Biking Downtown Continued

by on September 13, 2012 at 12:04 pm
Posted In: Test

Well the biking down town thing has been beginning to pay off and other that being a little saddle sore at times this has been going well. To the point that the only reason I need the bus anymore (not counting the times that you have to carry more than one backpack load) Is for anything I really be a sweaty mess for.

This latest trip downtown, my third, probably should have fit into this category. I’d gotten an invite through the Guild for Washington Lawyer’s For the Arts preview at SAM Gallery of, “Digital Connections” a show focused on digitally created art. I’d been wanting to check out the organization for some time and I figured this would be a good opportunity to do just that and get some networking in. Obviously not something you’d want to arrive at as a sweaty mess.

But I was in Scottish cheapskate mode figuring I was all ready paying five dollars to get in why would I want to pay another five for a round trip downtown? Since it’s finally beginning to cool down just a bit in Seattle I decided to chance it. Of course some precautions had to be made. First I gave myself twice as much time as I needed to get there… The assumption being if I deliberately took my time I wouldn’t exert myself and thus not overheat. This is easier said then done. I tend to be a point a to point b kinda guy who likes to try and beat his previous time every time he goes somewhere because of this biking slowly takes an effort.

Second I traveled light without my backpack. My backpack is like wearing a sweater and after the actual exercize is the biggest culpret when it comes to overheating.

So off I went. I managed to maintain my slow pace and was surprised that despite of this still made it in an hour. I spent the extra time at the Downtown Xanadu where comic artists Matthew Southworth and Harrison Wood were there for a signing. I had met both of them in professional capacity so it was good talking with both of them yet again.

When it was finally time to go to the event there was a little bit of confusion. Turns out the SAM Gallery is not actually in SAM. But I got there. It was a good event and I made several good contacts.

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Friday Museum Stetch

by on September 7, 2012 at 8:29 am
Posted In: Art

Today’s sketch is another piece of Neoclassicismfrom the RISD Art Museum ‘s Pendleton House wing. I confess that earlier I’d facetiously called a lot of this work “black velvet for rich people” and this piece is no exception. Nydia, the Blind Flower Girl of Pompeii by Randolph Rogers is based on the character from Edward Bulwer-Lytton‘s best-selling novel, The Last Days of Pompeii. (a book so popular and long lasting enough to have an 80s miniseries  done of it .) and he did at least 77 copies of it the photo on the bottom is showing what it looks like is actually the one from the New York collection I’ve also seen one at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts… Who said that Commercialism was a modern invention?

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Going Downtown

by on September 6, 2012 at 8:28 am
Posted In: Test

I just took another major step in my bicycle commute thing.  For the longest time I’d had a… not exactly a fear but a healthy caution for going downtown on my bicycle. Because of this I had an unwritten rule about not going any further south than the Ship Canal. Gradually I would bend this rule. For example there’s a user’s group just off Mercer ave that I’ve been going to but I would rationalize that it was the edge of downtown and I wouldn’t be a good idea to go farther south than that. I bent this rule again this June during Folklife telling myself that the Seattle Center  was only fifteen minutes away from where I had been biking to in Mercer and if I didn’t feel safe in the area around Aurora and Deny I could get off and walk. It turned out it wasn’t that bad and I ended up biking there for the entire weekend averaging 50 minutes each way.

So that’s where I’d left it for the next couple of months. However this week I had to go to a monthly meeting held at the downtown Barnes & Noble. Just to spell it out going downtown has become a pain for me. To the point I usually make a day of it maintaining a shopping list for several places and doing work at the library. To make matters worse getting back home after the meeting is a pain. Especially if you miss the first bus. So I’d been thinking about doing the bike ride for a while.

I’d been using the same rationalizing I’d used for stretching my range to the Seattle Center “oh this route doesn’t have that much traffic” or “It’s on a bus route. If you chicken out there’s no shame in putting your bike on the rack and riding the rest of the way” Anyway it turned out not to be that big a deal. Other than a bigger hill than I expected just before I had got into Downtown proper everything went smoothly. Turns out the traffic wasn’t as bad as I dreaded (in fact downtown congestion makes being on a bicycle an advantage) and the bike lanes were well marked so I got to my meeting with time to spare.

Getting home was a little more difficult. The route that I had planned didn’t work so I ended up retracing the way I came which turned out to be a series of one way streets with a few too many highway entrances than I was comfortable with. (Another example of Seattle’s idea of city planning which in hind sight I had not so fond memories of from my delivery days.)

But all in all it went well and any of the bugs I mentioned can be solved with a little better planning and studying the map. I should have been doing this for ages. Now the only reason for taking the bus (not counting errands that do not fit in one backpack) is so I won’t be a sweaty mess for any important meeting I’m going to.

PS

One quick caveat. I did actually bike downtown a few years before to see if I could. But that was on a holiday with bad weather and there was hardly a car on the road so I don’t think that technically counts.

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Saved a Chickadee

by on September 3, 2012 at 9:05 am
Posted In: Test

Well one fun thing that made an otherwise uneventful labor day weekend was a chickadee flying into the social hall of University Friend’s Meeting. I was there early taking care of the coffee hour. The little thing had gotten itself trapped from a combination of getting scared by the crowd and  being attracted to the lights of the roof windows.
To a certain extent this was sad to watch. I grew up reading Throton Burgess‘s Nature stories.  “Tommy Tit the Chickadee” was one of the smarter characters in his cast. While I certainly am not going to mistake a real animal for the witty character from a children’s book it was still a little disillusioning to see the poor thing do no better than the sparrows and starlings you normally see in this situation.

Several people tried to help it out by opening all of the windows and trying to give it hints. But all of the windows that would actually open were bellow where it was flying and it would not come down. In the mean time the way it was frantically flitting around one couldn’t help wondering when and if it would burn out.

Anyway after the crowd had died down it finally went and hid behind a brace that was holding up an air duct. This allowed for two things. One it was low enough that I could reach it standing on a chair, and two was it was cornered in such a way that it had no room to maneuver if some one tried to catch it by hand.

Remarkably it worked (I confess I had my doubts) And cupped in my hands I carried it to the window and let it fly away outside.

It’s the little things.

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