The Land of Bixi

What I learned about Montreal:

There is a certain aggressive vigour* in the city's view of itself- here is the founder of McGill, for example:

Onward!

It's particularly clear in the behaviour of the cyclists, who all ride like maniacs. And there are so many of them! Everywhere we rode (and we rode a lot) there were scores of fit, reckless people on bikes zooming by and jamming up the intersections. They have a beautifully done and very well used bike share programme, and everywhere you look is another rack of public bikes (or Bixis):

SO MANY BIXIS

The fact that each Bixi weighs about 50 pounds does not deter Montreallers from riding them TOP SPEED in all directions. I have wistful fantasies of NYC getting to that point eventually, but we'd need some serious bike lane restructuring. Montreal's bike lanes make sense, go where you want to go, and are often protected by concrete curbs on BOTH sides. It was really nice. 

There was also lovely architecture and landscapes and some really dedicated surfers flopping around in a slightly turbulent section of the Saint Lawrence. There was a Biosphere,

One of the weirder world fair relics I've seen, though I think Knoxville's Sunsphere still wins

And the Highest Inclined Tower in the World,

We went up in a funicular

And an Octopus,

Previously sighted in Portland

And an unexpected screening of my favorite Swiss 80s art film which OH MY LACK OF GOD is on YouTube! Aaaaah!

I liked wandering around and not rushing at all, and it was lovely to spend time with my gentleman-friend. We tried to speak French, but couldn't quite shake a sense of ridiculousness even if we KNEW we were saying the words we meant to say. The bizarre Quebecois accent doesn't help. A friendly youth hostel employee informed us that Montreallers are all mean, much meaner than New Yorkers, but  Philadelphians are the meanest of all. It's a shame that everyone's perception of Phila appears to be based on It's Always Sunny. 

I stopped in Phila on the way back to Brooklyn to collect my cat, and while sitting in the Rocket Cat and trying to get my brain together after a 15 hour train ride and inadequate sleep I felt a great sense of homesickness. Mostly because the flyers pasted to the windows were so much cooler than the ones I'd find in an analogous Brooklyn cafe. I might just be going to the wrong cafes, but Phila has a lovely sense of community and I don't think this big, anxious city can replicate it. 

Dorian don't care, though. He was nervous for about an hour, then decided he was above it all. 

This is after having his way with my lovely new curtains

It's only been 24 hours and my cat is already cooler than I am. 

Orientation starts tomorrow. I am not gonna be a snob! I am not gonna be a snob! I am not gonna be a snob! Much. 

-Isis

*Spelled in Canadian to honour and humour our neighbour's flavours.  

Bells

Looks who's an authentic NYer! I rode from my house to Williamsburg twice and the second time I only got lost once! WHY does Brooklyn have so many different grids?

It's been a strange week, half riding out in all directions and half being comatose and waiting for things, like utilities guys to turn up with the internet. My new neighborhood is largely Caribbean, so it smells amazing and the bodegas have fruits and candies that I can't identify. It's near Prospect Park, so I've been diligently riding out on the little bike loop every day. I like it a lot more than Central Park, less crowded, less manicured. Just as many manic-faced roadies in Kissena jerseys, though.

AND THERE'S NOWHERE TO PARK.

People are a lot nicer than I expected. They say hello to me and smile (after the sort of up-and-down size-up that seems to be a New York thing). I got a giant bell and furiously ding at anyone who gets in front of me, and they say 'I like your bell!' which is disarming. 

Replace the constant squeaking with DING DING DING DING DING...

Since everything is so far away from everything else I am gonna be getting Champion style legs pretty soon. 

I made a point to make my room nice; it'll be good to have a sanctuary from the inevitable school-related stress. Packing half a three story house into a third of a three bedroom apartment isn't so easy, but NYC has closets which are deeper than six inches, so there's that. The house mojo won't be properly set until my cat and the housemate's cat move in (also, the housemates). I miss having a chubby little pounce monster wrecking my curtains. 

And I miss Phila a lot, or rather I miss the people in it. It's going to take a long time to build up a community as amazing as the one I enjoyed there. I did visit Time's Up, which is a bike co-op not unlike Bike Church in Phila. And everyone was super nice and welcoming and unsnotty and that made me very happy. Bike people seem to be marvelously similar no matter where they are, and it's immensely comforting to find a space where I feel automatically at home. I've never dealt with design types before, and it's been a long time since art school. The social aspect of grad school is scaring me out of me tree going to be an adventure. 

Tomorrow I and my gentleman-friend are checking out a small-boat club where we may keep our sailboat (WHICH FLOATS!!!!!!) Is there a way to talk about your boat without sounding like an entitled twitbag? If you say 'I'm building a boat' everyone says 'Cool!' but if you say 'I have a boat' everyone thinks,

Wot? Me?

At some point I will write about the boat's maiden voyage. It was.... memorable. 

There are a lot of churches in my neighborhood. St Francis of Assisi rings its bells at 15 minute intervals (not quite on the dot). It makes me acutely aware of time, and how much (if any) I am wasting. This whole city seems very much concerned with time, at least no one appears to be loafing. I'll quit loafing the minute school starts, but at the moment flaneur-ing my way about Brooklyn feels very strange. 

Qua? Moi? Oui!

And on THAT note, I am off to Montreal for a week. 

Hello, mad city?

-Isis

Young Werther Syndrome

I quit my job at last and have been trying to get my entire life shrunk to the size of a third of a smallish Brooklyn apartment. I made a pile of give away/donate clothes, and it is three feet high (with the cat on top). I have no idea I had so much crap in my closets, and its a lovely light feeling to get rid of so much. But you can tear my Musketeer suit (which comes complete with a mustache) from my cold, dead hands.

I went to Chapterhouse for a break and a coffee the other day, and started rereading the Sorrows Of Young Werther. I distinctly remember the first time I read it-- in the tiny Art Student's League library when I was around fourteen. The cover had this insufferable pudgy guy on it, looking Intense. I'll never forget him:

KLOPSTOCK!

Even then, at my most insufferable and Intense stage of life (though not the most pudgy) I recognized it as being a bit silly. It's Sturm und Drang* at its most unabashed, overwrought, thunderstorms-and-heaving-bosoms best. Very briefly, Young Werther falls in love with a spoken-for lady who likes him back but not quite enough and winds up marrying her intended anyway, whereupon Werther shoots himself in the head after a great deal of whining. 

Most of the book is taken up with Werther rhapsodizing about stuff. He gets excited about dewdrops, cows, his own excellent artistic ability, common people, pretentious poetry, etc.  He's pretty terrible, but so relatable. After I read the book the first time I happily diagnosed Young Werther Syndrome in all my younger male friends, and myself. Had I been a little older, I might have agreed with the previous owner of my current copy: 

Yup.

I'm glad Werther led me on to Steppenwolf and Narcissus and Goldmund and other better Romantic German Books. There is something fatally, inescapably attractive about the sense of dreadfully overwrought oblivion all these characters share. 

Speaking of oblivion, much of the final pages of Young Werther are taken up with him translating Ossian, who was an Ancient Gaelic Poet. It's mostly vague emotional exposition with some mist and bogs thrown in. I looked up Ossian, and discovered that he was an invention of an eccentric Eighteenth Century Scottish politician. Its oddly fitting that Werther should be pouring out his self-involved soul in the words of a hoax. Goethe didn't know this of course, and was merely hopping onto the already highly popular Ossian bandwagon. Ossian (or rather, his creator MacPherson) certainly taps into the wistful yearning and wanderlust and cliffs so dear to the romantics, but the poems themselves really aren't very good. 

And now, apropos of nothing at all, may I present a hillbilly dancing with a raccoon:

CHAIN CHAIN CHAIN!

That totally made my day. 

Isis

But I Will Never Wear a Bimbo Shirt

Yesterday I went to my first professional soccer game. It was fun! A bunch of impossibly buff guys ran around in circles and fell over and writhed in apparent agony until some call or other was called, whereupon they leaped to their feet and continued scooting around with renewed vigor. Not that they weren't impressive! I can't so much as run around the block and they maintained a level of absolute sprightliness for an hour and a half. I must say though, the Philadelphia Union has a branding problem: 

They look thrilled

I was impressed that the swarms of bros swarming the stadium were happy to wear their Bimbo jerseys with a complete lack of irony. The look in this guy's eyes at the sponsorship party though...

....

They do make an effort to get English speakers to stop snickering....

But I snickered.

I liked how non-gross the fans were-- compared to hockey fans, who are kind of violent and terrible, they just yell useful advice and clap politely. 

The weeks are flying by, and it's astonishing to me that I'll be leaving Phila in a month. It's getting more bitter than bittersweet, really. I'm gonna miss everything.

It's not bitter to donate all my cool weather work clothes, though-- one of the reasons I'm going to grad school is that I want to work somewhere that doesn't leave me encrusted in half an inch of filth every day. Not that there aren't a lot of cool things about working in a metal shop, but looking like a scruffball every day for three years taught me that I don't like looking like a scruffball. 

With that in mind, here's how to not look like a scruffball on really short notice if you happen to be one (inspired by a conversation with Miss Laura who never looks as scruffy as me). 

Rayon is your friend. You can scrunch a rayon dress or top into the bottom of your messenger bag and it will emerge looking just fine. 

Also, make sure that anything wet in your messenger bag is sealed hermetically. Also, things that can become wet. You try getting melted chocolate out of a light blue blouse. 

Don't worry about clean pants. If your jeans are a mess but your top is obviously expensive, it's chic.  Somehow you don't get the same effect the other way-- a grimy Cinelli t-shirt and a shantung silk skirt looks weird. 

By obviously expensive I mean it has a fancy label and you got it for five bucks at AIDS Thrift. 

The awl on your Swiss Army knife is great for de-grubbing your nails. 

Slightly beat is scruffy. Really, really beat is hip. Don't ask me why. I had cloth mess bag in college that looked drab and shabby and made me feel broke. A girl I knew had an identical bag (ten bucks from the army-navy store) and it was covered in paint, mud, dust, grime, slime and mold, and made her look like a gypsy bohemian. So if you can't make something better and you don't want to chuck it, make it worse. 

Don't ever wear white. 

No matter how nuts your hair is, if your part is straight it will look like you did it on purpose. 

There is no reason to wear crappy, itchy, pilly fabric. Even to a metal shop. Ever. 

If it's cool enough for a scarf, wear one and wear a nice one. If it's bright and eye grabbing no one will notice that the rest of you is covered in bike. But take it off around power tools that spin. 

On that note, have a nice assortment of coats and jackets. Then if you have to look nice immediately after looking scruffy you can just keep your coat on and sweat in the name of sleekness. Also, hug your cat goodbye BEFORE you put your coat on in the morning (I can never remember to do this. Next coat I buy will be Dorian colored). 

Don't try biking in flowy wraparound skirts. They will unwrap. 

Anyone have any more suggestions? Pretty soon I'll have to present a reasonable facsimile of an efficient, sleek design-y New Yorker. I draw the line at Ray Bans, though. Why does everyone have Ray Bans?

And finally, the Tour opened with a team bus getting stuck under the finish line with the riders only 12k away:

They eventually let down the tires.

You can't make this up. 

--Isis

Stop the World

Many months ago a guy called the shop I work at to see if we could make him a special bicycle. I happened to get the phone and we got to talking. He told me he was stationed in Afghanistan, and planned to devote himself to helping kids with muscular dystrophy on his return. I think he mentioned having a relative with MD, but I could be wrong. The bike was to have a seat in the front so he could take kids riding with him. I told him that would be no problem, and booked the bike into our build queue.

He called fairly frequently after that, to talk about his bike or just talk. That bike seemed to symbolize the civilian life he was looking forward to so much, and he said he thought about it all the time. Once I asked him what it was like in Afghanistan. He was quiet so long I thought the connection had broken, and then he just said that you get used to it. I always wished him luck when he rang off.

We finished the bike, but there was no word from him. He'd said he was sometimes hard to reach, so we just hung the bike up and waited. But weeks turned into months and I got concerned. I googled his name, but it's a common one and I felt like a creeper and stopped.

Then today I read an email from him. He'd been severely wounded and implied that he didn't expect to ride again. He asked if we could sell his bike for him. 'It sucks, but that's war.'

I had to hide my face in my arms for a minute. It's easy to dismiss the military as jingoistic and bloodthirsty, especially with all the news about sexual assault and brutality against civilians. But one forgets (I forget) that these are just young people like myself, with passions and idealism and dreams that they cling to to get through hard times.

I'm glad this guy survived. I hope he does manage to ride again.

No pictures or goofiness today. I'm just feeling weary and sad with the world, that sends its young to get blown to bits and lets its wealthy and powerful commit extraordinary crimes.

This world is too much with us late and soon...

Isis

Never mind, a picture: if you happen to be in Pennsport and you meet a hairless cat, he needs to go home.

Goodbye Mad Industry: Le Cirque du Cyclisme

I'm being a very bad blogger; between my own distractibility and the Great Kitten Emergency the last thing on my list is blithering on about things I do. For the record, the Great Kitten Emergency is under control and everyone is safe and well (and out of my studio). A marketing major told me that the best way to get readers and money is to put up cute cat videos, so here's a cute cat video:

SO FUZZY! Also, where's my ten grand?

Anyway!

Last weekend I went to Le Cirque du Cyclisme, which is a classic bicycle rally. A lot of vintage bikes show up, and a lot of vintage bike fans. Some framebuilders come too, to show off and socialize. Now, as much as I gripe about the bike world, the lack of money and organization, the egos and the inefficiency, you will not find nicer people anywhere. The first year I went to the Cirque I hadn't even graduated college, didn't know a soul and had a wicked case of bronchitis, but I managed to make several friends and buttonhole my current boss and get him to give me a job.

Le Cirque happens in a Best Western in Leesburg Virginia, which is one of those heavily curated small towns with historical log cabins and artisan cupcakes. There's also a nice long rail trail I rode on for a bit with other Cirque attendees, and apparently some lovely rolling hills that are just great for riding but I din't find out because all the group rides left at 7.30 AM which is completely barbaric. Everyone (except my lazy tail) rides out in the morning, dorks out over each others' bikes and listens to seminars in the afternoon, and eats and drinks too much in the evening. There's stuff like this:

Drillium!

And modern stuff:

The finest lug

And a swap meet:

Old n fancy parts yo

And for lots more pictures you should check out this guy. I never take enough pictures of anything. 

On Saturday my gentleman-friend and I skipped out and went to a boat festival on the Chesapeake. We're building our own sailboat out of a kit from these guys, and the Cirque happened to coincide with their Okoumefest.   There were boats on the shore,

Just as fancy as the bikes

And boats in the bay:

There was one patrol boat that might have been patrolling for amateurs overboard, or not. 

I haven't sailed in ten years and my gentleman-friend hasn't sailed at all, but the nice and harassed staff cheerfully shoveled us into various boats and watched us flounder around. There wasn't much wind for the first one (a twelve foot bathtub) or the second one (a skerry-- like ours! with a busted tiller) but by the time we got in the third one, a dory with a sloop rig, the wind had picked up and we actually got moving. Which was great! I remembered why I loved sailing so much, the sense of speed and adventure skimming over the water (or in this case wallowing, since the friendly staff had been helpfully installing the rudder and swamped us pretty good and didn't have a bailer). Then I noticed that the divot cut in the transom for the tiller was either in the wrong place or something wasn't installed right, because we could only turn to starbord. We made it in eventually and if anyone was laughing at us I didn't notice. 

OH MY LACK OF GOD I CAN'T WAIT TO GO SAILING FOR REAL!!

I noticed that the boat people and the bike people were more or less interchangeable-- iron grey hair, mostly male, eyes gleaming with zealous perfectionism. Those sorts of people don't often get to let their nerd flags fly quite as high as they'd like, so at events like Cirque and Okoumefest they are brimming over with enthusiasm and generous knowledge. It's the loveliest atmosphere. 

Once back, covered in Chesapeake, we sat around with a bunch of fellow framebuilders and chatted and complained. It's a shame that most independent bike manufacturers exist in a constant state of financial anxiety. Really nice bikes take a long time-- and the current market just does not allow most builders to charge what their bikes are worth. It's a lot like fine art and fine craft, I think, where even top tier artisans are barely making ends meet. I would love to see custom bike builders doing better and getting more for individual frames, but this does contradict my philosophy (and many of theirs' too) that bikes should be for everyone, and affordable. 

There is exactly one custom framebuilder I know who is doing really well for himself. I'm not going to name him, and he's not famous. He works alone and makes about 200 frames a year which is a huge amount for one guy. Once I asked him how he managed and he gave a deranged giggle and said, 

'I do 'em in BATCHES!!!' and that was all I got. 

So there you go, I guess. Do 'em in batches. 

I wish it was possible to do better in this industry. There is so much talent and creativity and good people who deserve the best. I feel a bit of a traitor for leaving, for entering industrial design and most likely not building bikes anymore. I'm going to miss the camaraderie, the people, the unabashed nerdiness. I promised to go back next year. 

Isis

Oh Brooklyn!

As I've said before, I am moving to Brooklyn at the end of this summer. Despite having grown up in the New York suburbs, I don't know Brooklyn at all-- except for its reputation and the art museum (I roll my eyes at the former and like the latter). And I know how to get from the Music Hall of Williamsburg to Grand Central in time for the last train. But that's about it.

So I spent much of Saturday puttering around on a Dahon seeing what I could see. Here's some preliminary thoughts (and goodness knows I'll probably prove myself wrong in all sorts of ways come August).

Fixed gears are still a thing. Except now they have  tiny gear ratios, cruiser bars and little porteur racks on the front. I guess the first wave of fixiesnobs all blew their knees out? Also, no one wears helmets. 

Speaking of bikes, the lane situation is really confusing. They are everywhere, but they're also all over the road. I've heard enough horrific stories about cops fining cyclists for putting so much as a spoke out of line, so I found myself yawing all over the road trying to stay between my designated stripes. And the cabs give a lot less elbow room than their gentler Philadelphia cousins.

Riding through Williamsburg I got a lot of censorious looks from guys in hats: at my bare shoulders and  midriff from the Hasidic guys in their giant fur schtriemels, and at my dorky little bike from the scrawny hipsters in Cinelli caps.

Bed Stuy looks a lot like South Philly, if it were expecting a siege. Bars over everything. And no bars, to speak of. Or grocery stores. Or cafes. But plenty of hair salons. I might have just been going down the wrong streets.

The less bourgie areas have a layer of grime over them that is far more aggressive and permanent looking than laid-back Philly could ever achieve.

There is a bike vending machine!

PROOF!!

Brooklyn Bridge Park is stunningly gorgeous. I love rivers, bridges, and manicured parks, and this has the lot. I counted no less than five weddings. One of them involved a tandem bike, and reminded me to never try riding in a crinoline.

Red Hook is visually amazing too. There are giant fort-like buildings with gothic shutters along the waterfront. Out of sight of the river, it looks like Portland wants to look- so hip and quirky your teeth hurt. But at least it did it first.

It takes a kind of hiccup, a shift of perception, to see myself as a New Yorker again. For the first four years that I lived in Philadelphia I insisted on an outsider status- I wore black and walked fast and cultivated a superior attitude (in retrospect, I wasn't being a super-sophisticated New Yorker, I was being a hipster).

But then I fell in love and got a cool job and an independent life, and New York became the foreign place. Days flew by, happy, quiet days. I resented going to New York, almost, because it represented something I'd convinced myself I didn't need. But I got restless eventually, restless enough to give up the lovely, easy life I've led for nearly three years. And the other day, sitting by the river with the two great bridges overhead and the sun frying my black clothes, I thought 'I'm coming home.' 

--Isis

OH RIGHT, HEADLINE OF THE DAY!

Woman Finds Toad in Can of Beans

You're welcome.