SHEBOYGAN, Wis. - Brian LaFave couldn't care less how high gasoline prices climb these days — he's parked his pickup truck and is refusing to buy gas for a month, possibly longer.

"The goal is to not use one drop of gas for 31 days," LaFave said, calling it his personal stand against the oil companies.

Now LaFave, 31, is riding his bicycle or walking everywhere he goes. He won't even let friends pick him up unless they already planned on being in the neighborhood.

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You can tell because the lilacs are preparing to blossom and the Fearsome Fleet of Skinny Terror is back on the trail:

It's okay, biking n00b. We know you are clueless.

In sillier news, the Bike Center opened today and somebody had the seriously clever thought:  What if we set up the speech-givers on one side of the trail, and the audience on the other side?  Despite being separated by about six feet of pavement, this ensures that our cameras will be constantly interrupted by the bikers who actually, you know, have to get to work and stuff.  It's like setting up a press conference on opposite sides of a highway.  Talk about awkward.

In sadder news, I stuck a book in my pack of stuff and in my sleepy state thought that it would be secure there.  Lo, I got to work and no book.  It was brand new! I'd barely even cracked it!  At least it's a sunny day, so assuming that everybody just leaves it where it fell, I might find it on my way home.  Alas, I can't really go hunting for it till after work.  Poor book.  Poor me.  I hope some other writerly type finds it, if I don't get to keep it.

In inspiring news, here is a blog post from a brand-new bike commuter.  Hooray!! It's a success! 

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Hooray!

I guess I should have mentioned it BEFORE as a reminder, but there you go.

Good bike news:

I got free breakfast this morning because I am a bike commuter, plus the cafe was swarmed with other commuters and I loooove hearing people talk about how they never use their cars and only filled up their tank for the second time this year last week.

The weather has been sunny, clear, slightly chilly, and generally beautiful for biking.  And it's warm so my bike parts all move easily and aren't half-frozen. 

It's sort of astonishing how quickly I forget the dark-at-4:30 commute I had all winter (and which will be back in short order):

Bike over Hiawatha

I love how supportive Minneapolis Mayor Rybak is of bikes and bike commuting.  The city had a commuter challenge, wherein three individuals started at the same place and had to end up at the same place.  One person went by car, one by bike (the Mayor himself) and one by transit.  Rybak showed up first en bike, followed by the transit person and then by the poor car driver.

On Friday, there is going to be a bike center opening on the trail I take to and from work.  It's going to offer repairs, gear, bathrooms, showers, etc.  It sounds really spectacular and I can't wait for it to open on Friday.  I kind of want to shower there just because I can!  Mid-commute shower!

Hay everybody: Who's riding these days, regardless of national initiatives?  How's it going?  You can leave a comment without signing in here if you'd like.

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How many pair of shoes do you have? Out of those pairs, how many do you wear more than a few times a year?
Submitted by fightinggale.

This, my friends, is a sad story.

Once, I had hardly any shoes.  I would wear whatever shoes I had until they fell apart or (more likely) my feet outgrew them.  I had some Chuck Taylor imposters in middle school with Taz on them that I thought were basically the best shoes in the world.

Then, I found this book:

Shoes: A Celebration of Pumps, Sandals, Slippers & More

Linda O'Keeffe

In the two weeks I had it from the library, I realized that a) shoes are art, and b) shoes are crazy and amazing.

Thus I became enamored of ways to shod my feet.  My feet stopped growing so I have no reason to get rid of old shoes.  (Somehow this means that I keep shoes that are in tatters or completely broken.)

I'm not proud of this freakish part of my personality.  I'm disgusted by it but also sort of helpless.  After all, some shoes are pure genius which I can take home and put on my feet.  That said, do I really need a pair of neon green flats and neon pink heels?  My brain says no, but my eyes say yes.

But I guess this little weakness provides choreographic fodder:

See those freaking shoes all over the stage?

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Okay.

I am SO PROUD of myself.  PAINFULLY PROUD.

I finally got around to figuring out how to take a DVD and put it on Teh 'Tubez.  Do you know what this means?!  THIS MEANS MAD KING THOMAS VIDEOS EVERYWHERE!  It has been a stain on my internet rating that I couldn't figure out how to get this on to a website.  But I finally did it.

I've only done one so far, but here it is in all of its awkward glory!  It's the least flattering costume ever seen on this

Premium White Morsels

A bit of context: This was last May and was sort of a study for the much larger (and much better) Premium White Morsels, from whence all those lovely black and white pictures came.  It was a Capture!rama piece, just like what we did last night, which means that we made the film with a live! studio! audience! and all the edits are in-camera.  The whole thing was a little wild and woolly around the edges, but here it is.  Mad King Thomas in living color and also moving around!

MKT Capture!ama May 07

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I crashed on my bike yesterday (don't worry, o parents of mine, I'm fine).  I haven't actually fallen off my bike and hit pavement since Fall 2004 so I guess it's about time.  I think I sort of might blame my PowerGrips, because usually my feet skitter out and catch me before I find myself horizontal. 

I still like the PowerGrips and I'm not convinced they caused me to tumble.  There was a big knot of wire in the Greenway, which I straight up didn't see.  The Greenway is such a pothole-free paradise that I'm really out of the habit of looking for obstacles on it.  Everything just got kind of wobbly and about six feet later I was skidding out.  I smacked my head, but this is why I wear a helmet, and I have a series of bruises on the left side of my body (and the left side of my right knee).  Even on a flat, dry, carfree, smooth stretch of pavement, I can still find a way to tumble.  I've been coating all the tender bits in arnica gel, because it makes me feel as though I belong in the Minneapolis dance scene (and because it might help with the bruising).

---

This morning at 6 a.m. Paul woke me up, because Caesar was chasing his tail.  Not only was Caesar chasing his tail, he was doing it in a corner on top of a storage container that is only about 1 sq. foot.  Which meant that he was also running into the wall and slipping off the edges of the box.  Seeing your cat, for no known reason, at six in the morning, spin in circles and smash into walls is a rare treat that I wish everyone could experience.

---

I really love this song and this video, together and separately.  I can't put my finger on why, but I am reliably devastated by hearing it:
 

I'm Impressed - They Might Be Giants

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• Mad King Thomas show tomorrow night!  Capture!rama at the Bryant Lake Bowl, 8 p.m. and only $6.  We're premiering a little snippet of a big new project. Capture!ama is always relaxed so come down and see great local artists experimenting with film and dance.

• Picked up Square-Foot Gardening so I can plan out my plot at the community garden.  I might get some seeds in the ground this week, but more likely I will go to the ginormous Friends Plant Sale and buy some purple tomatoes and stuff and THEN plant some seeds (and some plants).
  

All New Square Foot Gardening

Mel Bartholomew

• I'm going to be in Australia in about six weeks.  HOLY CRAP.  This causes nothing short of glee and panic. Is anyone here a couchsurfing.com veteran?

• Maybe things are a bit manic at the moment. Behind in work, behind in soap-making, behind in dance-making, the house is a WRECK, my inbox has three times as many emails as I want it to, I haven't booked the campground in Uluru, my family thinks I'm dead, etc.  But I guess this is sort of how I like to live my life.  I guess?  It's getting hard to stay all frugal when I'm never home for breakfast, lunch OR dinner.  Where the eff is my stimulus payment?!
  

• Ain't nothin' gonna break-a my stride! Ain't nothin' gonna slooooow me down. OH NO. I got to keep on movin'.

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I bought a spade last night because tonight is Meeting #2 of my community garden.  I won't lie, the whole thing is terribly uncomfortable, but it is going to be awesome because I say so.  I will meet new people and learn how to grow food and share tools, etc.  I bought some seeds (as well as a ridiculous sun hat and some gloves and some tools).  I'm ready to go.

But first let me just say: Last night at Target I had an anti-consumerist meltdown that only relented when Paul made dinner for me (and by "relented", I mean I stopped feeling like crap long enough to behave like a human).

It is so FRUSTRATING that:

A) I don't know of any local stores where I can buy some freaking boring wooden garden stakes and some twine. Surely there are some but I don't know how to find them.

B) When I finally gave up on the quest for local stakes and twine (How is that not the simplest possible request?! Some pieces of wood and string?!), I go to Target where they have fourteen different varieties of gardening gloves, sun hats, garden buckets and watering cans, all in the seasons trendiest patterns and colors (brick red, cornflower blue, and lime). But no stakes or twine.  I mean, technically they had stakes but they were $4 a piece AND came complete with either a miniature ceramic mushroom or a miniature garden gnome.  It was all painfully trendy and chic, and for some reason, the rows of stylish garden implements made me realize the mountains of ugly plastic crap that are heading for our landfills and sitting dusty in our homes.

I usually have a soft spot for Target, but it was awful.  C'mon, Target--do you have to sell people such kitschy trash that they will be tossing in favor of next year's hot mess? (I'm predicting turquoise will be big, just so that's on the record). 

Next to all this yupster gardening b.s. was a bunch of kids' toys on deep discount: Anamalz.  I didn't buy one because I don't need one, but the text on the box covered the fact that riding your bike is an acceptable alternative to driving your car and that maybe you should make things to last instead of throwing things away.  They are made out of renewable, non-toxic materials and were kind of adorable.  But, just down the aisle, don't forget to buy cheap shit made in poor countries in at least three colors so your bag can match your gardening clogs.

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Spring!  It's here.  I know some of you are sweltering, but we had snow on Sunday so I think we deserve a little bit of sympathy. 

I rode to work for the first time in a while.  I ride from work, but it's a much simpler enterprise to take the bus to work.  I'm not sweaty when I arrive, I don't have to change, I get to read my book, I can be on sleepy-zombie autopilot.   But not today!  Today I could not let this delicate spring morning, full of calicos racing across fresh green lawns, creep away while I take the bus.

National Bike Month starts tomorrow.  I have no idea what events are happening (I could only find info for last year's Bike-to-Work Day) or how people are supposed to celebrate, but I started my festivities by doing a tune-up at home.  Aired up the tires, adjusted the seat height, tightened the ergostem and installed PowerGrips!

A) This means they're not sitting on my floor anymore, and
B) This means I can be more efficient and that thrills my nerdy little heart.

Tonight I will do the lazy person's tune-up, which is to say I will take it outside and spray it down with synthetic tune-up in a can or whatever it's called.  Anyway, I feel good about treating the bike well, since the bike returns the favor.   Next up I'm going to fit my winter bike with fenders and get it set for Paul to ride all summer.  Already I have daydreams of rolling up to the Metrodome with him and giggling at the masses as they stumble into the stadium, exhausted from their 20-block trek from the $15 parking lot. 

What about everybody else?  Are you thinking of joining in? Riding the good ole bicycle around a bit?

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DELICIOUS.

What you need:

Bread (probably some delicious wheaty sandwich bread with nuts in it)
A mango
An avocado
Mayo
Cardamom
Lime Juice
Cayenne
Lettuce

1. Mix together the mayo, cardamom, lime juice and cayenne.  You don't need a ton of cardamom.
2. Slice up the mango and the avocado.
3. Toast the bread.
4. Put the lettuce, mango, avocado and delish mayo on the bread.
5. Find yourself eating a beguiling nutty sweet filling creamy crispy vegetarian sandwich! 
   
6. Eat more until they are all gone.
   

I had doubts about the whole thing because I thought the mango would be too sweet, but instead it is just PERFECT when balanced with the cardamom, mayo, bread and avocado. 

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