I wish I could be there for the festival. I can't, so I'll just tell you a little story.

I was riding my tall bike home today when these two gorgeous girls in a BMW SUV slow down and start riding next to me. They were mesmerized by the tall bike and wanted to know if I just rode the thing because I could see more up high. I gave them my stock "30% funner" answer, they laughed and drove on. A block or two later, they slowed down again and resumed the conversation. "Hey, are you into jousting?" "Damn!" I thought, "two hot rich girls who like my tall bike not only know about jousting, but are interested in me doing it. Awesome!" I explained that I'm down with the jousting, but have had trouble finding opponents since I moved to Houston. "Oh, no problem, there's a bike shop up in the Heights where they do that kind of stuff." "Sweet!" I gulp out, with my voice cracking, "where is it?" They tell me some street names I've never heard of and I pretend I know exactly where it is, hoping I'll find it on Google Maps later. They continued, "Yeah, we don't joust on bikes, we do it on roller skates." At this point, I almost fell off my bike. How do you joust on roller skates? What can you fall off of? "You can find out about that at [some Montrose skate shop. Oh, and they're selling tall bikes there." I almost threw up. Later ladies.

In spite of that, I'm finally finding some bike culture here. The Rice bike co-op is still a dream at this point, but at least it's someone else's dream and I'm not alone. I have a few people interested in the tall bikes and jousting, and may even have a shop to do some welding in.