what was that? is that all there is? who is this? this is it.

pilderwasser unlimited T-shirts  pilder what? kickstand P know knew spew snap shots autoBIKEography RAGBRAI  slide shows phot-o-rama stationary-a-gogo 1/2 x 3/32 links

"we now join our regular commute, already in progress"

February 21, 2025

Another epic commute to work

 

A herky-jerky train ride sandwiched between two short bike rides like this and like that and like this

 

And then 9.5 hours later, do it all again in reverse order like this and like that and like this completing the round trip so to speak

 

And then 24 hours later do it 

 

ALL AGAIN AND AGAIN 

 

As often as necessary

Reading The New Yorker cover-to-cover or any random book dujour like The Storied Life of AJ Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin (thanks Cat) “no man is an island - every book is a world” 

 

Wordle & Spelling Bee & Connections  

 

With plenty of slack-jaw thousand-yard stares off into space. That’s how I roll in the groundhog-day hamster-wheel work-a-day rat race rut rote route routine

repeatedly

repeating 

repeat

 

 


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this space intentionally left blank

February 20, 2025

if I had a can of spray paint that's not where I would go with it. I'm more of a lowercase g guy.  but as I parked the electric ass bathtub beneath it every day this week at 1320 NE Campus Parkway right around 11:27 am, it's made me smile for various reasons

 


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like it's 1972

February 19, 2025

This book was published in 1972. Chock full of exploded view diagrams and classic hands-on black & white photos of bikes and tools and tools on bikes. I got it at a thrift store some time in the late 90’s. The book was pretty cool, but the cover kicks ass. The go-go boots, the inverted bike repair chat in the park, the all-ages joy ride and on and on and so on.  It was an original painting, specifically done to be the cover of this book. When I go back and find the artist’s name, I’ll let you know.  Or you can get your own copy on ebay and let me know his name. 

 

The other day I was about to chuck it in the little free library when I flipped through it one last time and noticed a few pages of diagrams had already been hacked out. They were probably cut and pasted into an issue of dickstank some time in the late 90’s. 

 

Here and now a few more of those exploded view diagrams are on their way into upcycled postcard status because I decided to tear off the cover and put it in a thrift store 8" x 10" frame to hang on the wall and collect dust like “art”

 


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single malt

February 14, 2025

Poached a page from Shan Jiang's Bicycle Coloring Book

I cannot say "single malt" without thinking of Ali

here's to mid-February, which means it's half way over and on its way to March

 

this book is a wonder to have and to hold. I have no intentions of coloring in it. But I look through it again and again

here's another book you might want to look through on a cold February morning 


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Brooklyn Trail Building bro

February 11, 2025

haven't had that spirit here since 1969

 

3903 Brooklyn Ave NE

Seattle WA  98105


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Shrek the Third

February 8, 2025

a horse a piece

like Steve said

six of one

half dozen 

the other

for all intents

and purposes

as my

trigonometry 

teacher said

too many times

repeating

repeatedly

sometimes

it’s a coin toss

fifty - fifty

heads or tails

mutually 

exclusive

exhaustive

events

however

sometimes

it’s weighted

 leaning

to the lesser

of two evils

making you

choose one

of only two 

choices

 

REO Speedwagon

vs

Styx

 

Mason Road

vs

the Burke-Gilman

 

Busch Light

vs

Keystone Light

 

ranch

vs

bleu cheese

 

elevator

vs

escalator

 

Aberdeen

vs

Hoquiam

 

27.5

vs

650b

 

Shrek the Third

vs

Shrek Forever After

 

 

 

 

 

really?

is that it?

is that all there is?

 


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spelling bee

February 7, 2025

“All the News That’s Fit to Print”

 

doom scroll

suck hole

no thanks

no news

is good news

just the puzzles

please


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book o the month

February 4, 2025

I wasn’t looking for this book. But I guess it was looking for me when it found me at the local library. Now I suggest you look for it.  Neko Case is a true rock star and she grew up right around here “raised by two dogs and a space heater” She spent a lot of time in Whatcom County and Washington state. And much of that time she was alone. 

 

I’m halfway through it but it’s not too soon to recommend that you read it too.  This week’s book of the month. This month’s book of the year. 

 


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spokey dokey

February 1, 2025

enunciated pronunciation

January 31, 2025

bilabial 

articulation

enunciation

pronunciation

M  B  P

consonants 

coincidence?

no no no

know

both lips 

bringing

it        all

together

 


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REGULAR - REGULAR

January 27, 2025

At the Bulldog street window I set down my coffee cup to reach for my wallet. No words were spoken until the barista poured my coffee and said “you’ve got some competition for the most regular-regular. Maybe we’ll take a photo and post it on the wall.”  

 

I smiled and said thankyou. 

 

Which brought to mind the regular-regular status I earned at Bean & Bagel — being so consistent they named a bagel setup after me 

 

“The Mark”  

Everything bagel toasted

Cream cheese

Tomato

Hot sauce

 

It’s like a phantom nostalgia BRASH burger PTSD covid stress dream. That place went out of business, unable to survive the covid lockdown zombie shit show. Sometimes I sit on the steps across the street at Gould and ponder it all retrospectively…

 

On the beer end of the continuum I’d say I’m not even in the top 30 regular-regulars at Big Time. But right around 3:33 I might be in the top 10. 

 

Same old same old, boring, predictable, invariable, blase you say.

 

How about dependable, solid, steady and trustworthy.

 

It’s not that I enjoy drip coffee so so much. It’s that I don’t give it any thought. I don’t want to think about it. Which frees up some bandwidth to think about very important things, like making a list of cat names:



CAT names for cats

 

  1. Smokey
  2. Colloquia
  3. Knock Knock
  4. Turkey Jerky 
  5. Regularly 
  6. Dennis
  7. Potsy 
  8. Audubon Autobahn 
  9. Ziptie
  10. Adirondack
  11. Nipples
  12. Kerouac
  13. Stoner
  14. Tuesday
  15. Brash
  16. Squeeze
  17. Sriracha
  18. VanSickle
  19. Precipitate
  20. Actuary
  21. Significance
  22. Super Bon Bon
  23. Sharrow
  24. Poncho
  25. Tanya
  26. Tamika
  27. Sharon
  28. Karen
  29. Zero Seven
  30. Ciocc
  31. Notary
  32. Hi Viz
  33. Tall Can
  34. TacocaT
  35. Catarina
  36. Inertia
  37. Reciprocity
  38. Nomenclature





Cats and their cat names bring to mind the movie Flow, which I saw yesterday in the theater with my kids. You can stream it soon.  spot on. 

 




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three facts... fast.

January 25, 2025

have you got all you need? enough to eat? and a book to read?

January 24, 2025

It was so 2022, but I'm a late bloomer

This book kicks ass.

If you haven't read it, read it. 

sincerely for real

really

 

Thanks Cat


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pawls serried

January 22, 2025

pilderwasser

 

spews lardier 

rewards spiel

rewired slaps

slaps weirder

pedlars wiser

a wilder press

draws replies

reprisals dew

redlip swears

i drawls peers

swirled pears

rewards piles

desire sprawl

swirls reaped

laws reprised

serried pawls

lad swipes err

ripsaw elders

welds praiser

rip ass welder

repairs welds

wilder passer

spew alder sir

we piss larder

sew rared lips

redraw less pi

 


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zesty irreverent audacity

January 20, 2025

Hungry I was so when I walked into the cafe/diner/bar/bookstore, a burger looked good. The large menu near the kitchen featured only one item:

 

The Brash Burger

Beef Patty $20

Bun $7

Cheese $5

Pickles-lettuce-onion $5

Sauces $6

 

My eye caught the $20 price tag while my brain said new normal hamburger. The smaller print faded back but would get my attention later, after I got the $63 tab for a burger and a beer. 

 

In the kitchen was a familiar face but he was out of context. Wearing an apron and a paper soda jerk hat, both pristine clean white. Like a high school theater production of Al’s Diner, just this side of the uncanny valley as if applied to back-of-the-house restaurant staff. This guy was from the high-end bike world. Custom one-off titanium bike like. You might know him. You more than likely know of him. All that made me smile and wonder what he was doing in the kitchen and if this was his place. And what was this place? How did I get there? Where was I? Where am I? 

 

As I placed my order I noticed a line of fine print on the menu. “inspired by Mark Pilder GED Advertising Marketing PR” Not sure what that was about. Could’ve been a PhD, MBA, DDS, MFA, BFD or a WTF?

 

And there were two other menus barely visible behind the Brash Burger. But I could not see all the details. This place does one thing at a time. Tomorrow they’ll flip the BRASH menu and reveal another adjective and higher high prices. 

 

For a moment I turned over brash in my head. A word I never use. A word I’ve never written down until now. A word with a few definitional variations. Down on the third tier, maybe it’s a stretch for a Pilder credit. 

 

A moment later I thought the NY Times marketing department was reaching me telepathically in this dream state. So I planned to toss out BRASH as my first wordle guess on the January day that was yet to come yesterday. 

 

BRASH was not the wordle word, but it did get me an R, which I eventually eeked out in the correct word ROWER. Can’t say I’ve ever used the word rower either, but it reminds me of Sievert Rohwer, UW professor emeritus, ornithologist and all around badass. But there are no 5 letter words there and there are no proper nouns in wordle. Maybe I wandered into Sievert’s Bookstore Cafe Bar on an island somewhere between here and Canada. 

 

The brain makes connections where there are none. Creating a  connect-the-dot drawing from details that don’t know each other, they’ve never met and there’s a language barrier. But none of that matters to the brain waving its sharpie around connecting dots. 

 

patterns emerge from the static 

 

audacious irreverence

irreverent audacity

zesty

 

it’s 3:33

 

not hungry

 

thirsty

 


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Attachment

January 18, 2025

And you may find yourself

on Okanogan Lane

going the wrong way

day after day after day

 

And you may ask yourself

“Well, how did I get here?”

 

And you may find yourself

a little blinky light

chirping in the middle 

of Okanogan Lane

 

And you may ask yourself

“How do I work this?”

 

And you may ask yourself

“Am I right, am I wrong?”

 

And you may say to yourself

“My god, what have I done?”

 

A USB rechargeable little 3-dollar blinky light lost & found between Chemical Engineering and Life Sciences one day going the wrong way on Okanogan Lane. The cute little plastic S-hook failed on the seatpost binder strap resulting in one man’s loss LOST. Which in turn led to another man’s find FOUND. 

I loosened the phillips screw, removed the rubber strap but retained the flat washer. 

It’s now a lowercase g backpack blinky light 

 

high brightness

medium brightness

breathing flash

comet flash

hybrid flash

energy saving flash

 

Of its 6 modes, comet flash is my favorite. However, experts disagree on which mode is best for the zombie lizard brains of distracted drivers. 



And you may find yourself 

behind the wheel

of a large automobile

 

And you may ask yourself

“What is that little blinky light?”

 

And you may ask yourself

“Is that a cyclist?”

 

And you may tell yourself

“he’s basically invisible” 

 


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teriyaki turkey jerky

January 15, 2025

2.54cm per chuck

give ‘em an inch 

they’ll take a shit

 


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a cat walks into a bar

January 13, 2025

I’m a palindrome fan: street addresses, zip codes, QR codes, calendar dates, digital clocks, coffee shop customer numbers, bar tabs, random numbers, symbols, words, phrases even complete sentences that read the same forward and backward. Bilateral symmetry, one way or another, speaks to me. 

 

I poached this Jon Agee cartoon from one of his books.

 

Aibohphobia is the fear of palindromes and of course the word itself is a palindrome. Somebody just made that shit up and I say   top spot.  

 

borrow or rob?

was it a car or a cat I saw?

no, it is open on one position

never odd or even

pull up if I pull up

don’t nod

peep

wow 

top spot

 


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static flow

January 12, 2025

Complicit inertia

complacent inertia

resting object

staying at rest

faster than 

a speeding Bullitt

static flow

idiot savant

definite maybe

protected bike lane

right of way

rite of passage

run the gauntlet

take the alley

off the Ave

at NE 42nd St 

run the gamut

variety show

static flow

shitshow

shit

call it 

what you will

 


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aphorism schism

January 10, 2025

you

can 

lead

a horse

to water

but

you 

can’t 

make

him

think

 


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confused with someone else

January 8, 2025

SOMEONE ELSE

by Rae Armantrout

 

The glum mail carrier

arrives after dark. 

 

 

You open your mouth:

 

“We” is a pity-party.

“I” is a Satanic cult.

 

Or it’s the other way around.

 

 

“Let’s pretend someone else

is blowing the bubbles!”

 

Painting the baubles.

 

Someone else

points and runs.

 

###

 

 

 

 

You must have me confused with someone else

You must have me confused with someone who gives a shit

You must have me confused with some other 55 year old bald white neuro divergent electric ass bathtub glum mail carrier

  

Armantrout has gotten my attention a few times in the past few years with her poems in the New Yorker. So few words. So much going on. 

But the other other day I got my hands on her 21st book of poetry:

GO FIGURE

it’s a keeper 

 

“Crystalline poems refract the meaning and irony of human existence; a clarifying, cagey reckoning with experience that may never add up.” –provided by publisher

 

spot on 

 

Rae Armantrout and Joy Williams walk into a bar

The bartender says    nothing: (speechless) 

 

What if…

…only for an hour or so you could see the world through their eyes (Williams or Armantrout) not only their eyes, but their eyes wired to their brains processing the input and feeding it to your brain. An hour might be too much, too overwhelming. 

 

Through their books I can only imagine. 




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bolt circle diameter

January 7, 2025

The only thing Campy at my house is a front hub in a wheel in a gate that I slapped together ten years ago to keep Junior Junior from crawling and falling off the stairs on the deck.  Here and now it’s still hanging on by a zip tie or two and keeping the dogs contained, more or less.  

 

Recently I uncovered one more Campy item in my basement. The 1997 Campagnolo Spare Parts Catalogue. It’s full of simple elegant exploded view diagrams of various Campy components. 

 

In the past week I have dismantled the catalog and I’m in the process of creating a series of postcards. I enjoy silkscreening and mishmashing stickers and images and recycled cardboard with glue sticks and paint. 

 

But what really brings me joy is the fact that I know that you know that I know Campy chainrings have a 135mm bolt circle diameter. And the chainring I’m slapping over the top of those beautiful Campy crank diagrams is a Shimano big ring with a 130 bcd.  Little things like that bring me joy. 

 

The exploded view of a Campy Record headset is great on its own and doesn’t need much help or improvement. 

 

The old Suntour derailleur I’m screening over the elegant Campy record derailleur is from another time, another category, but when they end up together on a scrap of cardboard new things appear. Toss in a few arrow stickers and call it art. With proper postage, call it a postcard. 


Years ago while working in a small nonprofit bike shop sorting through endless piles of bike shit, trying to organize usable parts and differentiate the shit-shit from the good-shit, I saw some other bike shop had chainrings displayed on pegs spaced to their corresponding bcd. So I created a display totem of common size chainrings with nails spaced to their bcds.  

 

It turned out to be a bust. Finicky and not user friendly for customers or employees. It’s much easier to paw through a milk crate full of 130 chainrings and toss in fresh incoming donations too. Trying to line up the bolt holes on a stack of rings was time consuming and frustrating and that display was eventually abandoned. 

 


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Safeway more ways

January 6, 2025

“There’s more than one way to get to Safeway”

a wise woman once said

 

getting to Safeway is easy, bombing downhill all the way. But getting home is a slow grind up the hills with a couple cheese pizzas, bananas and some grapefruit seltzer water in the Burley. 

 

This little Burley came from Bike Works for only $10.00 a few months ago because Junior wanted it for a Halloween costume idea. She pushed her friend around the block a few times then forgot about it and it’s been gathering dust since mid October.  Until yesterday when I hitched up a new grocery getter. 

 

It was mostly enjoyable but I ran out of gears on the 1 x 7. Next time I might try the other 1 x 7. If I go with a single-speed there will be some walking back up a couple of the hills on the way home. 

 

It’s been a long long time since I pulled a trailer. Since Junior and Junior Junior both fit in a double-wide Burley and I could actually take them to the park or the pool. We also had a CETMA cargo bike so the Burley was mostly used as a giant stroller, taking up the entire sidewalk. Very rarely did I hitch it to a bike. 

 

yesteryear...   ...before the CETMA I got a stripped down flatbed trailer from Jason Hultman and I used it to pick up pony kegs once in a while on a mostly flat round trip to 1221 E. Pike. Then I passed that trailer on to CMWC Craig Etheridge. 


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BFF

January 5, 2025

 

The other day Bret in ABQ told me about the Bicycle Film Festival (virtual) and then he bought me a ticket too. So now I’m watching it all in the comfort of my basement. 

 

Over the years I bought tickets a couple times and attended variations of the bike film festival when it rolled through Seattle theaters. 

 

But now I can watch all these films, fast forward, rewind and replay for days. 

 

Thank you Bret

Bicycle Film Festival

 

 


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life after death

January 4, 2025

Yesterday I half-assedly read the headlines in the New York Times, noting one article about life after death. 

 

Several hours later in the day in which it never stopped raining I pulled the electric ass bathtub all the way up into a covered cubby near the Ocean Sciences Building door to get out of the rain for a moment and deliver their mail. When I looked over at the bike on the rack I got a vague message from the bike’s owner who passed away a couple years ago. 

 

Then I went back and read that article in the New York Times and I was fortunate because it was my only free article as I’m not a subscriber. I hope you can read it too. It focuses on a group of scientists doing research on reincarnation, life after death and the possibility of receiving messages from the dead. Or the possibility of the dead sending messages over to this side where we’re still living. If a message is sent but there’s no one to receive it, does it make a sound? 

 

Long ago, Russell mentioned that this guy's bike was still locked up on campus. But it didn’t register with me, didn’t sink in. I visit Ocean Sciences often but I don’t usually park the bathtub in that spot and there are usually 50,000 people milling around campus and several other bikes on all the assorted bike racks. 

 

Yesterday however, there was no one in sight and only one bike on the rack and I stood and stared at it for a couple minutes. Like a ghost bike in more ways than one. 

 

This bike’s owner lived in his Astro van near the mothership. His van no longer functioned as an automobile and it was covered in reflective insulation bubble wrap. He kept his bike locked to a railing outside the mothership. As you can see in this  old photo I pulled from the archives.  

I would often see this guy riding to or from campus where he spent a lot of time in various buildings. We’d pass on sidewalks or the Burke-Gilman. I’d also see him in and around his Astro Van too because we rode by it all day everyday. 

 

I never had any conversation with the guy. Perhaps that’s why yesterday’s message was vague but I acknowledged it respectfully like a subtle chin tilt when crossing paths with another messenger. 


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like this and like that and like this

January 3, 2025

fortunate sequence of events

January 2, 2025

28 days later

December 30, 2024

 

sign, sign

everywhere a sign

blockin' out the scenery

breakin' my mind

do this, don't do that

can't you read the sign?



left turn only

bus only

only only

if and only if

if only

as if

oneway

this way

that way

both ways

either way

anyway

you two too

no   not you

you

accept 

except

bicycles

 

Signs everywhere. They’re not blocking out the scenery, they are the scenery. No longer looking at them, looking through them, over them, around them, taking them for granted, a given, a premise, a baseline riff, on or off, left or right, one way or another. 

 

In situ signs blend in with everything. Especially when moving in traffic at traffic speed. But when a bomb cyclone blew through Seattle in November, this one was torn off its sign post, making it easier to see in a new light, in another context. To get up-close, to get hands-on, to realize how big and reflective and heavy and awkward and over-built traffic signs are.  

 

This sign is 48” x 30” the largest in the collection so far and it needs its own wall space. By the way, I didn’t steal it, I just picked it up off the ground after a 28 day observation period in which I patiently watched it get kicked from here to there propped up, knocked down and moved around. A month is  plenty of time to plan for another context. 

 

I’ve been curating a collection of arrows and arrow signs for several years. Ground-scores, thrift stores, gifts and yard sales. 

 


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cold bump

December 27, 2024

I don’t follow the academic calendar, I just roll around in it. Doing the same routes every day, plus or minus 50,000 students, faculty, staff and what-nots. 

 

Here and now falls in the midst of a break between quarters with lots of open spaces, locked-down empty buildings and a little more down time than usual.  Idle hands, as you know, are tools of the devil. But in my hands I hold 400 pages of Rachel Kushner’s latest and greatest book, Creation Lake

 

When it first came out I read a blurb about it and forgot it.  Secret agent “noir” books are not my style. Then a few days ago I picked it up at the library and took a closer look.  This is not your average book. I’ve read a couple Kushner books in the past and she’s a real badass. 

 

I’ve read 47% of those 400 pages but I can 100% fully recommend that you read this book. 

 


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drip coffee

December 24, 2024

7:33am Xmas Eve - all I wanted was coffee 

Sea-Fab CLOSED 

Allegro CLOSED 

Solstice CLOSED 

Bulldog CLOSED 

but the sign said opening @ 9 

 

So I went through the motions of doing my job until 9am and then rolled back to Bulldog for some coffee. When I strolled in the owner was there saying “the espresso bar is closed but we have drip coffee” and I smiled thinking this is my dream coffee shop: 

 

 

 

pilder’s coffee 

order anything you want, all those foo-foo, poo-poo, shmoopy-poopy espresso drinks that people drink, with every possible fucked up labor intensive bullshit combination…  …we’ll let you spit all that shit out and we’ll charge you for it, but you’ll get a cup of drip coffee, just like everyone else

 

 

people love us on yelp 

 

 

 

 

The photo I’ve poached here is Nathaniel, a godfather of coffee and a godfather of the U-district. It’s old and it’s not mine, but I poached it because it speaks to me on several levels. I met Nathaniel 29 years ago when I worked at Kids Co and his kid was in kindergarten. He was an owner of Cafe Allegro. I was an aimless liberal arts grad about to get a messenger job for the summer before grad school.  Now his kid has her own kids and he’s retired. But he’s still a pillar in the 98105. Allegro, Bulldog and Big Time are old school U district establishments and I like that, that old school vibe. Sincerely for real. Really. These days I see Nathaniel once in a while on the street or at Big Time and he's a rock star rocking on. 

This academic calendar year my coffee-beer continuum has consistently been Bulldog <---> Big Time. Kicking off the day and then wrapping it up on the way back home.

Coffee <---> Beer

Spitting distance from each other on the AVE. 

 


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