1. Mobile restaurants are everywhere now. Mobile phones are fairly common too. On Alpe d’Huez we encountered a mobile Rapha store (but nothing was for sale). In New York we stumbled upon a mobile skate shop, TRE Truck. The shop is run by what appear to be teenagers – tweens even. Hard to imagine who drives. When we walked by, a young man was giving shout-outs to the people of LA on the PA system. We got the feeling he was referring to us. “Shout out to LA,” he kept repeating with his eyes fixed on us. But despite our tanned, fit, bodies and bleached blond hair, we are not from LA.
2. The narrowest house in New York was once inhabited by the great poet, Edna St. Vincent Millay.
The Heroes nearby tiny apartment feels like a double wide by comparison. The intriguing prospect for the Heroes is the possibility of a skinny New York Hero Headquarters in Greenwich Village, for this historic house is for sale. Thomas Hardy once wrote or perhaps quipped, “America has two great attractions: The skyscraper and the poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay.” Her most famous poem is First Fig. At least some of the Heroes ( and Tim Krabbe) consider the fig an essential cycling snack.
My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends—
It gives a lovely light.
3. Some of the Heroes worked for Robert Heinecken (1931 – 2006) and continue to work for his estate. We are in New York today for the opening of his first exhibition at Fredrich Petzel Gallery. Perhaps we are biased but we agree with the New Yorker who also put the exhibition on their short list.
