YDKF Episode 191: Bicycles

[m00npie]

Title: YDKF Episode 191: Bicycles
Date: Fri, 09 Oct 2020 06:01:03 +0000
Link: http://podcast.robohara.com/ydkf-episode-191-bicycles/

Description: Put up your kickstand and go on a ride with me as I pedal through some old memories of bicycles on this episode of You […]

[AArdvark]

Was there ever contention over the brand of bicycles you and your friends rode? Back when I was growing up if you didn't ride a Schwinn you were a second class kid

[Flack]

There may have been. I grew up in a pretty blue collar, working class neighborhood, so it wasn't like if you had a no-name bike you were the odd man out... it was more like, the kids with the fancy bikes stood out. I think most of us had Road Masters or Huffy bikes. I looked up the blue and yellow bike my friend had -- it was Raleigh. The bigger deal was when someone got a really nice bike, everybody noticed. When my next door neighbor got a Diamondback and another kid got a Mongoose, it was a big deal.

[AArdvark]

I remember when I saw my first Mongoose with mags. I had moved up to 10 speeds by then but it definitely turned my head, and everyone else's. This was well before E.T. came out. Everyone I know had a Schwinn Sting Ray (nobody's parents could afford a Krate, besides it would have just got stolen). If you had a Huffy or a K-Mart Special maybe you could hang with the rest of the kids, but you couldn't brag or boast. Everyone had a police I.D. sticker on the frame because we were, you know, cool. You could go down to the local precinct and ask for one and they would just hand them out. There was the coolest kid around, Dwayne, who had a 1976 Sting Ray, the bicentennial version. He was cool because he could bunny hop over a sideways trash can, the silver metal kind. He could also ride a wheelie around in circles in the street and boy, were we ever jealous of that skill. I had a Sting Ray BX model, basically a sidewalk bike with knobby tires and BMX handlebars with actual pads on it! OOooooO! But that was only for a couple years, by then I was moving up to the world of multiple gears. Alas, I never had a bike that wasn't stolen, except for the Schwinn Varsity that's rusting away in my shed and I'm pretty sure I'll never ride it again.

THE
TWO TIRED
AARDVARK