BSNYC No Quiz Because In My Mind It's Still Only Wednesday!

Like many cyclists, I've been waiting to pull the trigger on a fat bike until they're available in solid gold, and I've now learned from Twitter that my wait is finally at an end:

Yep, it's solid gold...plated:

Using modern day techniques and taking well over 750 hours to complete, each part was coated to perfection in the USA using the electroplating process.

It's also got a saddle that's covered in alligator:

The one of a kind customized seat is covered in the finest chocolate brown alligator and absolutely beautiful. 

I agree that it's quite beautiful, and furthermore that this misshapen turd perched precariously upon a gilded pillar is a poignant metaphor for America--and if you need me to hold your hand and walk you through that metaphor, the gilded pillar is central and south America, the turd is the USA, and your ass is Canada.

Think about it.

Scoff if you will, but if nothing else, this bicycle boasts the world's most expensive set of Avid mechanical disc brakes:

I don't know about you, but for a million clams I expect hydraulics that use a brake fluid made from the semen and tears of Kim Jong-un.

Still, you can't complain, because all the money goes to charity:

The House of Solid Gold’s CEO, Mr. Power, announced recently his elation about working closely with The Way to Happiness Foundation International, a global non-profit, non-religious charitable organization whose sole mission is to reverse the moral decay of society by restoring trust and honesty the world over through the publication and widespread distribution of "The Way to Happiness" booklet, a common sense guide to better living.  The majority, 90% or more, of the proceeds from the sale of this golden bicycle will go directly to this global organization.

Wow, The House of Solid Gold's CEO's name is really Mr. Power?

Get the fuck outta here!

Oh, and yes, "The Way to Happiness Foundation International" is totally a front for Scientology:

Creepy.  Really creepy.

Anyway, I know what you're thinking, and the answers to both those questions are, "Yes, I did buy one," and "Yes, of course I used PayPal:"

I plan to upgrade to hydraulic brakes immediately, even though whenever I need to bleed the brakes this man will have to masturbate and cry:

Though I'm guessing he spends most of his time doing that anyway.

Then, once I get a solid gold "tandum" my stable will finally be complete:

Even though I won't be able to sell it to Pete afterward:

Five minutes ago it never even occurred to me that anybody might write tandem as "tandum," and now it turns out that this is actually the preferred spelling on Craigslist.

In other news, America's educators continue to do their very best to frighten children away from riding bicycles and promote the agenda of the Automotive Industrial Complex, and to that end here's a self-proclaimed "former physicist" explaining to a bunch of kids why attempting to ride a bicycle without wearing a helment means certain death:


Okay, how do you become a "former physicist?"  Can you be disbarred?  If so, I suppose one good way to go about it would be to build a ridiculous medieval watermelon-smashing contraption and use it to scare the shit out of kids--because, as the former physicist explains, "it's just like if you were riding a bike without a helmet."

Yeah, just like it.

Oh, and how do you have a crash on your bicycle?  All sorts of ways.  See, it's totally beyond your control, as his fellow presenter goes out of her way to explain:

"Or you just fall.  Sometimes it just happens.  And you don't have to be going fast, it just can happen."

Hear that, kids?  It doesn't matter what you do.  You have no free will.  One minute you're puttering along on the sidewalk at 3mph, and the next minute you're dead.  Dead!

See, it's important to create a free-floating specter of terror and anxiety and associate that with riding bicycles in order to make sure kids don't grow up thinking that cycling is a reasonable choice.

Anyway, here's the former physicist loading up his atomic watermelon smasher:

And...splat!

"You don't want that to happen to you," he says, proving conclusively that dropping a heavy hammer on a piece of stationary fruit held firmly in place with a wedge will cause that piece of fruit to explode.

I wonder if it ever makes the former physicist uncomfortable that while Neil deGrasse Tyson is opening millions of children's minds to the infinite possibilities of the universe, he's fucking up perfectly good watermelons to scare kids off bikes--and he's not even succeeding in that, because the kids just think it's hilarious.  This guy's not an educator, he's a freaking prop comic!  Why not just skip the bullshit propaganda and let the kids watch a Gallagher VHS instead?

"Here's your brain, kids, I'm going to eat your brain!," the co-presenter then doesn't say, but might as well:

But wait!  Here's the same stunt again with the watermelon wearing a helment!

And guess what?  The hammer puts a big freaking hole in the helment!

"The crack that you see in that is the crack that would have happened to your skull," the former physicist explains:

Yes.  He's right.  If you build a catapult out of a shipping pallet and a hammer, pull the hammer back, place your head under it, and then let the hammer go, you will probably crack open your skull.  I can't wait until his next demonstration, wherein he uses a pile driver and a bunch of bananas to show you why riding a skateboard without a cup will pulverize your genitals.

Hey, I'm no physicist, former or otherwise, but I do know this: if anyone ever tries to teach any one of my seventeen (17) children a "lesson" like this, I'll put that watermelon right up their ass.

Anyway, there are way worse things out there for kids than riding a bike without a helment, and most of them are considered good in this country.  Take religion for example.  "Wait, you mean you'll fill my children's heads with lies and molest them?  Sounds great, sign 'em up!"

Lastly, there's a "pop-up Cat Café" in Manhattan now:

Meanwhile, a few miles north in Yonkers, there's a vacant lot full of cat corpses:

Choose your reality.