Tinker my Ride

I just spent five days in San Francisco and loved it. Why? Because my dumbass ran all over that town and saw most of the sights before dawn while traveling at about a 9:30 minute mile. That S.O.B. is hilly.

I attended a conference on Tinkering at the Exploratorium. For my dirty minded friends, and you know who you are, it is not like that at one of those places in San Francisco. It was about working with items in an experimental manner inside our children’s museums. Basically you set up a bunch of stuff and let kids create whatever they want. It might use gears, small motors, marbles, artwork, you name it. Then we went on to a tour of a place called the Crucible to see Tinkering in the real world. The Crucible is a non-profit educational facility that fosters a collaboration of Arts, Industry and Community. Through training in the fine and industrial arts, The Crucible promotes creative expression, reuse of materials and innovative design while serving as an accessible arts venue for the general public. Basically if you like to work with metals, glass, etc you can do it there on your own time. I thought the concept was awesome, even though the marketing director that gave us the tour made my ass twitch every time she opened her annoying mouth. But I digress.

There was an area in the Crucible where bikes were being remade, repaired, and even turned into art. A few of us thought a great idea would be to have a workshop at our museums called “Tinker my Ride”. You could have people bring in bikes, wagons, whatever. I immediately thought of my sisters ten speed that I borrowed without asking when I was ten.

I have always been a bit of a slow starter, and did not learn how to ride a bike until age ten. Once I finally mastered my ugly bike with the great big banana seat I started eyeing Cindy’s light blue ten speed. One Saturday I hauled ass (read casually rode) out of the garage before anyone else noticed and made my rounds in the neighborhood. Low and behold I saw the hottest boy in sixth grade mowing his lawn. Some things never change as even then I had NO FREAKING CLUE how to deal with the opposite sex. I just watched. I was still riding my bike past his yard and I was still watching him to the point my neck was straining. My neighborhood did not have curbs on its streets. Rather it just had concrete slopes from the edge of the street to the edge of the lawns. The next thing I know I hit the mailbox of the hottest boy in sixth grade and became airborne. Luckily his driveway broke my fall after I sailed over his mailbox. He stopped the mower and came to help me while I was in his driveway with bleeding legs and road rash all over my arms. My sister’s bike was simply put – beat to shit. I kept telling him I was fine and attempted to ride oh so casually away on the bike but the front tire was now in the shape of an “L” and would only go in circles. He offered to have his mom drive me home but I refused and carried my bike while limping down the road.

I think this set the tone for my future dealings with boys and men. Simply put, I AM SMOOTH.