If Crissy Can Do It

So, there’s Crissy with not one but two children and one of them is brand new and all bean-like and she’s blogging. I’ve got one kid and that seems like paradise to me at this point because not a day passes that I don’t want to remove my ovaries with a rusty spoon to avoid any future children.

And before you all jump on the tube-tying bandwagon, please note that I have an IUD, only the greatest birth control ever (along with my unwaivering fear of pregnant women and reproduction). I have the Mirena IUD, which, I swear makes me think (for one second) that there might be one single doctor in this world who loves women. I know that’s probably not true because doctors are evil (I have a doctor fear and a fear of heights). BUT someone invented birth control that is put in once and is 99% effective AND it makes my periods go away. I mean the menstruating part. The crazies are still there, as well as the breaking out. GAWD. But the period itself — nada. Or very little like every six months. Hello awesomeness! And I’m not getting fat and having my brain short circuit making me not want sex at all like what happened on this pill, which is, I think, the pill’s magic formula. Make a girl fat and crazy and that’ll shut her knees up tight.

Also, I want you to look at this picture from BikePortland.org. [Did I do that right? PHOTO CREDIT BIKEPORTLAND.ORG. Right? Right?]

The Portland Naked Bike Ride thing was Saturday night. And I did not participate because I believe that a girl (me) looks better in some undergarments than completely naked. And plus, the position you’d have to be on while riding is not the most flattering for a lady who has been preggers before and who nursed. And because it’s called the naked ride, I didn’t think I could wear delicate underbits. But it turns out you can and now I’m in love with this girl. I love you bike lady.

Finally, did you get your Back Fence tickets? Back Fence is taking a break after our June show, so get your fix now. We’ll be back in Fall.

I’m Allergic to More Stuff!

Yesterday the Melissa Lion family went for a bike ride. And Steve was like, “Let’s ride to Hawthorne!” And I was like, “Wow! No!” And he kept asking and I kept saying no because if we were going to ride to Hawthorne from St. John’s we might as well have ridden to California. IT’S THAT FAR. We did ride all over the place to the tune of about 30 miles. Before everyone says, ooooooooh it’s not that far, keep in mind that my bike is the one with the trailer and the three year old.

I got home and promptly felt the earth tilting precariously to the right and my skin felt hot but I was freezing ass cold. And I was a wee bit barfy. I have determined that now I am allergic to the sun, sweating, exercise and NE Portland. But not pizza, which we may or may not have had for lunch.

But I am also addicted to riding my bike. And I want to do it again today, but I’m not going to because my hips feel like I’ve just given birth.

I’m also addicted to riding my bike because I get to pick up my size 8 jeans today from Nordstrom and I would have never fit into these jeans if it weren’t for riding my bike. And this brings me to a point that was brought up last week by KK, which was why is that women’s jeans are not too long on her. Kiala and I are the same height. What’s more, Frayn is also my height and she too doesn’t need jeans hemmed. I, however, will put on women’s jeans and if I had a hole punch and laces, I wouldn’t need shoes.

I’m not short. I’m 5′7″. And my legs aren’t mutantly short, but there you are. I need my jeans hemmed.

Then, yesterday, mediaChick brought up a good point regarding my boots: “Those darling boots have a 19″ shaft. Is it even physically possible to accommodate that?? Why are you looking at me like that?” First off, my advice for accommodating a long shaft: just breathe deeply, slowly and relax. Secondly, WHAT IF MY FREAKISHLY SHORT LEGS PREVENT ME FROM WEARING THESE BOOTS?

Seriously, internets. What if I can’t even wear them?

There’s only one way to find out: I need to buy them. But first I need a spare $402. And that’s where you come in, internets. This can work one of two ways. Either you, my fan club, can all visualize my receiving a check for $402 and promptly ordering those boots OR some rich person reading this blog (hello, Sister Sarah Palin?) can just order them for me and have them shipped to my house.

In either case, once I get them, I will film myself trying to put them on because I don’t think they have a zipper and that would be funny and then I’ll prance around in them and you all can either laugh hysterically because I look like one of the midgets from Under the Rainbow, or you can all lick your computer screen in envy and I’ll charge each of you a shiny nickel to admire them up close.

It’s up to you, Internets. It is up to you.

Sunday Parkways

Archie and I are doing Sunday Parkways today. If you don’t follow the link, six miles of streets in N Portland are closed to cars for the day and the streets are filled with bicyclists. It’s part of a convention in town to discuss carfree cities.

If I can bike someplace within an hour, I do it instead of using my car. Portland is perfect for this sort of thing because there are so many cyclists in the city and most streets have bike lanes. I used to ride my bike as my main transportation in San Francisco, and I can tell you Portland drivers are actually wonderful when it comes to bicyclists. It’s not to say I haven’t had a few close calls, especially scary because I have a bike trailer for Arch, but nothing like San Francisco. Every morning, Steve and I would ride from the beach to downtown and the Art Institute’s bus would try and run us off the roads. Make an honest attempt at killing us. It was really horrible. And FUCK THE ART INSTITUTE. Poseurs.

Anyway, I hope that if enough people support this thing, Portland will take steps to close off some streets to cars permanently. Maybe a route around the city that’s just for bikes and pedestrians. That would be very cool.

I bought my bike five years ago. It was really, really expensive for me at the time — $350. But, also at that time, gas was really expensive (probably around $2.) And the bike is Italian, which means the cost was rising and rising as the dollar was sinking and sinking. But I bought it and told the guy, “I just don’t want to buy gas anymore.” Same thing I say now.

It’s a perfect city bike. 8-speed with shimano parts and an internal derailleur, which, according to the bike guy at Mississippi Bikes, is not an internal derailleur but something else not French and cute sounding. Whatever.

How cute is it??? So cute. And yes, I used it for my author photo for Upstream, because I love my bike.

And it has this other cool thing happening with it. It’s a cafe racer. From when I bought it, ’til yesterday, I just thought that was a cute name Bianchi gave my bike. Because how cute? I race from cafe to cafe being French and cute. And then I was reading shoes on powerlines, and he’s got a whole post about converting a bike into a cafe racer. Well, the post is not about that. It’s about his roommate getting into an accident, which is just harrowing to read. And it’s been keeping me up at night because I was in a motorcycle accident (well, it was a Lambretta suped up to be freeway legal) when I was 23. I broke my femur (that’s a thigh bone) and my hip. It was horrible. I was in the hospital for a week and in traction and now I have a titanium rod in my leg and scars on my knee and my butt cheek where they cut me open to put the rod in. To read about someone else’s accident takes me right back to that moment and makes me want to scream STOP RIDING THOSE FUCKING ORGAN DONOR MACHINES. But you cannot say that to boys who ride motorcycles because they do not hear this. At all. So you say things like, oh, hmmm, and that must be scary. And you just scream inside.

Back to cafe racer. Apparently a cafe racer is the design of the bike. Maybe with a shorter body? Or a wheel tucked under the seat. Or I don’t quite know because that would involve knowing about gears and parts and things and I’m just a girl with a tiny girl brain. And a very cute bike.

So if you’re at Sunday Parkways on this rainy Portland day, ring your bell when you see me racing from cafe to cafe.