I learned to ride on my sister's red Midget Sting-Ray. Then I got my very own sky blue Sting-Ray exactly like this one. I had a speedometer too. But I did not have the tassles sprouting from the grips.
that official Schwinn blue glitter grip tap handle is an ode to my first bicycle.
What if you walked by this air compressor two or four or six times a day. Every day. Monday through Friday. Until one day, in said hallway, you were holding in your hand, a one-of-a-kind pee-dub postcard for Dr 37 Mike and it all came together. ONEWAY or another.
So you paused and took a picture to make it last longer.
A few months ago I went to visit Cory & Clea down in Rip City and Clea gifted me a stack of books that included How The Dead Dream by Lydia Millet.
Recently I’ve been kicking around several books here & there. But last week this one got me started to finish. Reading it on train rides north, train rides south, even coffee breaks in the Hans Rosling Center. I actually read the entire book.
Each morning I hop off the train and I hop on my bike at 43rd & Brooklyn. Each afternoon I hop off my bike and I hop on the train.
What does this book have to do with the IHOP that used to live at 4301 Brooklyn Ave NE? What does anything have to do with anything? I don’t like to share too much about books when I recommend them. I’ll let you decide for yourself.
After you read this novel, we can talk more about the old U-district IHOP. It was constructed right about the same time as the Safeco Building in 1973, nestled in near the loading dock of that 22 story eyesore of a zoning violation. It’s the tallest building in Seattle outside of downtown. It’s now owned by UW and they call it “the tower”. I still like to think of it as “the Safeco Building” with a U-dub sticker pasted on top, because that’s what it is. I like to think of 1001 4th as “Safeco Plaza” - which became their HQ in 2007 when all those well-dressed office workers moved out of the U-district.
In the early 90s I ate at that IHOP a couple times before or after movies at the Neptune. (I also visited Big Time at least once in 1991. But not again until this electric ass bathtub gig 27 years later)
That old IHOP has been gone for 20 years as construction began way back when on the light rail station I visit twice a day these days. I hop on my bike then I hop on a train then I hop on my bike then I hop on a train then I hop on my bike…
Thursday I pulled a black sweatshirt from a free pile in the President’s office. No joke. I don’t need another sweatshirt. But it needed me to silkscreen some new features to distinguish it from the hundreds of others just like it wandering around campus. Now, nobody has one of these, except me. I plan to wear it to work and show the President's receptionist my "new" sweatshirt.
While the silkscreens were slathered up, I pulled off a few postcards too. Then while I was standing around in the garage watching the paint dry, I swapped out the shifters on the Poprad. I had been using a sweet pair of Microshift barend shifters, 8-speed frictioned out for my 7-speed cassette. They worked but not very well in the context of the downtube. It wasn't all wrong. It just wasn't quite right.
Out of the saddle grinding uphill the chain would sometimes jump a cog or two. Frustrating, embarrassing, and annoying. So I dug around in the small parts bins and found several combinations of mismatched downtube shifters. I really wanted to use those black Suntour shifters with their satisfying clicky-clicky ratchety-feely friction. But they won’t work when they're removed from their downtube clamp.
I was laughing to myself about times in my life when I’d never go out in public with mismatched shifters, realizing that perhaps I’ve grown out of that bike part phase. But then I found a matching pair of old Shimano shifters shifting as downtube shifters were meant to shift, on the downtube. I’ve had them for years and years and there was no reason for me to buy those Microshift beauties at Recycled Cycles. Now they look like store-credit to me.
39 always says, shifting is overrated. I agree. Grant Peterson says the same thing, in so many more words.
Driveway entrance to the Gould Hall loading dock stage right ground score. But not something I’m pocketing to take home and saute in butter with onions and garlic. Take only photos. Leave only empty beer cans. Three hours later the clouds lifted. Out came the sun. Add sidewalk chalk and call it In Situ Resource Utilization, optimized. ISRU kidding me, call it art. Take a picture, it’ll last longer. Sambas added to show scale. Here you are. You are here.
As an electric-ass bathtub mailman I deliver mail on campus at a large state university you might know of. An academic research powerhouse in multiple fields. However there is a lack of common sense in many day-to-day endeavors.
The day after election day I often pick up ballots that people placed in the outgoing mail tub for pickup. I shake my head, knowing their votes don’t count.
Why are you waiting until late in the day on election day to place your ballot in an outgoing mail tub that may or may not get picked up by some electric-ass mailman? Are you fucking kidding me? You have a PhD?
Please do not wait until Election Day, Tuesday November 3. Vote early and place your ballot in a secure drop box. Do not blame the election results on the US Postal Service.
“On one page of the book, I amuse myself imagining a society sufficiently tolerant for people to swap pornographic magazines quite happily with complete strangers in the same train compartment.”
–Catherine Millet
In 2001 this book hit the shelves, and it was nowhere on my radar. When the 20th anniversary edition came out with its New Afterword by the author, it was still way outta my wheelhouse.
Then one day recently, reading Maggie Nelson’s Bluets she refers to a line or two from Millet’s book. That got it on my radar, got me a used copy on eBay and got me into reading it on the train.
I spent $3.33 on these three little academy awards and three 7-sided weekly pill reminders.
gold is the new gold below behold sevenfold gold + 3 more gold components. Currently seven of the ten members in this group are from UW Surplus. Composition continues continuously.
On Tuesday November 1, 1988 I went to a Van Halen concert in Ames, Iowa with a few college friends. That much is true.
The concert was not very memorable. I do recall that Alex Van Halen’s drum kit was HUGE and rose up and down about 30 feet on a mechanical lift. And I remember getting hit in the head with a lighter that someone hurled across the coliseum. I pocketed that lighter and kept it for years.
On the drive back to Grinnell, we did not wait out a hail storm in a 7-11 parking lot. But we could have. I can almost see it. Selective memory. Recombinant recall. Phantom nostalgia. Fictional nonfiction.
This hail storm photo I found in the Atmospheric Sciences recycling bin turned into a postcard that evoked that Van Hagar concert. I sent it to Professor David Gerard in Appleton, Wisconsin. He sent it back as a component of a care package. Long story short, there was no postmark or cancellation on the stamp, so I silkscreened some more features on the front and mailed it back to Appleton. Round trip and a half. Out & back & out again.
"give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it and I shall move the world"
–Archimedes
grinding home uphill out of the saddle on the Poprad, there was a disturbance emanating from my bottom bracket area: a cricky creaky icky squeaky unpleasantly embarrassing sound.
I finally got around to it this weekend.
However, when I first took an 8mm swing at the non-drive side bolt that holds the crankset together, I found it to be wicked-tight. After a very brief youtube check-in, I was reassured that I was on the right track. The youtube dude propped the driveside crank on blocks of wood to gain leverage on the nondrive side crank bolt. I took a different approach.
give me a cheater bar long enough and I will bust that bolt loose. Pig Boy would be proud if he could’ve seen me utilize the Cannondale Police cheater bar set. One over the crank arm, one over the 8mm wrench… …easy peasy like Sunday morning. That bolt broke loose. I pulled it all apart, removed the cranks and bottom bracket and greased the shit out of it, all of it. Then I put it back together and took a little test ride to the tennis courts with Junior Junior.
