This year, I will be doing “something new.” I have chosen a “theme.” I will be blogging about biking adventures. This will include riding tales, travel, stories, absurdity, insanity, adventure, and hopefully a little humor and nonsense mixed in; my favorite topics.

By Zulu Delta

Meanwhile………back down on the Red Line in the Los Angeles Metro, your intrepid explorers (Matthew and Zulu Delta) once again head out into the late afternoon sun for more bike adventures. 

I don’t remember where we were off to, but we decided a quick jump on the Metro at this time of the day may be a little quicker and safer than slugging it out as “Urban Bike Warriors (“Toro, Toro Taxi!!”). It would leave us a beautiful summer night ride later when the air and traffic cooled off. 

The Metro is very accessible to bikes, and by this time we just hauled our “rolling ships of exploration” down the escalator, tapped across the platform, and onto a waiting train car. There is a section in the cars open to bikes. We were tucked against the bulkhead. Two stops later a young guy gets on wearing “business casual” garb. He also has his bike……nothing overwhelming special as far as I can tell. Despite our present ensemble of cargo shorts, hiking shoes, and rented hybrid bikes, I felt we had amassed enough of a respectable biking resume through the years to warrant some quick bike chatter. So often, I have met “tons” of great, kind, funny, helpful, and interesting cyclists; I was thinking this was just one more. I could chat up a rock…….this was more like a pebble.

Maybe he was having a tough day. He answered a few questions about cycling and bike commuting in L.A, but whether he didn’t view us as peers or just wasn’t the friendly type, I’m not sure. On the verge of giving up, I suddenly noticed his bike shoes; in his hands. You couldn’t miss them; fluorescent yellow with wheel cranks on the side for adjustment; similar, but not the ones pictured above. This was the type that looked like they could add 10 miles an hour to your ride even before you put them on……..if that makes sense. Hopefully not; sometimes it’s best if you don’t really know what I’m talking about, or at least deny that you do.

I knew these shoes, and very much wanted a pair! I had priced them out at one time. This is how the conversation went next;

Zulu; “Hey, I really like your bike shoes!

Commuter; “Hmmmm.”

Zulu; “I really wanted a pair, but I find it hard to justify spending $200 bucks on bike shoes.

Commuter….Looking and sounding annoyed; “Really? These shoes cost me $450!”

YIKES!!!! I started laughing; like I always do. I’d say a million things went through my mind, but millions of things are constantly going through my mind and the toughest part is not to blurt out all the smart comments I had to his fairly snooty response all at once.

Zulu;  “Wow…..did you get fries with that order?”

Zulu;  “Whoa, Whoa, Whoa, Dorothy; good luck getting back to Oz with those puppies!”

Zulu;   “Have you ever ridden a bike with them, or do you just prance around the Metro for show?”

I settled on one; “Hey Mattew…….this is our stop; let’s ride out here.”

Snobbery aside; I still love those shoes.