"Hey! I know you!" was the way that Greg introduced himself when he pinged me to ask for a ride to the AMC course. We'd known of each other the way one does in a scene. Faces that show up at enough events in common. Friends who include us in the same conversation but don't always introduce us to each other. Voices that appear on shared comment ( Read more... )

Joe had arrived at Passim a few minutes before me, and when I sat down, I noted that he was furiously scribbling some notes and passages on the back of a sheet of paper, then crossing them off, then scribbling again ( Read more... )

Tuesday night, I was at Oberon for the January Moth storyslam. mishak was there, as was Linder and an ex co-worker, LaBadassita and her boyfriend B. The theme for the month was Outgrown and I had thrown my name in the hat, but we had gotten through five storytellers, to intermission without my name being called. Linder asked, "so do you have to put up ( Read more... )

It was about 18 months ago that I was first introduced to the idea that, when you're on your bike, a pedestrian hailing a taxi-cab has their hand at a perfect angle for a high-five. It's a trick that's known amongst messengers, hipsters and other species of urban riders, replete with its own codes and rituals. The primary among them is getting ( Read more... )

I was lying in a field in western Massachusetts at the end of a long, hot Saturday afternoon, reposed in a state of pulsing pain.  My legs had been seized by cramps and were slowly unknotting.  The middle and index fingers on my left hand were paralyzed by nerve damage.  My shoulders and upper arms felt battered, but I was smiling. 
( on coming to terms with demons )

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I hear him before I see him. The creak of his chain comes up from behind me as we both near the crest of the Longfellow Bridge, and then he passes and I make the match. His face is masked and his eyes are shaded by sunglasses, but I recognize the posture, the bike and the legs -- bare even in the middle of winter, carved like marble and gleaming ( Read more... )

When I started to plan my move, one of the first things that I did was post various things on Craiglist: things that I may have loved and appreciated but needed to let go. Of these, none was moreso valuable than my old Trek. I credit the Trek 520 with being the catalyst for my long distance cycling. I did my first bike tour the year after I ( Read more... )

Last year, I volunteered to help with managing a 300k brevet and spent a bit of time on a beautiful May day with Chuck, another randonneur who was organizing the 300k and brimming with ideas for the club. I had a great time volunteering and thought to myself that if Chuck kept on organizing brevets, I wouldn't mind being his volunteer. Then Chuck ( Read more... )

I didn't really have a specific notion of what I was looking to build, when I started on a project of building a new fixed gear bicycle. At the time, I knew that I wanted a bike that could have fenders and racks, that could be used for riding around the city, and to be my primary bicycle when winter set in and the snow and salt would normally play ( Read more... )