“The Ginger Hitler Radio Hour.” Boy, that would’ve blown “This American Life” right off the airwaves, amirite? IHateMedia would syndicate that shit worldwide before you could say “Chinese virus.”
You’d never find ’phones for a head that swollen, though. The mic’ would need a pop filter and a set of windshield wipers. And none of the callers would be able to get a word in edgewise.
The body may be confined, yet the mind wanders, as it will.
And a few minutes ago it wandered past a pile of old cycling caps and went, “Hmmmm. …”
Yes, that is a 100 percent cotton Schwinn cycling cap buttressed by a Princeton Tec headlamp strap.
I may not be the first to think of this, but surely I won’t be the last.
Surprise, surprise — the Tour de France will be postponed, at the very least.
On Monday, according to The Guardian, President Emmanuel Macron announced that he would be extending France’s lockdown until May 11, and that no large public events would be allowed before July 11.
Le Tour had been scheduled to kick off June 26 in Nice.
Now, according to CyclingTips, the Spanish newspaper MARCA reports that the Tour could get shifted to August, with the Vuelta a España in September and the Giro d’Italia in October.
That would be a rough ol’ nine weeks, no? Looks like this is not the year to resurrect Live Update Guy.
Well, it was pretty easy to do the ol’ social distancing today.
The fog crept down the foothills like something out of a Sherlock Holmes movie, followed by the rain, and finally, the snow.
Well, it was “snow” only in the sense that it involved fat white flakes falling, but nothing stuck around long enough to be shoveled. It certainly wouldn’t have kept a Belgian off the bike. I don’t think anything can.
But it did the trick for me. I rode the trainer for 45 minutes, which I hate, and then did a little light resistance training, which also, too, and likewise.
Still, anything beats watching our national “leadership” act more like Al Capone than Al Schweitzer. These pendejos couldn’t organize a beer run for a frat house if the liquor store were downstairs.
You (OK, I) might have been thinking to yourself (or myself): “Man, a van, down by the river. That would be the thing right about now. Fresh air, solitude, no cootie-carrying COVID Charlies popping in and out, sneezing on everything. Get tired of this place, move to that place. Living the dream, baby.”
Not so much, it seems. Kylie Mohr chatted up a few van-life types and found that this livin’ off the road is gettin’ kinda old given current conditions.
Says full-time van-lifer Matthew Tufts:
“While thinking I’m living quite independently, I’m actually reliant on far more public places than the person with a home who fulfills a lot of those little daily tasks and activities from their residence. It sounds idyllic to weather this storm in rural locales and on the road, as if mobile living makes you immune to the issues currently plaguing most of society. But in reality, living on the road isn’t in the best interest of the greater population. …”
Happily, as in other corners of society, the nomads are taking care of each other, providing parking spaces, spare rooms, even apartments. Says one good Samaritan, Aileen Gardner:
“I definitely feel like we had a responsibility to take care of the people who are currently living on the road. The van-life community is honestly half the reason why people do van life. We take care of each other.”
Mad Blog Media 