Bowie vs. Prince

I joined a Pedalpalooza event for the Bowie vs. Prince ride on Friday night. The idea is that a bike ride cruises around and occasionally stops to drink and dance to a biked sound system. I decided to express with my outfit the question, "what if the harlequin from Scary Monsters was really just a big-boned gal in a bike helmet?" The fantastic DJ Rhienna was also in attendance. Rhienna rocks the Old Gregg leggings I sold her from this very website!

Beloved spouse in an amazing get-up

It was fun, although the music that started as very Bowie and Prince and quickly devolved to generic hip-hop, and I had hoped to see more awesome outfits. I did see 300 hipsters, 1000 cans of PBR, and about 80 helmets! There was a Screaming Lord Byron in attendance, and inexplicably, a Michael Jackson.

Strange things yelled at me on my bike:

1. Hey, do you have twenty dollars? Well, do you?

2. Hey! Your face!

3. Hi Virginia Jones! (not so strange, really)

300 people in the Safeway parking lot-like a flash mob, but more shambly and random.

We visited the bran' spankin' new Eastside Voodoo Doughnut, for those of us too drunk or lazy to go downtown to get one. Thank you, Jebus!
In the end, it is clear that Portland's sympathies lie with the Thin White Duke and not the Purple One, but it was close. Prince is still the universal #1 artist that drunk girls request at parties.

Mind Explosion!

It's Pedalpalooza in Portland, a fortnight of bike-related events that I had forgotten about until I left Harvey's on Saturday at midnight to be greeted by a peleton of naked bikers. The two road comics I was working with were very impressed by the display, as I commented, oh, it's naked bike ride time again already. Craigslist Missed Connections was also pretty active the next day, although suitors had to be fairly observant about bike makes, colors, and models, since "you were naked, so was I" did not really narrow the field.

Sensing the impending good times, my back wheel exploded Tuesday morning. Beloved Spouse took it into the shop, and said they were impressed by the level of metal fatigue/failure that caused the rim to curl away from the wheel. He called and said:

B.S.: There's a fifty dollar wheel available, and also one that's $250, which is more than we spent for your bike.

Me: Well, the wheel that exploded was $150, and served me well for three years and about seven thousand miles, and never needed truing- so I'd like to get the higher-end wheel. If it outlasts the frame, I'll make a tall unicycle out of it and keep riding.

B.S.: Of course, there's also the fifty dollar one.

Ah marriage!