I was talking to a dad from the father/son group I’m in, who is helping sponsor me in the upcoming MS-150 charity ride I’m doing. I was grousing about how my training the previous month was off, and I was only able to ride 150 miles instead of my 200 mile goal. His reply helped put a new perspective on things:
“I’m amazed that you would even consider riding five miles on one wheel, much less 150 or 200. To me, that’s seems about the same as flying to the moon with one of those rigs where you pedal to make the wings flap. One endeavor sounds about as feasible to me as the other. I don’t know how you do it…”
I think that one will help sustain me through the long ride ahead…
Went past two teenage girls in the park today. They both stared at me with eyes as big as dinner plates. As I go past, one whispers to the other, “Did you see that? He had no handlebars!”
No mention of a missing wheel at all.
Later on I go past an impossibly cute 8 or 9 year old little girl playing with her dad. She mantains eye contact with me as I approach, and in a crisp, clear voice says, “You’re clever.”
One day, Matt and I decided to meet up at a park near his house, so we could practice backwards riding in the hockey rink (sorry GILD). I got there about ten minutes before there, and I see that the park is really crowded. Turns out there is a soccer practice, and where this is a soccer practice, there are families. With small children. So as I ride towards the rink, I can already hear the "whoa!"s, and "AWESOME!"s, so the ride’s already starting out well. I get there, and sit down, and this group of 4-5 year olds walks over, and starts taking to me. And then, with the innocent, demanding air that only kids that little can pull off, a little girl “asks” me to do a trick. So I get up, and think “What will impress them most…hmmmm”. So I ride off a nearby picnic table, and they all start clapping. I immediately have to start trying to repress my horrible blush reflex (that’s extremely annoying). I ride around, and get through the vast majority of my tricks before Matt gets there. He starts to ride up, and they all start yelling “There’s two one-wheelers!!!”, which is of course only kids that young can pull off. So, we’re riding around, practicing our backwards riding (much to the kids’ amusement), and one of the kids yells to me “Why do you have your shirt off?”.
“Because it’s hot”
His response, which is probably the best example of little-kid logic that I have ever/will see:
“Why don’t you just wear a shirt, but take the sleeves off so you’ll be cooler?”
Had 3 negative comments last night, all within the space of 2 minutes.
I was riding down the foot path next to the road and a car comes up from behind with the passanger yelling “use your hands!”. I can only assume that they thought I was a regular Bicyclist (looking from behind) and were trying to throw me off. I was a little shocked because I thought to myself ‘where would i put my hands?’.
Next time i’ll put my hands over my head and make a clapping motion.
2nd comment was just a bit later from somone in a fenced in yard / lawn (Its a scout hall, but could be used by other people).
“The Circus is in town”.
I wasnt sure if they were talking to someone else so I just ignored it.
Then much louder a little later “Keep it in the Circus!”.
I understand the negativity that some non-unicyclist have. They are just jealous of our Skills and Ability. If i just walk down the street, no one would say anything. If I rode a bike down the street, no one says anything. But as soon as someone does something different or skillful, all bets are off. And I guess they feel better by insulting or trying to degrade that skill/ability then it makes them equals.
But next time i’ll reply with “Keep it in the ZOO!”
I had been riding my Muni on a rocky trail for a while and decided to take a break. While I was resting, a family came climbing up the trail towards me. The father, seeing that I had a unicycle, asked me the question that so many of you dispise. “Did you lose a wheel?” I looked over at him, and said," You know, I’ve been all over this park and I have know idea what happened to it." He and his family had big smiles on their faces, and it turned into a great opportunity to talk about unicycling. Then they asked if they could watch me ride down the rocky trail.
I usually respond in a similar manner, and have had many opportunities to talk with strangers about this unusual sport that they didn’t know existed.
From a group of kids as I rode past on my 36"er “Why do it?”
and on the same coker journey from a group of really little kids on bikes who live down my road “SHOWOFF” which they kept shouting as I went down the road.
yesterday I had several kids ranging in age from 5 to 12 years old ask me where I bought it and how much it was, I was on my way to the park and met a unicyclist who I talked to for a while he said there was a guy that lived across the street from him that taught him how to ride and that he occasionally ride everyonce in a while, while at the park several young children said “you’re really good at that!” then the started asking my to do some tricks so I did then they started challenging me to do new things that I had never tried before… I wasn’t too sucessful but the kids got a good laugh.
It was a rainy day, not really the best time to ride when everything is all slippery…Anyways, I went to a park by walking with my sister and carrying my unicycle…I learned my lesson, don’t walk your uni for long ammounts of time…When I was almost there, I rode it the 20 feet max. to the park, and there are two guys who ride their bikes a lot…to the beach I guess, there’s the park, on top of a 6-foot wall that separates the beach from the park, so we’re REALLY close to the beach, and those guys, their bikes are really old, or imitation, sort of like '64 Stingray type, really, mine’s ‘05 Stingray, probably not that far…I didn’t take it, enough blather, anyways they’re in groups of two and the first group just stares, one guy of the second group…also stares, the other one just says "Cuida’o que no te caiga’ " slangy “Careful you don’t fall” and right then I think, “Don’t they have any confidence? You can fall sitting down and I’m not telling them to be so careful” but I realize when it comes to unicycling, I use the fact that my sister and I almost fell while sitting down once. Right then I had a UPD, but no fall. Lucky me. Then eventually I fell and the pedal sort of got into my already ugly shins and scraped them and made them even uglier, I never thought it was possible!Well, then my sister noticed and she left. I haven’t asked for shin guards yet…I will…eventually.
I don’t read this thread regularly, so stop me if you’ve heard this one already:
I was in the park, riding around, and there were some little kids swimming in the river. A few of them saw me, so they got out and were watching me. A little boy said “Look at that guy on the bike!” and the little girl next to him smacked him, and said, “it’s a unicycle!”.
I was walking around the school today and i had at least 6 people ask where my Unicycle was, I guess I ride at school more often that I thought I did, It was pretty cool, one rather amusing comment was, “Where’s your Unicycle, Did you send it back to the Circus WHERE IT BELONGS!?” every capitalized letter is an emphasized word, My reply was “Nope just let my dog borrow it so he could show up the bear at the circus this weekend” they looked at me stunned then realized it was a joke and remembered I didn’t really have a dog and laughed so hard he fell over… that was fairly odd then I found out that he had taken about 2 vicodin before school for his ribs (he broke three of them falling out of a tree this summer.)
I was at the skate park the other day, and this guy on a downhill mtn bike told me to impress him… So I went and did a grind on a rail… a very short, badly executed grind (Hey, I’ve been grinding less than a week ;)) “HOLY 5H17 THAT WAS AWESOME!!!” Nice to know I can impress with the one street skill I don’t truly know
This always happens to me: I approach a group of kids, watching me, and I’m thinking they love the unicycle, but they always yell, “kin we pet yer dawg?”
Today, I’m riding home from work and a lady in a BMW SUV slows up next to me and rolls down her window. I’m thinking she’s interested in another middle aged working woman doing somthing a little different, commuting on a unicycle. She says, “that is the cutest dog, what’s his name?”
I love my dog, but he’s just a cow dog. He’s not like cuddly or anything!
bearing in mind this came from a little old lady whom to me looked to be at least mid fifty’s. “wow can i have a go?”
and she did, i was worried my pedals might chew up her legs off as in this instance with my feline friend
but she held on to a pole, mounted, fell and murmed a thankyou before slowly hobbling away with a new limp.
