By Jen
I recently came across another awesome WTF bike blog. Sam writes at Brown Girl in the Lane from her car-free life in San Diego. She recently mentioned her miles per burrito stats–clearly the best way to think about fueling your ride–and a ride in Tijuana, Mexico with Paseo de Todos. (Her partner Fred also blogs about bikes and he’s pretty cool too.)
Draw your attention to the MPB sticker on the top tube.
[Image of the rear half of a bike, viewed from above. The seat is covered in a white grocery bag. The frame is dark green, but largely covered in stickers (the only one clearly visible says 53 miles per burrito). The bike has a silver fender on the rear wheel and a black rack.]
In many cities, it is already Bike/Walk Week. (Twin Cities Bike/Walk Week is coming up June 4-12, 2011.) Sam is an experienced bike commuter but she gives a nice perspective on what it’s like to commute by bike for the first few times: stressful, harrowing, and very sweaty. You get strange looks (been there) and angry drivers and pedestrians (been there too). Infrastructure is not always designed in your favor.
Ah…I see you’ve been patiently waiting at this intersection for the light to change. We do not believe in timed lights in this city. Many cyclists will tell you that you need to place your your bicycle in such a way that the North Star and the Sun are both in alignment and you also need to do the hokey pokey and turn yourself around before the light will change.
But she sums it up the best way, explaining the unexplicable of why we bike everywhere.
You will learn to ride more and more and more. And it will be very hard to explain or even rationalize why you ride so much. But you will. And it will be the most blissful state of existence you will ever know. And you desperately want others to experience this too, but it is hard to explain or convince anyone else to do it. So you do it alone, every day. Just you and your bicycle.