Found a Striped Shirt

On the seventh of June I wrote that I left the house walking because I wanted to check in with my friend about the ride on the next day.  I noted that she might have to take her bike into the shop.  I rode to Cole Valley and met my buddy.  We had coffee and talked about the local shops.  We went to Decades Of Fashion and then to Wasteland.  I found a striped shirt.  We stopped by Goodwill and looked through images of people in berets on the internet.  We headed to Cal Surplus then were I looked at a bunch of shirts and hats.  I settled on two hats and then we went next door.  There I found a Navy outfit that just barely fit.

In the meantime my friend called to say that I was right about her bike.  She had also told me to come by around 5.  I said bye to my buddy then and went across the street to look for a basket and then I went to Delux to wait until it was time to go to my friend’s house.  I watched the rest of the Giants game and talked to the bartenders.  It was a bit too early when I shot down to the wiggle.

I left a little later.  On the way up the hill going home I rode up Page to Irving and onto the house.  I dropped my stuff and reorganized my things.  I left then and headed to Civic Center.  I took the Panhandle and only had maybe one incident.  I took the train to Ashby and when I arrived I learned that the Hella Big Bike Party would leave in a half an hour so I went to Shattuck and had some Enchiladas.  When I came back the ride had not left so I waited.

While waiting I saw a quadriplegic had caught his electric wheelchair on a wall.  The controller which he controlled with his head had been made askew.  I asked if he needed help but he had trouble interacting with me so I simply pulled his chair out and adjusted his controller.  At first I thought that he may have been indignant about this but he really couldn’t say much beyond groans.

The tray on his chair had a board with letters and words.  I watched him using his pointer and realized that he still needed some help and tried adjusting his controller a bit more.  He toggled it then and sped off.  However, a moment later he stopped and returned.  I stood there watching while he moved his head around; his pointer indicating words on his tray: “thank you.”

When he sped away the second time I noted that bike ride was getting ready to go.  I got on the bike and he headed out.  We took Ashby and went under the BART tracks and past the hospital to Broadway.  I ran over some guy’s phone.

A few blocks later we stopped and the ride leader indicated that we had to wait for the stragglers.  I few cops passed.  When the riders caught up we continued onto downtown.  I talked to the guy about his phone.  He had put it in his breast pocket and it had fallen out but when he retrieved it was alright.

Right past the freeway we headed south toward a parking lot with an adjacent alcove under the freeway.  There the ride leader presented the group a birthday cake with a number four on it.  She suggested that the Gemini’s come forward and one of them was a lady I remembered from SF Bike Party.  There was fire dancing and I saw a couple of others that I knew from Bike Party but I only had one beer and had a long way to go home so I left.

I went to Lake Merritt and took the train to Civic and then climbed Hickory to Page and beyond.  I only had one problem at Octavia.  I watched TV til I went to bed at 12.

The mooring of the day that I wrote this I was up around 10 and headed to Java Beach.  There I read the paper and looked at Twitter.  My buddy called to say he was late but I told him I wasn’t going to the ride. I got ready to go home and my riding partner texted.  I told him to talk to my friend.  I went home and was not super happy about the ride.  My friend had dug herself into a hole and I felt that there was very little I could do to change things.

This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.