Chickity-Check Yourself Before You Wreck Yourself

Big holes in yo' jeans is--ok, maybe not bad for your health, but it looks silly.

Let me explain:

Approximately two weeks ago, the engine malfunction light illuminated in my car. (Background information: my car is a 2006 with ~17000 miles on it. It has a 2.0L, turbocharged direct-injection engine. With this information you can neither peg me as a snobby yuppy nor as a poorass piece of trash so we'll leave it at that). It took about 3 miles to get home and after that, I didn't drive the car at all until the following Friday (16 March 2007) when I took it to the dealer, about thirty minutes away. The roads were pretty bad that day. I sat in the waiting room for two and a half hours and then they finally told me my car was ready. Apparently 'ready' is a relative term. They had done absolutely nothing to the car except clear the error codes (one for low catalytic efficience and one for turbo boost under threshold, neither condition calls for complete cessation of driving). Replacing the catalytic converter would take more time than I wanted to spend there (though I think they just didn't want to replace it because they had fuxored up their schedule and had too many cars/not enough mechanics). The test for the boost code required extensive road testing and, since the roads were crap, they didn't do them. So I took the car back with me to work.

I got to work just in time for lunch and got back from lunch just in time to find out my sister's flight out of EWR to ROC (she came from Spring Break in FL) was cancelled and she and her friend Elyse would probably be staying with me that night. Shortly after becoming privy to this information, I also found out our site would be closed at 2:30PM due to weather conditions. I picked up my sister and Elyse at EWR and drove home. I don't think I ever went faster than 40MPH due to the weather. We decided that I'd drive them to Scranton, PA and Elyse's parents would pick them up there, it's about halfway between us.

Saturday morning I started to scrape off the ice and saw that the driver's side wiper blade was all borked out. So I took it off and decided to go to Wally World to get a new one. Then I spent thirty minutes digging the car out of the ice/snow. On Rte 1 it became apparent that the car had NO boost, NO power, NO torque whatsoever. Bad news. Whatever. We got a new wiper blade but it didn't fit (stupid proprietary lock-in bullshit post to follow) so I went back in and got some duct tape (should've gone with the obvious solution from the outset) and fixed the wiper blade.

Once out on the road, it took--and I'm not exaggerating in the least--thirty seconds to accelerate from 0-62MPH (it normally takes 6.2 seconds). Bad news. So I drove the car to Tannersville, PA and we hung out at the outlet mall there until Elyse's parents got there. Then I drove my car straight back to the dealer and dropped it off.

Now we get to the point of this entire post: commuting on bicycle.

Most of last week and all of this week, since I was sans-car (last week by choice, this week, not), I rode my CX bike to work and back. My apparel generally consisted of Bottom: wool socks, bike shorts covered with tights covered with jeans and Top: t-shirt or UnderArmor covered with Hermes thermal jacket. I put my work clothes in my messenger bag and off I went.

Commuting on a bicycle is incredibly fun. I think having the messenger bag and the cycling cap make me take my life in my hands more readily than I normally would, weaving, dodging, swerving. It's quite exhilirating. Flying past all the fatasses in their SUVs during the evening commute through downtown New Brunswick is doubly exhilirating.

The other great thing about riding the bike to work is that I am, at minimum, two to two-and-a-half times happier at work than when I drive. Man I love the bike. (The bike loves me, too).

Unfortunately, my jeans started to get worn a bit by the saddle and I noticed a quarter-sized hole in the ass. I thought I'd take it to the Italian tailor in HP who did a magnificent job on my Hermes bib shorts. Not so fast, when I threw my leg over the saddle this morning, my heart sank as I heard a loud RRRRRRRRIP! Upon inspection, I had torn from near the waist to near the knee (yeah, I'm that swoll). Oh Gap jeans, how I'll miss thee.

The end.