Hello Kitty

A friend of mine who uses a bicycle as her primary transportation, but cannot manage anything mechanical, came to me on Sunday with a flat tire. I fixed the tube for her, but the tire itself was beyond salvation. Her bike's a street cruiser, and heavier than I'd like to lift, and it has huge fat tires with wide whitewalls. And she wanted a whitewall tire to replace the dead one.

She found a whitewall tire the next day. It has a Hello Kitty tread on it. It was made under liscence (sic) from Sanrio. The friend is mortified, and extremely grateful to the cycling gods that the tires mostly hidden by the huge fat fender. I don't think it's all that bad; it's kind of cute. I can't wait to see her tracks after a rain, or after she's ridden through a patch of mud.

I think it's not so bad, mostly because the friend is so embarrassed by it. For a six yer old girl (who'd NEVER be tall enough to use it), such a tire would be appropriate. For an adult? Well, I'm not sure I want to meet the woman, or even the teen, who would actually WANT a Hello Kitty bicycle tire.

I have photographic evidence, but I can't find the darned card reader. When I do find it, I'll post a photo or two.

A Question

I discovered the Aimee Mullins TED talk today, and while she seems at home with herself, I don't know how what to think of her. It seems good that she would invite children to see her collection of legs without the inhibiting adults around; she's trying to lessen the fear and discrimination, suppose. And that's good.

I know nothing of Ms. Mullin's personal history, but I would be interested to know if any of you patient people with disabilities would let me know what YOU think of Ms Mullins. She has a diffrent mind-set from most people, and what she's doing is obviously right for her, but is it the right thing for other people? Is she spreading the right attitude?

I will admit that I'm envious of her being able to choose her height. I'd love to be able to make myself a couple of inches shorter...


Anone want to enlighten me about her?

Of Wheels and Wings

I've finally gotten a photo of that lovely shirt sent by Laura.


Thanks, Laura! Now I can think of Beth even more often...

Snow

Snow. Fluffy, white stuff, floating down in big, wet flakes, looking endearingly like a Dickensian postcard.

Or sitting in huge, immobile 1.5-metre- high windrows, piled by graders on the side of the road, or more likely on the sidewalk so the traffic has room to navigate on slippery streets.

There's a sidewalk under this mess. And there's a curb cut under the windrow; the truck's stopped just on the edge of the crosswalk. May the gods have mercy on anyone who has to go anywhere in a wheelchair, but without the aid of a car. Or even get to a car with a wheelchair or cane...


Snow, falling so hard that visibility is under 500 metres, and the 50 km/hr wind is whipping it into drifts across doorways that you have to shovel almost constantly to be able to exit the building for little things like work and groceries...

Snow. 80 cm deep drifts in the park, inviting snowshoers and cross-country skiers, trudging or gliding happily through winter's early dusk.

Or sitting in half-metre deep drifts on people's front lawns, if they haven't piled it up to head height as they cleared their driveways.

This sidewalk was cleared recently. The snow, cut very neatly by a snowthrower, is about 50 cm deep.



Snow can make it awkward to sit at bus stops.



It can look picturesque, even in the biting cold, when it's blanketing pillars in attractive layers. The snow on this lamp has melted just a little, but the layers are visible, I think. I hope.




Of course, snow exists best when it's cold. And it was cold trying to take these photos with a digital camera 9 hours ago. The camera batteries got so cold I had to change them for a pair I had in an inside pocket. And my hand got so cold I couldn't feel the end of the thumb, since the camera had to come out of the mitt to be useful.

Regina was the coldest spot on earth about a week ago; our temperature was -42C, with the breeze causing a wind chill of -52. It then proceeded to warm up, until 41 hours later, it was -0.8C.

It has gotten colder again, and the wind chill is in the -35 range again. Sound carries differently in the cold, and water freezes quite quickly. I'll have to try throwing a cup of boiling water into the air, and see if it causes a cloud. If I can do that on the weekend, I'll try to post a video of it.

I looked into Kate J's blog a couple of days ago, and was inspired to get my camera in gear again. Thanks Kate! And since I also have one of those ever-so-cool t-shirts she's showing off, I should get a photo of that too.

Meanwhile, I have to negotiate that sidewalk tomorrow to get to work. Thank goodness all that snow is being cleared away as I write, with the assistance of semi-trailer dump trucks and snowthrowers mounted on front-end loaders. Of course, the graders moving the snow to the center of the streets will leave a smooth, slippery path for me. There's a reason I use cross-country or trekking poles to walk here: it's 4 wheel drive for feet!