It's autumn in New York. The leaves are cool and crisp, the air is a brilliant red and gold, and the rats are wearing adorable little sweaters in a manner that simultaneously turns your stomach and warms your heart. But for cyclists, autumn means only one thing:
It's smuglocross season!
If you're looking to engage in some smuglocross this weekend, be sure to see the film "With My Own Two Wheels" this Sunday at Lincoln Center:
Details on the screening are here, and additionally the filmmaker has asked me to share the following information:
We are also doing an informal pre-screening ride from from the Brooklyn War Memorial in Cadman Plaza to Lincoln Center: roughly the distance that a student in Zambia has to commute to school every day. The ride departs at noon, and bike parking will be provided at Lincoln Center. We will have a specially-designed bike from World Bicycle Relief on hand for people to take turns riding, and SRAM and World Bicycle Relief founder FK Day will be in attendance.
Now that's some smuglocross. By the way, if the distance seems too daunting, I've been assured the ride will be making "guilt stops" every couple of blocks during which you will be upbraided for your life of Western privilege by a qualified World Bicycle Relief guilt administrator.
If that's not enough smuglocross for you, how about taking part in a "crowdsourced documentary" about cargo bikes?
As a proud (by which I mean smug) Big Dummy rider, I'm actually tempted to create my own "edit" and submit it to the project. At the moment, I'm leaning towards converting my Big Dummy to a "fixie," removing the brakes, and doing some "hillbombing" with a helmetless child and six full bags of Trader Joe's groceries.
If that's not enough smuglocross for you, how about taking part in a "crowdsourced documentary" about cargo bikes?
As a proud (by which I mean smug) Big Dummy rider, I'm actually tempted to create my own "edit" and submit it to the project. At the moment, I'm leaning towards converting my Big Dummy to a "fixie," removing the brakes, and doing some "hillbombing" with a helmetless child and six full bags of Trader Joe's groceries.
Of course, if smugness is not your bag of organic groceries, then maybe you'd be interested in yet another pointless "collabo" bike:
Sure, it can't really carry all that much, and sure it's not really helping anybody in need, and sure it's just a brown hybrid with some gratuitous bags on it, but the bike does have the ability to promote numerous brands at once as well as the capacity to "portage" a single t-shirt:
Cannondale's Michael DeLeon tells us that, in order to create the Junk Food version of their Bad Boy bike, the team spent two weeks meticulously stripping the black finish and removing every spoke from the rims, for a clean, detailed, matte-green repaint. Junk Food also designed the leather saddle bag—made to hold a rolled-up tee—and the tool bag gracing the bike frame that easily converts into a shoulder bag.
That's right, two whole weeks of meticulous stripping. Now that's what I call epic.
That's right, two whole weeks of meticulous stripping. Now that's what I call epic.
With that, I'm pleased to present you with a quiz. As always, study the item, think, and click on your answer. If you're right you'll experience a profound sense of happiness not unlike what you'd experience riding a cargo bike or helping a Zambian studient, and if you're wrong you'll see "cycle chic" American style.
Thanks very much for reading, ride safe, and beware of falling leaves.
Thanks very much for reading, ride safe, and beware of falling leaves.
--Wildcat Rock Machine
1) "ABSOLUTE NO!" Mark "The Man Missile" Cavendish refuses to wear:
1) "ABSOLUTE NO!" Mark "The Man Missile" Cavendish refuses to wear:
--Bib shorts
5) This is a walk-behind bakfiets.
The ultimate commuting frame material is:
--Distressed steel
--Disguised crabon
--Discolored aluminum
--Disgusting bamboo
--Pants
4) A Utah man was recently arrested for smuggling which piece of contraband inside his bicycle?
5) This is a walk-behind bakfiets.
--True
--False
--Speed
--Weed
--Tweed
***Special Ultimate Commuter-Themed Bonus Question***
The ultimate commuting frame material is:
--Distressed steel
--Disguised crabon
--Discolored aluminum
--Disgusting bamboo
102 comments:
1st!
Sweep!
FUNK WIZZ
4th
Hungover today?
Not so early doors
WEED!
finish!
Top ten?
damn you guys are quick
I don't understand why Cannondale would strip the paint off of one of their own bikes to repaint it?? Wouldn't it have made more sense to grab it off the assembly line before the "paint step" and just paint it the color they wanted from the beginning?
Lots of weed in this quiz.
Need to get baked, Snob?
Wow, that must have been some Simchas Torah celebration yesterday!
No bright lights or loud noises around the author of this blog today, please, and can somebody SHUT THAT DOG UP?
what the
Any one willing to help out my Kickstarter for the line of "artisanal chamois cream" I'm starting?
In all fairness, the disguised crabon frame is actually a disguised aluminum frame with disguised crapon seat and chain stays.
cool, i didn't realize we had so many zambian students living in NYC. i will keep an eye out for them on the brooklyn bridge.
Not reading the post, but reading the comments - I'll donate for artisanal chamois cream, as long as it is mayo-flavoured
Re: the Cannondale's Junk Food version of their Bad Boy bike, the saddle bag will be better utilized for carying the numerous band aids that I will need for my chaffed inner thighs and calves from rubbing against the leather frame bag.
that is one unctuous looking cipollini. that's what she said.
The bonus photo is hilarious. I love the fact that in spite of having a bike rack, he's got his bag hanging on the handlebar. The texting is just gravy.
Wow! A Walmart carbon fiber complete bike for $549? Like you, I paid more than that for my chainring bolts alone.
greetings and salutations.
On the same page as the carbon fiber Schwinn was an ad for the "Thruster," WM's $99.00 fixie.
They called it that because someone else apparently owned the rights to the "Fuck-wiggle."
The disguised crabon bike also apparently has a disguised crabon rear rack because there are clearly welds holding it together.
T.H.K,
By the time C-Dale translates the instructions into Chinese and sends them overseas to the manufacturer, they've already completed the C-Dale, Colnago, and Pinarello production runs.
I picked up a roll of bar tape in the LBS today...$37.50! I put it right back down. It had something about "Pro" on it.
@Jasper. Yer in luck. The key ingredients for the artisanal chamois cream are indeed mayo, as well as a dollop of unicorn tears.
@ terri hat carL;
good point. I think the fact that the assembly line is/was somewhere in the orient, coupled with the fact that all the frames are already welded, painted, and shipped is why.
COLL ABO*
Did Cannondale lose its equivalent of Steve Jobs? WTF?
Took me a stylishly long time to finish the quiz, but I'm feeling tastefully cool now, thanks.
Question #3 picture :
BEASTIE BOYS!
Oh, and BSNCY???
1. Typo
2. I have to ask because I'm dumb
3. All of the above.
Is Your Tweed(ish) Suit a My Morning Jacket cover band?
Interesting fork (fo? rk?) on that Cannondale. I suppose their next innovation will be to do away with the fork altogether and hold the wheel in place with mind control.
Trying to thell y'all ... ITH THABOTAAATHHHH!!!!
@PdxSmugFest - sweet, start harvesting those unicorns and sign me up.
Gotta love the whole "budget crisis, everything is tough" intro while she feeds her kids $8-$9-a-box cereal and wears her clips down the front stairs of her amazing house.
...so, lemme get this straight...
...i read in the the copy about the junk food clothing bike that cannondale equates their 'bad boy' bike with 'hell's angel' types ???...
...excuse the fuck outa me but BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA !!!...okay, sorry, i needed to get that outa my system...
...just sayin'...
Lady be-cool is the greatest..My mom actually smoked those..Ahh, those long car rides with the windows up and us kids trying to breath..memories
Wow, top 50. Only missed the smuggler question. Guessed Viagra/hamster because the first two were too plausible and the last I couldn't quite visualize how. I suppose with one of those double sprung Walmartcycles like the White Extremist only different.
Also, back in the day I really wanted to bang someone who looked just like the Kool lady. Ah.... memories.
the 'welds' on the disguised crapon/crabon are OBVIOUSLY part of the clever camouflage
i shouldn't even have to say this!
you guys are pulling my femur, pretending not to see that!
wle.
Oh, and thanks for the raisins. They were delicious. Ride Kool, all!
Nebraska Bike Commuter:
I am glad that I may not be the only one who thinks that Doris Day, Barbara Feldon, Elizabeth Montgomery and Barbara Eden are among the most beautiful women who ever lived.
You can have your Brittneys, Lindsays and Parises.
mmm
Elizabeth Montgomery
http://www.hissandpop.com/celebrities/m/elizabethmontgomery/photos/elizabeth-montgomery-001.jpg
Only got one wrong on the quiz.
And now I feel like taking up smoking.
Or at least taking up banging that chick in the commercial with the oral fixation.
Bamboo is never disgusting,..... until Specialized gets a hold of it.
I am waiting for the collaboration with Panda Express.
"I don't understand why Cannondale would strip the paint off of one of their own bikes to repaint it?? Wouldn't it have made more sense to grab it off the assembly line before the "paint step" and just paint it the color they wanted from the beginning?"
Do you understand the words "Made in China"? Cheaper to strip, than send somebody to China to think.
...good point 'stupid name' & others...
...it also adds that certain required 'panache', yes ???..."our artisans, here in america, spent long hours striving to give this bike a personal touch like no other..."...
..."blah, blah, blah, hooey, hooey, hooey"...oh, sorry, i was starting to sound like 'best made' for a minute there...
...jeez, i AM getting cynical these days...
The Hell's Angels have a spot on East Third Street--they own the whole building-- it's the safest block in NYC.
Be careful walking by the Harleys, though.
@BGW
Yeah, but you come by it honestly.
...ain't THAT the truth...
...& so much 'material' to work with...
ummmmm tastes like cancer. feels like smugness. top 53?
I prefer More menthols.
They're on a popular social media and personal information gathering site.
Yeah, so do Kools. Effers.
Snob y'all be jonesin fa da shit, call ya local deala
Snob y'all be jonesin fa da shit, call ya local deala
I can't find messenger tape.
Can anybody point me to a source?
...anon 6:38pm...out in the garage...could be under the kitchen sink...try in the back shed or maybe an old toobox...
...i know you've got some...
Wow,feel the smugness in that cargo bike vid. They make our politician's sanctimonious bullshit look like the kind of polite "public debate" they always pretend it to be. Can we ever convert people to cycling by boring them to death with our earnestness?
Cipo likes the peehole
Why do you keep on bitchin´ on that cargo bike video and the method described?
Do you prefer people keeping on driving their cars/trucks instead of doing their transportation/hauling with a bike when possible?
If you find this video sucks, why the fuck don´t you try to find a better way to change things???
I´m all ears.
78 revolutions per minute....
SLF
hey nonny mouse.
(Go For It!)
If they smoke, they poke! Kool, man, Kool.
Those raisins may end up producing brightly colored Skittles.
Oh, and way to go Cipo.
That Kool cig vid brought back
memories of outdoor
afternoon delights.
Sun light coitis
is my favorite
finish to a ride.
JDH, my wife quit smoking...
Well this is odd. "Two whole weeks of meticulous stripping" was the project for which my dog sought a Ford Foundation grant.
I told him he would have better luck finding funding on Kickstarter for his vacation visiting gentlemen's clubs.
I don't have the heart to tell him that there is no right tree for him to bark up on this one.
Ride safe all!
The Tour de Bronx is Sunday. My dog says he's got the legs to dominate the Tour this year if he doesn't get distracted scoping out sea food places on City Island.
Hi Snobby, check out this 'safety campaign' in south australia: http://www.mac.sa.gov.au/popup/tv_campaign_multi.php?id=214
a shame you had to be cynical about the Two Wheels film. I saw it recently, didnt know anything about it, was pleasantly surprised and impressed by it. Just shows how something like a bike, which wankers (including you, however much you try to distance yourself) make into a big, fashionable, look at me statement about themselves, with all your self important first world problems; when in other cases access to a bike for a medic can influence the balance between life and death, in the case of the HIV case worker in the film. But fair enough, you're a rich American, from New York as well, so i guess we can look forward to criticism of such globally engaging and pressing topics as minimalism (its been a while), road racing shaving trends, and Steve Jobs products, all done in that supposed high ironic style.
Or "hipsters" maybe? Those people you claim to despise, but seem to know a lot about it, and obsess over from time to time. Even the "cool" Americans like yourself, from such supposed enlightened enclaves as NY, are just as repulsive as the rest of your gun toting, funeral picketing, bible thumping, Tea Partying brethren, in your own special way. We are thankful that most of you do not have passports.
Damn you disguised crabon, damn you to HELL!
Another great week for what is consistently the funniest and most interesting bike blog on the whole damn intaweb - cheers WRM.
I heard Gwenyth saw your post last week and wasn't impressed. She said, "Blogging isn't writing, it's just graffiti with punctuation... cough... cough... cough"
..."blah, blah, blah, hooey, hooey, hooey"...oh, sorry, i was starting to sound like 'best made' for a minute there...
Best pint made, specialized is the "Best Made" of the bicycle industry,
Style, no function, all BS. Why did it have to happen?
...@londoner 3:02 & 3:09am...
...rather than being so veddy british & holding your nose, you should take a deep breath...what you smell is a cesspool of your own shit...
...grab a life preserver, mate, 'cuz you're floundering helplessly in it...
...i feel it redundant to mention your limited sense of perspective which you let virtually drip from your every word but you seem to forget that it speaks more of you, sir, than that which you criticize...
...as we say, just sayin'...
Londoner may be the only English person without a sense of humor.
Tour de Bronx riders,
looks like the long route paases by the MOSHOLU GOLF COURSE. Stop by, if you need to use the bathroom, or maybe grab a snack and a drink.
I commute by bike year round here in Vancouver. Naturally, I have smugness a-plenty when it comes to this sort of thing, but the Cargo-Bike video really raises the smugness bar. I'd have been more positive about it if the main cargo didn't seem to Mr and Mrs (or Mr and Mr, Mrs and Mrs etc) Smuggers' planet-f$%^ing spawn.
SUPER blog !
Dear Mr. or Ms. Londoner --
My dog says you write good English for a foreigner.
He respectfully suggests, however, that you mistranslated Mr. BSNYC's post, which was a friendly "shout out" and "plug" for the Two Wheels film and related ride.
He further opines that your error is understandable given the differences in our respective languages.
He wonders if your rush to "judgement" was fueled by envy. After all, we here in Canada's soft underbelly have given the world NASCAR, Freedom Fries and professional wrestling. What has Britain ever contributed to literature and culture? Martin Amis? Oh please.
I would ignore his last remark.
I would also ignore his suggestion that your reference to a "First World" and a "Third World" is either bigoted (don't we all share the same world, why get trapped in that whole divisive ranking canard?) or indicative of ingestion of hallucinogens (as an alternative reality enthusiast, he wonders if you brought enough for everyone).
Honestly, what does he know? He licks himself.
And you could be from London, Ontario.
Did I contribute something? I must have been out of it at the time...have to say, that bally Londoner is giving us a bad name.
Address Occupy Wall Street, snob. Please.
Apparently Occupy Wall Street has many addresses around the world. Their main location is in Zuccotti Park, formally known as the Liberty Plaza Park, in the Wall Street Financial District. The address of this park is 1 Liberty Plaza, New York, New York 10006.
Now, why you would want WCRM to provide this address I have no idea. I would think if you wanted the address that badly, you could google it for yourself.
Dear Londoner
Leroy's dog took the words right out of my mouth. Indeed.
wp
"address" as in "speak to"? why would el snoberino want to give a speech? oh, yes-he does have that book (he claims he wrote) to sell. will soros allow it?
86
...anon 6:38pm if you show up for the recumbent ride and BGW offers to fill your water bottle and then is squirreling around under the counter GET OUT...that is where he keeps the recumbent ruffies.
...@londoner 3:02 & 3:09am...we only like hard british cocks!
KNEEL BEFORE ZOD.
No comment.
I love Neil Young!
iamagiantinthejizzcuzziebizznesscomeoverandplay
Loved this blog
Honda CBR 250 RR review
some Kool raisins smuggled would be nice right now...wake and play!
recumbent ruffies?
is that really necessary?
97
98
Kalifornia
Uber alles!
100st and perfect score! woot
And the samurai sword guy lives in... wait for it.. Magna! Huzzah!
re:smug(l)ocross?
lets call it smug-o-cross, not smuglocross? or it did originated from smugglers?
My bike and my ass have now made it onto bike snob. I've clearly accomplished something.
not sure if that picture Mario Cipollini is photoshoped.
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