Sometimes I wonder why I unrelentingly document so much of my time spent biking on the streets. Only the shortest of my rides goes untimelapsed by my handlebar-mounted camera. The bigger-picture reason is that I like the concept of compiling all the trips I make on two wheels, capturing a rolling record not just of the city’s bike-ability, but of the ever-changing city itself.
On a smaller scale I enjoy the endeavor because it’s the minutia, the blink-and-you-miss-them moments that end up in front of the lens, such as this one coming back from my volunteer shift at the SPCALA yesterday that occurred at the northeast corner of Redondo and San Vicente below — one I’d almost forgotten about until I was reviewing the footage:
It is of a sick man so I will give you the facts and not try not to make light of his mental illness. It is prefaced first by what I presume to be another psychologically impaired man beyond the angle of my camera on San Vicente approaching the southeast corner of the intersection as I arrived on Redondo.
After surveying me at a stop aboard El Naranja he then asked me point blank “Why do they call them Indy cars?” I can only guess why he posed such an incongruous question to me at a stop there on my bike, but when I didn’t respond, he simply provided what sounded to be a sarcasm-tinged weak imitation of an Indianapolis-class race car engine revving that coincided with the traffic signal turning green and I left him behind as he “vrooooom vroooomed” somewhat derisively.
Only to find this fellow on the other side, who’d sprinted across Redondo up onto the sidewalk wherein he pulled out an imaginary handgun and pointed it at the traffic light pole yelling at it to “Shut the fuck up!” three or four times as he circled around it.
When it complied with his order he holstered his weapon and continued east on San Vicente and I continued north.
Follow