What advantages are there in riding a bike like this?

Where do I go to... buy a bike.

I.
Bought.
a.
BIKE!!!

A warm thank you to Neighbor Joe for telling me about Chubby's Cruisers. I found a bicycle that was right for me. I got a "hybrid", that is, it is a hybrid between a mountain bike and a cruiser.


The owner, Nicole, on my new bike.



My bike, with a basket.



More bikes. I just bought one though.


I asked the owner how she got into selling bikes. She said that she started off fixing and selling bikes from her backyard and then decided to open up a store.

Nice staff. Nice owner. Good selection of bikes. Any bike that you buy from them they will do check ups and fix anything that needs to be fixed as long as you have the bike. There are certain limitations to that though. They won't fix your bike if you intentionally break it, or something like that. Anyway, its a great place to get a bike. I highly recommend them.

Chubby's Cruisers
2047 La Cienega Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90034
310.202.0005

Police Bicycles

On Central Ave in Little Tokyo.

Errands

I had to do a few errands around downtown the other day, (i)go to a Japanese market in Little Tokyo to get some dried seaweed and (ii) go to Grand Central Market to get some nopales and plantains.

As I was walking to Little Tokyo from the Historic Core, I made the decision to get a bike. I have safety concerns about riding a bike in LA, but fuck it I'll just ride on the sidewalk. It would have saved me a considerable amount of travel time. I didn't want to take my scooter because I didn't want to schlep it around inside the stores, and the chain that I use to chain it to bike posts was accidently left at work.

I don't have a place to put it in my place (yet). I wish we had more bike racks in my neighborhood. -Heck, all over the city for that matter.

Anyway, so I was walking up Main St on my way to the office depot in Little Tokyo. I passed by this man standing by a phone booth. He asked me if I can take a picture of him with City Hall in the background. He looks as though he may have been standing there for a while looking for somebody to take a picture of him. I told him I will do it only if he would let me take a picture of him.

So he let me take a picture of him:



I have been wanting to take pictures of people I see in the streets for YEARS. I just never had the audacity to just do it without asking, or to ask them and then do it. Its just so awkward. At most I have just been taking pictures of people's feet and legs in the subway:






Or the backs of unsuspecting people from the back of the bus:




Or their refection (in addition to the backs of their heads):




Or unsuspecting people waiting for the subway:




Or photos of people I intentionally take while I am pretending to fiddle with my camera:




But for now on, whenever somebody asks me for something when I am out and about, whether it be for change, directions, the time, etc. They will have to let me take a picture of them otherwise they get jack shit from me.

On my way to that Japanese market in that pedestrian walk way between 1st and 2nd street, I came across a musician named Greg Walsh playing the shamisen



He had a gathering of women over the age of 70 around him sort of dancing their upper torso while sitting and he was just simply awesome. I bought his CD for a reasonable $5.

On my way back to the historic core I saw some guy on 3rd St riding a rather unusual bike:



It looks uncomfortable. I would have asked if I could try it if I wasn't wearing a skirt. That is simply the worse way to travel on wheels if you are wearing a skirt.

I ran into Ricky The Pirate and he let me take several photos of him. I'll do a post later of all the pictures that I took. I think he is quite photogenic.



I then went to grand central market to buy some nopales and plantains.





Then I went home to make cooked plantains, nopales with tomato and wild mushrooms.

A future post will be on how to make this favorite nopales dish of mine.

How I Roll

I wish I could ride my bike around town and be safe doing so.- Or at least have the illusion that its safe. But the truth is, I just do not want to share the road with cars and people who are driving them.

Instead, I stroll around town in this:

My scooter parked in my office.


When I am rolling around the city, people often ask me "What are you riding?" And then I say "a xootr." And then they say "what?" And then I spell out "x-o-o-t-r".

If I am not in a hurry I will get off and let them try it.

If where I have to go is less than 1.5 miles, I ride the xootr.
If where I have to go will take me a half hour or less via walking and public transport, I do public transport. [This has been my new policy ever since I finally got my own car a few months ago (I'm 26 years old). Before then, I would do foot and public transport because those were my only options.]

Pedicabs!

Photo by MetroRiderLA.


Check out this recent post by MetroRiderLA.

I have yet to see them around in person...

Vintage Memo, Age Five

My old RTD bus pass.

Retro Public Transit Ad

As some of you know, before there was the MTA, there was the RTD.

I recently came across this old RTD commercial on Franklin Ave: