Oh bother...

Right after I had said I would wait until after this summer to get a new bike, I foolishly started looking at bike shop websites (you know, just to see what's out there) and promptly fell in lust with the Opus Ivanna and Nuovella bikes. At this point, the relationship is based pretty much on looks alone -- although the internal hub would be sweet because they're supposed to be very low maintenance, as long as it doesn't make changing the inevitable flat tire too much of a pain, and let's face it, just about anything would be better than the Tank, so who cares what kind of ride it is?

So now I'm fantasizing about pretty bikes. But I don't need a new bike right this minute. And those bikes cost a bit more than I really want to spend. And I have no secure place to store it -- could it stay out all winter?

But maybe I'll just pop by the shops to take a quick look. And a test ride. You know, get it out of my system.

And then I'll buy this helmet to go with it.

Sigh.

PhysicsGirl and the blustery day

Well, it wasn't that windy, but it sure was cold.

I went for brunch with my friend T at Easy Restaurant at Roncesvalles and Queen. Afterward, we went for a walk along the western boardwalk, where to my shame I had never been. It was beautifully sunny, but brutally cold.

We saw some urban art, some very cold swans, and a surprising number of people. It's a 10-minute bike ride from my place; I definitely have to make it a regular haunt when it gets warmer.

You can see the rest of the pictures by clicking on the link under the pic and scrolling to the picture below.

From Rambling Through Toronto

Back in the saddle again...

After what seems like forever, but was probably only two months and a bit, I'm back on the Tank. This week was absolutely lovely for biking, especially yesterday and today with the 10 degree temperatures! Today was gorgeous; the sun was shining and I wound up not having to deal with much traffic. So nice to be back at it.

I'm not used to going this long without biking, and I usually keep riding during the winter. The temperature isn't much of an issue for me, cycling-wise, as long as the roads are fairly clear. This winter has been a bit hard, because the Tank doesn't do snow well. Or at all. It also sometimes doesn't like the cold, refusing to gear back up after a stop, but that hasn't been much of an issue this week. Which might change when the temperature drops back down below zero in the next few days.

While I don't recommend this as a diet...

Lucy is a one-kitty-household kind of girl. When my brother's cat Crazy first came to stay with us in my tiny bachelor apartment, Lucy was unimpressed. She made noises like the Chamberlain in The Dark Crystal. There was much squabbling. And for Lucy, there was eating far too much food. Despite the fact that Crazy never ate a lot to begin with and the bowls always magically replenished themselves, Lucy was afraid that Crazy would eat more than her fair share and so she'd store away extra calories against the day that the interloper would... I don't know, set up camp in front of the food bowl and deny access or something. Obviously Crazy was planning something during those intense bouts of napping, right?

Electrocuting pickles for Science!

It has become somewhat of a tradition for me to electrocute a pickle or two in my grade 12 physics class the day before the Winter Break. Partially to entice the students into class that day, but mostly because it's cool. (And tangentially related to the content. Of course.)

Warning: Science Content ahead
The pickles glow yellow-orange because of the sodium chloride. I read a few years ago about a group who had soaked pickles in different kinds of salts, which caused them to glow different colours. I kept meaning to try it, but every year I forgot about it until a week or so beforehand, which wouldn't give me enough time. This year, however, I was on top of it.

Lester leapt in

I've been swing dancing, and specifically lindy hopping, for just over a decade. I went out regularly when I was in grad school, but then I got a real job and suddenly felt all kinds of guilty not spending all my time marking or planning exciting things for my students to do. After a while, I just got out of the habit of going out.

Part of my problem was that after the regular Wednesday nights at Barcode stopped, the scene sort of fractured. We tried to find a new "regular" night -- you can dance pretty much every night of the week in Toronto, but Wednesday was the night you could definitely expect to see more than a few people you knew. For the past few years when I have gone out, I didn't know if my lindy friends would be there. I didn't really know that many people anymore, "and nobody can ever be introduced in a ball-room."

Anyway, last year I didn't have any of that guilt hanging over me, and I went out a lot more. My natural shyness wore off as I started to see some "new" people more often, and I had old friends to introduce me. I didn't want to fall back into old, hermit-like habits when I went back to work this year, so I signed up for a choreography class with Bees' Knees Dance. It's been kicking my butt for the past few months.

All that build-up to say that we performed our first routine at Swing Out to Victory in Hamilton last Saturday. It was a lot of fun. I even attempted a victory roll.


Video credit: Arthur Lulu

In which PhysicsGirl gets medieval on your charleston

This time last year, all I had ready for my Hallowe'en costume was an un-hemmed, un-beribboned body and one sleeve. I was disappointed.

This year, however, the dress made its debut. It was a huge hit at school, despite the fact I only got to wear it for half a day due to an early closing. The back is challenging to do up by myself; fortunately I did have a tire-woman after all, in the shape of a girl sitting outside the bathroom who offered to tighten my laces for me. After a few hours of fielding the "who are you supposed to be?" question (can't I just be a chick in a medieval dress?), I started answering Christine de Pizan as being a sufficiently obscure response to stop them asking.