Yellow Tent Adventures

Twenty-six seconds.

That was the elapsed time between the delivery of our “Dex” phone books and their arrival in our recycle bin.

It has been a couple of years since any phone book has made it into our house from the front porch. Pounds of paper wrapped in a plastic bag. I used to bring them in out of some bizarre sense of guilt. Trees had been sacrificed. Gas used to delivery them. All sorts of compounds went into the ink for the bright “the phone book’s here” colors. But there they would sit in my office, gathering dust for several months before they ended up in the recycle bin.

The time has come. The time for citizens to be given the option to “opt out” of receiving physical phone books. Or even better, an “opt in” policy.

Fortunately, that time maybe coming sooner than later. Seattle City Councilmember Mike O’Brien has been pondering the value of physical phone books and their impact on our city.

Mike says in his post:
“So what do we do next? I’ve decided to take up a collection. If you receive unwanted phone books, I encourage you to bring them down to city hall and drop them off for my office, and I will store them here as we ponder what to do next. It would be even better if you attached a brief story about your unwanted phone books: Do you not use Yellow Pages at all? Do you use Yellow Pages, but feel you can go without multiple copies? Do you have a favorite brand? What steps have you taken previously to stop receiving phonebooks and did it work? Or maybe you feel the existing phonebook system works well for you? If you don’t want to lug your unwanted yellow pages into city hall but have a story to share, please post it here.

As we continue to formulate our policies on reducing waste, I look forward to hearing from you.”

Read Mike O’Brien’s whole post here.

So here is your chance to help stop the delivery truck-to-porch-to-recycle bin tango. Go to Mike’s office with your unwanted phone book or go to his page above and leave your comments.

Maybe if we can’t convince the industry to give us an “opt in” policy … maybe each residence can at least opt to have their phone books delivered directly into their recycle bins.

That tandem-thing we tried for a few years wasn’t quite our bag, but when you put 7 people on a bike, suddenly it’s a party.

Pure fun to pedal the Seattle Pride parade route and support two causes near and dear to my heart. It gave new meaning to the phrase “On your left!” and the idea of “Share the Road”.

Thanks to the Bicycle Alliance for inviting us to the party!

Romance is in the air. Three times this spring, at public speaking engagements, I’ve had an audience member ask, “What is your most romantic travel memory?”

It’s hard to come up with just the right answer to many travel questions, but I never hesitate with this one. It was in Hungary.

Below is the transcript from the commentary that aired on public radio station KUOW in Seattle. It was later published in different forms and an expanded version can be found in the 2nd edition of Spokesongs: Bicycle Adventures on Three Continents.

Their voices filled the still night with such sweet harmony it sent chills up and down my spine. I squeezed Kat’s hand and we exchanged glances and smiles. Was this real? It had all of the elements of a dream.

We were being serenaded with a French love song by an all-men’s Italian chorus on a midsummer night’s eve, near a Greek Catholic church on a street corner of a village in Hungary.

It all began as we attempted to look through the large keyhole of an ornate church. The groundskeeper spied us and unlocked the sanctuary. As we gazed up at the Byzantine-styled frescos painted on the walls and ceiling he went on and on about a concert. The only thing that we understood for sure (our Hungarian limited to two-word phrases almost entirely related to food) was the event was that very evening.

Was it to be a local children’s choir? The history of Hungary as interpreted by a mime troop? Traveling Scottish bagpipers? We had no idea, but we took a chance and waited for evening while drinking abysmally bitter cups of coffee in the local sweet shop.

We changed into our formal attire in the city park. “Formal attire” while on a multi-month bicycle journey often consists of a clean, wrinkled T-shirt, shorts and sandals with socks.

Our under-dressed anxiety was relieved by Father Ernst, who greeted us wearing a long black robe descending to bright white sneakers.

The group of men who filed into the now crowded church were members of Coro Monte Pasubio, an award-winning choral group visiting from Italy. We were treated to an hour of the finest singing I have ever heard. The audience applauded enthusiastically for encore after encore.

Having secured our bicycles in the church’s schoolhouse, we wandered into a restaurant after the concert. In a back room seated at an enormously long table were the members of the chorus and their local supporters. Several people waved us in and we entered to smiles and applause. News of our bicycle journey had spread.

We sat down to glasses of red wine and seltzer. Franco, one of the choir members who spoke English, acted as our interpreter as we answered questions about our trip. At one point we let slip that we were engaged. A week prior I had asked Kat to marry me as we gazed across the Danube at the grand parliament building in Budapest. We hadn’t even told our parents yet. But somehow it seemed appropriate to divulge our secret to this man with the voice of an angel.

We drank more wine and listened to more songs, wishing the evening would never end.

Two of the last to leave, we exited the restaurant only to find the entire chorus gathered in a semicircle facing us. Franco smiled and said, “It’s your fault. You told me you were engaged. Now we Italians, being romantics, must sing for you.”

The basses, baritones, and tenors all found their notes, then broke out in laughter after a phrase, discovering they had begun in the wrong key. The second attempt was flawless. As they serenaded us with the French ballad Les Plaisirs (The Pleasures), some smiled warmly at us, others simply closed their eyes.

We were touched, awed and somewhat embarrassed all at the same time. Each of the members came up to us afterward and wished us a safe journey and much happiness. The leader presented us with one of the group’s cassette tapes and his comments brought a chorus of laughter. Franco translated, “He says you must listen to this tape before or after les plaisirs…it is a collection of our church songs after all.”

Then they were on their way to Debrecen and their next engagement, leaving us to bask in the glow of our own personal midsummer night’s dream.

We may never top the event above. But it sure will be fun trying.

The audio below is from the church concert earlier that evening. I didn’t record the song outside the restaurant. Both Kat in I were in romantic shock.

Coro Monte Pasubio–public concert

Originally posted on the Adventure Cycling Association’s blog.

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On the Right Track from Mayor Sam Adams on Vimeo.

The above video (thanks Portland!) is a great introduction to Cycle Tracks and what we can look forward to on Dexter Avenue here in Seattle.

What were they thinking?

Now here is a ice cream flavor for our times. Ben & Jerry’s Fossil Fuel. “Sweet Cream Ice Cream with Chocolate Cookie Pieces, Fudge Dinosaurs & a Fudge Swirl”. It could only be a worse marketing nightmare if it contained fudge pelicans instead of dinosaurs.

I believe this flavor was on it’s way out before the BP disaster. If we could only ween ourselves off of fossil fuel as fast as Ben & Jerry’s will ditch this flavor from its line up.

I have a few new flavor suggestions for the company … how about “Solar Panel” and “Pedal Power”?

The Seattle BikeExpo was last weekend, and by the look of it, the bike scene is all about flashy sport gear, big organized rides, exotic tours, and power-sport-energy-nutrition-gonzo-bars. I nibbled a few bars, but I was really at the BikeExpo to attend a forum on “Bike Culture”. My general assumption was that the five panelists would talk about the integration of bikes into our modern, urban culture — the headway and the roadblocks.

The gender makeup of the panel, 4 men and 1 woman, was disheartening, even if it was an accurate representation of the cycling gender divide. It was an obvious example of how small of a voice women have in the bikiest of bike cultures — the Bike Expo. Looking around the Expo in general, you would get the impressing that to be a cyclists means suiting up in bright, shiny moisture-wicking, synthetic fibers, clicking your high-tech specialized shoes into your pedals, and riding your ultra-tricked out machine really, really fast. Sure, some cyclists do that—both men and women. Some ride for speed, endurance, endorphins and bragging rights, but that whole mentality is counter-productive to bringing bike culture into mainstream culture. What struck me about the BikeExpo in general was how little effort was made by vendors to show bikes as a way of life. Bikes were represented as a leisure/sport activity that is done on the side of life.

I’ve been thinking about how we get more people riding bikes as their everyday short-trip vehicle of choice and think that targeting women is a key ingredient, and the marketplace in America has neglected this segment of potential riders and shoppers. Fewer bikes are made to fit women’s bodies and the majority of the gear sold at bike shops (and BikeExpos) does not address the needs of running the quick and easy errand, but instead continues to focus on the sport rides in spandex. When the time comes that you walk out of your house and automatically ride your bike to the grocery store in your neighborhood instead of hopping into your car to get the quart of milk or bottle of wine for dinner, then we’ll have an integrated bike culture.

The panel discussion nibbled around the edges of this lack of women representation, but fortunately the lone women of the forum, Amy Walker, is the publisher and creative director of Momentum magazine. I can only imagine the charge I would get out of 5 Amy Walkers talking about how we live life — get to work, shop for new clothes, meet for lunch, run errands, get to community meetings, go to the dentist, arrive at a dinner party, take our kids to school, enjoy a date night, transport our pets to the vet — on two wheels.

“Momentum magazine provides urban cyclists with the inspiration, information and resources to fully enjoy their riding experience and connect with local and global cycling communities.” So says their web site.

Momentum is dazzling eye candy for women like me who want my bike to be an extension of who I am and how I choose to live, shop, work, and play. Momentum does for people on bikes what Dwell magazine does for lovers of modern, urban architecture and design. It makes me want. It makes me want to consume with its ads for beautiful city-geared bicycles, stylish bike bags, and life-style spotlights on people living — and making a living — as part of the two-wheeled culture. The fashion and stories show beautiful people living a dreamy life that I want to cultivate.

Which begs the question then, if BikeExpo had a large component of bikes and bicycle accessories for women living a cycling lifestyle, would more of those weekend trail riders want to integrate cycling into regular life? Could the bike-fashion-lifestyle trend grow and entice more women on bikes, which would lead to more awareness of bike riders, better safety measures, improved bike parking, calmer traffic, and ultimately utopia?

A girl can dream… And I dream of a day that my friend Michele wants to meet me at the bakery in Ballard on her bicycle. We will wear cute shoes.

Alright. The good news is that Google Maps has added a Bike Route option. Great. But a quick “get direction by bike” request from near our place on Beacon Hill to Pike Place Market yields some scary results.

Google Maps Bike Route to Pike Place Market

Click on the link above. Yikes!!!! No bike route should include Rainier Ave … ever.

Google Maps Car Route to Pike Place Market

What I find entertaining, is that the car route above would be one of my preferred routes by bike. Who doesn’t want to scream down Holgate at 40mph?

So I wouldn’t use this service to find a bike route yet. What I would suggest, is to put your regular destinations in the Google Maps bike route option and then use the link to report roads that aren’t suitable for cycling. Or suggest a completely different route.

Google does include the following statement:
“Bicycling directions are in beta. Use caution and please report unmapped bike routes, streets that aren’t suited for cycling, and other problems here.” (linked java).

I would, however, suggest that Google reword their notice to read:
“Bicycling directions are in super-beta. They may just send you on a route that could get you killed. Consult your city bike map or cycling friend before following any Google bike route directions.”

I applaud Google for including cyclists, but this option is not ready for prime time.  With your input, it could be ready sooner rather than later.

I just received an invitation to a meet-up with the makers of Pandora (the Music Genome Project)  held at Seattle’s downtown public library, and it was all well and good until I got to this:

Parking: Pandora will provide complimentary parking for attendees at the Seattle Public Library parking garage on Spring Street between 4th and 5th Ave. The entrance is mid-block on the south side of Spring St.   Please bring the ticket from the machine to the meeting and you will be given a coupon that you can present to the parking lot attendant after the event.

Really? Pandora is going to pay people for driving to downtown Seattle? That just strikes me as an old, tired way of thinking which I didn’t expect from such an exciting new company and our über modern library.

So this was my response to their invitation:

Hi Tim,
It would be wonderfully  progressive if Pandora gave an incentive for arriving by public transportation, foot or bicycle instead of rewarding people for driving a vehicle to a downtown urban center. You want to change the way we listen to music. I want to change the way we live in our communities.

Does the Seattle Public Library and Pandora really want people to drive to the event? They offered drivers a carrot…

The gray days of winter are here. The kind of days that look like it’s perpetually 4pm even when it’s 11 in the morning. Saturated to the point the ground no longer drinks in the pissing rain, we are steeped in grayness. These are days that test the carfree.

But I’m itching to move, and with new walking shoes and an adequate rain jacket I go out to breath in fresh air, clear my head, and pump up my heart rate. And it’s working. I’m rewarded by flashes of color that brighten my day.

Wide load

It is amazing what you can strap on to the back rack of a bicycle.