Tag Archives: bicycles

Curbing Traffic

Posted on January 4, 2024 by smellincoffee

A few years ago, Chris and Melissa Bruntlett moved from Vancouver to Delft, and wrote a book (Building the Cycling City) on how Dutch city design not only facilitates, but encourages, cycling as a primary of transportation. Having explained how, Curbing Traffic delves into … Continue reading →

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A Brief History of Motion

Posted on July 5, 2023 by smellincoffee

Tom, Tom, Tom. You know drinking and driving is a bad idea, but what did you do? You followed A History of the World through Six Glasses with this A Brief History of Motion: From the Wheel to the Automobile. … Continue reading →

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Sean of the South and the Old Man’s Boy

Posted on December 6, 2022 by smellincoffee

Sean Dietrich and his wife Jamie’s collective world was shaken when their doctor said the C word.  Cancer.  The emperor of all maladies,  the ticking timebomb in each of us.   Rather than crumbling into a  weeping ball of woe-is-me,  … Continue reading →

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A Hole in the Wind

Posted on February 17, 2022 by smellincoffee

A Hole in the Wind: A Climate Scientist’s Bicycle Journey Across the United States© 2017 David Goodrich304 pages A Hole in the Wind features a retired climate scientist touring from Delaware to to Oregon, speaking with people along the way … Continue reading →

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A Walk Around the Block

Posted on January 15, 2021 by smellincoffee

A Walk Around the Block: Stoplight Secrets, Mischievous Squirrels, Manhole Mysteries & Other Stuff You See Every Day (And Know Nothing About)© 2020 Spike Carlsen336 pages One of my favorite books to think back on is Scott Huler’s On the … Continue reading →

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Walkable City Rules

Posted on March 16, 2019 by smellincoffee

Walkaable City Rules: 101 Steps to Making Better Places © 2018 Jeff Speck312 pages In Walkable Cities, Jeff Speck argued for the virtues of a city optimized for pedestrian travel, and offered ten general guidelines  for making it happen — … Continue reading →

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Fear, bikes, and NaNoWriMo

Posted on November 5, 2018 by smellincoffee

Happy Monday! (Or Monday evening, depending on where you are…) My NaNoWriMo is off to a promising start, as I’ve been logging just over 4,000 words per day, well over the 1667 minimum average requirement.   That is completely  unprecedented … Continue reading →

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Amsterdam

Posted on January 16, 2018 by smellincoffee

Amsterdam: A History of the World’s Most Liberal City© 2013 Russell Shorto369 pages In the early 14th century, a group of fisher-folk around the Amstel river came together with a dream: to build a place where people could smoke weed … Continue reading →

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The Wheels of Chance

Posted on February 23, 2017 by smellincoffee

The Wheels of Chance: A Bicycling Idyll© 1896 H.G. Wells193 pages What an odd little story! Begin with one J. Hoopdriver, a draper’s assistant who lives for nothing but spare opportunities to ride his bicycle — or rather, to crash … Continue reading →

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On Bikes

Posted on January 26, 2017 by smellincoffee

On Bicycles: 50 Ways the New Bike Culture Can Change Your Life© 2011 ed. Amy Walker384 pages On Bicycles collects fifty cycling pieces, collecting in categories on why biking is awesome, how gear can make it better, how biking can … Continue reading →

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