A Girl...

Sweet Ride

This morning over scrambled eggs and P.G. Tips, Simon blew hot steam rings from his mouth into the kitchen air because it was just that cold inside the house. I wanted to cry. The apartment heater doesn't really work, and all the windows leak, and outside of the electric blanket and the disco shower, we live in a state of constant shiver. Simon got me microwavable socks for Christmas and I'm wondering if they come large enough to fit my entire body. Has anyone ever seen a microwavable jumpsuit? Hell, would I even dare wear a microwavable jumpsuit? Or a jumpsuit of any kind?

Also, we valiantly fought legions of ants who this weekend stormed both the kitchen and the bedroom. Seems they were after the sugar, the rotten vegetables in the garbage, and my panties. Yup--ants in my pants. Super.

In better news, we watched a buttload of movies this weekend, including Angel Heart, which was so very good; director Alan Parker should be famouser. But the best part of the weekend was yesterday afternoon, when the sun was bright and actually emitting warmth, which meant we finally got a chance to get outside and enjoy our new bikes. Yes! Bikes! Simon got us both bikes for Christmas! What are we--seven? Hell yes.

Alas, all I have right now are crappy, dark, indoor, stationary shots of the bikes since all of the good, sunshiney, outdoor, action shots are living on Simon's camera and he's off being businessy today, which means you'll have to wait to see the better full-body pics. Ooh la la. Here's a sneak peak at the magnificence of our new rides. Yes, those are Wallace and Gromit figurines we're going to attach as fender ornaments.

As you can see, they're not your ordinary bikes. They're old-timey cruisers, but with cool gangsta stylin. We have the pimpest rides in all the land. Simon picked them up when he was in Orange County for Thanksgiving, and he put them together on the sly and hid them in a closet for an entire month so he could surprise me. I actually suspected he might have gotten me a bike because he'd mentioned seeing them when he was in the OC back in October, but I had no idea that my bike would be so pink and curvaceous and goddamn sexy, and I certainly didn't expect him to pull a second bike out of the closet for himself. It was a wonderful wonderful wonderful surprise.

The thing is, when you ride bikes like these, you have to be very comfortable with the attention of strangers. Only two minutes into our ride, some lady stopped us to say how much she "admired" the bikes and how mine reminded her of her old Huffy cruiser, and by the end of our outing, we'd heard no fewer than a dozen comments about our killer wheels. Little kids said "cool," some old dudes lined up on a park bench playing blues riffs said "Right on!" and a girl in a pink tank top said they were "hawt" and that mine was the best color. We kind of caused a sensation.

It was a lovely, perfect day for riding, and the lake we circumnavigted twice had all kinds of hidden corners that I never knew about: the bonsai garden, the bird sanctuary, the boat launch, the gazebo, the lawn bowling fields. Lots and lots of excellent people watching too, and by day's end we'd heard a generous handful of foreign languages, some unidentifiable.

My favorite part of the day was our ride a block from the lake to a coffee shop for a latte and a hot chocolate. We sat on the curb outside sipping our drinks and watching people check out our bikes. It's funny how such a silly little thing can make people smile.

Simon rode in front of me most of the time, and at one point I rung my little bell to get his attention and called out, "Are you smiling like a damn fool? Because I am." If he wasn't smiling before, he certainly was then.

And that reminded me of a night last week when I was padding about the house in my microwave socks.

"So do those make you happy, girl?" he asked.

"They work great! My feet are so warm."

"That's not what I asked. I don't care if they work. I just care if they make you happy. So, do they?"

"Yes, they make me happy."

"Okay then. I have succeeded. Mission accomplished."

Posted by Leah at January 9, 2006 02:59 PM