A perfect night for a ride (almost)
I took my gorgeous new Cream City Fixed Gear out for a spin this evening. God, what a wonderful bike it is. Back in high school my dad and I got ahold of a 1964 Thunderbird in a beautiful silverish blue. I still remember looking out my window on those summer nights and seeing it parked under the street lamp outside my house, and how its color made it appear like a ghost in the night. This bike, in silverish green, has the same look, almost glowing. I cruised around by myself for awhile, getting a handle on the intricacies of fixed gear. The toughest part is getting my feet into the toe-clips. A little later on I met up with LittleTinyFish and then we really broke it in. We cruised Lake Drive, taking in the smells of coming spring and enjoying the clear night. We dragged raced (he won). All in all an awesome night until the very end. The bike has beautiful white fenders, but i noticed all night they were slightly rubbing the wheels. We adjusted them until it seemed to go away, but right after we parted I was heading home when i hit a bump and somehow the front fender caught on the wheel and crumpled in around it! The wheel, while undamaged, was completely locked up and I had to walk it home. So tomorrow Im gonna go back there, and have them put on a replacement fender. And I ain’t paying for it.
You forgot the part when we found a random stranger on a folding bike at the lakefront who was looking for UWM. It turned out he was an IBM employee working to get the VFW computer systems up to date from the 70s and 80s. We weren’t doing anything so we escorted him to the campus.
Then when we were down at Alterra another guy pulled up and asked us for directions to the U.S. Cellular center. TheNeilShow and LittleTinyFish: Bicycle Ambassadors of Milwaukee.
Also, to add another fender horror story, a friend of an acquaintance had a fender strut break off and jam into their wheel, causing her to flip over the handlebars and requiring a hospital visit. She unfortunately had to sue the bike shop for improper installation.
