This is the semi-nostalgic tale of what came to pass that fate-filled afternoon where I found myself parting ways from my trusted and beloved Hampton Cruiser (pictured there <—) and coming to terms with newly-acquainting myself to a freshly pressed basket-less Electra.  Before we get too far into the melodrama, let me clear the air and admit that the Midtown Drinking Machine is still securely tethered to a tree in my yard.  BUT it has a non-functioning system, most crucial to its ability to role me through the mean streets of midtown.  Not to mention many other, what lay-folks would call horrific, brief yet momentous all original rage induced fits of stupendous, umm…occasions?  So you can imagine.  No, seriously, please do imagine.  I’m a fan.

It all started one Saturday when that guy JoshGZ called to tell me he and his financier (I mean fiancée ) were on their way to gather their bicycles from my yard and I should thus ready myself for a trip we’ll call a pedal <insert noun here> crawl.  blah blah blah, I get to gearing up my bike which I’ve neglected most of the winter months and realize it needs a new tube on the rear wheel.  A bit of grease on the hands, a few dead bugs living in the tire, and several minutes later, I’m ready to inflate the new tube.  No problem.  Except, in my haste, I failed to realize I’ve used a substandard piece which, when inflated to pressures acceptable to the old tube, cause the new tube to explode.  Literally, explode.  It was loud and exciting enough for both my neighbors to the east and to the west to peak over the fence and assess my well-being (they’re what average people would call "responsible" adults).  Needless to say, I was in a hurry and now further aggravated with my lack of preparedness for said impending adventure.

Enter brain’s idea to walk the two and a half blocks to the bike shop and buy whichever single-speed cruiser is least expensive  (and I don’t know what it is about the folks pedaling the flat streets of Sacramento that makes them believe they require more than one gear to get around, but please all be to WTF that we can’t carry more than one single-speed cruiser that isn’t meant for the non-junk having female rider.)  My brain isn’t always at its best, but it was the best idea I had at the time.  As if to imply it was too much work to purchase the correct tube and spend another few minutes switching it out.  Uhh…yeah, that makes a whole lot of sense.

Enough rambling, and long story short.  I’d been dreaming up excuses to buy an Electra since the summer of 2007, and here we are on the cusp of summer 2009, so it was inevitable.  I made an impulse decision to make an impulse purchase and settle for a shiny new plain bicycle (pictured below) for which I overpaid.  So it goes.

Don’t get me wrong, these Electra bicycles are of higher quality than my Hampton Cruiser, but they lack character.  It’s backwards.  You can’t buy character, it’s created.  Electra, outside of their basic models, panders to an imaginless audience (wait, I mean an audience that lacks imagination), incapable of creating interesting behaviour.

Don’t be boring.  Express yourself.  Say "goodybye". Say "hello".  And throw something.

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Say Goodbye, Say Hello was first posted to justinll.com on May 27, 2009.