Take that, Portland! Minneapolis finishes first in national bike rankings

Minnesota might be known for its cold winters and "Ya, you betcha!" accents, but it's beginning to get some recognition for biking as well.
Minneapolis unseated Portland, Ore. as the most bike-friendly city in the country, according to an article in the Star Tribune. The rankings were determined by Bicycling magazine and compared 49 different cities in the country based on a city's number of bike lanes, municipal bike racks, bike boulevards, government interest in cycling improvements and local bike culture.
Minneapolis also scored high because of its pledge to instill a bike share program and the city's spike in bike commuters in recent years (almost tripled in the last three years alone!). Other high-ranking cities were Seattle, Boulder, Eugene and Madison.
As most Mankato-area residents probably know, South Central Minnesota is littered with good bike trails and all sorts of fun routes to take day trips on. Bike trails and low-traffic back roads can be used to get to anywhere from Faribault to New Ulm and back.
However, I was unaware our in-state metropolitan to the north was such an advocate for two-wheeled travel. I always figured that since the Minneapolis/St. Paul area was such a pain in the neck to drive through, it couldn't possibly be accommodating to cyclists.
I sense a road trip to the cities coming on. I'm going to have to see this cities biking culture first-hand to get a full grasp of it.

Ivy Green: Birthplace of Helen Keller ... America’s First Lady of Courage

Wednesday, 20 February (Part II)
Custom RV (AKA Brannon Hutcheson — Vina, Alabama

Soon after we arrived in Red Bay, Marsha (of Where’s Weaver) recommended that we check out the Helen Keller Museum in Tuscumbia, Alabama … some 40+ miles (64+ km) away.

We intended to go last Sunday, but luckily I checked the website first as they are only open Monday through Saturday. Since we had some free time before our dinner date with friends, we headed over to Ivy Green … Birthplace of Helen Keller this afternoon.

Built in 1820 by Helen’s grandfather, the white clapboard home was the second house to be built in Tuscumbia after Alabama joined the Union as the 22nd state. It is a Virginia style cottage, with four rooms downstairs.
To the right is the cottage where Helen Keller was born; and where Anne Sullivan later taught her.

(If you’d like to see the full-sized versions of the photos that make up the collages, and the photos I did not post here, feel free to visit my online gallery.)

First, I’m going to fess up to not knowing much about Helen Keller before our visit to Ivy Green. I knew her name, of course, and that she was a blind-deaf woman who had overcome great obstacles with the help of her teacher, Anne Sullivan. But that was about it. So I read up on her a bit before we headed out on today’s outing.

A replica of the statue that immortalizes the moment of Helen’s “breakthrough” with touch-signing
is the centerpiece of the memorabilias displayed in what used to be Aunt Evaline's room.

In her book, Helen Keller: Rebellious Spirit, author Laurie Lawlor writes:
Some relatives began to call Helen “a wild, destructive animal.” One uncle told her
mother that she was “mentally defective” and should be put out of sight in an institution.
Loyal Aunt evaline, Captain Keller’s sister, nicknamed Aunt Ev, disagreed. “This child
has more sense than all the kellers,” she said, "’if there’s a way to reach her mind.”

Although my insight into Helen Keller is sketchy at best, it didn’t take me long to realize that we weren’t getting the full picture from the docent who was walking us around the house. A lovely lady, mind you, but she seemed more concerned about pointing out Helen’s physical beauty, exclaiming at every opportunity, “Wasn’t she pretty!”

The original statue is part of the National Statuary Hall Collection at the US Capitol.
It was unveiled in ; unfortunately we didn’t see it when we visited the Capitol in .

The docent briefly told us about the family history; about how, at just 19 months old, Helen Keller came down with a sickness that led to her becoming blind and deaf; about how her parents sought help from Alexander Graham Bell, who was working with hearing-impaired children at the time; about how she was considered a '”wild child” until Anne Sullivan, whom she met at the Perkins Institute for the Blind, took her in hand when she became Helen’s teacher; about how she had a breakthrough in learning Anne’s “touch-signing” at the well pump; about how she then quickly grasped the concept of touch-signing, and went on to speak well enough to be accepted and study at Radcliffe College with the help of her teacher Anne, who interpreted lectures for her.

Two of the many pictures of Helen Keller that decorate the walls of Ivy Green.
Because she had a protruding left eye, she was almost always photographed in profile.
(Both eyes were replaced with glass ones later in life.)

Yes, there was mention of her success as both an author and a speaker; and her travels to many countries in her quest to help the deaf-blind around the world. But nowhere was there any mention of her activities as a suffragist, or the fact that she was a member of the Socialist Party … all experiences that helped to shape her into the woman that she was — America’s First Lady of Courage.

Maybe I just didn’t look close enough to see this side of Helen Keller represented at Ivy Green. Or perhaps, had we not been interrupted by a family arriving to visit the house, the docent would have answered the question I was about to pose about the oversight. (This article, which a friend linked me to, makes for an interesting read; perhaps you will find that to be the case as well.)

to show his appreciation of her efforts with war-blinded soldiers, President Eisenhower
invited Helen Keller to the White House. The photo captures the moment after Helen
expressed her desire to "see" Ike’s famous smile.

Polly Thomason, long-time companion and guide, is “signing” into Helen’s hand.

I don’t intend to turn this post into a thesis on Helen Keller. Those who wish to learn more about her can refer to the voluminous amounts of information on the web. In the meantime, let me give you a quick tour of the home in which this remarkable woman was born and raised.

Helen’s parents’ room is one of the four rooms on the ground floor of the two story house.
The docent opened the gate so we could get a closer look at the beautiful bedspread, and
explained that they allow the sight-impaired to touch it so that they can “see” the details.

The parlor, like the rest of the house, is decorated with mostly original furnishings of the
Keller Family and memorabilia from Helen’s life. The picture on the table is of Helen at age seven.

In the movie, the Miracle Worker, the dining room is the scene of one of Helen’s “wild-child” tantrums. The docent told us that Anne Sullivan asked Helen’s parents to leave the room,
locked the door, and spent the day teaching her how to behave at the table.

Helen shared this second floor bedroom with her teacher, Anne Sullivan.

The lengths I go to in order to take pictures!
Although the docent walked us behind the gates in the downstairs rooms,
there was no one to unlock the security gates upstairs.

This building, located in the back garden, houses the kitchen and the cook’s bedroom.

Glimpses into the kitchen …

… and the cook’s bedroom.

From the brochure we were given on arrival at Ivy Green: This is the pump at which Helen learned her first word, “water.” It is located behind the main house. Annie wrote these words later that historic night: “she learned that everything has a name, and that the manual alphabet is the key to everything she wants to know.”

Originally the office where the plantation books were kept, this cottage was
converted into a bridal suite when Helen’s father married her mother;
this is where Helen was born, and later lived with her teacher, Anne Sullivan.

The Docent told us that when Annie realized that Helen’s parents were catering to
all of her whims, she decided she needed to move Helen away in order to control her
tantrums. The story goes that Helen was put into a carriage and taken for a long ride
before being brought back to this cabin, just yards away from the main house; she had
no idea how close she was to the house and her parents.

The two-room cottage consists of the playroom / schoolroom (left) and the bedroom
Helen and Annie shared; the shoes at the foot of the doll bed (top right) belonged to Helen.

Although it was rather chilly to be wandering around outside, we did take some time to check out the grounds. We peeked in at the outdoor stage where William Gibson’s The Miracle Worker, is performed during June and July, and wandered amongst the homages installed in tribute to Helen Keller. At this time of the year, the grounds are devoid of color, but come spring time, I bet the garden is a nice place to sit and contemplate what Helen Keller stood for.

These two totems are part of the “Gateway” from the Maori people of New Zealand.

Helen Keller challenged the Lions to help her “hasten the day when there shall be no preventable
blindness; no little deaf, blind child untaught; no blind man or woman unaided.” That challenge,
and the Lions’ response, are on the left; the Knights of the Blind exhibit is on the right.
[click the collage for a more legible version]

The docent who welcomed us to Ivy Green — and the brochures we picked up — all refer to Helen Keller’s birthplace house as …

… a permanent shrine to the “miracle” that occurred in a blind and deaf seven-year-old girl’s life.

And that’s what visitors will find when they come here. We thoroughly enjoyed our visit, even if, in our humble opinion, it is perhaps an incomplete shrine since it does not pay tribute to the “complete” woman that Helen Keller was. It was definitely worth the $6/person admission ($5/person with AAA or military ID).

End of theYear

Well, I will have to settle with 2028 miles on the bikes for the year. I should have braved the wind today, but just did not have the drive. Yes, it was in the 50s here. I know others were out riding, but I called it a year.
No chance to ride tomorrow (New Year's Eve) as the weather is heading South as I am writing this (sleet and snow on the way). Forecast is for bitter cold on New Year Day.
Don't get me wrong, I am pleased with my efforts this year. After the worst winter weather in decades, a week in the hospital for biopsy, 7 1/2 weeks of radiation treatments, and 11 weeks of chemotherapy, I was able to ride 340 miles during the period.
To celebrate getting though the treatments, I treated myself with a new bike - my first road bike. Ended up with logging over 1000 miles on the new bike this year. Not much dirt riding at home, Lake Manawa trails were under water most of the year. Enjoyed some awesome dirt riding in Wisconsin and S. Carolina.
So, I am ready to close the book on ...
, bring it on!

First fitting

I'm sorry, I really didn't mean the title of this post to be a pun on first footing. I'm writing about the first fitting session for my son's kilt. But 'first foot' in my dialect of Scots would be pronounced 'first fit'....
Anyway, here's the young man trying on a sample kilt to see how his own kilt is going to be shaped at the waist and over the hips. We learned a lot about how the pleats would be sewn, and how the kilt would be made to sit slightly higher at the waist to allow for any last extra bit of upward growth. And because our son is very slim, any filling out in later years will be catered for by extra hidden pleats that will wrap under the flat front of the kilt.
The tartan of the sample kilt is Nicolson. Our son's been deciding which of our family tartans he wants. Probably the only time in his life that our engineer-to-be will be seen poring over swatches.

Cascade River Waterfalls

Here are a couple of waterfall shots during our outing to Cascade River State Park earlier this week. We had a perfect day for exploring the river and looking for flowers. The sky was overcast which makes for ideal photography of waterfalls and flowers.

Illuminated Camellia

A camellia flower at the UC Berkeley Garden.

Sweetest Little Pea

Beaker is our parakeet (budgie). I don't have a lot of pictures of him, because he's usually pretty camera-shy. This past weekend he was in a mood for it, though.

Pretty bird!
Descriptive, but also one of his favorite things to say.

Man oh man, does Beaker love him some bananas.
He's very happy about the banana. Budgies' pupils shrink when they're excited. (Compare with the eyes in the first picture.)

The skin is actually his favorite part.
I am so totally nuts about this bird!
It takes a little while to teach budgies to speak, but it's definitely worth it. Beaker does a few tricks too. "Gimme a kiss" gets you nose kisses, and he'll fly to you when you say, "C'mere". If he feels like it.
I've been bad about not teaching him new things to say lately. But he picked one up anyway. He's got a little Ferris wheel with bells that he loves to throw to the floor. We got in the habit of saying, "Excuse me!" when he does that... and now he says it too!
Notes on parakeets/budgies:
If you ever buy a parakeet, I can't recommend this enough: find one that will sit on your finger in the store. I probably traumatized our first budgie by trying so hard to make friends with an unfriendly bird. There are all sorts of taming techniques, but none worked on poor Mr. Jitters.
When budgies are first delivered to the store, they are usually fairly tame. But it only takes a day or two for them to learn (from the other birds) to flee from the hand. So plan in advance and ask your pet store to call you when the birds first arrive.

New beginning

Getting totally forked on the weekend may be the catalyst for a new beginning.
My hybrid bike, which has toured in three countries, and which I haven't yet got around to naming is probably going to be replaced. I have had a quick search of possible replacement forks on the Internet, and they aren't cheap. In fact, when I consider the things I'll soon need to replace on my current ride (I've only changed a single gear cable in over 8,000km), it may work out cheaper to just buy a new machine and have done with it. The best news is that I have the option to rand sack the current bike and keep the parts that still have some value, some of which may be of some use in getting The Black Magic back to a standard at which it can be used for centuries.
I think there is a lesson in this incident. While my hybrid is (was) perfectly capable of handling dirt roads, it probably wasn't up to being consistently ridden to hell and back. If I apply the old 80/20 rule, I should be able to utilise the more robust frame and forks of The Black Magic and eliminate much of the wear on the new steed, which can then be used as a touring machine, handling the occasional dirt road, but predominantly riding sealed/paved surfaces at home. I may even restore The Black Magic to a permanent commuter role, so good has it's performance been this week.
Sometimes the darkest hour can be the catalyst for a new beginning.

• In other news, I'm getting a little tired of hearing/reading reports of road "accidents", hearing the police complaining about having to deal with so many of them, before reading the old "no charges will be pressed" line. Wake up. If the police are really tired of dealing with these incidents, they are the ones who are in the best position to do the most to stop them. How about actually enforcing the traffic laws? It's not bloody rocket science, but would probably halve the road toll within 12 months if it was actually supported by some magistrates who might actually apply the penalties written in law. Either way, if the police aren't prepared to do their job, they should resign and leave it for someone else who will.

Thatched Mushroom

I have got a busy day ahead of me and probably won't have time to post later, so here is a lovely thatched cottage which we saw yesterday. One of the little treasures of Lincolnshire.

No reaction

Haven't been on much the last couple of days. I figure it's about time for an update. In my last entry I referred to a punch-throwing/car-throwing yobbo that I encountered on Sunday evening. However, the surprising thing has been the total lack of reaction to this incident from the cycling advocates whom I've contacted (Bicycle Queensland, Bicycle Gold Coast, and anyone who read the thread over at bikeforums). Especially when compared with other "hit and run" incidents which weren't quite as blatantly deliberate (albeit quite suspicious).

Granted, I wasn't hit, however, a less experienced, less cynical and less judgemental cyclist would have been. And while such incidents (fortunately) are relatively rare, this is proof that they still happen. Admittedly, the muted reaction may be partially my own fault. After all, I didn't have a pen and paper with me to record the details of the vehicle (a registration # would have been all I needed), but it does still raise one or two questions about why there is so much more focus on the supposedly "accidental" incidents than the blatantly deliberate ones. Have we just accepted ths sort of behaviour as something that can (and will) never be changed? Are advocates so wrapped up in the "building things" ideal that they pay more attention to the incidents they expect to give more credence to this mantra?

In something more positive, it hasn't stopped me from riding (why would it after Sunday night?). Yesterday morning was particularly pleasant with the low-lying cloud near Hinze Dam. That place seems different everytime I go out there, and it does serve a purpose for quick hills when I need them (and right now, I need them as much as ever!).


I'm still a little undecided about where to go this weekend. "Officially" I'm supposed to be leading the Tweed Mystery Ride to cover for Martin, but I'm not expecting anyone to get in touch now that I've taken over. If they don't, it leaves me with options. I could head for O'Reilly's (I usually do when I've had it with the world). Alternatively, I could say sod it all and jump on a train to the Glasshouse Mountains. I just don't know at this point.