Long time, no see.
I’m back. I have innumerable excuses for why this post took me so long, but the universe has found a way for me to stop putting it off: I am currently on my couch with a heating pad, trying to manage some chronic lower back pain from a car crash I was in years ago. I could do without the back pain but at least I’m finally getting down to business.
Be prepared for what lies ahead - it’s going to be a wild ride. Already have too much excitement in your life? Just read a bulleted version of the post and you can be on your way:
NY Giants Ride 2022
Teaching Rosemarie About Her Bicycle
“One day, I meant to ride my bicycle but mostly just ate things”
Riding the Henry Hudson Trail in NJ
Birthday Ride
LI Housewarming Party
Prospect Park Laps
Brooklyn Ride Where I Eat Shit
Girls Bike NYC Ride to Randall’s Island
I Am Fostering a Cat and Four Kittens
I’ll still try to keep these short and sweet but no promises.
NY Giants Ride 2022
What a blast! The last Giants ride was in November of 2021, but I had to miss that one so I’m glad I was able to make this. I met up with Girls Bike NYC for what would be my second ride with them. Why didn’t I post about it sooner? Because on this day, I used my friend’s Insta360 One RS Twin and had this grand idea of editing the footage together for a blog post. Have I edited videos before? No. Why did I think it would be easy? Idk.
At first I gave up because I thought the footage was choppy and didn’t know how I could resolve that issue. Then, I decided I would go ahead and post whatever I had anyway. Despite making that decision, I never did it. Finally, weeks later, I spent about ten minutes editing the video. And you can tell I only spent ten minutes because half of it isn’t edited, it’s too long, there are no transitions, there are duplicate splices, and I have about 2 minutes of the same music on loop for the 20+ minute video. My excuse is that I do not have a computer with enough processing power to do this kind of editing so these efforts will have to take a backseat for now. Regardless, there is some really great footage and it was such an awesome ride. I always love when bikes take over NYC streets. Without further ado:
Teaching Rosemarie About Her Bicycle
Rosemarie is my mother. She and I are pretty different - she color coordinates her outfits (she has five pairs of the same sandals in different colors), she’s always wearing jewelry, she skeeves everything, and she’s not very adventurous. By some miracle, I convinced her to buy a bicycle for her house in Florida. I rode through her community when I visited in February and it’s a beautiful place for her to ride around in for some low-impact exercise. A few weeks ago, she video chatted me to tell me about her first ride and ask some questions. Buckle up.
Rosemarie was chatting with me from her laptop. When I asked her to show me her chain rings and cassette, she proceeded to try and maneuver her laptop’s camera, which proved difficult. I had her place the laptop on the floor to get a full view of the bike instead. The start of the conversation is educational and informative, as I teach Rosemarie about how to change her gears and am kindly reminded by my phone to pay my REI credit card.
Next, Rosemarie begins to recount her maiden ride. I expect a brief story. I am wrong.
Rosemarie was riding around her community, which has several walking bridges that cross the lake at points. At the base of one of these bridges was a young girl, sitting on a bench with her dog and reading a book. Rosemarie tried to play it cool and wave to the girl while riding over the bridge, but instead got stuck and couldn’t make it up, embarrassing herself in the process. She went on about how she hates the bridges so now I know where I get my hatred of hills from; I reassured her that with the proper gearing, she’ll be fine.
Then we moved onto her bicycle fashion. She forgot to bring sneakers with her and had a pair of loafers or a pair of flip-flops to ride in. With a focus more on fashion, rather than safety, here is Rosemarie explaining how she opted for the flip-flops because she felt the white loafers, “weren’t a good look.”:
Her first lesson was how to change her gears. Her next will be bicycle safety.
One day, I meant to ride my bicycle but mostly just ate things.
Yep, that’s it.
Riding the Henry Hudson Trail in Jersey
Another day, I rode the southern portion of the Henry Hudson Trail in New Jersey. This was the only picture I took the entire ride:
And it was only to express FOMO in the Girls Bike NYC group chat.
Birthday Ride
I went on ride for my birthday. I rode around Brooklyn, I ate, I drank, I chilled by the water.
Long Island Housewarming Party
I went to see my friends’, Lauren and Mark, new apartment house. This was my first time taking a bike on the LIRR.
They have the entire house to themselves! It is so cute and cozy and I was so happy to be able to see some friends that I haven’t seen in a very long time. I even got to meet my friends’ baby, Mabel! At the end of the night, I was gifted a dope balloon animal that accompanied me on my ride back to Brooklyn (I can write so much more about my emotions related to getting to see my friends but I said I’d try and keep this quick!).
Prospect Park Laps
A rough last few months but I’m finally starting to feel a lot better. Last week, I was able to get some laps in at Prospect Park after work one day. It felt GOOD and I even set a few PRs. Enjoyed the sunset for a bit afterwards.
Brooklyn Ride Where I Eat Shit
This past Saturday, I took my Pack Rat out but in my haste, forgot a lock. I was near Ride Brooklyn so I stopped in to grab one and ended up matching their storefront. After a day of riding the waterfront, we ended in Prospect Park. Obligatory stop at the dog beach before I unceremoniously ate it while hopping onto a dirt trail from the main loop (a friend was kind enough to document the scene of the crime). A combination of things led up to this incident but I would like to place all of the blame on the large stick that I had to pull out from between my rear tire and fender. I flew over the handlebars and naively thought the scrape on my leg would be the worst of it. Today, the bruises are almost at their peak ripeness (I’ll spare you those photos. Also, I may be in denial about the fact that my current back pain could be related to this fall).
Girls Bike NYC Ride to Randall’s Island
I didn’t let Saturday’s events stop me from going on my first ever Sunday ride with Girls Bike NYC! Girls Bike starts the season with Prospect Park laps before transitioning to Sunday rides. They also participate in local events and organized rides, which is how I started riding with them. I rode the marathon route last year and joined them for the Giants Ride a few weeks ago. Again, I could go on and on about how happy I am to have found this group of people to ride with but I’ll save it for another post.
This ride started at Grand Army Plaza and went up through Williamsburg and Greenpoint before crossing over the Kosciuszko Bridge (much discussion about the pronunciation) into Long Island City. Next was Manhattan, via the Queensboro Bridge, up 1st Avenue and over the Ward’s Island Bridge to Randall’s Island. I’ve only ever gotten to Randall’s Island by taking the RFK from Astoria so it was nice to learn and take a different route. We kept the ride tight, since it was Father’s Day and a lot of people had afternoon plans, but still made time for a coffee stop when we were up in Harlem. The ride was relaxed and fun and all of the people I rode with were so kind and friendly towards me. A lot of these women have been riding together for years but I immediately felt so welcome.
**Photo credit to everyone in Girls Bike NYC since I don’t know which photos I stole from the group chat.
I Am Fostering a Cat and Four Kittens.
You know how I always complain about how things are hectic and I’m always so busy? Well, we all know I do it to myself. I recently started fostering a mother, two of her four-week-old kittens, and two one-week-old kittens who were orphaned. The bike room has once again become the kitten room. It’s gonna be a fun few weeks…
