When I was at Stanford, grad students were the object of our constant scorn because they wore bike helmets and outfitted their bicycles (on which they commuted to and from their off-campus apartments) with all manner of seemingly absurd geegaws and doodads. Well, I am now that nerd. This old bike was bought used about eight years ago. It's terribly rusted from being abandoned outside for years at a time. I just used a hearty helping of WD-40 to loosen up the rusted-shut clips on the back baskets. I also just installed the pink bike bell I've had in the garage for about four years, put batteries in the back bike light and installed the 60-kajillion-terrajoule LED front bike headlight. I removed the front bike basket because it was getting in the way of the headlight. Somewhere a wrongly maligned grad student is laughing...

The good news is I might be getting more exercise. We have a wonderful Sprouts Market close to us now, and I have delusions of grocery shopping on a daily basis, visiting my local markets by bike, à la the Europeans or No-Impact Man. (Watch the No-Impact Man documentary if you ever find it on TV or in the library, it's a fascinating family story that almost reminded me of Little House on the Prairie, although of course it's Upper-Middle-Class Professionals in the Big City instead.) I used my bike to go shopping tonight, and aside from the two or three near-death experiences (I think I need to inflate my tires better?), the ride was beautiful, the August full moon was a treat and now I am eating chocolate-covered pretzels, whee!