i got a faucet you got a 2 speed

blistering heat makes for the bestest awesomest riding. trust.

so i decided that home depot was the best bet for fixing my faucet and but so i measured and took the faucet apart and found the piece that was making it leak like an old man’s wiener and got everything in order in my brain and headed out.

some guy decided to roll me at a stop light on venice and he was moving pretty well so it took me a minute to catch up but when i got him i noticed that what i thought was a single speed was actually a 2 speed. he had a front derailer and two chainrings but no back cog, just a chain tensioner.

point is i rode his ass and he ran red lights and kept up a good pace for about a mile but he was killing himself and it was obvious by the way he would look back at every light to see if i was still there and then and only then would he proceed to run the light and try to gain some ground.

i cut out on national blvd and made a left and he said “thank you.” as i pedaled away. i’m not sure why but in my head it was for a good race.

home depot sucks.

faucet is fixed. only cost $1.34. whoopie!

chirp,

hillary

where is the city of commerce and what is a “hondo”?

in case you missed it or don’t live in los angeles, it was hot yesterday. i didn’t check the forecast but i knew it was gonna be warm. i loaded up on water and hit the road.

my original plan was to go to home depot (aka deeps) in marina del ray to get a faucet for our bathroom cuz the one we have is severly lacking in the "not leaking all the goddamn time department"…does that even make sense? the faucet leaks okay? there.

anyway i was gonna ride down the beach trail and then hit the end, do a 180, and fly fly little starling back up to the deeps but what happened was i got down the beach and decided that i was so awesome that i would do a reverse ride of what i normally do when i take the la river trail and then hit o.s.h. on the way back to get a faucet.

well riding down torrence blvd and del amo was awesome cuz the wind was at my back and i was feelin’ all nina simone good even though i had ot admit that yes, it was hot as hooha out there.

i got the the entrance to the la river and turned north and started to cry almost instantly. why? because i literally got something in both my eyes. the wind was up and evil hot. but it was blowing from my left so it wasn’t horrible. it was just really gusty and dumb.

so i rode and rode and at some point on the la river trail on the way down you have to cut over a bridge because the trail essentially ends on the west side of the river but so i was kinda not looking and i guess i missed the bridge cuz i started seeing shit that didn’t look familiar and i chalked it up to facing a different direction than i normally do but after a few minutes i came upon a bridge that i had definitely never seen before and the river looked weird and everything was wrong.

i was soooo pumped! some how i had made it to somewhere i’d never been before with out even trying. i wasn’t exactly sure how but…i decided the best thing to do was to try to get as lost as possible and then try to find my way home.

i passed under slauson ave which is where i normally get on the river trail but it was definitely a different "river" (let’s keep in mind here that river means that the city took a real river and poured several million tons of concrete to keep it in its place). then there was a huge sign for "city of commerce". which to me means nothing. i’ve hear of it but i have no idea where it is in relation to anything else.

then there was the sign for the "rio hondo". i passed a golf course and the trail not only got weird and split off in numerous direction (none of which looked…well i didn’t want chickens near my head) but there was massive construction going on under one of the bridges making it impossible to go any further. so back to the streets i went.

beverly blvd. i’ve been there. east beverly blvd??? i passed the east la sheriff’s office and several of the nicest parks i’ve seen in los angeles filled with people sitting in the shade having picnics around little ponds with fountains in the middle. i followed what appeared to be a light rail system that was under construction. i ended up on 4th street coming into downtown and then went to o.s.h. on pico.

they didn’t have a faucet that would work. so now i really have to go to deeps.

got home, and found out it was 108 degrees. also read that the wind was blowing east at 20 mph which means those funny little gusts that were in my face once i got onto beverly and continued the whole way home were not a figment of my imagination.

chirp,

hillary

a wider bike path would be safer…

so i “worked” in the valley the last few days. it was a very strange spot in van nuys where if you were on the street where the house was where we were shooting you’d think something along the lines of “wow, this is such a nice area. i want a family and a life and everything and i’ll just be happy here forever.”

then if you went to the end of the street and went half a block in any direction your thoughts would shift to something like “oh, shit…where the fuck am i? i should call someone to come pick me up. i should just hide behind a bush until they get here. fuck, there are so many things i never did…huck, spluts, garble, murmur, huhuhuuuuuu…”

the real news is that it was 16.3 miles from home going the shortest distance so i got a pretty deese lil’ ride in without even meaning to.

but so after work each day i decided it would be smart to try to find a different way home. one night i was riding down riverside drive where there is a nice bike lane that goes for miles and miles and it’s really well lit and it’s flat and straight so you can just haul arse and whatever. so i hit this one light and there’s a turn lane so i make sure i’m not in it and i take a drink of water and a lady pulls up in a silver honda civic and rolls her window down and says hello.

i’m a little weirded out but i say hello back to her. she then says to me “a wider bike path would be safer.” i say “that’s true.” she rolls her window up and turns right on red and then the light is green and i’m off again.

about 30 seconds go by of me replaying the whole thing when i realize she didn’t say “a wider bike path would be safer.” she said “a white backpack would be safer.”

i am now officially over how mad it made me when i realized i’d misheard her. but to say the least i was glad it was a nice cool night. i’m not even going to bother explaining all the reasons her statement bothered me. i won’t even explain what i was wearing, or all the safety features i have in use on my bike.

i’m also not going to ask why so many people take upon themselves the burden of giving advice when it’s not asked for.

i will simply give this unsolicited advice -

griffith park should be open to bikes only at night if they are not going to turn on the lights.

la river bike path should @ least have those little solar lawn lights to illuminate the edges of the path.

all bridges that it’s not illegal to ride a bike on should have a bike lane even if there is no bike lane leading up to or away from said bridge.

when fixing potholes in this city, a big lump of asphalt is at least as bad as a big hole so it’s worth the extra time to everyone involved on both ends for the people doing the “fixing” to smooth it out. especially on beverly, 6th, 3rd, and wilshire east of la brea.

this city should pay people $1 a mile to ride their bikes for their commute to work.

okay, that’s all i can think of right now.

chirp,

hillary

a first time

somehow it’s never happened before but now i’ve done it. i rode out sunset blvd all the way to the beach.

i left early and traffic was mild. cars got about as close as you would expect which is to say they were far closer than they the drivers themselves would ever want anyone to get to them in a car were they ever on the road in any manner other than encased in 4,000+ pounds of steel and glass.

dan and i “rode” for a while. it was great. we covered all sorts of good territory.

venice blvd back home as usual. bang bang bang. 100 miles since i’ve been home.

chirp,

hillary

back around the bend

two rides in two days. one to the valley one to the beach.

nothing of note except a nice lady yesterday decided to not use her signal or have any clue what was going on around her and ended up turning into me with the side of her car. luckily for me she saw the person walking across the intersection right at the last second and slammed on the brakes which is the only reason i’m not under her car right now. all is well that ends well right? she’s got a nice scratch on her car to remind her to look. too bad it’s on her passenger side and she will never see it…

chirp,

hillary

dumpy doo

we all know that plans can change. i had planned on getting up and riding to the valley and going to this stupid work meeting and then really putting the hammer down and crushing sepulveda and hitting 40 mph and doing like 45 miles and coming home.

then i got to the meeting and everyone was late and it took 1.5 hours instead of .5 hours and then nothing i needed to know was resolved or even discussed so i decided it wasn’t a bad idea to go to lunch with the my bosses and try to work it all out and then they didn’t really have a plan and everything is still up in the air and all that we all agreed on is that i should be to work by 7 instead of 8…

going up cahuenga beat me up. my legs are pretty sore after my day off from riding which i don’t really get but i’ll survive. then forrest lawn was the only place i wasn’t getting banged in the face by the wind so i slashed it and ricked 32 mph on the flat. griffith seemed to go by really quickly, like somehow the reverse route cuts off a good portion of the ride…

anyway, now i wish i had just skipped the meeting and gotten in one last good ride before this crazy trip to south dakota.

life is full of regrets.

chirp,