Unicycling along Swansea beach front today, three very serious lycra-clad roadies are heading towards me from the opposite direction in slipstream formation.
In the space of about two seconds the first guy says “Wow!”, the second says “Cool!” and the third says “Respect!”
And with the faintest of chain and mech noise, they are gone, leaving me to wonder if they were ever there in the first place.
Later on I reach the bridge that goes over the mouth of the harbour.
It’s one of those swing bridges that open up for boats every now and then.
I happen to approach when it’s open and there’s a queue of around thirty people waiting to get across.
As I get near a little girl shouts out “Look Mum!” and points at me.
Thirty people turn as one to stare at me.
I think to myself “Oh this is too freaky,” and turn around and go the other way.
Last year i got agiraffe unicycle during christmas. So i decided i would ride around and show off a bit. Then one day right after school i was riding it through the parking lot and lot’s of people were around. Unfortanatly my sholace was untied so it got tangled around my pedal and i fell flat on my face from 5 feet up.
Then as i was lying there on the ground all scratched up and with the wind knocked out of me, a little boy walked by and said, “look mommy, he can’t do it either!”
Then when i got up i was hopping around trying to untangle myself but i couldnt reach the pedals, and, to much laughing of my friends, i had to ask somebody nearby to help untangle me.
A bizarre couple today.
Firstly I approach three teenage girls along the beach front.
All giggles and laughter, one of them points at me and shouts “Unicycle!”
As I get closer I see they all have been face-painted.
To look like clowns.
As I ride by, I point at them and shout “Clowns!”
Later on, just as I’m approaching my workplace, I pass four scruffy youths (let’s call them ‘chavs’) getting into a car. One of them shouts out “I hope you fckin’ fall and break ewer fckin’ neck!”
“Your mother must be so proud of you.” I retort, while at the same time giving him a double bird salute.
Assholes.
Last night was Halloween, and as I rode home in the dark, I passed several
groups of trick-or-treating kids being herded about by their parents.
As I was passing the last group, I heard this:
“Hey, look! It’s that unicycle man”
“We love you!”
<slight pause>
“No we don’t!”
–
Peter Haworth pmh@edison.ioppublishing.com
“I couldn’t even find anything to read. The hotel shop
only had two decent books, and I’d written both of them.”
– Douglas Adams, the Salmon of Doubt
Hmm, I wonder if it’s just you or if it’s Wales.
You seem to get a lot of negative and somewhat agressive reactions from youth. I know, chavs suck, but why is it you interact with them so much?
I was riding at the church down the street when I met a guy who looked like he was a hobo. He started asking me about how long it took to learn how to ride and stuff when some jerks in a camaro dorve by and yelled at me, “YOU SUCK!” this guy turned around and started swearing at them like crazy. once they were gone, He turned to me and said, “Now THAT’S immaturity!”
He then proceeded to give me a five minute sermon on how if I ever saw them again that I should, well I don’t think I should say what he said but every fifth word should have been blanked out!
I’m just riding along minding my own business.
I don’t invite discussion, they take it upon themselves to hurl abuse.
I guess some people would turn the other cheek or try to laugh off insults with a joke, but I’m not that type of person.
I guess Canadians really are nicer. Never thought that was true.
The old people say: “hey, I remember when those were popular” or “are you a busker?”
The adults either stare or completely ignore me at all costs, unless they have a kid with them, in which case they go “Hey timmy, LOOK! That bike he’s riding has ONE WHEEL!” and the little kid goes, “it’s called a unicycle.”
Teens say something like “wow man thats INTENSE” if I’m doing trials or something, or “what the fuck?” if they’ve never seen one before.
I’ve build several giraffe unicycles out of old bikes. No, I haven’t come up with any design that lasts for riding trials. I’m still riding a KH 20 05, the only mod’s are the saddle and a grind plate.
A very odd one today.
On a scale of oddness, this was eleven.
I’m on my lunch break and unicycling along Swansea beach-front.
The beach-front paths are tiered. You can look down 8 or 9 feet to the next path below.
I’m merrily unicycling along the mid-path.
Lah lah lah, isn’t this nice.
Next thing I know, a man and his bicycle have fallen from the sky and landed on top of me.
I’ll just run that by you again.
A man and his bicycle have fallen from the sky and landed on top of me!
It turns out that on the tier above me a group of trials bikers are attempting to hop up the wall splitting the tiers.
One manages to do so, but loses his balance and instead of falling the way he hopped up, he falls the long way down the other side.
Onto me.
Needless to say this causes me to UPD.
Luckily no one is hurt.
We both ask “Are you okay?” at the same time.
We both walk back up the ramp to the top tier.
I don’t know who was more surprised, him or me.
There is much joshing with the riders. They seem like a good bunch of lads.
I go back to work and tell everyone what has happened.
No one believes me.
i love that one. it really cracks me up every time. it’s got to be the most mindless, imbecilic reaction a human can have to seeing a unicyclist. and they were in a mullet car to boot. nice.
No, sure I’ve had some negative comments. Not as bad as you, though. I guess the worst one was when this old man told us to piss off when we were just riding around and not doing anything. I got kinda annoyed, but let it slide. I don’t wanna stir up trouble in the neighbourhood.
Oh the 30th I got a bunch of retards driving in a car 2 feet beside me, one threw an egg and missed me by at least a foot, and he was only 2 feet or so beside me… he was laughing pretty hard, but I was yelling “I’ll murder your family asshole!”
