DC’s Capital Bikeshare program, for which you pay a fee to join and then ride bikes to and from docking stations across the city, is a popular thing that keeps enlisting new members and expanding. Its success is leading other cities, such as New York, to start their own programs. Now, as an earth-destroying motorist, your Wonkette author basically hates bikers and runs them over at every opportunity. But it’s hard to deny the success of a successful program that most people like, right? And now we can really confirm the success of this program, because a Washington Times columnist has written a pathetic, desperate screed about how bikesharing is communist, and gay, and the downfall of the West, essentially.
Let It Be Known: Moonie Times penman Charles Hurt is sick of the communist queers picking up bicycles for transportation, near his house:
Unlike Sarah Palin or Tina Fey, or whoever it was, I really can see Russia from my front porch. Or, at least, I can see broken-down socialism.
That is because across the street from my house on Capitol Hill is a loud, clanging “Capital Bikeshare” docking station. It is one of the locking ports for those fat, red communal bicycles you see peddled all over town by commune enthusiasts. (Say that fast, and it sounds like you are saying “commun-ists.”)
“Say that fast, and it sounds like you are saying ‘commun-ists’” — Sentence published in the Washington Times, Wednesday, May 30, 2012.
Now, back to them all being Maoist queers, and Charles Hurt being sexist:
For a small membership fee, users can pick up a bike at any of 165 such docking stations and proudly pedal themselves to work, school or to pick up Chinese food. The little black wire basket on the front is sturdy enough to carry a briefcase or a carry-out order of tofu. The bikes are shaped like the old-timey “girl bikes” without the crossbar, making them suitable for un-liberated women in skirts as well as these so-called “metrosexual” males everybody keeps talking about in these parts.
It just sort of goes on like this. At the end, Hurt explains how delighted he was to watch a woman get mugged by a cyclist recently, as it proved that biking is bad for society:
My personal pride in the program reached a new level last week after reading about a woman in my neighborhood who was talking on her cellular phone. A thug rode by on a bike, slapped her and swiped her phone.
He was probably that invisible blah thug who stole the Daily Caller guy’s bike, too! It all fits together.
{ 216 comments }
Sarah Palin rides a bike without a seat.
So does Charles Hurt's mom.
Okay, I just grossed myself out, I started and deleted three comments about Tod.
I'd love to hear them, lol.
I was hoping whoever linked to the dildo bike picture during the last bicycle story was going to do that again, cuz that's fun.
Sorry I'm so late to the party!
(I was actually working on one of my bikes today. No, not installing a new 'seat'.)
Ha! perfect.
nv911:
Thank you for posting that and saving me from putting out in public something I would regretted!
Little Red Snatch
So the kid flying ET on his handle bars was a gay communist too?
What do you expect. That movie was the work of one of those Jews who run Hollywood. Mel Gibson told me that, so you know it's true.
The stupid, it Hurts.
Hurts? Hell, if you aren't careful it'll burn holes through your screen and then start in on the masonry.
Old White, is your p-point rating taking a dip again? I thought I saw you up to 86 and now you are at 82.
Oh, please dear, call me OWL (cuz nobody else does).
And yes, OWL's "Reputation Rating" has taken a couple hits since last we spoke. It was down to 81 earlier today. But OWL shall not be deterred from OWL's otherwise obtuse course. OWL thanks you kindly for your inquiry and the sentiment that OWL senses behind it.
Worry not fair laydee-person, OWL shall persevere. (Though this talking in third person stuff is a troubling development … )
Cheers!
OWL, you do something that I find very charming in that you give a P-point rating to posts that you reply to, thank you. I like that.
You should follow Wonkette on Twitter and come and hang around with us, please.
The whole point of communal bikes is that they are pedaled, not peddled. You are correct, facepalming can cause pain.
Why aren't these fuckers burning oil (and lots of it) like the people in Real America do? Heengh? Why does this biker gang hate America?
Puck, did you watch the hockey game tonight? Who did you root for?
He's right: those bikes are ghastly! I mean, they're well-maintained and are designed for durability, the tyres hardly ever go flat and you can return them all around town!
Goodness! It's like…I dunno….renting a ZipCar!
By the way, when did the Moonies start caring about esthetics?
I cite Charles Hurt's writing style as categorical proof that they do not care in the least about æsthetics.
Ooh, and you spelled it correctly, too.
I hurt my ligature reading that
Snicker.
"Tyres?" Really?
Yes. You know. The things your vehicle rides on, as opposed to the state in which your toddler leaves you.
Yes, I do know. One's toddler leaves one tired, however, not tires.
The tyke tires its parents; but the tyres cushion the car.
Tyres? What are you? Some kind of Candian or something?
Aqui, se habla Amuhrikan, amigo. Claro? USA! USA! USA!
Obama is politicizing bicycles.
Because he is morally weak.
Are you Tim Thomas?
Every evening Charles puts on his favorite frock and does a 'tour de France' on the stationary bike he keeps in his closet.
He's hoping that he can get a position at the Daily Caller so that Tucker Carlson will give him a daily "tour de Greece", if you catch my drift.
The only part of Charles Hurt that has touched a bicycle is his nose…to the seat(s).
See, I think this is the real problem. He can't control himself
There is a medical parasexual/fetishistic term for someone who can't control themselves or their olfactories around bicycle seats and it is (I do not know the correct spelling so I'll wing it phonetically) phanarnar.
"phanarnar"
I thought that was the 7 year cycle for Vulcan sex.
Pon Farr libel!
…hey, hey, hey, goodbye!
For sale: Girl's bicycle seats. New: $7. Used: $10
"Four wheels good, two wheels bad."
What about Harley's with a side car?
Three wheels queer
Or at least trysexual.
I don't know about that I was thinking about one of those CanAmSpyder Trikes.
When you see how cool you look on one, you'll reconsider.
I lust after this: http://www.terratrike.com/
I missed the part where he told everyone to get off his lawn
The bikes are shaped like the old-timey “girl bikes” without the crossbar, making them suitable for un-liberated women in skirts as well as these so-called “metrosexual” males everybody keeps talking about in these parts.
Guess it's been a while since this guy had any interesting things going on between his legs…
Or even three feet higher or so
Some of the things going on down there are interesting to medical professionals.
In a strictly clinical way.
And we mean "strictly"!
The fact he uses the word "metrosexual" shows you how timely he is.
After completing his column, Charles Hurt went back to yelling at bicycles through the windows of the Washington Times.
Sharing is communist and un-American!
What I think he doesn't get is that it's not sharing. Not any more than my renting a car is "sharing". Did I read that right…people have to pay a fee? Not sharing.
Every day brings a new headshaker.
Zackly. How does this differ in any way from hailing a taxi? Other than you can actually get the bike, while the taxi probably won't pick you up.
I guess it's the requirement of physical exercise that makes it extra sochalistic.—
Oh, I never thought of that! It's part of the Big Government conspiracy to create Smaller Citizens!
Bicycle politics. Fucking riveting.
It will weld us together, however.
That would require an external power source. I hear Hitachi has something along those lines.
Those things are awesome. And that "come fuck me" red is hawt!
Is that the sound of dripping smugma?
What a fucking douchebag. My personal pride in General Motors would reach a new level if someone would run over Charles Hurt in a brand new Escalade, and then back up, get the rear tires on his bleeding and prostrate form and patch out.
I killed a snake that way, one time. So, this is apt.
It would probably just get stuck.
You're gonna need a bigger boat.
Bost of Illinois would get it done right.
things which are communist:
privately-run bicycle rental programs
health care programs where people are required to buy health insurance from private insurers on an open market
taxes
government regulation
mass transit
things which are capitalism:
roads systems paid for with taxes
government agricultural subsidies
defense industries manufacturing multi-multi-billion dollar weapons systems the DOD doesn't want anyway
government vouchers for private schools
municipally funded football stadiums
You forgot NFL profit sharing arrangements.
Republicans ride House Pages around the city.
They come with a rentboy big enough to carry luggage!
ROTFLMAO!
Wow, he's really passionate about this whole effiminate-commie-bike thing. Tandem curious, perhaps?
Wait, Russia is communist? Somebody better tell Pooty poot.
You know what Lenin said about bicycles?
Велосипеды сосать?
Bicycles unite? (velocipidi I got, but sosat?)
The capitalists will sell us the cable with which we will re-string our gear shifters? (Pathetic, I know, from someone who shares a surname with the former Mayor of Petrograd)
Bicycles suck. (I don't think it's idiomatic in Russian, but it comes out as I wanted it to on Google translate.)
Nothing?
Я хочу кататься на велосипеде, я хочу ездить там, где мне нравится?
No, wait, that was Freddy Mercury. Shit, I always get those two mixed up!
I've seen every blue eyed floozy on the way…
Get on your bikes and ride!
That Clara Zetkin had been ridden by more men than one?
What metrosexual male parts is he thinking about?
Are metrosexuals those fellas that have elephantitis of the nuts and have to cart their nuts around in a wheelbarrow? Cuz that might be what he was thinking of.
My balls are so big, I need a WHEELBARROW to carry them around! Ya hear me? A fucking WHEELBARROW!
AOTK!
So, what happens is, these noble warriors ride their bikes to work in the morning, only to discover that so has everybody else. And all the docking stations are filled up. So they have to wander around in search of a place to dock their bike so they can get to work…
After early complaints about this problem, central planners did what central planners do. The program didn’t need to be eliminated. It needed to be — made bigger.
Yeah, because everyone knows that the answer to a strong demand for a service or product is to eliminate it.
Moran.
Why does this man want to punish success?
Bicycles are one step away from Fascism.
Sounds to me like Mr. Hurt is a fat-assed republican ass smoocher who couldn't ride a bike ten feet without the help of o2 and some meth.
It may sound different to him, but every time Charles Hurt says anything it sounds like someone projectile vomiting in the grimy far stall of a Greyhound bus station to me.
Next column: Sharing Cabs: Fuckin' Commie Fags.
Did you guys know that in Old Europe they don't steal each others bicycles? People don't even own locks. Go to any city-center and the bikes are all on racked with no locks. Expensive bikes.
America is a pit.
Wooohooo! Boys, I smell opportunity! I'll call you from Prague.
Got any buddies with a cargo ship? Or better yet, know of any cargo ships just sitting there without a lock on it?
This is not true. I've had people from the Netherlands (about as bike-friendly a place as you'll ever find) tell me that you aren't Dutch until you've had at least one of your bicycles stolen.
I lived in Amsterdam for a year, and went through three bikes that way. *Triple* Dutch, yo!
I lived in Italy as a kid, and I stole lots of bikes.
Italy is a pit.
Would it be better if the bikes were painted red, white and blue?
Ah hell piss em off, paint the bikes green.
Red, white, and blue: just like the flag of CUBA!! Communism proved.
Red stripe for the original colonies as envisioned by Betsy Ross LIBEL!
Wait what? for a small fee? I want a free bike now or a hoverround yea make it a hoverround I aint pushin no pettels.
"bikesharing is communist, and gay, and the downfall of the West"
Well, duh.
It isn't that the bikes are ugly (which they are), or that the docking stations are loud (they aren't). What really pisses Charles Hurt off is the thought that right there outside his door–in plain sight, even–are people who aren't as petty, peevish and chronically miserable as he is. Intolerable!
This honestly sums up a lot of conservatism, these days, in America. They want you to be as veneal and petty and miserable as they are. And, how dare you! if you're not.
When he was a child Charles Hurt's mom wouldn't let him ride a bike but she made him wear a bike helmet.
He still needs to wear it.
And harnessed him to the swing set in the front yard.
Look what I can do!
Even when a tornado wasn't coming.
Poor kid. Nowadays they'd just put a shock collar on him and get an Invisible Fence. Of course that wouldn't have kept him from drinking out of the toilet.
Nothing does, Wile E.
Short bus libel!
From the way he writes, he never wore a helmet.
Why would anyone ride a bike?!? It takes two hands usually which leave no hands free to shove a Big Mac in my face! And I so need a few extra pounds (and diabetes) to fit into my new mu-mu.
And, how can one text while riding those things? AND, weave over 4 lanes of traffic??? Why it is just unAmerican.
Plus there's no cupholder for my Big Gulp, and they have yet to put a cigarette lighter on them that's worth a damn. Oh sure, I had one of those lame ones that was connected to a generator on the rear wheel, but Jesus, have you ever tried pedaling extra hard to get enough juice to warm up the cigarette lighter so you can light a Camel?
"these so-called “metrosexual” males everybody keeps talking about in these parts"
What are "these parts", 1999?
Undoubtedly, this will lead to Glam Rock.
Shit! That means that Roller Disco is going to be coming down the pipeline.
Are you saying that I should refund my tickets to the roller derby?
Roller disco would have lasted longer if it had involved less disco clothing and more hot chicks brutally slamming into each other at high speed on a flat track.
I'm nostalgic for the days when the Rat City Rollergirls still held matches up at Magnusson Park in Seattle. Roller Derby, greasy burgers and cheap PBR in an old airplane hangar on a rainy Saturday night in Seattle. What more could you possibly ask for?
Rock and/or rollin' degenerates who don't know how to be men what with wearin' make-up and struttin' around wearin' dresses like they's womenfolk.
What's next? Women gettin' their hair cut in barbershops?
Cain't tell my woman from the man
They is dressed in the same pollution
The riders they cover their face
So you could not make them out in smokey place
Same as naughty bits
Duh, the parts below their belts, duuuuh.
Charles Hurt is a man on the cutting edge. Next week his column will introduce us to a hot new show on the television called "American Idol" where a nasty British man will yell at sweet American children singing all the current hit songs like Against All Odds and Total Eclipse of The Heart. Charles Hurt knows what's hot!
Flann O'Brien said it best
"The gross and net result of it is that people who spent most of their natural lives riding iron bicycles over the rocky roadsteads of this parish get their personalities mixed up with the personalities of their bicycle as a result of the interchanging of the atoms of each of them and you would be surprised at the number of people in these parts who are nearly half people and half bicycles…when a man lets things go so far that he is more than half a bicycle, you will not see him so much because he spends a lot of his time leaning with one elbow on walls or standing propped by one foot at kerbstones."
I'll bet there aren't more than seven people on Wonketz who know what a kerbstone is.
But we all know about buttsecks, so it's okay.
Well, in all fairness, buttsechs IS more important.
The thing is, there are some legitimate beefs about these bikes. Like the fact that few if any of the people that casually ride them wear helmets. Or know anything about bike safety. Or have ever ridden a bike before.
Mix that combination of traits with DC traffic, and it's amazing to me that people are killed on these things every day. DC drivers have trouble avoiding other cars and even *buses;* how you expect them to not mow down rent-a-cyclists is just beyond me.
Somehow Communism doesn't really strike me as among the top 200 problems with this program.
Helmets are communist.
Even more communist than the bike program?
That's commie-commie. I heard that in the 80's there was so much commie that a little boy named George turned into a chameleon.
You make some valid points. I comfort myself by thinking there's fewer cars on the road as a result.
BUT THERE AREN'T!
I really should not listen to myself.
There's some statistics that show riding with a helmet is less safe than riding without one. At least according to the Europeans.
Some people seem to think that if you're wearing a helmet you're invulnerable to anything bad that might happen, especially if you're riding like an idiot. I wear a helmet, but I don't expect it to protect me if I get broadsided by an SUV.
Yeah, we have a program here too, and they really, really need to start providing helmets. But overall I think these programs are awesome. The more people riding bikes, the better.
That's my little feathered bicyclist!
Little claws are great for pedaling!
Natural clip-ons.
Seems like Chuckles is rapidly running out of things to write about. Sort of like Andy Rooney toward the end, only without any signs of intellectual functioning. The next column will probably reflect on the superiority of the conservative diet since he has suddenly become aware that his own farts don't smell as bad as other peoples farts do.
And without Andy Rooney's service record.
Say,
Is there a reason why this Hurt fella is taking jabs at Asian food as well? O.o
Unless it comes from Panda Express, that stuff is Commie, too.
Well, duh. You KNOW all those goddamn furrnurrs, especially the slanty-eyed darkskinned ones, are COMMIES.
Yes, people having a choice to ride a bike rather than drive in DC……choice=COMMUNISM!!
Don't worry Charles, that one that won't have sex with you is a total byke.
Today low cost bike transport – tomorrow SUV driver Holocaust!
bout damned time the sexy lady was brought to the official wonkette portrait.
we aren't all patchouli and unshaven pits.
Wow, and I thought the Sons Of Anarchy were based out of California.
They shuld ride those RED anti-Amurican bikes straight to Tora Bora!!1!!111
Those are no longer called girl bikes and haven't been for years. They are step through frames and are for people who find the crossbar too difficult to mount.
Of course, Charles here knows nothing about mounting but maybe being mounted?
My personal pride in the program reached a new level last week after reading about a woman in my neighborhood who was talking on her cellular phone. A thug rode by on a bike, slapped her and swiped her phone.
Seriously, I'm out of snark for people like this. What a POS.
Well if chewing gum and walking simultaneously is considered an accomplishment, then biking and stealing must be a goddamn feat. He might just be jealous.
Did he ride by on a rented bike? Also, I feel your frustration. For me it is not the stupidity, but the consistency with which it is put out into the world. But then, you cannot expected a stupid person to stop being stupid.
Also, let me point out that as of this moment, this comment on the article's page:
"This is seriously the dumbest article/editorial I have ever read in my entire life. Wow, I applaud you for reaching a whole new low of stupidity"
Has 118 likes. On their own page. Also, almost every comment is insulting to the author. So it seems that about the only people who actually read this moronity are those that get directed there from somewhere else to see how stupid it is.
Have faith, in other words.
I was that thug that swiped that cell phone out of that woman's hand. She was in a moving SUV.
I would like to open my calm well-reasoned rebuttal by saying fuck you Charles Hurt. Bikes are noisy not cars and car alarms; bikes are a danger to the placid cityscape that is DC. As to the money spent on the program (8 million dollars) I ask you how many feet of road expansion would that buy? As to the ride buy mugging tell it to me when the event rises to 1% of the frequency of drive by shootings. Charles has put himself alongside other great conservative icons who were they alive today would certainly be writing for the Washington Times. I am of course speaking of Benito Mussolini whose hatred of cycling used many of the same justifications.
I knew he hated cats, but hadn't heard his opinion of bikes before.
We have something like this in North Carolina. Except it's with pick-up trucks and you don't have to pay – you just have to know how to hot-wire it (or how to get your 12 year old first cousin wife to hot-wire it for you).
Who can be 'smugly' while plowing uphill in crazy-loud traffic in a 100 degree climate? Do we stick our pinky's out from our handlebars? Our hands are numb. Do we stick our noses up ('cause thats stupid and dangerous). Do we give the cold shoulder when you engage in polite conversation at the intersection. No, moron, we are in traffic – GET OFF THAT PHONE! Smugly? No. Rabid.
Of course it's commie! The bikes are red…duh.
And their shape suggests a hammer and sickle!
Those dirty B. Hussein Obummer commies and their red hammer and sickle bikes. They need to go back to Kenya.
I can never decide if these people were born assholes or if they worked their way up (or down) to it. What a whiny miserable lot.
Back in 'Nam the VC dragged their artillery up the side of a fuckin mountain on bicycles and then shelled the shit out of the French at Dien Bien Phu.
Never liked bicycles after that.
I just finished reading Bernard Hall's book on the battle for Dien Bien Phu. Man.
To be pendantic, I believe it's Bernard Fall. He was killed over there – and if he'd lived, and if people had bothered to read and learn from his books, we might have avoided that debacle.
For anyone interested in Viet Nam, or in what we could have learned from that and then avoided in Iraq, I highly recommend Prof. Arthur Schlesinger's "The Bitter Heritage."
Every argument used to justify invading Iraq is demolished in that outstanding little book.
Memo to Rebecca: Wonkette could use a books section!
You're correct. I was a little sleepy when I wrote that. (I love my fellow pedants, I really do. When Armageddon comes, we'll still be arguing over whether anal-retentive takes a hyphen.)
Thank you for that recommendation. Periodically, when I'm feeling *really* low about the state of the world, I like to read the inimitable Wilfred Burchett, or Agnes Smedley, both of whom could teach the current generation of warmongers a thing or two.
"Anal retentive certainly beats the opposite."
~ Woody Allen
I corrected you because I thought some other Wonketters would want to read that book. That you for taking my correction in the spirit in which it was offered.
Not to be pedantic, but that was the Viet Minh. (Yeah, I'm being pedantic-or as the Brits would say, paedantic.)
MI: Thanks for correcting my error!
True. Although the Indochinese Communist Party was founded in the 1930s, the fight against colonialism and French occupation was initially led by a broad-based coalition. I'm reading Bui Tinh's memoirs right now. What a fascinating story!
He should know that the United States lost the struggle against Communism when they allowed those insidious contraptions, water foundations.
"And as for those lycra shorts they claim are one-size-fits-all…"
I hope Charles' middle name isn't "Butte," or some variant thereof.
I think it's "DeServes".
I look forward most eagerly to further suggestions …
Maybe his middle name is "Brain"?
"Head"?
"Sensibilities"?
"Sack"?
"Ball"?
Okay, I'll stop now…
WHY? I mean, those are ALL excellent suggestions.
The guy has a point. And his point is equally valid for another wheel-based communist plot. That's right, I'm talking about roads. Where for a small fee (registration fees, transportation funds, etc), you can drive a car on communal roads. One of the ways this is paid for is a tax on the gasoline pumped into a hole in the side of the road enthusiasts car. These "gas holes" don't pay for the secondary costs of automobiles: air pollution, military operations to protect supply, subsidies to oil companies, police. Piss Karl Marx off: get rid of your car!
Pixelz, that is simply brilliant. I wish I could think of some way to spread this meme.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, OK! But who pays for the gas?
But when Medicare pays for your scooter, that's American as apple pie.
Well … how ELSE will you haul your fat, overfed American ass around?
I agree that bicyclists must be destroyed, but I'm thinking more of the ones who ride around on $4000 bikes, decked out in bright green Spandex.
Its kinda sad that they're so disappointed with Romney that all they can come up with is complaining about bicycles and agitating former criminals, until said criminals get agitated back. "Look! I created theater when I punched this bee's nest!"
Yeah, 'cause parking lots and garages aren't "loud, clanging" at all, right? Bikes are so fucking loud! What with their bells and whistles and such as.
When my bicycle makes rubbing screechy noises, I know how to repair it. But for Hurt, as the man says, you can't fix stupid.
In Charles Hurt's defense, he is currently trying out for the voice of Grandpa Simpson.
I used to live in a college town where "GRRRRRRRR" everyone hated students on bicycles so bad. It never occurred to the townies that those students on bikes weren't competing with them for road space, parking or gasoline and therefore made their lives somewhat more convenient and less expensive. If the world really ran on self interest, it might be a better place.
The teatards went down this road before with Dan Maes' "it's all a communist UN plot!" attack on the B-Cycle system that John Hickenlooper brought to Denver. The stupid thing is that bike sharing is about the most cost-effective transit available — users pay most of the costs of the system, unlike pretty much every other urban transportation mode — but OMG! Sharing isn't caring, it's Kommunist!
This pathetic, stupid, stinking piece of stinking drivel in the Times reads like something scribbled by a mentally-damaged, mentally-deficient, brain-damaged 9-year-old. It is absolutely, completely juvenile, childish, immature, unprofessional and undeserving of being published anywhere. It is simply a stinking, stupid pile of fertilizer. The Times had regressed so much in recent years, it's simply pathetic. The Moonies should have given up years and years ago.
They're in the process. They're trying to sell it to someone else.
Must have awakened him from his Beauty Sleep.
So who is going to break the news that the Beauty Sleep will not cure the Ugly that is inside of him? [raises hand and waves it in the air... like I just don't care!]
Pee Wee Herman is all for this, so fuck off, Charles "Never Heard of You" Hurt.
Expect to see Arnaud de Borchgrave reprinting this word for word and claiming it as his own any day now in his Moonie Times column.
This article needs more Agenda 21.
You know I am old enough now where cool is no longer an issue. I wear things, drive things and live places I like and could care less what anyone thinks, except for maybe the Mrs. (Which is why I don't have a beard).
The only NICE thing about getting old is, you don't have to give a fuck.
I started my I-Don't-Give-A-Fuck phase when I hit 30. It was really liberating.
But, man, sometimes I do feel old.
Siouxsie Sioux turned 55 on the 27th.
Diamanda will be turning 57 in August.
Fuck!
Cuts into profits!
ZOMG. I must kill myself immediately.
Diamanda Galas is almost 60.
Trims (heh) profit margins.
Oh, geeze. If you can't balance on two wheels anymore, it's time to quit riding. Same goes for the motorized tricycles. Cripes, buy a Honda Civic, you'll be more comfy.
Richard…
Weenea…
Peter…
Paul Philip…
Membar…
I live along the TransAmerica bike route in Eastern Oregon, and before my heart thickened up with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy was a long-distance bicycle touring fanatic. I used to help the neophytes fix their bikes at my general store. One day a couple came into town on these, having started on the east coast. They were fresh as daisies, relatively speaking, compared to the 2-wheel types. Even before my heart decided not to let me do all that stuff just holding my head up hour after hour on the road got to feeling like balancing a cannonball. The only major downside to these and all recumbents that I can see is that you can't stand up and vary the load on your legs on a long climb. Muscle power is still the only proper way to travel. At the end of a summer of centuries, double centuries, and self-contained tours I used to feel like Superman. Anything that lets you keep doing it longer is OK by me.
I get most of that, but what's a … oh, I get it. Never mind.
(Hugs TG fondly) TG, my friend, your corrections are meant to set the record straight for all, not to mock or belittle. Of course I accept them in the spirit in which they're given. Besides, you're one of the reasons I Wonketz — full of interesting information, and always happy to share.
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