Riding today was pretty awesome. I put in a solid few hours in the velo going east along the coast, first to Monaco then into Italy and around a bit there. The real story was the weather though… perfectly sunny and in the mid to upper 60s. One sign I passed said 24c, but I think it was in the sun. Regardless, I rode sans legwarmers and with just a long sleeve jersey on top, and when I got home I was still covered in salt from sweating. And it’s the end of November! For everyone in warmer parts of the world this might not be so significant, but for those of us in the PNW slugging out 5hr rides in horizontal rain, this is not a trifle matter. I think I’ve also found the cure for vitamin D deficiency and SAD… get the hell out of Seattle. I mean, seriously. No wonder our state is the capital of coffee, grunge, intellectual hip hop, and meth. Is there anything worse than about 3 months of straight rain? Other than being out riding your bike in it every day?
The best part is that the sun is still intense enough to be warm and to give a tan. From just my ride today I already came back a shade darker. Watch out Mason lake, I’m going to be that guy riding in shorts when it’s 33 and snowing just to show off my winter bronze. The south-facing shore and low sun angle also means that you’re riding in the sun constantly. Oh, incidentally, for the cycling fans who watched this year’s Paris-Nice, my ride today was the last part of the final stage when Contador soloed in. And speaking of cycling fans, there were huge packs of cyclists out riding. Except instead of Discovery and US Postal kits and Treks, everyone was wearing Credit Agricole kits and riding Looks. I think next weekend I might try to hook up with some cagey old locals to figure out where to ride.
Other things happening… the weekend is huge here, which shouldn’t be much of a surprise but at home it seems like things are really quiet in general on the weekends and people crawl into their cocoons. Again, perhaps a function of the weather. But here everything is hopping… traffic is way worse than even mid-week rush hour, the streets are totally packed, etc. Yesterday they inaugurated the new tram which from what I can tell runs only about 3km and is sort of pointless, but it was open to ride for free so the were HOARDES of people jamming themselves into the little cars and mayhem in general. People were literally putting their kids on the tracks in front of the oncoming tram to take pictures. I don’t know about these Euros sometimes…
I’ve also spent a fair amount of time getting acquainted with different parts of the city, figuring out some recipes from the new food selection, and working on my French. Nice isn’t a super expensive city but some things are ridiculous. Beef, for instance, starts at about 20 euros/kilo from what I’ve found. And the cheapest pre-paid cell card is 55 cents/minute within France and you have to pay 30 euros just to get it. For comparison, in Germany it was 5 euros for the card and 14 cents/minute.
My current techniques for learning French are perhaps unorthodox, but so far they’ve been working pretty well. My first day here I bought a dictionary, two bike magazines, and a parallel translation of the Old Man and the Sea. The bike magazines are easy to read because I can look at the picture and figure out what the article is about, then learn words because I pretty much know what they’re saying. The Old Man and the Sea is great because I can read one page in English, the look over and read the same thing in French and if I get stumped just go back and forth. Hemmingway also writes in a style quite helpful for the marginally-literate reader such as myself. I’ve also been watching the French show called “Are You Smarter than a 10 Year-old,” which is great because all questions are pretty basic and half the time they quiz people about English.
That’s what I’ve got for now. I’m hard at work on another movie that is going to blow some minds. I found a bunch more editing “things” and have a fresh new soundtrack… Dan and I are also confirmed for Zurich now, and I posted the start list above if you didn’t already see it. Also, God willing I hereby vow to avoid all Nice/nice puns for the duration of my stay and encourage all of you to do so as well. To ease the transition I will give everyone one free pass then after that I’m cutting you off. Remember, with great power comes great responsibility.
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