficult, beautiful, and full of fantastic people as the last 2.5 months have been: it's sure nice to visit Atlanta every once in a while, and see J.

Back to West Virginia in five days.

FOOD PORN!

Today's installment of food porn is dedicated to my good friend from Arizona: vegan biscuits and gravy with scrambled tofu and a soy latte from  Watercourse in Denver.

The ride ended well. I finished the 33 miles up and down Fremont Pass, then up to Leadville, and promptly ate about five bags of potato chips. Our team captain and I waited at the finish line for our remaining team members to come in, cheering and clapping for all of the riders as they made their way up one last hill. One of my favorite moments of the weekend came when a six or seven year old was struggling to stay upright (he had just ridden 33 miles with a few thousand feet of elevation gain.) I helped get him going, then walked along behind him. He managed to fall again, so I picked him up, helped him back on his bike, and walked just behind him to the finish line. Seeing him work so hard to finish was just wonderful.

Also during this time, I got to watch and cheer the finish of Team Courage, which is comprised of dozens of disabled children, most of whom receive treatment at Children's Hospital, who the ride benefits. Four on handcycles, many on tandems with family or friends, many on their own bikes, doing something amazing.

Then Richard, Gretchen's dad, who invited me to participate in this amazing ride, made it to the finish, nearly collapsing from exhaustion, but hellbent to finish.

Bad idea

Speaks for itself, right?

Finished

Lovely sky welcoming us to Leadville. A great riding day, only 33 miles, with a maximum speed of 43mph.

I'm really, really happy I did this ride, and definitely hope to do it again next year.

Hopefully below this is a picture at the top of Fremont Pass, elevation 11,318. Phew. The ride down was fast and fun, but with a lot of traffic.

Back to Denver for a couple days, and then a visit to this city called Atlanta before returning to West Virginia.

Leadville

Day 3: looking toward today's finish line. Seems like a good day to ride to the highest incorporated city in the US!

Current accommodations, and laundry porn

It's really a sweet pop-up, which I'm sharing with Gretchen's dad. My queen size bed is just through the screens. My laundry is flying like a flag.

Oh, yeah: today's total mileage was 59.83, average speed was 13.8 (it was 16.6 before the climb up Vail Pass, which was roughly miles 45-52.) Maximum speed was a paltry 42, but there was a lot in the high 30s.

Still trying to decide if tomorrow will be 54 miles or 100. I wish there was an in-between option.

Courage Classic, Day 1

Had a good ride today, the first day of the Courage Classic. Vail Pass was a fucking gutbuster as expected, seven straight miles of basically continuous uphill, but it didn't rain as predicted, so that's something.

Staying vegan is making my food boring: oatmeal for breakfast, PB&J and potato chips for lunch, and more bananas than you can shake a banana at.

I took a few fun pictures, but all with my camera, not my phone, so nothing to post right now. I was hoping for a sign that said Vail Pass, but was spurned.

Only cried twice, and got choked up about a dozen other times. The volunteers are amazing, especially at welcoming riders into rest stops, and the reception is pretty moving.

I got a great high five from a six or seven year old girl sticking her hand out through the gates just before I rode through today's finish line, then watched as many others riders rode by her outstretched hand, oblivious or ignoring it. It made me sad, but she still seemed to be having a great time.

Poison right, antidote left

Fairly self explanatory, right?

And no, I didn't do this damage by myself.

Dear Denver, Part Two

It's a little strange to be writing public love letters to you, Denver, but J is aware of it, and it's fine. Really. I can maintain both relationships, I'm confident of it. Just don't ask me to choose, okay?

Alright, enough of that: it's too difficult to try to structure a blog post as a love letter. Denver is, however, lovely. Another warm clear day, Wynkoop beer on the way, and a long night ahead of paying to celebrate T leaving town.

The bicycle facilities are fantastic here, and not just in comparison to Atlanta. Bike lanes, sharrows, great signage. There are separate paths on the Cherry Creek Trail for cyclists and pedestrians, for crying out loud. And the cyclists respond by being everywhere, and the cars respond by being courteous and respectful. What a notion: bicycling begets bicycling!

Damn, I want to live in the west again. As much as Atlanta is treating us well, it's just not a love affair like the west is.

Dear Denver,

I missed you. I didn't miss the chronically late Amtrak, though Union Station left me alone for the hour or so I carefully put Sitba back together, and Amtrak personnel from Charleston, WV, to Chicago, to Denver managed to inflict no damage, even though they screwed up her rear fender in the short space from Springfield, MA, to Rochester, NY in May. But I digress, sweet Denver.

I arrived, and you welcomed me, in late July, with one of those perfect Denver summer days: warm, clear, dry.

I visited your REI flagship.

I marveled at the fantastic bicycling culture and infrastructure.

I'm drinking Bruery Cotton, half price, and thinking about wandering to Tattered Cover for a while, then your gorgeous City Park.

Denver, when can we make it work again?

Train

Why the hell am I blogging at such an early hour (4:25am MDT), you wish to know?

Because the fucking door in the picture, which is about eight feet from my seat, slams like a gunshot as often as every thirty seconds. I'm less than amused.

Overhead view

From my walk around Chicago today while on an Amtrak layover. I had an amazing lunch at a vegan restaurant, Karyn's on Green, and picked up some Dogfish 90 Minute for my continuing journey.

We're rolling through beautiful heartland. That is, if you can ignore the ginormous monocrop industrial corn and soybean fields, and the seven or so coal trains that have passed us going east, and the repulsive vegan burger I just had for dinner. Denver tomorrow!

Anthony Bourdain = idiot

I've said it a lot of times, but  this article by Dan Landes, owner of two vegetarian restaurants we love in Denver, Watercourse and City, O' City , says it very well and with more texture than I normally have.

Industrial America

Since that last screed about energy, my train passed by Lucas Oil Stadium (home of the Indianapolis Colts) and is now transitioning from Appalachian misery to Rust Belt decay.

Lucas Oil paid 121 million dollars for the naming rights to the stadium. Say what?

Misty taste of moonshine

John Denver sang that West Virginia was almost heaven. And indeed, it's a pretty special place. At least when the fucking coal companies aren't blowing the tops off of the mountains. Mountaintop Removal Mining, or MTR for short, is such a monstrosity, such an abomination, that it's difficult to describe rationally, or without hyperbole. Lives are being destroyed, rivers and creeks poisoned and entirely eliminated, human health sacrificed, cultures and families shattered. All so we can leave our lights on at an artificially cheap price, blast our air conditioners, keep our gigantic flat screen televisions blathering.

What is wrong with us?

Why do we possibly think it acceptable to butcher Appalachia this way, when we would never dream of doing it to New York City, or the Oregon coast?

How many BP oil disasters, Exxon Valdez disasters, Bhopal disasters do we need before we address our addiction to artificially cheap energy and corporate profit?

Biking in Charleston, WV

It was otherwise quite nice. But this is where the riverside bike path just, uhhh, ends. That's path at the bottom of the photo.

More boring clothes washing images

Looks for all the world like I'm washing my clothes in a toilet, doesn't it? I swear I'm not, even though living in a tent in a virtual rainforest in rural southern West Virginia does lower one's standards pretty significantly. I promise I'm going to shower, probably multiple times, before I see a couple of you next week.

And no, I don't expect for laundry porn to bump out food porn on my blog, but eating peanuts and potato chips in my tent doesn't make for particularly exciting blog photography.

Current accommodations

And it's wonderful. Much better than last night, before I rigged the tarp.

Yes, I'm a little crazy. Just a little.

Laundry

You know, if the hotels I stayed at had washers and dryer, maybe I wouldn't do this. Maybe.

My dearth of blogging lately is due, in part, to being busy touring through the extremely hot and humid states of Michigan, Ohio, and now West Virginia, and that typing on my phone is a big pain in the add without swipe.

Maybe more soon!

Charcoal delivery

The first of two runs of 46 pounds of charcoal, for a cookout for ~150. My plan is to deliver everything by bike before the rest of the volunteer crew arrives.

p.s. Hope we don't set anything on fire, 'cause that fire extinguisher isn't charged.

The one

This is the one biblical verse I know by heart. (banner at the wonderful conference I'm spending my birthday at, Resistance For a Nuclear Free Future.)

Pretty damn funny

I've never actually flagged something to Best of Craigslist before this ad:


Divorcing my almost NEW Giant XTC 2 - $750 (Cabbagetown). Seriously: go read this ad, and pay special attention to the pictures.

It's all the funnier to me since it's the same bike, and likely even the same model year, that I rode and sold to fund the purchase of Sitba.

I rode the crap out of that bike: used it as a year-round commuter in Anchorage, regularly left it locked up outside in snow and ice, hauled lumber and compost with it, rode it 26 miles on uncleared trails in -20 weather as training for the Frostfree Bottom that didn't happen.

All that said, though, at a nearly one for one exchange rate with the Canadian dollar, he's still asking more for the bike than I paid for it new. I have no idea what the hell is going on with the used bicycle market in Toronto, but from briefly perusing the other bike ads, I think this guy just really doesn't want a divorce. Maybe relationship therapy would be a good interim step.

Dangers of bicycling

This is a horrifying article about two cyclists that were shot at by guys in a pickup truck in an upscale community near Houston while riding home from work:

Shotgun Blast fired at 2 on bikes in Woodlands.

Sometimes my faith in humanity is really, really challenged, as it was in the case of the physician I blogged about here, who weaponized his car to assault two cyclists because he didn't like them riding in his upscale neighborhood.

What is wrong with us? Really?

Fundraising, and bicycles

I'm very happy to be back in Atlanta, even if only for a few days. It's awfully nice to sleep in my own bed, and use my own shower. Even silly little stuff like having a coffee maker that I know how it works is nice.

Enough smalltalk: gentle readers, I want you to consider donating to a fundraising ride I'm doing at the end of the month for the Children's Hospital Foundation of Denver. As some of you know, I'm not very good at fundraising, in large part because I don't like asking for money. So, while I may or may not hit you up personally by email, I'd really like you to consider donating.

The Children's Hospital Courage Classic is a three day, 155 mile bike ride up and down mountain passes in Colorado I'll be riding in honor of J's best friend from medical school, Gretchen. She died in New Orleans in a boating accident in 2005, right at the end of her pediatrics residency, just before returning to Colorado to be a pediatrician in Rifle.

Gretchen's father and brothers have been riding this ride for the last few years, to honor her life, and her commitment to pediatric medicine, which she was natural at: she had an immense amount of love, compassion, dedication. She was genuinely one of the kindest people I have ever known.

Gretchen's death was, in a strange way, sort of caused by Hurricane Katrina (which I flew to New Orleans to assist with protests, rebuilding, and resistance work around, and to stay at Gretchen and Frank's house, only to show up on the doorstep and find out they had drowned two days before.) This drowning was a little different than the ones we heard so much news coverage of: Gretchen and Frank went out in a boat that Frank had built on Lake Pontchartrain shortly after the hurricane, it capsized in high winds, and they held on for hours: long enough to shred their lifejackets from the friction of the boat bobbing up and down. Before the hurricane, a boat floating out on Lake Pontchartain within a half mile of the Pontchartrain Causeway would have been cause for alarm. Not so after the hurricane, when debris was still floating throughout the lake, thoughout New Orleans. So for J and I, and perhaps for Gretchen and Frank's families, the official death toll from Katrina should be 1,838.

I've wanted to do this ride in previous years, and the stars all lined up this year: I'm going to fly back to Detroit, ride my bike from there to Denver, and do the ride. Then maybe I'll ride to California and thank some of you in person for donating. That remains up in the air.

Okay. Writing that made me cry, so I'm going to wrap up. Please consider donating toward my measly $300 fundraising goal at: www.couragetours.com/siteapps/personalpage/SearchPage.aspx?c=tmL0KbN0LxH&b=5612731, and plugging in my name. Any amount you can afford is awesome. Really. Thank you.

Fielding Street, Ferndale (Detroit) MI

This its a random sidewalk that kinda acts like a street in my sister in law's neigh,borhood, about three blocker from her house.

Detroit, Atlanta, Tennessee, Atlanta, Detroit, Denver.

Phew! I'm tired just typing that title. The US Social Forum has been fantastic, exhausting, exhilarating. I'm so glad I came. I rode with and met some fantastic people, and got to see friends in Detroit from many areas and timeframes of my life. That being said, I'm definitely happy to get back to Atlanta for a couple weeks.

Then go to Tennessee for an event. Then fly back to Detroit. Then ride my bike to Denver. I have such an amazingly great life.

Detroit is a city facing immense challenges, not the least of which is an urban core that has been in decay for four decades or so.


I stayed with J's sister and her boyfriend in a near suburb, which provided for plenty of bicycling and exposure to the city that I missed the last time I was here, in fall 2008.

Detroit is a city with an immense amount of heart; as cliche as it might sound, an immense amount of soul. Nearly every Detroiter I talked to had a sense of hope, of optimism, of struggle. I have no real desire to live here, but there is a tangible sense of energy, of passion.

Okay, I know my readers have been starving, pun intended, for food porn. Cooking in someone else's kitchen when they aren't around can be a little like camping when you haven't packed your bags well, and can't find anything. I made a tofu scramble this morning to use up some produce that would otherwise go bad:

ONIONS!

Peppers!

Tofu!

Cook it!

Add some spinach!

Eat it!

More to follow. Really. Maybe.

O Canada!

Today I volunteered on an urban organic farm in Buffalo trellising tomatoes for four hours, then our group returned to the community center where we're camping on the floor and I facilitated a discussion of the legal and logistical issues around crossing into Canada tomorrow, then facilitated a discussion of the politics and social justice issues around borders. Then I spent about three hours fixing and fitting people's bikes for them. Then I cleaned my drivetrain.

Sitba is still performing like a rockstar, after rolling over 1,000 miles on this tour coming into Buffalo yesterday. She's the prettiest bike on the ride, but I can't tell her so: I don't want her getting a big head about it.

I'm totally loving this. I have a ridiculously great life.

Internet access will be limited or nonexistent while in Canada, since I'm unwilling to pay verizon for data or voice roaming unless it's a legitimate emergency. So, more blogging to come when we get to Detroit!

Shuffle off to Buffalo!

I'm now with a group ride, headed to Detroit for the US Social Forum. While I love solo bike touring, it's really great to be riding with many wonderful people, committed activists, and eating the amazing food being prepared for us. I'm working on the medic team, and assisting with some legal stuff. The medic team work has mostly been pestering people about sunscreen, hydration, and a little poison ivy treatment.

In Rochester we were hosted by the incredibly generous and kind folks at the Flying Squirrel Community Space, where we did some volunteer work for them: replacing damaged acoustic ceiling tiles and painting all of the tiles in a room that's about 100 feet by 40 feet, removing a non-functional urinal from a bathroom, painting trim, cleaning and organizing their kitchen, and I removed an unused commercial kitchen ventilation fan from a wall and covered up the vent hole, and hole in the wall.

Tomorrow we're doing a group work project at the farm for the very kind folks hosting us at the Massachusetts Ave Project of the Grant Street Neighborhood Center.

Lots of pictures to follow, but today was 92 miles from Rochester to Buffalo, so I'm exhausted. BED!

Fast Times at College X

My college reunion was ridiculous, wonderful, funny. As many of you know, I went to a college that is, well, special.

Drinking copious amounts of beer with professors I never took a class with, people (not me) stealing golf carts, my mural still up on the basement wall where I painted it almost 17 years ago (inexplicably, since all the others, in a project that I initiated and got funded, have been painted over), wandering through the forest and farm center at night, the pool and sauna I spent so many great hours de-stressing. It was amazing.

Improvising

This might be the first in a series of single photo posts, unless I can get Blogaway to let me upload more than one photo at a time.

This is how to dry your biking jersey after sink washing it, since hanging it on the shower rod and hoping just doesn't cut it in a humid climate. And lemme tell you, putting on clammy wet biking clothes in the morning just isn't a hell of a lot of fun.

Tank crossing

From my ride though Camp Lejeune marine corps base. There was also incredibly loud artillery fire for the second half of the ride.

Rails to Trails, aka mountain biking

This isn't from the worst trails that google maps tried to send me on (the Southern New England Trunk Line, and the northern portion of the Airline North State Park Trail, both in northeastern Connecticut.) It's actually from the day before, on the trail I mention in  this post which was comparatively great biking.

This tunnel had standing water deep enough that a couple big sucks and rocks I tossed into it disappeared entirely. I'm not a fan of cycling with wet, muddy shoes, so I scrambled up the hillside, crossed the road, and scrambled back down.

Yesterday was another one of those rocky days in my tenuous relationship with Google Maps. When it sent me onto a dirt road on my third turn, a mile and a half into my ride, I seriously thought we might need to break up. (Hint: Cody Road in Fitchburg, MA is dirt.)  Shortly thereafter, it routed me through a church parking lot, and what was basically someone's back yard.

We're working on it. I have to work on it too, mostly by not putting so much trust in it, until it has worked on some of its issues. I'm looking in to relationship therapy.

Gardening, and green with envy

This is only part of my friend D's ridiculously lush backyard garden in Boston. His herbs grow like weeds. I miss being able to garden outside, though I've never had herbs like this, even in Alaska. Unless you count that fennel plant we could have used as a christmas tree. (The red cabbage the size of beach balls weren't herbs.)

D truly has the greenest thumb of anyone I know, and if I hadn't been the beneficiary of huge amounts of fresh herbs for the five days I stayed with them, I'd be even more envious.

For waking me up

Confidential to T: not all of us wake up at the ass crack of dawn. What were you thinking, calling me that early? You know I have much more embarrassing photos from your fridge than leaving the spoon in the peanut butter, right?

Reader Poll! How many of you leave the spoon in the peanut butter jar when you put it back in the fridge? Be honest.

Hills

I knew that western Mass was going to be hilly, but I'd forgotten what a gutbusting slog 202 from Athol to Pelham was. The upsides are two: it's almost all downhill from Pelham to Amherst, and I'm now sitting in Amherst Brewing Company drinking a ridiculously good oak aged double hopped double IPA. Too bad I still have three miles to go to the hotel.

Leaving Normal

With apologies to my favorite band. And okay, yes, as most of you know, I left normal a long time ago.

Actually, I'm leaving Boston, after a really great 5.5 days here. I spent a good chunk of it helping a friend clean out a cavernous basement chockablock full of books. The books ranged from very valuable, like a first edition of Dickens' Our Mutual Friend, to junk, to mold infested junk. It was an adventure.

And yesterday I ran into another friend completely randomly at the T station (hi C!) who has this uncanny knack of finding me when I'm in JP. I think she has me under surveillance. (C, do you have me under surveillance?) We had a lovely play date at the playground with two ~2 year olds, catching up.

Today probably just riding to Worcester or so, the on tomorrow to somewhere in the Happy Valley.

While it was really good to get a rest (if you can call lugging box after box of books up basement stairs resting), I can't wait to be back on the bike again. Speaking of which, I better get to it!

Google Maps, we need to talk.

Google Maps, ummm, we need to talk. I think we might need to break up. Not permanently, maybe just a trial separation while you get some help for your issues.

Yesterday's 57.4 miles from Mansfield Center, CT, to Milford, MA was the second or third most difficult day of cycling I have ever done. More difficult that 150 miles on a loaded mountain bike through Los Angeles? No. More difficult than 26 miles on snow and ice in Anchorage when it was 25 below zero? I'm not sure on that one.

Google Maps has this sillyass notion that the Airline North State Park Trail, north section, is suitable for bicycling. IT'S NOT. Just in case anyone finds this page while, oh, I don't know, GOOGLING, I'll repeat that: it is NOT SUITABLE for cycling. It's an unfinished Rails To Trails, and is loose sand that would be difficult even on an unloaded mountain bike, and is basically impossible on anything else. After walking for about a mile of it (imagine pushing a loaded touring bike for a mile on the beach, except the beach has poison ivy) I cut down through someone's yard to escape.

Later in the day, I attempted the Southern New England Trunk Line rails to trails, also on Google Maps sadistic recommendation. It is a series of rolling bumps that are basically impossible to ride. I even found hikers and runners online saying it's unsuitable for them. Too bad I didn't find those comments first.

Good things: I got to my hotel just in time to sit in the hot tub and watch the torrential downpour, and remembered I packed Lanacane in my first aid kit, which is very nice for poison ivy.

All this said, it's still an amazing life to be able to get up and ride my bike every day.

Today, BOSTON!

And yes, once I have a full keyboard in front of me, I am going to write to google with the various suggestions i have for fixing their very, very beta bicycling directions.

Good, hard, beautiful, grateful.

That yesterday's maximum speed was 41.0 mph (the fastest I've had the Surly) and my average speed was only 11.2 mph speaks to a tough riding day. It was also one of the most pleasant so far.

Eastern Connecticut is hilly. Seriously. I knew that as I got into New England the flat oceanside riding was over, but i'd forgotten how damn hilly it can be here.

And beautiful. The smells of mixed northern hardwood woodland and forest are so deep, so... lush. I think I still love western forests more, but it's amazing how the smell can bring me back to college, to outdoor trips, to figuring out who I was to be.

Speaking of smells, at least one of my readers (hi, S!) would also be transported back to a certain summer school for the arts we both worked at by the smell of the hallway of this Best Western: they are replacing the carpet, and have mattresses piled up in the hallways, and it smells just like the dorms did at the beginning and end of those summers. Another really good smell, good set of memories, good time of self discovery.

Due to my request for a ground floor room so I wouldn't have to muscle the loaded bike up stairs, I was accidentally put in the wing they are doing construction on and renovating, so I have it entirely to myself. It's a little strange, but also neat. S, imagine having McN to yourself for a night.

Yesterday included about twelve miles of varying packed dirt on rails-to-trails, some as wide as 15 feet and packed like Alta late on a powder day weekend, some of it legitimate singletrack.

I now am 792.7 miles into the tour, have 1358.8 miles on the Surly, and 2524.1 miles on this bike computer.

Every day while riding, I say to myself out loud, "FUCK, I HAVE A GOOD LIFE." Usually multiple times, often in a row.

Thank you, J - for everything. I love you.

Connecticut, and that city south of it

Spent a good three days in NYC with T, doing some treacherous city riding, which was an entertaining change of pace from touring. T and his 7 year old daughter, I, commute by bike ten miles every day to and from school, from the south Bronx to Manhattan. Pretty badass for a seven year old.

T and I emptied and reorganized his bike closet, replaced the pump in his washing machine, and I did a major cleaning of their fridge while they were gone. Also got to hang out with their ridiculous cane corso (another name for an Italian Mastiff) and equally ridiculous hairless Egyptian cat. I've started calling their condo The Menagerie.

Then I rode up, with a little distance assistance from the MNR, to J's brother and sister's house west of Hartford, for a very pleasant dinner, laundry, bed, getting my malpractice insurance renewal together, and most importantly, spending time with their three adorable children. They are all delightful, and almost creepy smart. I love other people's children!

Today is an easy day, due to the death of camping and hotels in eastern Connecticut. Hugely looking to Boston.

NYC

After almost two weeks of riding from the deep south through the mid-Atlantic, to NYC, the thing I'm most struck by here in NYC is that people are so damn aggressive.

I've spent a fair amount of time in New York, so it's not like this is new to me. But I am struck by how unnecessarily and arbitrarily aggressive people are. For stupid reasons. For no reason.

It's sad, really.

Cops lie, google doesn't.

Okay, as we know, google most certainly does lie. But today, google told the truth, and a Galloway Township, NJ cop lied. Or at least her partner/friend/boyfriend figure did, and she didn't contradict him. He told me it was perfectly legal to ride across US-9 just north of Port Townsend, where it joins the Garden State Parkway.

It's not.

And it's a really treacherous two miles, on an interstate, with construction blocking most of the shoulder.

But I did it anyway, since at that point, to turn around would have meant adding 15 or so miles to my already 71 mile day.

Oh, and the day started from Atlantic City in fog so thick it was like light rain, and with me bruising my calf badly while muscling my bike in the bushes alongside a bridge. Then the last 15 or so miles were in some of the most miserable suburban traffic ever, at least since I left Atlanta.

But I hustled to avoid the thunderstorms, have tofu broccoli and brown rice in me, and am ready to ride and ferry to Manhattan tomorrow.

Hard to complain, since life really does remain fantastic.

Meet Virginia

To get across the Chesapeake Bay bridge and tunnel, you have to arrange a shuttle through the bridge police, then wait around until they send a maintenance employee with a pickup to shuttle you across. (For which you have to pay the standard $12 car toll, which I find a little silly, but whatever.)

I was being driven across the immense bridge when a truck with a camper shell with Virginia plates passed us in the fast lane. It was plastered with bigoted bumper stickers, literally flying a full sized confederate flag, and the license plate was WHITEP. Yeah, the confederate flag is just about history and heritage.

I was literally speechless for a couple beats, then said to the driver, "Okay, I have to say something. What kind of fucking jackass flies a confederate flag and gets plates that say WHITEP?" The driver, who was African-American, was quiet for a couple beats, then said, "Yeah... we've come a long way, but we still have a long way to go." So, so, true.

And what the fuck is wrong with Virginia DMV, issuing those plates?

The ride continues to be great. In Onley, VA now, and expect to be in Ocean City, MD tonight. Ocean City both puts me back on the water for a while, and might sound familiar to some of you: it's the eastern terminus of US highway 50.

Virginia, except for the ignorant racist cracker in the truck, has been nice to ride in, though I am looking forward to getting back to the northern states.

Day, uhhh, 7?

Left North Carolina yesterday, will be in Virginia for 2-3 days. I'm only averaging 50-60 miles a day, but am on "schedule" and not physically tired, and it's nice to be able to explore a little rather than just fall asleep exhausted.

Loving every day of riding. Even the rain and dumpy run down rural motels.

Massachusetts here I come!

Day 5!

Rode around 50 miles, took a ferry from Ocracoke Island to Hatteras Island, climbed the tallest brick lighthouse in the world, did laundry, and am about to go swim in the ocean. Returning to mainland North Carolina today.

Life is really, really good.

Bicycling directions (beta): use caution.

Caution, indeed! Today's 46.8 miles (so far) were some of the most difficult I've ever ridden. Google's bicycling directions sent me down a rough dirt road (okay, I admit, I had to go past some barricades to get on it. Permanent barricades. But hey: I ALWAYS do what google maps tells me to: I think you get shot with a laser from space if you don't.)

The road then ended abruptly, and I had to climb down and out of a steep drainage culvert. Then it really started to suck: about 15 miles of soft dirt roads through an enormous series of industrial corn fields.

Waiting for the ferry to Cape Hatteras now, so tomorrow should be better.

Day 2: Wilmington to Surf City

A short 28.1 miles, but most of it was in moderate to driving rain, and stopping in Surf City, NC was too tempting to pass up. The ocean is about 100 yards from the front door of my room, and it's pleasantly quiet on a Monday afternoon in what looks to be a packed tourist town on weekends in season.

Odometer: 1827.8
Maximum speed: 22.5
Riding time: 2:01:03 (seriously?)
Average mph: 13.9

Now: beer and dinner.

Day 2!

Sitting in a Subway in Hampstead, NC, as much to get out of the rain as to eat. Yesterday was 67 miles from North Myrtle Beach to Wilmington. Today is up in the air: either 35 or 45-50. Either way I'm hoping to stay close enough to the ocean that I can go for a swim. Sitba is performing beautifully, though I'd love to cut some weight.

More boring updates to come!

A big bike tour! And food porn!

C'mon, what more do you need?

Planning for a big bike tour now. Roughly: Myrtle Beach, SC to Amherst, MA, then train to Rochester, NY, then bike to Detroit. Unknown from Detroit. Big times. Hopefully I'll figure out how to post photos when doing mobile blogging.

But just in case, so my loyal readership isn't starved for food porn for a month or more, here's last night's dinner I made. J2 came over and we played trivial pursuit. We were going to go out to bar trivia, but only one non-smoking place in the area had trivia, and it was in East Decatur.

Ridiculously, dinner didn't include any onions. Bummer. It was a basic stir-fry, with brown rice:

Frying tofu.

Fried tofu.

Broccoli!

Giving the broccoli stem a little extra frying time before adding the crowns.

Stem and crown: reunited, and it feels so good!

Zucchini!

Zucchini, cooking!

Poblano peppers!

Poblano peppers! Frying! (Garlic was added later.)

And like I usually do when we have guests over, I kept most of the components separate so the guest(s) can add whatever they want, and skip what they don't. Except onions. Onions are mandatory.

Cork fell out and you stink!

Well, okay, nobody stinks. But I did just replace the ink in my crappy little $80 printer. The quality of the printing isn't so bad: average inkjet. But the little black starter ink cartridge was empty after about three months of fairly light use. (Check out the complaints on the amazon page for the HP901 ink cartridge.

So while the manufacturer's game is presumably to get you to spend $40-$60 on replacement ink cartridges, I instead took the cheap, messy route, and paid $11.50 on ebay for a refill kit. And it worked great. I probably wasted a little ink in doing three full cartridge cleaning processes, as the refill manufacturer recommends doing one to three, but it's still a way better deal than replacing the cartridges.

Today: meeting with the commander of the local private security force regarding my complaint about one of his officers (an off-duty police officer) who threatened to charge me for criminal damage for having my bike locked up to a utility pole on the sidewalk, and then a committee meeting tonight to work on recycling and bicycle storage issues in our building. In between, planning for the bike tour, which is looming near!

Randomorama

Looks like I'm on one of those blogging binges again. Here is a random balcony panorama from yesterday:


I got the free tickets (wristbands) for Georgia Shakespeare doing A Midsummer Night's Dream tonight in the super cutely named Shake at the Lake, and we're excited about the play. I've never seen it, and how can you not be excited about free Shakespeare? Well, I suppose you could be unexcited if it sucks. But hopefully it won't.

A report absolutely may or may not follow.

Free shit update

It's now 9:30am, and there are a couple hundred people in line for the free Shakespeare tonight. Since they give out 4 tickets (wristbands, actually) per person, there is no way all these people are going to get them.  People keep showing up at the front of the line (I'm about six people back) thinking it's the back, and the people at the front inform them that they have been here since 6:15am. And I thought I was ridiculous for showing up at 7:30!

Free shit

It's 8:14 in the morning, and there are already 17 of us in line for free tickets for tonight's performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream in Piedmont Park. Yesterday I was about 20 people back from getting tickets after waiting for an hour; today I came 2.5 hours early. Amazing what people will do for free shit. Okay, what I will do for free shit.

In our stars, or in ourselves?

"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings."
-Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, Act I, Scene ii

Today I got a smartphone. It's only the second I've ever owned, and the first, a Motorola Droid, I owned for less than 30 days, and went back to my coffin phone, a Nokia 3*** series that has served me incredibly well. With the upcoming bike tour, though, I really wanted on the go GPS and google maps, and the HTC Incredible came out at just the right time. So far, I'm extremely happy with it, excepting the mediocre battery life.

Yeah, yeah: what the hell does this have to do with Shakespeare?

Well, I don't know if the fault is in our smartphones (our stars), or the human condition (ourselves) but I wonder if smartphones are the death of human civility. Sure, for a while there it was people screaming into their phones on the bus, on the subway, on sidewalks, in meetings. Slowly, though, people are realizing that just isn't socially acceptable.

What hasn't seeped in yet is that clicking away nonstop on your blackberryiphonedroidwhatever in a public setting just isn't acceptable. Especially if you're a board member. In a board meeting.

Last night I went to the NPU-E meeting, and a member of the board literally sat there the entire meeting when he wasn't talking and looked down at his blackberryiphonedroidwhatever. Now, I'm not talking about furtively checking it when it vibrates, and putting it back in your pocket. or even excusing yourself and stepping away to take a call. No, this person literally played with his device the entire 2.5+ hour meeting, except when he was talking about (the apparently one) issue he cared about. The other guy in the picture was actually listening to the public official talking, to his right.

To be real, NPU meetings aren't exactly barnburners. It's mostly consideration of special event permits, zoning variances, and liquor licenses. Judging from the few I've attended, it's mostly rubber stamping of the neighborhood association decisions, and said rubber stamp is then forwarded on to the appropriate city department.

But really? You want to serve on the board, and have us sit and look at you conference panel style for two to three hours, and all you can do is sit there and play with your blackberryiphonedroidwhatever? Really?

Privilege, and responsibility

I was writing an e-mail to a friend, and decided to make it a blog post instead. She mentioned how much she appreciates that I've dedicated myself to following my passions, and found a way to make it work. I was struck, as I often am, by how extraordinarily, amazingly privileged and lucky I am to be able to live my life the way I do.

Sure: J and I live relatively simply and inexpensively (outside of travel) and very consciously live within the bounds of one income. Even though we both love food, we don't eat out all that often. Well, J eats out a lot while traveling for work, and loves it, since she can justify it money-wise: she gets a per diem. Even when I'm traveling, I tend to shop at the market whenever possible, and try to get hotel rooms with fridges and microwaves, and even better, with kitchens.

We're amazingly lucky that most of my income, be it from lawyering, bartending, selling homebrew supplies, etc., can go to savings, travel, retirement, and fun stuff like bikes. On which note, our transportation choices also save us a lot of money: our car regularly sits in our parking space for weeks at a time. It's a 2007, and has ~16k miles on it. I clip coupons, comparison shop, and buy in bulk, and we cook almost all of our meals at home (as you've seen from this blog!) I stand in the store and do the math to figure out what the best price is for recycled toilet paper (and then pay more, if necessary, for the TP with the most post-consumer recycled content.) I do the same thing for soap and shampoo, and then pay more to get products that aren't tested on animals. I bring home napkins from airplanes and restaurants, though this is definitely as much an environmental decision as a money saving decision. Same for obsessively printing on recycled, re-sourced, and salvaged paper, and printing double sided whenever I run out of recycled/re-sourced/salvaged. While yes, our condo is in a high rise, with floor to ceiling windows, it's a 865 square foot, one bedroom, one bath. We don't need more, and so we don't get more. We still entertain. People we love still come to visit. (I even occasionally clean it when people visit! Come visit! We're fun! And sometimes not this preachy!)

I'm extraordinarily privileged that I can do so much volunteer and pro bono work, and very mindful of my obligation to give back to my communities, social justice causes, and people and the earth generally. I'm aware that every single thing I do matters. It's a little like the Butterfly effect: every thing I do, choose to not do, or fail to do, effects something. Not necessarily in a Newtonian way, in that it won't always be equal and opposite, but it does matter if I choose to decline a bag at the store, or put my litter in my pocket rather than drop it on the street, or ride my bike instead of driving my car, or stop to help someone on the street. It matters when I dumpster dive into the trash cans outside of Whole Paycheck for recyclables, or pull the junk mail out of the trash can in the mail room in our building and recycle it. (Though of course, for myself, I prefer to reduce, then reuse, then recycle.)

As I explained to a friend recently (hi A2! and p.s., it'd be easier to blog if I didn't have so many people whose names start with A and J: would you all consider changing your names? Or maybe going by your middle names?) I don't believe in the cockroach karma: i.e., if I stomp on a cockroach, I don't think I'll be reincarnated as a cockroach. (Though I don't kill cockroaches, or ants, or mosquitos: I don't need to, and they're just filling their econiche. And in the case of cockroaches, doing it incredibly well.) But I do believe in a more general kind of karma: I believe that if I generally do good in the world, good things will generally happen for me, and vise versa: if I generally do bad in the world, bad things will generally happen for me.

A good friend in law school (A3, are you still reading my blog? Want to consider changing your name?) was the first person I heard this quote from: "Service is the rent we pay for the privilege of living on this earth." (attributed to both Shirley Chisholm and Marian Wright Edelman. I absolutely believe this to be true, and have tried hard to live most of my adult life this way.

I absolutley believe that I have an obligation to give back, and a responsibility to mitigate the immense privilege I have, much of which I was born with: skin privilege, gender privilege, language privilege, health privilege, being born into a developed nation privilege. Some of it I've acquired along the way: I'm graduated educated, have no more student loans, own a home, have extraordinarily good health care. If we want, and continue to live simply and mindfully, J and I can retire in our early 50s. Imagine that! We have a society where people work two and three jobs, where people work full time into their 70s even when they'd prefer not to, and we could quit working in less than twenty years.

When I talk about mitigating privelege, what I mean is that I must be mindful every day of my privilege, and to consciously and carefully work every day to be sure I'm not using it (them) unfairly, exploitatively, or abusively. To be privileged, and not give back, would be some or all of those three.

Okay, at a certain length, this probably gets preachy, and I don't want to lose what precious little readership I have. So I'm going to go do some volunteer work. Yes: really. And then tonight, go meet with a group I did (volunteer) legal observing with for a post-event wrap-up, and then have drinks with a friend who I'm working with on a recycling and non-profit fundraising project.

Massacares, and government power

Tomorrow, as most people know, is the 40th anniversary of the Kent State Massacre. At the risk of boring you, on May 4, 1970, Ohio National Guardsmen fired 67 rounds over 13 seconds at unarmed anti-war protesters who were between 75 and 400 feet away, murdering four, and wounding another nine, including paralyzing one from the chest down for life.

It is slight comfort that the Kent State Massacre was a pivotal moment in our war in Vietnam, and one of the events that started turning mainstream public opionion against the war, leading to our ultimate withdrawal. It is of somewhat cold comfort that Kent State helped lead to the development of so-called "less lethal" munitions, like rubber bullet guns and beanbag guns.

A point worth making is that this is not the last time that US government personnel, under the color of law, have murdered and tortured US citizens. Almost every day, someone is gunned down in a major American city by police. Absolutely every day, indeed, right this minute, someone is being tazed or pepper sprayed or beaten by a cop somewhere. Maybe it's "necessary" for the administration of "justice." Like the broken broomstick was "necessary" for NYPD officers to anally rape Abner Louima. Like all 41 rounds were "necessary" when NYPD officers murdered Amadou Diallo while he was reaching for his wallet. Like it was "necessary" for the LAPD to beat Rodney King. Like it was "necessary" for a NYPD officer to gun down unarmed Ousmane Zongo, including shooting him twice in the back, as part of protecting the world against the horror of pirated CDs.

Now, don't get me totally wrong here: as many of you know, I'm a big fan of big government, the welfare state, and am a staunch tax and spend leftist. But maybe -- just maybe -- giving government employees guns and nearly unfettered discretion to discharge them against unarmed citizens is a poor idea. Can we learn something from our history? Or shall we only think about for a few days each year, and be condemned to repeat it?