Sunday, March 28, 2010

Palm Sunday







I got a new bike today! I woke up this morning and it was overcast and cold. Not exactly a day to inspire one to go biking. So I thought it would be the perfect day to bike shop. Once we get a really nice warm, sunny weekend, the bike shops in my neighborhood will be overflowing with people who want to take advantage of the weather. I thought I might beat the crowds by going today.

I got a mountain bike, with a more upright seat. Pretty grayish blue color with circle designs on it. I'll post pictures sometime soon. Hopefully, this bike will work out for me. I wasn't very lucky with my last 3 bikes.

I had a bike in high school that I liked. I didn't ride it much during college or after. When I went to law school, I started riding a bit more. I stored it in my garage in the back of the house. One Saturday, my (then-)husband was working in the yard. He left the garage door open and came into the house for less than a minute (literally, less than 60 seconds) to get an extension cord. When he got back outside, my bike had been stolen from the garage.

Then when I first moved to Chicago, I got another bike to replace my stolen one. I was nervous about riding in the city through traffic, so I didn't take it out much the first year or two here. When I was moving from my loft condo to my current studio, I went down to the bike storage room to get my bike, and it wasn't there. It had been stolen right out of the storage room, with my lock, comfy seat and handles, and all the other little goodies I'd had installed. It was also a gorgeous green color and very comfortable. I was not happy. The bike storage room had a camera, but there was a trick around that. The camera only recorded for 30 seconds after the door opened, so the camera showed the thief's hand pushing open the door, then nothing happened for 30 seconds. The camera would go off. The thief would then enter the storage room and take whatever he/she wanted, unobserved.

Last summer, I got another bike. One of my boyfriend's brothers was touring as a clown with the circus. He wanted to trick out a bike to use as a clown bike. He found one bike and started working on it, but then he found another one that he thought would work better. I got the first "clown bike" to use, but as I started fixing it up a bit, I realized it wasn't sized well for me and was a bit uncomfortable to ride, so I put it on Craig's List.

I'm excited to finally have a bike again. I'm looking forward to taking it out as soon as the weather warms up a bit!

Where:
bike shopping, my first (freezing) test ride on my new(!) bike, hanging out at my local tea house reading, laundry and cooking at home

What:
Sweater: thrifted
Graphic Tee: Forever XXI
Long-Sleeved Pale Pink Tee: H&M
Pin-Striped Navy Trousers: New York & Co.
Red High-Top Shoes: Converse All-Stars (thrifted)
Cross Necklace: from the Notre Dame Bookstore
Beaded "Gina" necklace: vintage, handmade to order by a vendor in the mall in the early 80's
Ice Cream Cone Earrings: mine from 1989 or the early 90's
Argyle Scarf: H&M (gift from my boyfriend)


2 comments:

  1. I love, lovey, love this outfit !!! I want a bike so bad! If I'd stay out of the thrift stores I could buy one ;). My hubs prefers to hike as do I, and finding a good trail for bikes is so hard in Cinti!

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  2. I admire people like you that brave the streets on your bikes. I get so scared I'm going to wobble off my bike and into traffic! I love your fun layers in this look and those sneakers are wonderful :-)

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