Saturday, September 8, 2007

baby's nth century: chicago perimeter ride!

this century went around the perimeter of chicago. that's perimeter, not to be confused with perineum. that ride would have been much more painful!

it wasn't painful, though, at least not for my badass, already accustomed to long days in the brooks. some folks started complaining about their bums at about mile 60, though they were in street clothes. bike shorts make a huge difference, people. as does ass lube.

at the time of the ride, all of my butt'r was in a box somewhere between san francisco and chicago. why? well, a summer of daily use (and occasional abuse) of my rolling suitcase left it with some large, NSFF holes. (not safe for flight. duh.) also, bikes are hellof awkward when they're in boxes, and i did not want to be wrestling with a sketchy rolling suitcase, a messenger bag, and a bike box, and i especially did not want to be wrestling to get all these things onto the CTA. so i shipped most of my shit, traveling with only my bike box, the bag that fits on my bike rack, and messenger bag. and believe you me, i got some weird looks as i reassembled my bicycle at baggage claim! and then i had a great 7ish-mile ride to my new home in bridgeport.

but back to the ride. fortunately, my ass was not lubeless, because anna brought some over! anna, one of my fellow bike & builders, goes to grinnell college in iowa. i lured her to chicago with, "hey, you're from the midwest! come to the perimeter ride!! i KNOW you want to do another century this summer—seven is definitely not enough!!!" she drove over with her friend jasmine, who doesn't really bike but is cool anyway.

i had some other friends on the ride; martin "safety" hazard and andy "the professor," two of my midnight marauding friends. the lot of us met for breakfast at the hollywood grill, where i met a few more folks. after a delicious breakfast (broccoli and feta omelet for me!), we rode east to the lakefront. and then we went waaaay south (the idea, after all, was to ride the perimeter—"live on the edge," as the cue sheet instructed us), stopping first at the mussolini pillar near soldier field. once down south (95th? maybe?) we stopped for lunch (homemade mexican food sold from a trailer), then rambled on west...

obviously the most important thing about long bike rides is food, so the next thing i remember clearly is an ice cream stop at the original rainbow cone, on 92nd and western. i had never heard of the place, but apparently everyone loves this place, and everyone eats rainbow-flavored ice cream cones at the taste of chicago. i suppose i should clarify that it's not a rainbow flavor, but rather a rainbow of colors in the cone. however, i invite you to pause now and consider what a rainbow would taste like. and if your answer is something lame like "water vapor," i invite you to use a little imagination next time, ok?

i don't have my cue sheet, but i think the next big thing was a jaunt out to the suburb of berwyn to see the spindle, possibly for the last time. you can check out some spindle-saving press here. and yes, we ate there, too, at claude's favorite fast food "restaurant."

then it was off to superdawg very very conveniently located directly next to a liquor store. we're probably at mile 70 or 80ish at this point, which was close enough to the end of the 100 miles that most of us switched to a different sort of hydration. i stopped avoiding beef for long enough to have a famed hot dog, which was decent but definitely no hot doug's.

the bonus hydration made our next stop, the leaning tower of niles, some other suburb, lean juuuust a little more. after that, we had a bit of a haul to the lake. it seemed extra super long to me, since all that hydration had me looking for a poorly-lit bush or tree on the side of the street. places to drop trou and take a piss are few and far between, though, when you're not in middle-of-nowhere, USA. (which is probably one of the weirdest things i'll miss about bike & build: stopping anywhere—anywhere!—to pee, walking 2 feet off the road/highway, declaring, "this spot is perfect!", and popping a squat. early in the trip, mind you, we were much more vigilant about finding cover. it was probably the change in terrain to ranches and desert, combined with pure laziness, that caused our drastic shift in modesty...)

i shared my overhydration with vic, whose name i've seen online plenty but had never met before. very familiar with evanston, which we were riding east to at this point, vic knew the planned route to the lake, and volunteered to wait up for me. we soon passed a suitable empty park with some suitable unlit shrubbery, and the remainder of my ride to the lake was much more comfortable.

and then it was naked time! and by naked time, i mean some marauders may or may not have opted to rinse off the day's sweat in lake michigan's pristine waters. i was sure anna would join us, but she took a nap instead.

a short and uneventful ride to the handlebar followed. there were $5 margaritas. incriminating photos exist. the end.

3 comments:

T.C. O'Rourke said...

Lubed asses, Mussolini monuments, public urination and nude frolicking!

The Suburban Council of Mayors has called a special meeting to ascertain what can be done about this scourge.

Um, yeah Super Dawg is all statues and no substance.

eric said...

That was prolly Vic Sholis.

lauren said...

i know it was vic sholis! i said i'd seen his name online before, but hadn't met him IRL yet.