My already annoying/difficult/always-changing commute to work has been made even more expensive/time consuming/aggravating. The Delaware River Port Authority has jacked up the price of toll to five bucks, and also raised the price of taking the PATCO/High Speed Line.  Having to pay more money to go to work is a proverbial slap in the face – this is money I could be spending on my son Jack, or beer! As I have discussed in a past blog, my commute to work in the most difficult 10 miles you could imagine. So I have decided I may start bicycling to work to give the Delaware River Port Authority a stubby, pinkish, Irish middle finger.

I have been driving to work, even with the price of a gallon of gas approaching the cost of a pint of a good craft beer, it’s the quickest way. Granted, I have to park a mile away in a rough neighborhood, but its better than taking PATCO for almost 8 bucks a day. The drive commute has its downsides, I have been seeing this Amstel Light billboard everyday and it drives me nuts. There is this handsome young guy and weird looking old dude admiring a glass of Amstel Light. But they refer to it as “bier” and for some reason seeing this billboard daily may very bizarrely be the launching point for my descent into insanity.

Another problem with a driving commute is my car. My 1999 Nissan Altima, once a trusted friend that guided to me hundreds of trips to the shore, Baltimore, and concerts is now run-down, unreliable, and still smells like a wet dog from the time it got flooded at the PATCO parking lot. Last Thursday, I came to my car and discovered a flat on a tire I JUST had replaced.  After a few minutes of muttering curses and slamming my hands on the hood of the car (as if I were Fonzie, and the car would magically get fixed), I calmed down and called AAA. I had been planning on going to the shore that night because I had the next day off, but this put a halt to my plans. The AAA guy was super nice, and fixed the tire for the time being, but I wisely decided to get the tire properly looked at and fixed before I risked getting stuck on the Atlantic City Expressway. The next morning, I took it to a place in Camden and the tire got fixed for 10 bucks. Much better than the AAA guys suggestion I take it to the Firestone on Drexel’s campus that surely would have cost me over a hundred bucks.

So I have been kicking around the idea of riding my bike to work ever since Christmas. That’s when my parents gave their 34 year old grown son a shiny new bicycle. Safe to say I am probably one of a very few dudes in their mid-30’s who received a bike from his parents as a Christmas gift. They got me a Mongoose Cachet, which is a fixed gear bike, or “fixie” as hipsters refer to them. This bike came from Walmart, and is an affordable fixie, and according to a bunch of bike blogs I checked out – totally scorned by hipsters. So that’s A-OK with me – anything to piss off the hipsters. It’s a cool looking bike, even if it was put together by five year olds in some faraway country. It came mildly assembled in the box, and my brother “put together” the rest of it. (More on that later)

There is a gentleman from my town who rides his bike to the Manyunk section of Philadelphia every day. As you can imagine, he is in really good shape. I have been fascinated with trying this, but hesitant because a good portion of the ride takes you through Camden, New Jersey, the perennial winner or runner-up of the prestigious title of “Most Dangerous City in the United States”. So I decided I would ride my bike to PATCO, then ride to work – it will at least save me a couple bucks since I wouldn’t have to ride SEPTA and would also be good exercise.

I decided to make the maiden voyage the Friday before July 4^th weekend. My plan was to ride to the Collingswood PATCO, then to work, then get to 30^th Street Station and take the train to Atlantic City, then bike to Margate so I would have my bike at the shore. I was foolishly going to make this trip without a helmet because I had rewarded Jack with a new Thomas train for good behavior rather than purchasing a helmet. So I decided to take as many back streets as possible and just take it easy. The ride was really nice, I cruised through a bunch of quaint neighborhoods in Haddon Township and Collingswood. The only shaky part of the ride was going down Route 130, where cars whizzed past me, and I whizzed past a strip bar and two adult book stores. The bike didn’t feel totally right through, and upon getting to the PATCO station I realized that my brother put the front forks on backwards. So my tire was technically backwards if that makes any sense.

Once I got to the city, it was a bit more nerve wracking. Philadelphia has fantastic bike lanes, and is a very biker friendly city, but the streets are filled with angry drivers, and bicyclists who do this on the daily and have no patience for a newbie on a cheap Walmart hipster style bike nervously and helmetlessly navigating though the city. Plus I’m not totally versed on the rules of biker etiquette although I am sure the hipsters would be frowning upon my khaki pants. I have never been one to want to follow rules and etiquette though, and usually try to rage against the machine. Especially with golf, I hate all these unspoken rules and traditions they follow. Like replace the divots- I don’t even know what the fuck a divot is. So again, if I was pissing off the hipsters with my khaki pants so be it.

It dawned on me while observing the other bicyclists on my way in, if I do start riding in, and decided for some bizarre reason that I wanted to fit in, I have a ton of work to do. I would need a bunch of tattoos of maps and constellations and weird stuff – I would need to grow a funny looking mustache, and most likely would have to take Blink-182 off my iPod. I do however already have a pair of cut-off jeans (the official summer gear of hipsters). I recently cut a pair of beat up Old Navy jeans into shorts – not to try and be hip, but more in terms of trying to salvage clothes. To me, it’s much more important for Jack to have new clothes than for me to have new clothes. These were jeans with holes in the knees, so they are now a new pair of shorts – I just haven’t had the nerve to wear them.

The ride to work was a success I suppose, I am still alive and the bike is still in one piece (put together incorrectly, but still in one piece). Now I just have to muster up the courage to do the entire trip. Going over the Ben Franklin Bridge on a bike is a bit intimidating, but I think once I do it, it will just get easier from there. Just need to get a helmet, throw on my cut off jeans shorts, get some tattoos, and start working on a funny looking mustache!

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