Peugeot love

Went to dinner at Puerte Alegro on Valencia (famous for their margaritas and infamous for the long waits) tonight with Mark, Pam, Tom, and a few other people from the neighborhood. It was the first time that I locked my bike on the street for more than 20 minutes, and of all places by 16th Street, so needless to say I was a bit paranoid about it's safety. Luckily, it had a friend to keep it company for the three and half hours we were there...another old Peugeot. I don't even mind the ugly bandage-colored bar tape anymore.

Busy weekend

I got to San Jose on Friday and ended up meetng Kelsey at the gym at almost 1 in the morning. It was the first 24 Hour Fitness I've been to in San Jose and it smelled like one giant sock. Saturday was spent with Becky, Bella, and Sarah in Santa Cruz/Davenport/Pescadero. Lots of food was eaten; fun was had by all.

Today, Sunday, I spent driving around San Jose looking for handlebar tape and places to print digital photos. I don't ever miss the relatively slow pace of suburbia until I'm actually immersed in it. It's nice to drive around and then get to park right in front of where you want to be...without circling endlessly.



I didn't find any tape that I liked, but I did pick up a Topeak mini tool kit for my bike. It's possibly the coolest thing I've bought in a while (and I buy a lot of crap). The body of the tiny kit breaks into two halves, packed with 26 tools. In additional to standards like Allen and box wrenches, this badass comes with TWO tire levers (!!!!), a chain tool, spoke wrenches, AND a compartment for two chain pins. Topeak is definitely my favorite bike accessories brand. Their stuff is pricey, but well designed.

After driving around, I went for a long ride with my little cousin. We made a stop by my old junior high for kicks. The photo of the doors is the entrance to the band room, where I spent a great deal of my time in 7th and 8th grade.

My bike doesn't look good in nude

My little Peugeot was in desperate need of some new handlebar tape, so I went down to Freewheel Bike Shop and tried to buy some medium-dark brown tape (I want to replace my seat with a nice brown leather seat eventually). Apparently the color I want is really hard to come by, even though purple tape, pink tape, and purple tape with pink speckles were readily available. So I decided to go with a tan cork tape, figuring that it'll eventually get darker from wear. It took a while to put on the new tape, but I actually did a pretty decent job. However (and this is a huge however), my handlebars now look like they've been in an accident and are all bandaged up. It makes me a little sad to look at the bike. Sometime this week I'm going to have to go with another color, probably black, because I can't handle the tan.

When bikes die

I've been semi-obsessed with finding out the model and year of my bike. Unfortunately, the serial number has been scratched off (many years ago, I'm assuming, because there seems to be years of rust on the exposed metal), so I can't really look it up.

After trudging through tons of sites, I found this little treasure. It's a no-nonsense collection of bikes—and bits of bikes—that have been abandoned around NYC. Clicking through these photos made me a bit sad. I wonder if my bike will end up unwanted and rusty on the streets one day. Hopefully not.


Part bike, part vomit.


(Un)intentionally funny?

Boy on a bike

Found this bike on Craigslist and picked it up in San Jose. It's a 10-speed Peugeot road bike from the late 70's or early 80's. The guy I bought it from was pretty nice. I talked him down to $100 from $200. It's only been a day and I've kind of gone crazy buying stuff for it. Bye bye paychecks :(

Thanks to those who had to hold my hand through the process. I'm sure I'll be coming to you with more questions like "what's a fork?" and "do I really have to re-grip the bar?"

I didn't have my camera with me, so I took a shot with my camera phone. More to come!



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