It's a twister!

Tornado watches in Massachusetts?  Hmm, maybe no cycling tonight...

PS Miss Gulch has a pretty nice loop frame there!

Safe harbors and mysterious bikes

Yesterday, I had to take Frida deep into East Cambridge for the first time.  She was kind of freaked out about being left by herself outside in a strange new setting after spending so much of her young life within the rarefied bounds of Harvard Yard, so I did a quick survey of available parking options and sought out the safest-looking, most populated among them.  There was a a nice little pedestrian way leading off the street that was well stocked with bicycle racks and bicycles, so I wheeled Frida over to one of the rearmost racks, which also had the most Frida-friendly bikes attached to it.

Here you can see she is being kept company by a cruiser-style mixte (more on this in a bit), a men's KHS Green (which immediately calmed her down!), and a very dapper charcoal and honey diamond frame bike whose saddle and handlebar tape matched Frida's handbag perfectly.  Here she is snuggling up close to his reassuring and color-coordinating figure:

Not only was his casual handsomeness soothing, but there was also this:

See, Frida?  Chillax already!

Now, the mixte [Q: is it still a mixte if the top tubes don't connect directly to the rear axle?].  This was a strange one.

We've got: wide, almost Dutch-style handlebars; a twin-tube mixte frame with a delicate yet cruiser-ish swoop; huge, super-nubby mountain bike-type tires, with one fender on the front tire only; a vaguely 1950s-feeling partial chain guard; some kind of crazy, giant spring thing by the front rack; and nary an identifying mark to be found.  What to make of this idiosyncratic fellow?  I really didn't know, but I left him a note before heading inside:

Part 1 of the Let's Go Ride a Bike Summer Games: Social Cycling>> leave a friendly note on a bike.

(I was taking these with the camera on my phone, so I'm just going to call the reverse focus on the last one "artsy.")

When I got back, it was dark, the mixte and diamond frame were gone, and Frida was sitting there quietly and calmly, ready to head home after a long but pleasant day.

Good mornings

The first thing I heard as I was about to pull into the street with Frida this sunny Friday morning?

"Margonaute?"

Wouldn't you know it, somervillain was right there in the street in front of my house!  I wasn't quite sure how best to negotiate a busy bike lane + morning rush hour + inter-bicycle communication, but we did get to chat briefly for a block or so before we turned our separate ways. What a pleasant way to start the day!




Just one more example of how bicycles make life a little bit sweeter...

Critical mass

[photos courtesy iamtonyang's flickr]

As I look back at all the wonderful Tweed Ride photos that continue to materialize (and probably also as a reaction to my recent bicycle-car accident), I've been reflecting a bit on the practice of cycling in the city.  One thing that made the Tweed Ride so enjoyable, aside from the fun fashions and the vintage bicycles and the beautiful day, was that it felt so safe.

When there are enough cyclists, you begin to feel you have just as much right to the road, just as much presence, as the motorists.

When there are enough cyclists, you feel safe taking the lane and making a left turn just like a car would, without getting yelled at.

When there are enough cyclists, it's tough for cars to ignore the logic of passing at an appropriate distance, for everyone's safety.

When there are enough cyclists, even gigantic, scary buses can't help but notice you are there.

It would be really nice

if there were enough bikes

 every day of the year.

From somervillain's flickr.

Lovely times

Last night, I had a bicycle date with Velouria from Lovely Bicycle!, and as she details on her blog, it was lovely indeed.  It was a strange and wonderful experience to see Eustacia (and Velouria!) up close and personal after following the blog for the past months, with the scales tipping over to the 'wonderful' side, naturally.

Photo from Lovely Bicycle!

As you can see, I did take a quick ride on the Pashley.  How could I resist?  It was a very short 60-second spin, at least in part because I felt a little bit less sure of myself on this new-to-me bike.  As Velouria mentioned, the saddle probably could've been a bit higher for me, and her handlebars are set much lower than mine.  Even though I looked quite upright on the Pashley, I felt a distinct forward lean in comparison to my Fryslan.  If you look at the photo from last night compared to one from Monday's Tweed Ride, you can see that on Frida, I'm sitting up completely straight and my arms are bent almost at 90 degrees to my body (especially when compared to the other bikes in that photo!):

From Lovely Bicycle!

From Albert's picasa album

I think my riding position on the Pashley is similar to what I had with my KHS Green, but there too, the position of the handlebars was different: those angled slightly up where Eustacia's are angled noticeably downward.  As my own personal preference, I like/have grown used to the very stately, upright posture of my Fryslan, but the downside is that it's definitely not one that's suited for speed.  I compare cycling on Frida to riding a grand ocean liner-- smooth, stable, and slow-- whereas Eustacia did feel like it could be sportier and nimbler [V: has the Pashley ever been described as sporty or nimble before?  :-)  I guess emphasis is on the "-ER"!].  I think the Fryslan's longer wheelbase and larger wheels also add to the ocean liner handling when compared to the Pashley.

Another contributing factor was that the Pashley's handlebars are simply narrower than the wide, squared-off handlebars of the Dutch Fryslan.  I like the way my wide bars feel 95% of the time, but for those moments when I want to pass between stopped and parked cars to move up to a light, or when I'm trying to maneuver both self and bike through doorways, they can feel a bit oversized.  I like to think of Frida's handlebars as acting like a cat's whiskers, though-- they'll make sure she never enters a space that's too narrow for her!  (Eustacia may just be a skinnier cat, of course.)

Obviously, none of this is to say that one of these bikes is better than the other-- how could anyone make such a choice?!-- but they do feel measurably different, especially with Velouria's particular modifications.  I would be curious to try a Pashley that was set up to fit me a bit better (perhaps even a larger frame size?) to see what a more direct comparison would be like.  I continue to be surprised at how much difference just a few inches or degrees can make in determining a bicycle's comfort for oneself.  The moral is test, test, test!

It was the loveliest of evenings, and I think all four ladies had a very nice time together.

More tweed

First of all: I finally have a photo of Frida and me in motion!  Hooray!

From Albert's picasa album

So many great Tweed Ride photos are popping up all over the place.  Some of my favorites are over on davidmorrisflickr's album.  Par exemple:

So dreamy!

I love my love with an F...

... because she is so fetching.  I hate her with an F because she is no flyweight.  Her name is Frida; she lives in Front Hallway; I feed her on fresh air and flowers.