Lance Armstrong is from Austin. He’s very good at cycling. Especially in France.
Austin consequently has many cycle paths. I was surprised that these were not horizontal air-conditioned paths, tunnelled through the hills, but then maybe that’s because I spent last week in a car. Surrounded by lazy motorists who travel in complete isolation behind darkened windows. I covered 730 miles in my hire car last week – taking off the Houston journey that implies 400 miles in Austin. Round and around, getting lost on skyways, flyways, parkways, byways and myways.
Carless this week, I bought a bicycle from a pawn shop. If the bicyle were a horse it would have been shot. If it were a car, it would be on blocks in the back yard, and a family of ferrets would have moved into the glove compartment. I have managed two miles on my 50 dolllar bike so far. I think I might borrow one of my room mates guns, spraypaint the word “horse” on it and shoot it.