After a rough winter, leaning into spring: bikelovejones returns

I won’t lie. It’s been a very rough winter her at Rancho Beth.

Between all my usual pesky medical things and a new twist, my health took a nosedive in the early fall, and stayed there for months. It took time to get a proper diagnosis, but it appears that I got slammed with serious case of Crohn’s-related anemia. I had a blood transfusion a couple weeks ago, and that helped restore some oxygen to my blood. Next up, five weekly infusions of iron by IV (because I can’t take iron pills anymore), after which it’s hoped I will be back to full density and able to function again.

So, in a fit of optimism, I signed up for Urban Adventure League’s Mileposts Ride on May 7.

Between now and then, I’ll need to put my All-Rounder bike up in the stand and give it some love after months of benign neglect.

Along the way, I’ll be going through the small mountain of bikey things I no longer use or need, and will bring a small backpack of them with me to the Bicycle swap Meet on Sunday, April 3rd to make some quick cash. I will also have a casual reopening of the Bicycle Brain Trust next month, and locals can come by and hang out and dig bikes together. I’ll announce the reopening date in a future post.

Meanwhile, I will hope to begin taking your old, unwanted adult bicycles for refurbishing and distribution to those in need, sometime in late April when I’ve made some space. Stay tuned.

And a special note of #gratitude to each and every one of you who reached out to me while I was down and out over the last few months. Your notes of encouragement and goodwill meant and still mean a lot to me.

I look forward to being able to ride my bike around Portland again this spring.

I won’t ever be fast again, but I’ll be happy to ride.

Happy riding, and keep the rubber side down.