Today: In Honor of the Doctor

Old Stevinsky, the closet academic, the John Denver croonin', lichen-lovin', Spanish-speakin', hermano de la valle de Utah, just defended his Ph.D dissertation. The man's a doctor. Holy Smokes. Here's a little video capturing our last significant lichen finding on site at Black Butte in Eastern Oregon. You've made us all experts in the field, Sir Leavitt. Here's to many blissful years in the search of Lichen truth!

Today: Bike Commuting

I work in a very unique environment. In our building in Bellevue, I would guess that close to a dozen people commute to work by bicycle. Of those twelve, eight to ten work in my office. Having commuted by bike off and on for nine years now, it has been torture seeing their bikes and not being able to join them. One of the challenges, for me, of moving to Maple Valley was giving up that option to commute by bike. Currently, a one-way trip to the office clocks in at a whopping 24 miles. For those of you, like me, who operate at a first-grade math level, that amounts to a 48-mile round trip. With Seminary taking up my mornings before work and darkness cutting off the time after work during the winter, my bicycle commuting days dwindled to a thin trickle.


This year, Rachael pushed me to get a 24-hour membership. I have resisted for almost three years because the mere act of entering that place nauseates me. Eventually, I saw the reason in her words, but signing up nearly broke me. Providently, the sales person saw the revulsion brimming in my eyes and wisely did not push me to meet with a chipper trainer when I growled through gritted teeth: “It’s nothing personal, but I only need access to the showers.”

Come to find out that if you can make it past the blaring techno in the gym, the locker room is a surprisingly sheltered place. Flat-panel televisions broadcast the World Cup games, the voices of international game announcers murmur through the room in low tones. The morning’s would-be athletes appear to be professionals and behave with more decorum than the lunch-time crowd. It’s a bit like having ice cream in Hell. No wants to spend any time there, but anything to lessen the impact of molten brimstone can only serve to render the experience a little less painful.


So all this is to make the point that I forgot a few things on my bike ride to work today. Things such as: my shoes, deodorant, and gel. Fortunately, Rite Aid is half a block away. So, after showering and retreading myself in bike shoes, I clicked and tapped my way over to Rite Aid, my unruly concentration-camp hair fluffing in full glory.



Once there, Linda—the middle-aged clerk behind the counter—took my plastic in exchange for Speedstick and “L.A. Looks” mega hold hair gel. I know what you’re thinking, and you can think it all you want. Two dollars for 20 oz of green sticky goodness represents a ridiculously inexpensive means of taming my hair. So long as it does the job, who cares what they call it?? As for the shoes, my bike shoes, while old and naturally stiff, provide a modicum of comfort.


The best part of this story is that when Pat—a religious bike commuter in the office—saw that I was wearing my bike shoes today he said: “It could be worse, you could forget your pants.” Evidently, he forgot his pants one day and walked around the office for an hour and a half in tight biker pants before he decided, in his words, “This is not okay.” So what does he do? He walked to the mall, which is only five blocks away, and bought a pair of pants at the Gap. (I get a smile just thinking of him walking into that store in bike pants.) Then Dawn says, “Well at least you didn’t forget your underwear.” And Pat says, “actually.” Dawn, the most committed of all bike commuters in the office, shakes her head knowingly.

My lapse in judgment or memory, depending on how you choose to view it, really doesn’t sound all that bad compared to missing briefs, boxers, and brassieres. I have, on occasion, forgotten a towel. This oversight represents nearly an intractable problem. Toilet paper? You can imagine the results—but try not to. Paper towels? Once or twice. You try that in a locker room full of onlookers. I don’t have the stomach for it. Of course, you could always fall back on the sweaty t-shirt you just took off or the clean shirt you plan to wear. As Ellie is wont to say: “That makes me not eat.”