You've got a Friend in Philly

I've been cat-sitting for my friend this week, and she happens to live near my old 'hood, way closer to where I work, so I asked her if I could spend the night there a couple-a-three times. She said yes, and I did last night. Eventually.

I had just finished eating dinner and was getting ready to leave, but I was putzing around as I am wont to do. Then, I got a text from some friends who just so happened to be in town and were looking for a good place to eat. I threw out a bunch of recommendations, and they decided on Cedars, the Mediterranean joint that's not too far from my house. I thought it would be nice to pay them a visit on my way up north, figuring I wouldn't be more than 10-15 minutes.

A couple hours, many good laughs and 3 glasses of wine later, I was on my way up north. So much for a short visit. Ha...

Finally on my way again, I saw this random dude waving at me through the window at Silk City on Spring Garden St. At first, I thought it was just some guy being a dick. Then I took a second glance and I thought for sure it was my co-worker who I never see any more (we work different shifts). So I pulled on to the sidewalk, and as I was locking my bike, this tall fella came outside and said "Yo Prudente!" So, naturally, I stopped to catch up. Ha...

Luckily I had fed the cats earlier in the day, or I'm sure they would have been pretty annoyed with me by the time I showed up at 11:30. Just FYI, they were/are fine.

The big city is, in fact, quite small. I mean, what are the odds? It's always kinda nice to randomly run into friends, and I guess even running behind schedule, you always end up where you're meant to be.

Nice Rack: Frankford & Norris

It's been a while since I've biked through central Fishtown. Today, I did, and I remembered that I have a bunch of bike rack art that I never posted! Who doesn't love a good back track bike rack? I may have to use that again.

Anywho, I almost hesitate to desecrate one of these neat sculptures by attaching my bike to it. It seems like it would cheapen the art, or something:

Nice Racks is a series of bike rack art I've stumbled upon throughout Philadelphia.

Chariotrike

I moved nearly 500 pounds of pillows from Temple this morning. I also lost nearly that much weight in sweat. And you guys all wonder how I stay so thin eating all the food I do...

Anyway, moving that much laundry is no small task, of course. After 2 trips (and still not being completed), I decided I needed more space on my trike. Enter the chariot:

11 bags of pillows in one load. Yikes. The ol' Worksman was more than up to the task, but stopping was a bit tricky...

I got lots of love from the stoop-dwellers on the way back to the laundromat, too. I mean, how often do you see something like this rolling through your neighbourhood?

Rustcycles: 10th & Spring Garden - Double Shot

Blame it on my morning haze or whatever, but I've been delivering/picking up from W/N W/N Coffee Bar for almost 3 months and I never noticed these two abandoned bikes until today, each missing at least one tire:

I'm not sure how the bike on the left is still balancing like that. Interestingly, the bike on the right is actually locked to the bike behind it, which is unscathed. For those of you who don't regularly "Facebook" or "Instagram," this is right next to the historic marker that commemorates Milton Hershey's very first candy store that I posted several months ago, making it even more amusing (to me) that I didn't notice this:

Rustcycles is a series of abandoned bicycles and locks I've stumbled upon throughout Philadelphia.

Back on the Cycle Again

I wrote last week that I was going away for a while. I definitely missed this place, but I had fun while I was away, too. Here's what I did!

That's a 27-inch pike, and the lure that caught him (or her...I'm not really sure). More or less, that's what I did last week: fishing, some hiking, other outdoors-ing, none of which really fits into the mold of this blog, so we'll move on...

Getting the cycling legs back this morning was more challenging than expected, and I'm not sure why I was surprised. When I used to lift weights every day and then take a few days off here and there, I was always annoyed by how easily the body can lose muscle mass seemingly 50 times faster than it gains. Hauling a full trike (and round-tripping over 15 miles today) was anything but a pleasure cruise, but I survived, and I could even fake a smile:

I've been going overboard on the selfies lately. Whatever.

At any rate, on the way home, I encountered a strangely creepy yet peaceful scene in my old 'hood, where the beginnings of some much-needed road repair provided a desolate view of N3RD street:

And then again on 4th street, which hadn't been ground yet:

This was a stark departure from two streets I'm used to seeing packed bumper-to-bumper on both curbs, making the road just barely wide enough for a bike and the average car. I like it this way better. No truck dodging. Ha.

Now let's see how long it takes them to actually PAVE the street...

Your Friendly Neighborhood Cyclist

Look at that mug. After 3 cups of coffee (pun intended), I guess anyone can have enough energy to cheeseball...haha.

Today was my last day of work before a week's hiatus - much-needed, but it will be bittersweet for sure. I like it here in Philly. I don't like to leave here very often, and today, I was reminded of how ingrained what I do and where I live has become in my very being.

I don't want to go into too many specifics, but here's one quaint little tale: I was riding through Northern Liberties this morning when I heard a polite "honk honk" on 2nd Street. I looked over, and it was one of my clients, the owner of Flotation Philly. A polite "What's up?" and a wave and we went about our days, just like neighbors passing by. Since Wash Cycle switched to route managers, it's been great. I feel like my customers have become my friends as well. Plus, the company gave me these business cards with my name on 'em!

And a webpage too: http://www.washcyclelaundry.com/prudente. Alright, that's enough shameless self-promotion. Point is, I'm going to miss interacting with my customers and my community this week. I came home this afternoon to find my roommates and neighbors lounging with a kiddie pool.

Not bad for a city sidewalk. My roommates greeted me with lunch, which was much appreciated because of how late I was getting home. I wish I could have stuck around longer. Alas...

After I got showered and changed, I walked down the street to my afternoon job at SHI. We're currently hosting a seminar, and I've become pretty good friends with the students but especially our staff and volunteers. On top of being super nice people, they greeted me with food as well (which I had to politely decline because I was full - a good problem to have, right?).

I got sidetracked writing this...I had more to add, but you get the point. I'll miss this place while I'm away. Cheers.

Rustcycles: 10th & Arch

I'm catching up on oldies this week before vacation.

I found this one several months ago at a rather busy intersection in Chinatown, just across from the Trocadero Theatre (you can see it in the background). It would be surprising, except that there's an abandoned bicycle on just about every corner, even on the busiest of streets. On a side note, I don't work much in that neighborhood any more (and hence, I don't venture over that way very often either), and I honestly don't miss it.

Rustcycles is a series of abandoned bicycles and locks I've stumbled upon throughout Philadelphia.

A Sharrowing Tale...

Well, not really.

I've known that these are referred to as sharrows:

Share + Arrows = Sharrows. Clever.

What I didn't know (and found out today) was that they are actually strategically placed to reduce the risk of being hit by car doors. I found it on Wikipedia, so that means it has to be true. Hah... I just assumed they were placed on roads to make motorists aware of lane-sharing. I guess I need to pay more attention.

Rustcycles: 5th & Washington

This is a delayed post, and plenty odd...

Whoever owns this bike actually took the time to remove the rear tire before locking their bike to this electric pole:

Good idea, except they left their seat attached, and some peeps will try to steal anything that's not locked down. I'm not sure if they were trying to steal the tube or just mess with the bike, but it appears that they realized there was no way to remove it without removing the chain (or cutting the tube) and decided to just leave it:

As I said, this one is quite bizarre, but since I took this picture several weeks ago, I have seen a few other attempted tube removals like this...people are strange.

Rustcycles is a series of abandoned bicycles and locks I've stumbled upon throughout Philadelphia.

Nice Rack: 22nd & Parrish

Aww, that's so cute. They're bicycles:

Nice Racks is a series of bike rack art I've stumbled upon in Philadelphia.

They Call me the Worksman

Actually, they don't. The mild pun will make sense later on in this post. But first an aside...

Yesterday, I mentioned that it's been downright gloomy around here lately, and I've been searching for bright spots. The mural next to the laundromat was doubly nice this morning:

Update: the weather finally broke this afternoon after I had started writing this

That's actually painted on the side of the last remaining row home on the block, which has been converted into a baptist church. What I'm more interested in are the garden beds in the foreground. Gotta find out who those belong to...

Our laundromat (and our fleet) received some sprucing up as well:

I'm not sure if matching the blues was intentional, but color coordination makes the obsessive compulsive side of me very happy. I also enjoy the new Worksman trike you see up there. Only 3 speeds, but it's got an electric assist (for those serious hills north of the wall) and can haul some serious ass. Just gotta be careful around those turns...the cornering leaves a bit to be desired.

My supervisor told me to push its limits if possible (gotta know if she's gonna be able to handle our worst, right?). That's easy enough:

That's 8 bags of laundry, each weighing about 40 pounds, packed into that bin. Piece of friggin' cake.

I'm not sure if this is gonna be my full-time ride, but I enjoyed being on a grown-up tricycle this week. Who doesn't love a little regression? Happy Friday.

St. Francis of a Tree - See?

The last few days have been overcast, rainy and cold here in the City of Brotherly Love. The environmentalist in me loves it - we seriously needed the rain. The outdoor enthusiast in me hates it - gray and overcast is great in the Pacific Northwest where the trees, ferns and vegetation appear bright green by comparison, but not so great when everything else in the city also appears to be gray. Riding around had gotten somewhat boring until out of the corner of my eye I saw this on North 19th Street:

Now, I probably pass by this every day on my way home from the laundromat, but for whatever reason, I didn't notice it until today (I also didn't notice the neat old-school post office in the background). It's a nice piece of art ala Isaiah (though not the same). Equally nice to see a dead tree turned into something lively. You can also see the opposite side of an adorned stone wall that's unfortunately cracked:

I know a stone mason who would be very disappointed...but nonetheless, this was a bright spot in what's been an otherwise gray week.

I'm still trying to find the history on this artwork, so if anyone has any tips, let me know.

IndeGo In the Clutch

A few weeks ago, I mildly insulted the new IndeGo BikeShare in Philly. Wouldn't you know it? Today it saved my ass.

That's ANOTHER flat rear tire - why do flats ALWAYS happen on the rear tire? Fronts are much easier to fix, that's why!

At any rate, I had just left Thompson Street and was on my way to the Wash Cycle office to take care of some administrative BS when it happened. Luckily, it happened two blocks from the IndeGo station at Logan Square. Of course I didn't like the idea of having to pay for a bike, but I guess it's better than taking a cab. It rode rather nicely too, even though it's a bit bulkier than my hog.

Thanks to bike sharing, I made it to the office on time and all the other things I had to do this afternoon weren't too adversely impacted. One big plus: I didn't have to return the bike to where I picked it up. I rode the bike to 4th & Christian (which is pretty close to my neighborhood) and took my car to pick up my bike. Maybe I should stop my hatin'.

In hindsight, with the amount of construction zones in this city (and the fact that I had just rode directly past one), I'm surprised I don't end up with more flats. Hah. Now to get my hands greasy...

Rustcycles: 21st & Chestnut

I took the above picture several months ago, forgot to post it, and then happened to walk by this same spot last night with my roommate. The frame is still there.

Rustcycles is a series of abandoned bicycles and locks I've stumbled upon throughout Philadelphia.