black out

f.g.g. interview - Molly Godlewski/

well hows this... the usual format is getting boring. i don't want to repeat the same questions w/ every person. so how about i ask you a question and we try to bottom post them so i can just copy and paste when we're done and we'll just go back and forth, rather than having a static format flooded with a sense of ennui? eh?

so... let's start with name/aliases: who are you?
(what's your biker number)

Well that sounds just Dandy.

My name is Molly, some people call me 'Mozzie' when I was a rookie I was obsessed with anything the color pink so a long while ago a few people called me pink.. creative, uh? My current number is 6022.. I've had the numbers 19, 26 (too sick) and 34 at other companies.

What else ya got?


are you a chicago original?

I grew up in Oak Park, a suburb about 9 miles west of the loop.
At seventeen years of age I moved into Chicago proper and have lived in a few different neighborhoods. Humboldt Park being my favorite.

okay. so backing up a bit... how did you end up with a 4 digit biker
number? is that typical for your company?

Yes, indeed it is typical of my company. Everyone at Dynamex has a 4 digit biker number. I'm confident in surmising it's due to our nextel radios - the last 4 digits of my direct connect are 6022.

haha. what are you riding now?

My current work bike is an older Soma Rush. There's a silly anecdote about how I got the frame and fork for "free": It was 2004 and I was on my way to work when suddenly I found myself sprawled on my back in the middle of the street. I had been T-boned by a woman coming out of an alley. I was surprisingly unharmed but the KHS was badly damaged. She drove me and the bike to Upgrade and tried to convert me to Christianity during the trip.. claiming it was "God's plan / fault" she hit me that morning. The woman agreed to pay for the new frame; gave me her information and left the shop. The bible thumper ended up fighting me tooth and nail - even getting her son to call and harass me once she found out how much it would cost her (more than 50 dollars) Thus adding another reason for why I'm a proud atheist.
I take responsibility for my actions.

I have a few others: a Planet X Cross, Lemond road equipped with Campy, Fuji Track Pro in the works.. I plan to race ONLY at the velodrome, a vintage Puch road racing bicycle with Campy 12 speed and perhaps a Specialized MTB if I ever end up picking it up from my friend Josh.

so with all of these lovely bikes, do you race?

I do. I belong to a team comprised mainly of messengers, ex-
messengers and general bad asses: The Chicago Cuttin'
Crew.
This is our second year as a team and the first year I
actually trained outside of riding for work, so I'm
much more confident. Being a messenger prepares you for
sprints but doesn't give you much in the way of
endurance, not as much as you'd think.. Maybe if
you're working the car board?
Anyhow, I want to focus more on track this upcoming season.

Our team is planning to host a women's track clinic in
May. Unfortunately there's a noticeable disparity
between the men and womens races.. An average Cat4 mens race
will have up to 40 racers where as the womens Cat4's
will have maybe 5 or 6 racers. It can be quite
discouraging/ intimidating if you're a new woman to the
sport, let's face it.. it's a boys club.
Hopefully with more women based events and clinics we can
reach out to the fast females out there.. I know they're
out there!

[short time lapse in emails]

just wanted to finish up that interview. hopefully you got my last question. if not...
any last words?
btw, i saw your picture in cog... apparently you're getting pretty famous.

cheers-

-gene

i'm sorry, i don't think i got your last question.
not fabulous at speaking off the cuff, especially after work.
so these "last words" you ask of me.. i think i'll pass.

everyone is in Cog, i'm nothing special.

see you around the Frog.
have a lovely weekend dear, take care.

-Molly


thanks again Molly!!!

f.g.g interview - autumn

photo credit: lucas saugen photography


what's your name? fixie chic aka autumn

what's your bikes name? none of my bikes have names, exactly. i have 12 (?) bikes now, so it would never be able to keep track of that many nicknames. my winter fixie is known as the 'derby bike' (because it can be used for bike derby and is also has more than a few roller derby stickers on it) or the 'pink bike' (because although the frame is black, it has pink fenders). my summer fixie is 'the pake' because its...a pake. my single speed touring bike is known as either 'the motobecane' (because it is on - my father's old road bike from the late 70s) or the 'duluth bike' since its the bike i have used tor ride to duluth and back. the majority of my bikes are actually geared (time trial, road, mountain, etc), however 90% of my riding is fixed or single speed.

what is the bike/setup you're riding (what's your gearing at least)? i think my current gearing on my winter fixie, the pink bike, is 40 15, and my summer fixie, the pake, is 46 20.

how long have you been riding fixed? ummmm. a few years now. rode single for a long time prior to going fixed.

how long did you cycle before you "converted" as it were? from the time i was a child, i was riding, but it didn't become my primary transport until my late teens. i am in my 30s now and have never had a drivers license or a car. the bicycle is what i use for 90% of my transportation (the other 10% would be foot, bus, or carpooling). i also ride for fun doing everything from half-ironman distance triathlons, alley cats, double and triple centuries, to 24 hour mountain bike races.

how has cycling changed or defined your life (if it has)? since i've always relied on my bikes or my feet for transportation, i feel i have enjoyed simple things i may have missed otherwise. it is a constant in my life that i need to be able to walk or bike to get what i need.

what's the most damage you've accrued to you or your ride while riding a fixie? while riding a fixie - a very badly bruised, possibly broken, tailbone when i hopped a curb and crashed. it was a pretty stupid crash actually. near financial damage - i almost got a traffic ticket while riding the same bike this summer. most damage riding a bike (geared) would be a broken and dislocated elbow while winter commuting in 98.

what's your most embarrassing fixie moment? ummmm. can't think of one...but in college on a geared bike, i was wearing a dress and the skirt of the dress got caught in the wheel (?) and tore off completely. awesome. i was able to convert it into a wrap around skirt for the rest of the ride, but it was pretty embarrassing. i did do a naked ride on a cold halloween night on my fixie, but that was intended nudity and was more fun (and cold) than embarrassing.

anything else you'd like to say? bike lots.

f.g.g. interview - Sonia Serba

www. myspace.com/sunnyd

*what's your name?
My name is Sonia Serba, better known as Sunny D the photonic emcee.

*what's your bikes name?
I have 2 bikes at the moment: Kierin the Kraptastic Kuwahara, and Ollie the Opus. Kierin's fixed and Ollie's full-gears for long-hauls.

*what is the bike/setup you're riding (what's your gearing at least)?
Kierin's my winter-beater bike, so he's got a front-brake for hairy traffic situations in Canadian winters. He's 44/17 spintastic and he's pretty heavy with triple-butted steel tubing and full-fenders. I find that riding a clunky bike in winter makes for really fun when riding lighter bikes in the summer.

*how long have you been riding fixed?
I've been riding fixed gear for 3 years. I competed in my first alleycat not quite a week after converting to fixed (my 1st Sunday riding fixed gear) and came in 1st girl, 3rd overall. The race started in an alley and I nearly crashed into the adjacent curb straight off the hop!! That's just what happens when your left turns are too wide in a crowd of racers! hahaha...

*how long did you cycle before you "converted" as it were?
I bought a heavy-ass Infinity Telluride piece of crap mountain bike from Costco in 1999 and rode it on occasion, then became a bike courier in 2003, and switched to fixed-gear the last week of October in 2005.

*how has cycling changed or defined your life (if it has)?
My entire life changed after I switched from a car-centric mentality to a bike- & pedestrian-centric mentality. I see the matrix for what it is, clearer than ever. Everything looks different now.

*what's the most damage you've accrued to you or your ride while riding a fixie?
Shoot! I was riding Hayden the Hutsebaut track bike, coming to a red light, riding around some big, beefy motorcyclist who was in my lane: between the streetcar track and row of parked cars. I crossed the track to my left at the correct angle, went around dumb-ass, then crossed back to the right over the track at the correct angle, but when I went to straighten out into my lane, my bike didn't respond because there was a layer of dry but greasy garbage juice on the road. I ran into a parked van at a fairly slow speed but my frame was MUNCHED. The head tube was completely pushed back and the top and down tubes were buckled. I got the frame straightened, but a couple months later I noticed that the top lug was cracked almost all the way around. I cried and hung the frame on my wall as art.

*what's your most embarrassing fixie moment?
See above. The motorcyclist had no sympathy and didn't really get that he was an asshole for not properly driving in his own lane.

*anything else you'd like to say?
Buy my CD! Come meet me for Kyoto Loco and the CMWC in Tokyo in September! Also, look out for my new album Poor Little Bitch Girl dropping next year.
visit Sunny D here.

nyc's girl's night out - bikes

there is a women & trans bike-repair class being hosted each monday night at 6:30pm at
156 Rivington St. (between Suffolk & Clinton St in Manhattan's Lower East Side) in the basement.



while this seems like a fantastic idea, it does come across as a little gender biased, but then, it's probably this way to keep roving, new yorkers, foaming at the mouth, from showing up at a bike-repair meeting to pick up on girls. this means that girls can learn how to fix and build bikes w/o worrying about boys hitting on them; so ultimately, a plus.

while most of the world doesn't actually live in or near new york, if you do, you're that much more capable of accessing a female-based bike group with the wherewithal or the savoir faire help you learn how to maintain your two-wheeled ride.

Y: The Last Man - Unmanned

the other day Chapel Hill Comics had a "buy two, get one" sale. i picked up a couple issues of The Walking Dead and with my free selection also grabbed the first issue of Brian K. Vaughan's Y: The Last Man. it is truly an amazing graphic novel. i'm already unfortunately obsessed with this wonderful story as is per usual when considering apocalyptic settings, albeit amidst our financial crisis and my small pocketbook.

we are shown that all people can be driven to their most basic animalities in an effort to survive extreme circumstances with the introduction of the republican wives and the gang of amazons. this phenomenal work has already won best comic of 2008 against a league of other incredible works. Y has also been nominated for several other awards as well.

below is original artwork for the first issue


the work has been touted as pro-feminist and alternately misogynistic disparaging Vaughan himself. Regardless, with the final issues release this week, it appears it doesn't look far off for the masterpiece to be adapted into a film- possibly 3 according to wikipedia.

"I guess I've moved into acceptance but that doesn't mean that I'm not still depressed about it," said Vaughan, 31, a native of my hometown, Cleveland, Ohio, who now resides in Los Angeles.

i'd like to leave off with a few words from the author, Brian K. Vaughan (who also writes for the popular Lost television series.)

back online!

so after about 1 year + or -, my website is back up and running. please visit the site and tell me what you think. i have regained control of my domain and after a few hours of learning dns shit, the site has once again been brought back to life.
carrionfair.com

Intergalactic Law 2-104

pink raygun

the undead & the illustrated

i'm a huge zombie fan. huge. i've seen dozens of films. own a score of comic books and regularly enter "undead, zombie, day of the, night of the, dawn of the," or some derivation into a search bar looking up some minute reference. so it comes with no surprise that as we near halloween, the search for, "the recently deceased, returning to life," will be a continuous go-to for me.

i've currently finished with book 5 of 8 of robert kirkman's "the walking dead." i look forward to finishing the series as soon as this financial crisis blows over (or i might just have to sell all of my other books).

today i wandered into the local comic shop looking for some interesting material for f.g.g.. much to my dismay, there aren't a huge amount of feminist comic writers/illustrators as were so popular in the 70's; or so said the girl behind the counter. she did, however, point me in the direction of a few girl-empowered graphic novels. many of them i found to be written and illustrated by men: cool. what i found was rather disingenous. a new "tank girl," by Ashley Wood: don't get me wrong; Wood is a great artist, but, i wouldn't say that he's much of a feminist. picture after picture displayed a scantily clad tank girl with her panties exposed. i proceeded to look at several other works by Wood, most of them featuring nude or nearly nude females.

i spent the better half of an hour scouring the comic shop in search of some sort of feminist comic or graphic novel. i was lead to female-written biographical comics and subtle if not borderline feminist works such as a league of extraordinary gentleman, y, the last man and persepolis but again, two-thirds male driven, and none containing that certain je ne sais quoi that i was looking for.

i think perhaps my search, though without spelling it out in exact words to the proprietor, was for a contemporary work of art that deals with todays women in everyday instances. i didn't want to find a girl with huge tits strutting around a war torn city with a gun, donning a cape... well the war torn part might be cool if it might have had some sort of participation on the part of the undead, but, ultimately i wanted something with real women perspective that wasn't outlandishly superheroish. i was, after some time, able to find a few cool items that i will have to return for. by no means is this meant to come off as some tirade against CH comics either: i respect the couple that own the shop and wish them well beyond their wildest dreams. what i would like to see is more women writing and illustrating novels based on everyday trials, or the very least, better characters in realistic, if slightly outlandish or apocalyptic settings.

one of the wonderfully fruitful things i received from my visit was the tip that led me here to girl-wonder.org. it was there that i found out about fem-oreiented zombie apparel, and nothing, as anyone who knows anything about anything, is cooler than zombies and zombie-related topics. although i'm not sure how exactly their fashion line actually has anything to do with zombies, they do have some cool designs and so i'll name drop them on an undead-premise (if not just for the fact that they hail from Stow, OH., which is a paltry 35 minutes from my hometown.) i was sort of hoping that there might be some zombie themed fabrics; maybe a silk-screened t-shirt or skirt that had "bub" or at least a few blood spatters, but, the dresses and other adornments were bereft of any noticeable gore, albeit, the models did look a mildly less-than-lively (goth?) before moving on i did browse through several of ZA's previous fashion shows taking notice of just a few disturbing things:


1st - the bald creep who repeatedly looks odd and pervish in the background. what's he hiding under those folded arms??



seen again here with an alarming countenance on his face. is he leaning over the invisible front row to get a better glimpse of shoes or a thigh? i'm thinking the latter



2nd - the men's line: who the fuck is wearing this other than this guy? for him, i feel sorry, and slightly ashamed.



again: who the hell is wearing this? what genre/crowd/style of people is this? pearl necklace clad grandma meets scottish-goth and has a sex-change, falls in love with the drop kick murphy's and buys a rainslicker so she doesn't have to cart a goddamn umbrella everywhere she goes.

F.G.G. interview - Maria

what's your name? Maria (from Florida)

what's your bikes name? La metrayadora

what is the bike/setup you're riding (what's your gearing at least)? 42x16

how long have you been riding fixed? Almost 2 months

how long did you cycle before you converted as it were? 2 years

how has cycling changed or defined your life (if it has)? Its alot better i no longer depend on cars to take me places,i feel alot better physically and emotionally cause of it

what's the most damage you've accrued to you or yourself while riding a fixie? Luckily i havent had any injuries yet

what's your most embarrassing fixie moment? None yeett

anything else you'd like to say? I think everyone should go fixed and if not then just ride a bike!!
its a beautiful thing and alottttaa fun!!