Oh the Barenaked Ladies, what a fabulously humourous and talented bunch of Canadians they are, and how much am I looking forward to seeing them at Hard Rock Calling in a couple of weeks...
This is another one that gets me bike dancing, head bobbing, shoulders going as I zoom home on my new Schwalbe Marathon tyres courtesy of the Bike Park in Leicester!
If you haven't heard this song before - check out the video and while you'll there check out this random song, which was supposed to be 'Yoko' until the YouTube poilce hunted them down - captions are rather funny...
(By the way, this song is worth a listen for the mad yodelling part alone).
Back to cycling, and as I arrived home this evening I saw two lads in shirts and ties chaining their bikes together on the corner. Hold on, young, smartly dressed men on bikes....this can only mean...MORMONS! The Yoko song has a line that's: 'To have you hanging off my ankle like some kind of ball and chain' and frankly it reminds me of these lads. I have lost count of the times these two have chained their little* bikes up at the end of the road and gone a knockin' on people's doors. I wonder, do they knock on the same doors every week? Do people give them shit? How does it feel to have a door slammed in your face? Do they feel like Yoko Ono did?
Still, this is Leicester, a city of religious tolerance of course. And by my own defintion of religious tolerance I mean an inward roll of the eyes detectable only to those who know me closey, and not answering the door to mormons etc, cos it's better to ignore than offend. And by etc I also mean those dirty looking gentlemen selling unecessary plastic items too...
*for 'little' read normal sized mountain bikes actually.
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Thursday, 9 June 2011
Monday, 6 June 2011
Super Furry Cyclists
It's almost like when 'Baby ate my Eightball' came on then all these people doing crazy things on bikes come out the woodwork.
First up on my way home I see a group of four lads cycling and sharing a joint, passing it from person to person like they are just sat in someone's living room rather than cycling along at 6 O'clock kids and families all about, then I see an old guy, suited up like he's just finished work at Legal and General, cycling along no handed, with his hands folded behind his back pretty much the length of Forest Way. When I get home my (insert name of female relative here) calls and tells me that she's just seen a couple of lads on bikes nick some massive statues out of the neighbours garden and ride off with them. Mad.
Anyway, this last weekend Leicester played host to the Building Cycling Cultures conference. I didn't go, due to various obligations to partner's various obligations to other festivals going on in Leics at the time, but by all accounts it was a good show, attracting folk from all over, including cycling bods from New York.
Anyway, over the weekend (I am told) one of the points of discussion was an article in the Guardian helpfully entitled: On your bike? Not likely...cycling is for children, study finds. (For some reason the online version has a different title, like the Guardian know that online stuff is around for a lot longer so they need to tread more carefully).
The jist of the article (if you can't be bothered to follow the link) is that the majority of the population view bikes as 'children's toys or for lycra clad hobbyists' (these by the way are the Guardian's words, not the study's. There are a few things I find annoying about the way this story is covered in the Guardian:
1. The negative way in which the story is presented - most people won't get past the headline or the first para, so just read the bad bits.
2. The Guardian are normally the biggest cycling advocates - they promote cycling as a means of transport, whereas other papers never mention cycling, or in the Times' case it's a nice thing to do for a Sunday afternoon jolly. I know they have to give a balanced view, but lets face it, they don't normally.
3. The final line is a plug for the Guardian's new book 'Cyclebabble'. They now that only cyclists will be interested beyond paragraph three, becuase by then non-cyclists will be laughing at the lycra clad bit and sniggering. So they get their book in!!!!!! The bloody cheek of it.
I do sincerely hope they are wrong. Studies aside, when I am out and about in Leicester I see the difference - it's visible, there are tons of cyclists on the roads and paths and they are not all wearing lycra. At the weekend we were out and about in Bradgate Park area - we saw people cycling to the pub in Cropston, to the Open Gardens event and to Stonehurst Family Farm in Mountsorrel.
People are cycling in Leicester, and they are loving it!
First up on my way home I see a group of four lads cycling and sharing a joint, passing it from person to person like they are just sat in someone's living room rather than cycling along at 6 O'clock kids and families all about, then I see an old guy, suited up like he's just finished work at Legal and General, cycling along no handed, with his hands folded behind his back pretty much the length of Forest Way. When I get home my (insert name of female relative here) calls and tells me that she's just seen a couple of lads on bikes nick some massive statues out of the neighbours garden and ride off with them. Mad.
Anyway, this last weekend Leicester played host to the Building Cycling Cultures conference. I didn't go, due to various obligations to partner's various obligations to other festivals going on in Leics at the time, but by all accounts it was a good show, attracting folk from all over, including cycling bods from New York.
Anyway, over the weekend (I am told) one of the points of discussion was an article in the Guardian helpfully entitled: On your bike? Not likely...cycling is for children, study finds. (For some reason the online version has a different title, like the Guardian know that online stuff is around for a lot longer so they need to tread more carefully).
The jist of the article (if you can't be bothered to follow the link) is that the majority of the population view bikes as 'children's toys or for lycra clad hobbyists' (these by the way are the Guardian's words, not the study's. There are a few things I find annoying about the way this story is covered in the Guardian:
1. The negative way in which the story is presented - most people won't get past the headline or the first para, so just read the bad bits.
2. The Guardian are normally the biggest cycling advocates - they promote cycling as a means of transport, whereas other papers never mention cycling, or in the Times' case it's a nice thing to do for a Sunday afternoon jolly. I know they have to give a balanced view, but lets face it, they don't normally.
3. The final line is a plug for the Guardian's new book 'Cyclebabble'. They now that only cyclists will be interested beyond paragraph three, becuase by then non-cyclists will be laughing at the lycra clad bit and sniggering. So they get their book in!!!!!! The bloody cheek of it.
I do sincerely hope they are wrong. Studies aside, when I am out and about in Leicester I see the difference - it's visible, there are tons of cyclists on the roads and paths and they are not all wearing lycra. At the weekend we were out and about in Bradgate Park area - we saw people cycling to the pub in Cropston, to the Open Gardens event and to Stonehurst Family Farm in Mountsorrel.
People are cycling in Leicester, and they are loving it!
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