Cycle+Art+Design: Bicycle Art and Clothing

Check out our new website, Cycle+Art+Design, which is devoted to bicycle themed art and design and sells custom t-shirts with biking themed graphics.

If you are an avid cyclist we recommend checking us out.  All of our designs are original and obviously they are all cycling themed.

Flat Tire

Yesterday.  It goes without saying but I will say it anyway.  It was yet another Day From Hell.  After 12 hours of misery I was about to make my escape when I noticed, my mountain bike had a flat tire.  The mountain bike with puncture proof tubes and puncture resistant tires.  Making matters all the worse was the fact that I had left my repair kit on my road bike.  I was so fed up after the day I had just gone through that I was tempted to just walk the bike home.  I was really bent.

Luckily, my boss had brought his truck to work so he offered me a ride home.  The tire is still flat and I have not had time to see what caused it to become that way.  At this point I am having another fucked up day at work so it is not a huge concern.

Thank god for having multiple bikes.

Should Cyclists Pay?

Good point.  It has been said elsewhere that motorists pay for improvements to the roadways and boaters pay for use of the waterways but the majority of U.S. cyclists do not pay any sort of fee or tax when trails or roadways are built.

Personally, at this point in time I am 100% against a cyclist having to register their bike or pay any other fees associated with the construction of bike trails or other cycling infrastructure.

The reason for this is simple.  The government, local or otherwise, does not make any real effort to promote cycling as a lifestyle.  Sure I appreciate bike lanes or MUP’s but unlike motorists there is not a lot of maintenance done on them and safety is a constant concern.  I’ve biked here in the Portland metro area and down in Albuquerque, New Mexico and several other American cities and I have never seen a lot of interest paid to cyclists.  Sure, there are bike advocacy groups but these are private entities and they do not always hold a lot of sway with local governments.

If I knew that my money was going to be put to good use for me as a cyclist then I would have no issues with paying money to local government to be put towards cycling related maintenance and construction projects.  But until that day comes, no sir, I do not support charging cyclists fees.

Body In Motion, At Rest

A guy rolls down the road doing 25mph on a bike, he rolls over a sewer grate. Sudden stop, traumatic injury. I am not without empathy as I myself have gone down before, broken some bones and thought about it later how I may have avoided such a situation.

This dude sues the city of Portland and walks away with $100,000. Not a bad payday for a situation that I feel could have been easily avoided. Granted, the city should have replaced the existing sewer grate with the bike safe model but even so, most cyclists should know better than to risk riding over metal and other potentially slippery surfaces, especially if you are spinning along at a fast pace.

This is just my opinion. I’m just a guy who doesn’t own a car and bikes just about every day, year around, in all types of weather and road conditions.

Vanilla Biker

So I roll on a 2007 Giant OCR3 and it has served me well for my commuting and general cycling activities. The only real issue I have with the bike is the color. I don’t really care for the blue color scheme. Then why did I buy a blue bike you ask? Because.

When I was still in Albuquerque I had been riding my Gary Fisher Opie and I had been craving a new road bike. Unfortunately, when the budget allowed for the purchase there was not a bike shop in town that had any model that fit both my budget and my short stature. I had the option of ordering and then waiting for a new bike but I was just too anxious. So in a moment of impatience I went to Bike World in Albuquerque and bought the blue OCR 3.

Personally I was hoping for a red/white color scheme but I took what they had. And as I said, it has been a great ride.

But the topic here is my lack of personal style. I am pretty vanilla in most aspects of my life. Fashion, brand names, furnishings, etc. I know there are options to make my bike more personalized but I am such a vanilla person that I am afraid to experiment. Maybe I can change the bar tape or add a bottle cage, but beyond that I am stuck. I’m going to keep trying and hope that I can break out of this vanilla rut.