Ride Home 9/13: Pillowcase the joint

Why do we ride? Is it to feel the wind in our faces? Is it the feeling of the blood pumping in our legs? Is it to serve as a pretext to write blogs and tweet? Yes, I say. Yes, it is. I'd like to think that the original pretext was hieroglyphics. Blogging in hieroglyphics would probably see really annoying, though Shit Anubis Says would be a pretty hilarious tumblr. When Amon Ra was like [gif of pyramid], I was all like [gif of sphinx] and then he was all [gif of mummy]. The original gif, and this was well later in history, was the gif of the Magi. Before Christianity, they believed in the Greek myths and then everything was in jPegasus. Moving on.

I rode behind a guy who was hunched over on his bike, his left shoulder lifted to his ear with his cell phone in between. Dude, just pull over. Riding at 2 miles per hour while you try to carry on a phone conversation really isn't worth it. 

On 23rd Street and Sheriden Circle there's a building, perhaps an embassy, the hosts events and those events sometimes have valet parking and this valet parking causes car traffic to back up nearly to Water Street, maybe a half mile or so away. I blame Bikeshare. Wait, I'm sorry- I accidentally touched an Examiner today and I think I caught "the sickness." This valet arrangement must be pretty annoying to other drivers, but I don't know if there's anything they can do about it. Other than get mad. And sit there waiting. I rode on the sidewalk. Peace out suckers. 

I rode through Dupont Circle and out the other side, down Massachusetts before turning right on to 18 Street, mostly because I didn't want to ride next to an MPD motorcycle cop, who for some reason seemed to intimidate me for no apparent reason. 18th Street was fine, but I forgot that it would end after 2 blocks, forcing me to turn left on N Street, to turn right again at 17th, which proved mostly fine, but then I got all turned around and didn't quite remember how I'd get to Pennsylvania Avenue, mostly because you can't get to Pennsylvania Avenue from 17th Street. I turned left again at L, which still doesn't have a cycle track, but maybe will by the end of the year,  and then I turned right on to 16th Street, which I knew would take me to the Lafayette Square and the White House. It was a mess. And by that, I don't mean covered in potato chip crumbs and dirty socks, but a mess of cars and drivers and buses and drivers and trucks and drivers and cabs and drivers some of whom couldn't get their cars through intersections or change lanes, or make u-turns in their cabs, as one driver tried to do, directly in front of me. With his car at a 45 degree angle pointed at me, I stopped, looked up and shrugged. As I set off again, he pulled forward to try to complete his turn, bringing the front of his car even closer! This earned him a muttered "you've gotta be fucking kidding me," but I don't think he heard. Anyway, kids, this was a horrible way to go. If you need to head south from Mass, take don't try anything between 19th and 15th, especially at rush hour. "Rush hour" isn't a term I especially care for and I'm surprised it wasn't banned during the Cold War (for fear of Russians- womp womp). I also don't think I ever saw the Jackie Chan- Chris Tucker movie franchise of the same name, but if the plot involved them sitting in cars sitting amidst other cars sitting on a sea of asphalt, I can't imagine it'd be very exciting. Premium Rush, a movie about bicycle messengers, might have also involved rushing or maybe it just involved trying to get into a very exclusive fraternity. Haven't seen that one either.

Superbiker shoaler. He wasn't in a premium rush to get through the green light at 7th, but saw no problem in riding through the red about two seconds after it had changed. I wrote myself an email to remind myself of this, so as to blog about it and such, and mistyped "supwrbijer" and I think that might actually be Danish for superbiker, or at least it should be. "Should be a Danish word" would be a great Jeopardy! category. On either American or Danish Jeopardy. Danish Jeopardy means you can't prosecute the same pastry for the same crime twice, or something.

I saw three people I knew riding their bikes within three blocks of each other. I love it. DC is such a small town and some day I will know everyone in it. This is only a minor exaggeration, like a fake ID.

I'm ready for Friday. I hope Friday is ready for me.