Thursday, January 29, 2009

Sometimes I Am So Awesome It Hurts

I was riding my bicycle back from the grocery store the other day, and took my usual shortcut home, which involves bypassing a gate of the sort often found at toll booths and the like. It's about a meter off the ground, a little lower than the height of my handlebars. I've been practicing riding under it by putting both of my feet onto the same pedal, so I can act as a counterweight, then leaning the bike over about π/4 radians and coasting underneath, ducking my head so as to avoid obvious consequences. I've made it a few times, but have always fallen over (or had to dismount to avoid falling over) right afterwards.

I finally pulled it off, though - I dismounted, coasted underneath the gate leaning sideways, re-mounted, and pedaled off, all while carrying ~30 lbs. of groceries in my backpack.

That's not the point of the story, though.

It's been snowing quite a bit, and I was walking back to my apartment during a flurry that left an inch-thick dusting on an already icy ground. Pittsburgh being a hilly city, this journey involves at least one flight of stairs - rather than risk my neck on the slick steps, I stepped onto the banister and slid down a good 20 feet, landing on my feet.

That's not the point of the story, either.

The point of the story is this - why can I never pull off any of this stuff whenever there are girls watching?

--
so she's taking lots of vitamins

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