joanie met her twin. mixte love ensued.

this past sunday a few friends and i were going about our sunday routine to the farmer's market and to get chocolate cherry bread from our local co-operative bakery. i can write sentences like that because i live in san francisco.

anyway, as we passed the de young museum on our way to these aformentioned places, i saw the most beautimous thing i've ever seen. a pristine twin to my dear joanie baby.



light was not totally on my side that day, but i did what i could.



i left a love note.


and gasped in (sort of mock) horror when i saw this beauty was locked up with a CABLE LOCK! i wrote on the note for the person to pleaseplease get a ulock. note that person also has the same helmet as me. WHO IS THIS PERSON?!



i left my calling card so they knew i was serious. maybe they are reading today?



i've modified joanie quite a bit from the drop down bars when i got her, but i made her undeniably MINE. i ride her every day and i love her dearly. by extension, i love her twin dearly as well.



have you ever left a love note for a bike?

friday fun times: mixte parking only

things were looking a little mixte-crazy over on a bike rack at a busy intersection in SF recently.



they must have put up a sign saying "mixte only plz. kthx."

it's not every day you see three mixtes parked up on bike racks. i would love to see that happen more often. mixture of the old and the new. it's all good.

happy friday y'all!

it's monday! time to mixte it up!

it will not be a surprise to long time readers of the blog that the SF crew of CYLRAB are mixte fanatics. in fact, i like them so much, i've had two. just one now :(

exhibit a:

calitexican's bici #2, meli's frenchie and ade's S.A.M.

exhibit b:

(the same usual suspects)

and finally, we have the most recent installment of the mixte lovin', a lil piece i like to call...

ENGLISH BEATS MEET THE FRENCH PRESS...

cali's joanie baby, ade's S.A.M. & meli's frenchie.

friend to the blog, eric, upon seeing the above picture jokingly asked,"is there a law in sf that says all mixtes must have wire front baskets? just wonderin'... "

the three of us SF CYLRAB members of course had to respond to that..separately of course:

cali's response:

yes, it is codified...."upon whence you procure a vintage mixte, which was found by various means, but never through a bike store, thee shall place upon the front wheel a large basket. after basket is attached to aforementioned predetermined location, a back rack is optional, but a bungee cord and a ringing apparatus of some fashion is not."

ade's response:

it is actually the 11th Commandment.

Thou shalt adorn thy mixte with those things that make it pleasing to the Lord and practical for carrying the Holy Beer.

and, finally, meli's response:

Mixtes and the lady owners must stay hydrated from either barley or caffeine beverages. Repeat daily from either one.
For further reference please consult the HH handbook, beer:30 ext. happy hour.

now, i hereby call a very friendly and totally benign mixte competition. how many english beats (bicis of english heritage) do you see compared to french presses (velos of the french make)?

GO! ;)

on another note, do you notice the people you like/like to ride with tend to have the same bikes as you? road bikes, vintage, fixies, MTB, touring, steel, trikes? i feel like the answer may not be as easy as it could be at first glance. this may be because the people you know may have more than one bike. maybe not.

have a happy monday Y'ALL.

Ben & His Bike Shop

After leaving the house with S.A.M. for the first ride after being put back together, I discovered my front brakes were... useless. It wasn't so bad, but I had to be extra vigilant until I got it fixed (I couldn't figure out the immediate problem which is the one drawback to being married to Hubby the Bike Man- I let him take care of it : ).

I thought I was going to stop at Box Dog Bikes as they are the ones that always have the kind of parts my old re-cycles need, but that was not really on my way. That was when I remembered that Ben, the guy who has become well known for opening up shop on the side of the road in the Panhandle, had opened up his own place on Treat St. That was exactly on my route, so that was where I headed.

Ben's shop is tiny and cute. I am sure that Ben would not describe his bike nook as cute, but it is. He has bikes hanging from the ceiling like salamis.

He has room for his single bike rack, and a rug, and a boom box and his tools.

When I looked to the back of the shop, I saw a familiar bicycle on the floor- KT's Motobecane. I thought it was funny that I recognized the pieces of my friend's bike without knowing the bike was there in the first place.

Ten minutes and $5 later, my brakes were doing their appointed job and I was on my way. I love little shops like Ben's. Nothing fancy, just the tools required to do the job and a guy with a nice smile and a bike stand. I was off for the rest of my errands in the brief sunshine we got that day in no time.

Thanks, Ben!

scenes from the bikey lane: monday march madness edition.

hey y'all. can you believe it's march already?! wow, 2010 is speeding by like a certain famous bikey dude riding his cargo bike down the wiggle the other day. vroom vroom.

ok then, let's get to it:

1. light grey skies, dark gray asphalt outlined with yellow stripes next to dewy and fresh smelling green grass. nice change of scenery.

2. sausage fest throughout said above route.

3. 3 women, 1 male at page and octavia.

4. 5 women, 0 males at 7th and market.

5. 6 women, 2 men at 5th and market.

6. red mixte seen inside bank: 1

7. baskets seen: 4. two were on the same bike.

8. mixtes spotted: 2. upright handlebars on those bikes: 2.

9. cords worn: 1 pair. (brand unknown. not pink)

see anything fun or different on your commute this morning?

On The Road Again

S.A.M. is back on the road. He does not look that much different, but he is!

I was going to do the work, but it ended up with Hubby the Bike Man doing just about everything (we have a different work style involved primarily with me liking to have a cup of tea at 10:30 PM and James liking to go work in the garage until midnight).

S.A.M. has a new bottom bracket (sealed), new pedals (MKS), new chain rings (Hubby knew I needed different gearing although I was oblivious), new wheel bearings and a repacked head tube.

All of the recycled parts required overnight soaking in orange oil prior to being scraped clean. That is some serious, long standing, baked on grime. It was worth it, though. James was able to salvage the derailleurs.

The paint is still shot. The paint that is left is strong and a really pretty soft metallic blue, but so much has been scraped off. I was worried the new V.O. fenders and the Axiom rack would really make the paint look baaaaad.

I was pleasantly surprised to find the new shiny bits do not make the paint look worse. S.A.M. has an air of shabby chic now that was not there before. The addition of the Peterboro baskets to the back end are perfect.

Today, I got to take him for a nice, quiet ride to the Farmer's Market. It has become obvious that the freewheel needs to be replaced, but other than that, everything rides so much better! Nothing grinds anymore. Everything is quiet and smooth. The fact that it is well tuned and 25 lbs lighter than the Bat, 65 lbs lighter if you factor in the weight of Declan, means that I don't end up as tired at the end of the ride. It makes me happy.

It is not easy to put an old bike back together. There is a lot of trial and error involved. I am lucky to have a husband who enjoys building bicycles (I hate to think how much it would have cost to have a professional do it). If you have the interest in this kind of thing, you should do it. Having a bicycle with history and character is wonderful. Being able to make it exactly what you want it to be makes riding so much better.

Go fix a bike! You will like it!

¿quién es esa niña?

in the words of madonna above and below..."who's that girl?"

scenes from the bikey lane: austin, I'M HOME, edition.

in case you haven't guessed by the title of this post, i'm home in texas right now. yay.

i was a chauffeur for the mama texican earlier today (no u-lock required), and rather than going home, i went around downtown austin. it has changed a lot. i forgot some places i used to know, i forgot how to get to certain places, i forgot that i forget things.

but i didn't forget about the bikey time that i wanted to squeeze in. so, after getting a little turned around, i went to mellow johnny's because it is a few blocks away from the mama texican's workey times place.

i got some coffee and then cruised around the bike store.







i helped a(n admittedly clueless) guy buy a shirt for his sister, looked at clothes & bikey art, and looked at rows and rows of bikes.

as you may know from reading this blog...we over here have a weakness for mixtes.



"a powder blue 8 speed masi mixte soulville? i need to get on this bike right now," i thought to myself.

so i did. and this is what i saw:













if you have/had to travel far during the holiday season, did/do you incorporate your bike love into your trip? for example, besides my test ride of that delicious mixte, i am planning on going back and renting a bike from MJ's and teaching one of my cousins (who is 15!!) how to ride a bike. i also got another cousin talking about bikes, so i plan on visiting his bikey soon. i hear it has an old school iron child's seat on it.

please let us know in the comments :)

Hello Readers. Mucho Gusto.

Hi. Those rather enterprising sorts of readers may have noticed a new contributor as of this morning. Yes, that's me, calitexican.

You may have met me before on the interwebs, or not. I first appeared on this right here site right here (Texas grammar intentional), and then I popped up here. I kept bumping into Meli and Adrienne all over town and on flickr. Through our encounters, I came to believe we all share a similar philosophy on riding bikes, and how they can be incorporated seamlessly into one's lifestyle. I hope to make some of you laugh (or at least smile), and to make others of you think. Most importantly, I hope to encourage all of you to ride around over town just living your own life.

So no matter what sort of riding you do, please get to it. There's a lot of roads, trails, mud, grass, whatever and et cetera to explore.

I would like to officially shake hands with the internet for bringing the three of us to know each other. I would also like to thank Meli, Adrienne and Caryl for asking me to be a part of this venture.

Have a great rest of your day. New horizons await all of us.