Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Bikes: There Goes the Neighborhood

Futher to yesterday's post, a number of readers pointed out that I may have incorrectly identified the nationway of the Mankini Castaway's flag:



To wit:

Anonymous said...


Rookie error by BikeSnob NYC there, confusing the Aussie Flag with what is actually the New Zealand flag...its a New Zealand flag, ergo, the guy on the roof was a sheep rooter/defiler....


our Kiwi cousins often pretend to be Aussies because they are so ashamed of their minnow status in everything...


July 30, 2012 9:48 PM

I'm not even sure it's possible to positively identify the flag given the extremely poor quality of the picture, which I took with professional quality photo equipment from the cockpit of a helicopter, and not with a Cheetos dust-smudged smartphone from my couch.  In fact, I'm not even sure it's possible to positively identify that flag if you're standing right in front of it, since the Australian flag looks like this:


And the New Zealand flag looks like this:


Or maybe the Australian flag looks like this:


And the New Zealand flag looks like this:



Honestly I have no idea.  All I know is that if these two so-called "countries" want people to be able to tell them apart they should at least have different flags.  It can also be difficult to differentiate Canadians from actual Americans, but you can't say our flags aren't distinctive.  Here's Canada's:
(That's a maple leaf, and not a silhouette of two turkeys humping.)

And here's America's:


(America: Guns, Trucks, and Money)

Betsy Ross sewed the first American flag back in 1492 (that's "sewed" in the American sense, meaning that she drew it on paper and then had it made in China), and you can see why we don't stitch that onto our backpacks like the Canadians do.  Instead, we just stitch Canadian flags on there so people will be nice to us and not take us hostage.

(By the way, if you ever want to be sure the person you're dealing with is an actual Canadian, just ask him or her to name the US Secretary of State.  If he answers correctly, then he's a Canadian.)

Meanwhile, here in Brooklyn, bike thefts in Williamsburg have apparently quadrupled:


I'm no criminalologist, but there are three (17) likely explanations for this:

1) More people are cycling in Williamsburg;
2) Criminals have realized that more people are cycling in Williamsburg and have decided to start taking their bicycles from them;
5) Given the constant influx of transplants from other parts of the United States, the typical Williamsburger is now roughly four times more likely to be utterly clueless, which makes taking bikes from them extremely easy;
D) A fine dessert cheese can complement any meal.

I told you I wasn't a criminalologist.

So what can you do to protect your bike?  Well, obviously you should put a lock on it, and it also helps if your city bike is an easily replaceable piece of crap and not a $5,000 rolling artisanal handjob:

Hey, it's a very nice bike, but this is Brooklyn and not Portland.  Sure, it's almost impossible to tell the two places apart now, but the resemblance is still largely superficial.

Also, according to a bike messenger quoted in the above article, you should also personalize your bike and have lots of friends:

Ciminera, 29, said she didn't go to the police when her bike was stolen months ago, but that other members of the bike messenger community spotted it 15 minutes after she sent a mass text message to make people watch out for the personalized two-wheeler, whose stickers and decorations made it recognizable.


"They went on a high-speed chase and got it back," recalled Ciminera. "It's good to personalize your bike, not just to ride around a factory Schwinn."

I drive more people away from me every year so the friend thing is not an option, but the personalization tip is a particularly good one, so I took her advice by putting distinctive $2,000 crabon racing wheels on my Scattante and then hanging a bunch of $600 electronic rear derailleurs from the top tube.  Sure, all that cost me more than a Beloved, but if the bike gets stolen while I'm in a bar getting drunk with a bunch of Portland transplants it will be instantly recognizable.

Ironically though, while everyone seems to want to steal bikes in Brooklyn, nobody in Brooklyn seems to want bikes around.  Consider the $40 million velodrome a wealthy benefactor wants to gift to the city, and which the neighborhood residents don't want:


So what could possibly be so bad about putting a velodrome on the Brooklyn waterfront?  Well, here's the mind-bendingly paradoxical reasoning behind the opposition:


Leaders of the major community groups in the neighborhoods abutting the park, including Brooklyn Heights and Dumbo, have questions about the track. They say they worry about the building’s size (with a footprint of up to 70,000 square feet, it is larger than a football field) and the traffic it might draw to the cobbled streets of Brooklyn Heights, while pointing out the relatively obscure nature of track cycling, in which riders on fixed-gear bicycles without brakes travel at terrific speeds around curves banked at 45-degree angles.

In other words, they say that arena will draw too much traffic, yet at the same time track cycling is "obscure," which means nobody is going to come see it.  I suppose the project is also too big yet too small, and too cheap yet too expensive, and too crazy yet too sane, and up is down, and 2+2+5.


On top of all this, I wonder if it ever occurred to any of the brilliant amateur urban planners who comprise these "community groups" that a lot of these bike racing fans might actually ride their fucking bikes to the velodrome, and that you could fit about a hundred bikes in the space two of these "community group" members take up with their cars.

I was also intrigued by the article's description of track racing:

"...riders on fixed-gear bicycles without brakes travel at terrific speeds around curves banked at 45-degree angles."

Is it even necessary to explain the concept of bikes racing around an indoor track?  I remember when journalists used to explain the fixed-gear trend by saying they're like the bikes track racers use.  Now they explain track racing by saying they're like the bikes fixed-gear riders use.  It makes track racing sound like some kind of newfangled indoor alleycat, and as though track racing followed the fixed-gear trend and not the other way around.

But the most convincing anti-velodrome argument was this completely irrelevant zebra metaphor:

“You can paint stripes on a horse, but that doesn’t make it a zebra,” said Peter Flemming, co-chairman of the independent Brooklyn Bridge Park Community Council and a resident of Brooklyn Heights. “Nor can calling this a ‘field house’ make it anything other than an Olympic-class track-cyling velodrome.”

You can call a velodrome cockblocker the co-chairman of the independent Brooklyn Bridge Park Community Council, but that doesn't make him not a velodrome cockblocker.

Oh, also, someone named Candace is afraid velodrome-bound cars could "overwhelm the neighborhood:"

Candace Lombardi, a Brooklyn Heights resident of 17 years, said she worried that the cars that would most likely descend on the velodrome could overwhelm the neighborhood. (There is no parking in the plan.) “This is a little 19th-century street with cobblestones,” she said, pointing to the foot of Joralemon Street, which is near the proposed site. “I’m just thinking about all the spectators and the traffic this will bring.”

Between this and the complaints about bike share stations, people in Brooklyn Heights must have the most bloated sense of entitlement on this side of the Willamette.  Brooklyn Heights is right on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge, and adjacent to downtown Brooklyn, which is full of courthouses and municipal buildings and colleges and office buildings--yet somehow the velodrome is going to be the thing that "overwhelms the neighborhood."  I'd suggest to Candace Lombardi that if she's looking for tranquility she made a bad choice by moving to Brooklyn Heights, and if she wants a peaceful upscale enclave dripping with charm and cachet and within reasonable commuting distance to Manhattan she may want to look into a picturesque little neighborhood called Connecticut.

As for the pro-velodrome people, they've found themselves a handy scapegoat in the form of beach volleyball players:

As for critics who have dismissed track cycling as elitist, obscure or simply weird, Mr. Reiners countered that Brooklyn Bridge Park recently opened three regulation-size sand volleyball courts on Pier 6. “If that’s the criteria for building facilities in this park, that it has to be very well known and popular, then that seems like a facetious argument,” he said. “Beach volleyball is fairly obscure itself.”

Actually, the solution is obvious, and I think the perfect compromise would be to use the space not as a velodrome but as an indoor cyclocross park where the riders compete in bikinis.  This should please everybody.  Plus, everybody knows cyclocross is the new track racing anyway.  Buying an expensive track bike, saying you're going to take it to the velodrome, and never actually doing it is so five years ago.  Now it's all about buying an expensive cyclocross bike, saying you're going to race cyclocross, never actually doing it, but justifying the bike by riding it on a short gravel path every once in awhile and taking lots of photos of it.

As for the people who actually do race track bikes, the "simply weird" criticism isn't entirely unwarranted.  Consider this article which was forwarded to me by a reader:


Are you wondering what the Olympic athletes are doing to pass the time before they compete in competitions they've trained their entire lives for?


If you're part of the German men's cycling team, then you pass the time by pulling down your pants and having a good old fashioned "quad off."

As well as the accompanying Tweet:



Actually, there's nothing weird about that, it's just Hans and Franz hanging out with in the Olympic Village's Castro district with no pants on.

Between the beach volleyball and the "quad-offs" the Brooklyn waterfront is going to be the new Muscle Beach.

111 comments:

Anonymous said...

nonplussed blog reader

Serial Retrogrouch said...

viva vino... viva kazakhstan... viva la vida loca!

singlespeedwaster said...

Podium! That's what I call a neighbourhood

I KNOW THAT said...

GG ALLIN IS NOT A BIKEY BOY

tridork said...

Long time reader…first time top ten?
(cyclist gone to the tri dark side, but at least I know how to put my helmet on the right way)

Anonymous said...

TOOOOP TEEEEN

Bonk said...

Potato-nd!

crosspalms said...

I guess if you have a big public park with recreational facilities of any kind, the last thing you want is people showing up to use them.

Anonymous said...

Missed the podium to stare at quads.

Anonymous said...

KNEEL BEFORE ZOD.

abelgus said...

God I read the post twiste an still top 15

abelgus said...

On second thought, I am selling eleventh place to vino.

Anonymous said...

Hot quads!

Anonymous said...

Top twenty?

balls®

Anonymous said...

NICE POST

re: VELO DROM

I was totally into the sport, committed and dedicated. I got a bike, several wheelsets, cogs, etc. After I was fully kitted I looked around for a place to ride it. It was too far away. So the thing goes unridden, the 220psi sew-ups cracking with age as entire cans of glue dry out in situ.

Sheep said...

little people spoof

McFly said...

Cobbles? Velodrome? Drunk People? Sounds like a Nouveau Paris-Roubaix. 45 degrees seems a little chilly for bicycle racing though.

le Correcteur said...

WRM: "Cheetos dust-smudged" should be "Cheetos-dust-smudged" or "Cheetos-dust smudged" maybe.

Top twenty anyway, and I read it well enough to nitpick!

Anonymous said...

DEM QUADZZ

Anonymous said...

Is it just me, or did it seem like Snob was trying too hard today?

Fred Nifacent said...

Missed the podium, circuitous arguement made me ride in circles and got I lost circling back

Anonymous said...

Top XX !! Oh! Even noted the Kwad-Off, awesome!!

Nice Vein said...

Those quads don't look very aero.

Anonymous said...

Snob - did you mean to wit or twit?

cycle

Anonymous said...

There's 20M sheep in New Zealand. 4M think they're human.

BikeSnobNYC said...

Anonymous 1:25pm,

It was you. I'm not saying the post was good, I'm just saying I never try at anything.

--Wildcat Rock Machine

Anonymous said...

Well, if there are colleges nearby, why not just combine the track with some bedrooms and make it the Velodorme?

babble on said...

You've got something against rolling artisanal handjobs?

Anonymous said...

Can we have the velodrome if you* don't want it? It's always bloody raining here and ours is outdoors.

*that's a generalised rather than a specific "you", obviously....

hey nonny mouse

JB said...

babble on: when they cost $5k, yes.

FR8 said...

Brooklyn+Velodrome = Circular argument

mikeweb said...

I was a co-founder and president of a 'community organization' in a neighborhood that borders Brooklyn Heights a few years back.

It still never ceases to amaze me how tight of a death grip some people cling to the status quo with.

I think Ms. Candace needs to walk out of her apartment which is undoubtedly way less than 1,000 sq. ft. yet north of $3,000 a month, and take a look at the traffic on Clinton, Hicks, Henry, Atlantic, etc. on the average weekend. Oh yeah, and the BQE. I think the truck exhaust soot from that thoroughfare that's filling her lungs has gone to her brain and polluted it with idiocy.

I am a quad engine said...

"Actually, the solution is obvious, and I think the perfect compromise would be to use the space not as a velodrome but as an indoor cyclocross park where the riders compete in bikinis. "

Fucking brilliant, how about borat mankinis, that will give a boost to bike racing and give it instant credibility.

recumbent conspiracy theorist said...

If I'm gonna blow 5K on a rolling artistanal handjob I'm at least going with the budnitz. I like ti.

If you're thrifty the budnitz no. 4 is cro-moly and it's only $2500.

Literal grammer nazi said...

"There's 20M sheep in New Zealand. 4M think they're human."

There are 4,405,200 humans in New Zealand, and they act like sheep.

Serial Retrogrouch said...

NIMBY cunts!

Anonymous said...

You forgot the bible—that goes on there too.

You call those big quads...my parakeet has bigger quads than that!

pebes said...

three things:
1) I saw that thigh pic yesterday and, without reading the caption, thought "ew, midget bodybuilders are even grosser than full sized bodybuilders".
2) new zealanders are crazy good sailors. the America's cup contest that is going on right now has a disproportional number of kiwis- even the chinese team is skippered by a sheep buggerer. i bet they'll win the olympics.
3)i fucking hate nimbys.

that is all

Anonymous said...

@ le Correcteur at 1:22

I believe either the original "Cheetos dust-smudged" or your alternative "Cheetos-dust-smudged" will work. I don't believe "Cheetos-dust smudged" will work in this case.

Anonymous Coward said...

@McFly depending on your degree-way, 45 degrees might be a bit warm for bike racing

Serial Retrogrouch said...

yeh, but would you call your country a cunt?

Bob said...

It ain't just Brooklyn - a neighbourhood in Edmonton, Alberta, opposed plans to expand an already-existing velodrome in a public park over similar concerns. Must be all those cycling hooligans, eh?

Tenured and Bitter said...

Candace Lombardi. 17 years in Brooklyn. Fucking Newbies. Like zealous converts to a new religion.
Nimby Newbies. The worst.

le Correcteur said...

Anonymous at 2:17:

Any particular reason why? Or are you simply giving and argument from authority (while being anonymous)?

Is your name Kate Turabian? No, she died in 1987.

leroy said...

My dog regularly pees in Brooklyn Heights.

I thought he was just too lazy to ride to Piermont, but thanks to today's post, I realize what he's up to.

He's marking territory before the neighbors get there.

RANTWICK said...

quad off: DNF

grog said...

Recumbabe is not nimby, and she doesn't play volleyball in a bikini.

Portland Is Ofay! said...

Props for dropping the Brooklyn knowledge, Snob; the Heights 'community' blowhards are beyond insipid and totally full of shit; DUMBO anything is beyond the pale.

It's like the Heights and "Boerum Hill" morons arguing against the Brooklyn House of Detention...

... which was their FIRST and is conveniently located-- wow, what do you know-- adjacent very nearby the courts its inhabitants will appear in.

Maybe these fine WHITE people would prefer the Brooklyn pen be in East New York, Brownsville, New Lots or Canarsie, places none of them have ever BEEN except skirting on the way to airport or Jackie Robinson Pkwy?

Q: How often has the Flushing, Kew Gardens etc community found need to protest the track at Kissena Park?

Anonymous said...

No way, the terrorists might use the velodrome to stage attacks. A 40 million terrorist training center? Why don't they build a free parking silo for cars instead?

Rick said...

@ le Correcteur

"Use a hyphen to join two or more words serving as a single adjective before a noun."
[Harbrace College Handbook, 7th edition, p185 (1972)]

"dust" and "smudged" definitely both modify "lens." Is "Cheetos" also serving as an adjective here? On second thought, maybe so.


Rick (formerly known as anonymous)

McFly said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Marcel Da Chump said...

Williamsburg needs a Bike Dick.

crosspalms said...

Are you sure that's a flag?

Anonymous said...

Wow. Suddenly I'm a Greipel fan.

CommieCanuck said...

Snob,

I'm insulted by your ignorance.

That thing in the middle of the Canadian flag is a silhouette of two gay beavers french kissing.

LeGA YBVR


Sure, build a velodorome and they will come, they meaning every asshole who hates fit people to try and shut it down. Meanwhile, you can setup a donut shop anywhere, even across the street from another donut shop, both with drive-thrus to fuck up the whole neighbourhood.

Meh.

DerZoots said...

Circular logic is my favorite.

pebes said...

i think crosspalms nailed it!!!
and check this out http://www.itati-shop.com/products/Man-Beach-towel-170x75cm.html
its probably not even a real body builder.

Anonymous said...

Not surprisingly, bigger quads exist on idle Brooklyn Heights residents.

RantsnobTaxpayer said...

As soon as I read the velodrome story in the Times this morning I couldn't wait for the snob-blog. Perfect. A few observations though, 1)Trader Joe's brought more artery-clogging car traffic to the neighborhood than the entire US Olympic Cycling Team could do while riding around the proposed velodrome to celebrate George Roebling's birthday. 2)While it's true that the track-races will probably be attended primarily by sans-cars cyclists, this logic will only cause the anti-bikelane brooklyn contingent to rally around the flag to decry the hoard of 2-wheel maniacs about to descend on poor little 19th century, cobblestoned, Brooklyn Bridge Park. 3)Why does EVERY public work have to (supposedly) be common, and popular, and universally acclaimed, and non-controversial? This city is awash in basketball courts and baseball diamonds. That's fine with me, but I have no interest in either. There are also a few running tracks around, that's cool too- I used to be a serious runner. So with the number of bicyclists exponentially increasing- what's so revolutionary about the velodrome proposal? This whole thing is getting me angry, now that I think about it...

Trailer Park Cyclist said...

Has anybody ever figured out how to pronounce "rorschach," or spell it?

Wasn't he a character in "Welcome Back Kooter?"

Plus, lots of oddly-shaped scantily clad men of questionable nationality.

All in all, not bad...not bad at all.

ROAR SHACK

Unknown said...

No, that's an Australian flag. it's got a big streak of vomit on it. "Aussie Aussie Aussie! Oi! Oi! Oigghhhhhherrrgghh…"

Salty and Sore said...

The parking argument is actually a good one. 4 out of 5 dentists agree.

45 degrees is rather Portland of you. Our track maxes out at 28. Good luck, and and when can I get tickets?!

BKLN KIRN

Anonymous said...

Rorschach; there was a programme on Radio 4 about him last week. And then there's Poison Ivy.....

With regard to today's grammar/usage quandary, I would go with "Cheeto-smudged" if I actually knew what a Cheeto was....

hey nonny mouse

rantsnob said...

Oh, and this from an earlier column about this same park...
"Pier 5 is set to open this fall, with new athletic fields, while development plans call for Pier 2 to offer five acres of racket sports."

from this:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/20/nyregion/40-million-pledged-for-brooklyn-bridge-park.html

Oh, the horror! Does anyone expect 5 acres-worth of racket-sport types to be arriving by foot??
Grrr...
I guess racket-sport traffic is so much more genteel and soft-treading on these poor little cobble-stone streets...

Bicyclingist said...

I finally figured out who is stealing all those bikes....its all the bike haters of Brooklyn! Their mission is to steal all the bikes in NY .... no bikes , no cyclists!

rantsnob said...

Sorry, not meaning to be anti-racket-sport. I see lots of bikes out there with rackets attached. I'm done.

Crispy Kale said...

Members of State Farm's Youth Advisory Board (a grant decisionmaking body) call themselves "YABBIES." This is ripe for referencing.

http://www.facebook.com/SFYAB/posts/115884201890224

http://www.statefarmyab.com/

Anonymous said...

They should think more progressively about the space in Brkln hghts:

Due to the future need for sustainable energy, a reliable, local form of electricity is needed.

Henceforth I propose to use the spaceto house hundreds upon hundreds of bicycle powered electricity generators.

It solves racers' need to generate watts and the need for nearby Brooklyn Heights residents to sop up more of the gravy born of their exalted position in life.

Anonymous said...

Kristin Armstrong is nursing abrasions and cuntusions suffered in her Olympic road race crash on Sunday.

Aryan Nation said...

So steroids really do make your junk shrink? Or is it just a German thing?

rantsnob said...

I can't help myself- one last rant.
From the Times article, "Some also doubt Mr. Rechnitz’s motives: a 47-year-old resident of the Upper West Side, he is an avid amateur track cyclist who has tried — and failed — to bring a velodrome to the city. Now, they say, he is buying the track he wants, on public land."
Imagine this entry, "Some also doubt Ms. Flugelheim's motives: a frustrated opera singer herself, she now plans to fund the building of a concert hall on the city's upper west side." (You can probably make up your own example, even more relevant than that...)
Can you imagine the Times scaring off culture-donors with a line like that?

Anonymous said...

USAC is busy fellating the Tri-geek rejects with more money than brains buying EPO over the Interwebs to have them RIDE to the velodrome. Nooo!

Ample parking and triple-high parking garage ceilings for luxury sports cars with crabon fibre track bikes affixed to their roofs is what's called for.

I've lived near two velodromes for most of my adult life. Neither one of them generates much of anything year round. Not even for a UCI World Cup.

babble on said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Soup Nazi said...

That Morton bike's bar tape is called "Brooks Leather Black/Honey." Personally, I prefer neon-red plastic and high fructose corn syrup bar tape. That's cuz I gots me some street creds, not that fancy-schmancy crap!

Seinfeld said...

Not that there's anything wrong with that!

Anonymous said...

Panties!

blah said...

Up here in Burnaby (Canada) we have an indoor velodrome with volleyball courts on the infield. It adds a huge level of excitement when you are racing and someone yells "BALL!" and everyone in the sprint looks up trying to avoid getting hit by it.

blah said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Really Hungry Panda said...

So now velodromes are superfluous since all we need is a quad-off.

Should save money on infrastructure and parking. Small Yabbies are a small price to pay for really big quads. You just need to set your priorities.
Nice stretch armstrong picture, I will send you a camera made in the 60s which could take better pictures than your satellite.

Anonymous said...

fucking canadians always multi-tasking.

McFly said...

Ermahgerd. Comment Sexshun.

Anonymous said...

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Bobby said...

Hey Snob!

Crispy Kale is right! There IS a State Farm Yabbie.

I am tempted to click on the "I want to be a Yabbie!" button. Will it link to the Quad-Off?

Fergie said...

"...as though track racing followed the fixed-gear trend and not the other way around.

Since highwheels were the first fixed gear trend and velodromes didn't get big until a few years later (~1890's?) I would say this whole thing we call cycling started with a fix gear trend.

Dr. Professor Bonkeinstein said...

Firstable, I'd like to apologize and correct myself. Earlier I mistakenly proclaimed myself potato-nd. Obviously, I was potato-th. That was my bad. It was a short read but I went full gas the entire time and I was simply running on fumes. It's not an excuse but I blame it on my B Sample.

Anyway,

le Correcteur said...

WRM: "Cheetos dust-smudged" should be "Cheetos-dust-smudged" or "Cheetos-dust smudged" maybe.
Also @Anon2:17(Rick), Nonny Mouse5:52, and WRM by proxy...

I'm sure you're all too young and beautiful to remember the 80's. Truly a cesspool of a decade but, bear with me. In the late 80's there was a mildly amusing parody show on HBO called "Not Necessarily the News " which gave a young Conan O'Brien his start and catapulted Stuart Pankin into the glamorous world of infomercials.

Along with all the starting and catapulting there was also a segment starring Rich Hall (NOT to be confused with Rich Little) called "Sniglets". A collection of words that aren't in the dictionary but should be.

Included in the Sniglets pantheon is the word "Cheedle". Defined as: "the yellow orange dust left on your fingers after consuming Chee-tos".

Hopefully you can all add this word to your respective lexicons and we can stop this disgusting hyphen talk.

David Henderson said...

Best comment ever. So earnest and truthful it brought tears to my eyes.

Thank you Anonymous, you've truly earned your podium position.

Anonymous said...

Not if the other half of the curmudgeons have anything to do about it:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2012/07/31/157663749/will-this-be-the-post-car-century-in-new-york-city?utm_source=fp&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=20120731

Anonymous said...

The problems with the velodrome are first of all, that the man backing it essentially bought his way onto the committee approving it through bribery, and second of all that its maintenance costs will be completely unsustainable. The unique nature of Brooklyn Bridge park is that it is supposed to be paid for entirely by the condos/hotels being built in space that was supposed to be green parkland. The costs incurred by a velodrome, rather than the original simple community center, mean that either A. The prices of the housing in the park will be even more unreachable for the 99% than they would already be or B. more park land would be taken away for housing. It's completely unjustifiable, furthermore, to house a 2500 seat arena for an extremely niche sport in a public park. It's not "just" a track. The original plans called for a community center that could be used for free. The velodrome is in no way an improvement on that.
Also, as a BH resident, I have to say that it would absolutely devastate my spondee.

ce said...

No NIMBYs allowed in my backyard!

Content Nazi said...

Waaaaaaaaaay too many TLDR's.


K.I.S.I.Y.W.M.T.R.I.S.


Keep It Simple If You Want Me To Read It Stupid

Anonymous said...

snob! stop your whining or move to the countryside!

Anonymous said...

2GAY BVRS

Bubba said...

I used to have a cat just like that. The ASPCA shut me down when I tied her to the top of a 30 ft. pole.

Steve Tilford said...

I pulled it out one night and told Greg that with all the silly racing over in Europe, he never had a chance to get one of these.

Stupid Name said...

"The problems with the velodrome are first of all, that the man backing it essentially bought his way onto the committee approving it through bribery"

Some people are completely unaware how New York got built.

ce said...

Australia vs New Zealand

ce said...

I think the picture is supposed to highlight Australia's superiority, but actually it makes New Zealand look kind of cool.

ce said...

Although, when New Zealanders are cool, it usually isn't long before they start spooning sheep to warm up again.

JB said...

Can I take the quiz early? I'm going to be out the rest of the week.

wishiwasmerckx said...

100th!

McFly said...

Them Russians girls choked BIGTIME. Catalina Ponor on the other hand, was magnificent. I love her.

Ian Brett Cooper said...

The flag was pretty clearly an NZ flag. You can easily tell the Australian one - it has a big white star beneath the union flag symbol.

I agree that Australia should do a bit more to differentiate its flag from that of NZ. Perhaps they could include some black vertical bars, to remind us all that, unlike NZ, Australia started its life as a penal colony. Or a more subtle solution - just include the words "Mind your wallets" along the bottom edge of the flag.

McFly said...

I am 62% certain that Catalina Ponor is Romanian slang for Cadillac Porno, which can't be all bad.

ce said...

penal

Liuc said...

kickstarter is showing the yin and yang of humanity.
And both are >100% funded
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/schuyler/lockpicks-by-open-locksport

VS

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1051734209/tigr-titanium-lock-as-cool-as-your-bike?ref=live

SteadyFreddy said...

Pumped up my tires today! From Republic of Boulder Bicyle Cycling Team.

Lemon Luvah said...

"No! Joralemon!

Souter said...

Dude, when are you going to save us a lot of hassle and split your blog into a Peta Todd stream and fixie curmudgeon one(question mark)
It would save time for long time readers depending on their mood.

The People of Detroit said...

"Hasidim are just like every other religious group, in that they rigorously adhere to a bunch of nonsensical laws that are relevant only to their small community, yet the're perfectly happy to disregard the actual laws that are there to keep us all alive."

Well said, sir.

Anonymous said...

Canada flag is about 3 turkeys humping, NOT 2!!!

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