It looks like my stay in Regina is turning into a little mini-epic in its own right. A couple of days turned into a week, which became two weeks, which became a month. I haven't updated in a long time, because I wanted to wait until I had some progress to report, but enough people have been asking what happened to me that I think I owe an account of what's been happining. Bicycle problems, uncooperative weather, and a fair dose of simple laziness seemed to be consipiring to keep me here, and now, just to top it off, the biggest disaster of all. I'll keep you in suspense until you read it for yourself. In short, my trip is up in the air right now. I'm considering my options.

I am SO GLAD I didn't start out today. Stormy, windy, unbelieveable weather. I kept my bike at the hostel today, and ventured farther afield by bus. I was actually looking for a souvenir spoon, which I've been buying for my mom as I go, but couldn't find any. For that matter, I'm noticing that all the spoons are the same, a few basic designs repeated in every town, with just the town name engraved in the bowl. Kind of a ripoff.

Day 28. Mon May 21, 2001.
Row, Row, Row Your Boat.

Stayed another day, with no particular reason. Fact is, I like Regina, and I'm not sure why. It has, after all, the same awful streets as Calgary. Maybe it's the convenience -- the only thing conveniently close to the Calgary hostel was the library. I still can't believe what you had to go through just to get some lousy M&M's in that town! Here though, you have the library, foodstores, movie theaters, a decent bookstore and the Saskatchewan Royal Museum all in walking distance. Or maybe it's that Regina is so easy to get into and so easy to get out of -- Hwy 11 turns into Albert St. which goes straight downtown, one block from the hostel, and Victoria Ave. turns into the Trans-Canada headed east. Not like the black hole of Calgary traffic.

Then there's the hostel itself. I like this place, and again I'm not sure why because in a point-by-point comparison with Calgary, it's actually inferior in several ways. No pool table, for instance. You have to pay for sheets. The beds are the least comfortable of any hostel so far. And (gasp) the TV has only 3 channels! But, it has a large library, the first so far to do so. And it has character; Turgeon Hostel is an heritage building saved from the wrecking ball and refurbished.

Slim Shady drove me crazy tonight, endlessly adjusting the TV antenna. It made me think of the definition of insanity, doing the same thing over and over expecting different results. I finally said "Give it up, it's not getting any better," and he said that he never gives up. I think that's what the donkey said about the carrot.

There was a neat story on the news about a team setting out today from Halifax to break the record for human-powered crossing of Canada (13 days and change. Holy shit!). But, instead of cycling across, they have built a machine called a 'roadboat' that is powered by rowing. It seats 5, a driver and four rowers. They have a website at www.rowingacrosscanada.com.

Day 29. Tues May 22, 2001.
This is a hard town to leave.

I had every intention of leaving today, but didn't. Why not? Maybe I hate the thought of going back into the ring with the wind. Or maybe it's because Ontario looms ahead, and I'm not looking forward to it -- it's too damn big. Or maybe the real reason is that I OVERSLEPT!! I didn't get a lot of sleep last night. 'Slim Shady' went out and got himself hammered, and he was snoring like a...really really hammered banshee. Snoring like that just laughs at earplugs. I finally had to sneak into one of the other rooms and find an empty bed.

I finally broke down today and bought a hostel membership. It's obvious that hostels are going to continue to play a big role on this trip. If I'd bought one when I started, it would have paid for itself by now.

Day 30. Wed May 23, 2001.
Just when I think I'm OUT...

I was up, packed and on the road by 8 this morning. It's almost scary how quickly I've settled into Regina. That's been the usual pattern for this whole trip -- it's been hard every morning to leave whatever port of refuge I'd found -- but it gets harder the longer I stay. The weather is beautiful, no clouds at all. It's still windy, coming at me from the north, slowing me down, but I'm finally out of Regina. Except for one thing...

THIS CITY WON'T LET ME LEAVE!

I had gotten 20 km out of town when suddenly: GRRRIIIND! My back wheel seizes up completely, and I'm stuck standing at the side of the road somewhat at a loss. I called a cab from a nearby trailer park, to give me a lift back to the hostel. This same thing happened before, about a week after I first bought this bike. It was a simple problem -- the locking ring just loosened a bit -- but the bike shop I took it to said that the part is from a company that doesn't exist anymore (Sunrace) and they don't have the proper tool to tighten it. They did the best they could with a hammer and a screwdriver, and it's rolling freely again, but they suggest an entirely new wheel. Well, not without a fight. I'll have to check out some more bike shops tomorrow, see if they have this tool, and more importantly, if they'll sell me one.

One other thing I have to say. After an hour in the wind again, I'm 'putting my thang down.' I refuse to set foot outside again until the wind is in my favor. I don't care if I'm here until July. There have been a number of ads on the bulletin board for people to share gas on the ride east; if I have to, I'll get a lift out of the prairies with one of them. I've had enough.

One bright point: I got an e-mail from Karen. She's back in Montreal, but didn't make it all the way to Halifax. They broke down too, and got a lift home. That seems to be going around...remember those rowers? After one day, they declared defeat too.

Day 31. Thurs May 24, 2001.
The importance of second opinions.

First thing, I took my bike out to Sport Chek, and talked to Trevor (not that one) the mechanic on duty. He did have the right tool, fortunately, but unfortunately had none for sale. But, he suggested a place called Dutch Cycles (Dutch...a good sign).

I left my bike behind to get a full tuneup, and the best part is that it won't cost a cent because the bike is still under warranty. Now that's more like it! I told him about how the other place tried to sell me an entire new wheel, and he said they were pretty dumb about bikes. I don't want to name the place, because they did try to be nice, and didn't charge me for tightening the ring (even though I hate the thought of them taking a hammer and screwdriver to my wheel). Hopefully by tommorow the Skeptic Tank will be fully operational again.

Day 32. Fri May 25, 2001.
Photo chores, bike chores.

Took the bus out to Sport Chek to pick up my bike, but went next door to Future Shop first. I had a cd-rom of photos to deal with, so I thought I'd see if I could use the demo computers. The clerk didn't mind, so I shrunk them all down to a reasonable size, made thumbnails as well, and put them onto floppies to upload later. It was a pretty time-consuming process.

My bike looks great, and I rode it back, but it's still making this raspy dry metallic sound. Well, I still have to check out this Dutch Cycles place.

Spent a long time at the library getting all the new photos up and running.

Day 33. Sat May 26, 2001.
Another dead end.

Dutch Cycles didn't have the tool either, and couldn't offer any suggestions about what was making that noise. They did at least reassure me that tightening the ring with a screwdriver was no big deal.

Day 34. Sun May 27, 2001.
Temporal anomaly, Captain!

I'm still trapped on the island of Calypso, and I don't mean Jamaica! (I knew reading the Odyssey would come in handy.) The hardest cages to get out of are the ones we create in our heads, and I'm finding it entirely too comfortable in Regina. And I'm not the only one. Slim Shady was just passing through too, but now he's got a job and an apartment -- an idea I'm starting to find pretty seductive.

On another note, a minor mystery was cleared up. I realised shortly after arriving here that Saskatchewan is a different time zone than Alberta, and I hadn't reset my watch. "A-ha!" I thought. "No wonder all the TV shows seem to be on at the wrong time." But then I remembered I had gone to see a movie, and it started at the right time, by my watch. So, I've been wondering why the map shows a time change when no time change took place, and I finally found out: it's because Saskatchewan doesn't observe Daylight Savings Time. That explains a lot.

Day 35. Mon May 28, 2001.
On...

Wind: 30 km/hr from the east. No thanks.

Day 36. Tues May 29, 2001.
...and on...

Wind: 60 km/hr from the east. Pass.

Took a few night pictures of Regina, thanks to a friendly security guard who let me up on the roof of the SaskPower building after hours. WAY after hours. I wanted to finish the roll.

Day 37. Wed May 30, 2001.
I've become a publicity whore

I sent an email to People magazine. Maybe they'll find this trip interesting. Emails are beginning to trickle in from strangers.

Day 38. Thurs May 31, 2001.
O Skytrain, Where Art Thou?

Good grief. The wind today was headed due east, 45-60 km/hr. Perfect, except for one thing: pouring rain. So, I figure on another day, and decide to take the opportunity to get a roll of film developed. I dropped it off, and an hour later the rain...stops. The rest of the day the weather is perfect for cycling; partly cloudy and wind my way. Shit.

So, I got the pictures up at least, which was an all-day job. Get the roll back, then go to Future Shop to convert them into a form I can use. Go to the internet cafe to upload them, then the library to write the code and captions. It all took longer than it had to, because this city has a really bad bus system. That's graded on a curve, by the way -- you expect bigger cities to have worse bus systems because they've got so many more people to move around to so many more places, but Regina is so small it doesn't have to be this bad. In this city, it really is faster to bike whereever you're going.

All they really need is two routes, one north-south, one east-west. Instead, the buses go wandering through every meandering maze of residential streets in the damn city. Getting back downtown, only 3km as the crow flies, took forever. It didn't help that the idiotic bus driver didn't tell me I had to transfer, even though he knew I was going downtown. Actually, he did tell me: "Did you know you had to get that other bus back there?" --insert your own 'idiot noise' here--

Day 39. Fri June 1, 2001.

June, and still in Saskatchewan. Maybe this trip is over and I just don't know it yet. I'm getting incredibly ,restless, but cant' bring myself to leave.

That breakdown, minor as it was, shook me up, I think. it was only 20 km to backtrack, but what if it had been 100 km from anywhere? I can fix a lot of things myself, but this threw me.

Also, laziness. A mattress is a luxury that's hard to give up. Not to mention doing nothing strenuous all day.

Cay 40. Sat June 2, 2001.

Didn't slep at all last night. Finally, I went biking around, enjoying the pre-sunrise city. My bike is still making that intermittent rasping noise, and I don't know why. Sometimes it seems to be caused by pedalling, but then I hear it when coasting too, and that idea goes out the window. And no matter how I try, I can't make it happen when I've got the bike upside down and my face up close to the rear wheel. My best guess is that the brake pad brushes the rim a little, or the chain scrapes against the front derailleur.

Here's a random observation about Regina: A lot of the trees have a sticky yellow collar around their trunks, and it's apparently to prevent the spread of Dutch elm disease. Also, I was buying junk food when for the first time in my life I saw pork rinds for sale. You can't get them in BC. Well, maybe you can, but I've never seen them.

Day 41. Sun June 3, 2001.
Crossword Frenzy!!

I found a copy of the Vancouver Sun in a convenience store, and pounced on it. What a pleasure that was -- an island of familiarity in a sea of pure evil (just kidding -- that's my Dave Foley impression). It was last Saturday's paper, which meant not one, but two, New York Times crosswords. That pretty much filled my evening.

It got me thinking about other things I miss about BC:

• Vertical traffic lights. They're all horizontal on the Prairies, for some reason. It feels wrong, like being in a third world country where the cars have three wheels and the telephone numbers go clockwise.
• Licence plates with a decent color scheme. Now some may say that this is all a matter of what you're used to, but I don't buy it. These colors just aren't right -- I think it even says so in the Bible.
• Radio stations that don't have ads for fertilizer and farm equipment.
• A decent night life. I don't expect much, but I got a sudden urge for lasagna around 10:30, and biked all over downtown looking for someplace still open. Nothing.
• And of course, Skytrain.

Day 42. Mon June 4, 2001.

You find moments of beauty when and where you least expect them. I was up early, and parked my bike down at the Cornwall Mall, in one of those downtown "dead-zones" where wind deposits litter. I noticed several dragonflies scattered around, apparently dead. But, when I got back, it had warmed up a bit, and they had revived, clinging to the walls. About a dozen of them, red, yellow and green. I saw them everywhere the rest of the day. Regina seems to have a one-day dragonfly season.

Day 43. Tues June 5, 2001.

The seedpod season, in contrast, seems to go on and on. The library has drifts of the stuff out front. I took a picture. It floats through the air like snow.

Day 44. Wed June 6, 2001.

I've been east, west and south, so today I decided to ride north, along the route I took into town. There wasn't much to see but a standard strip with a mall anchoring the northern end.

Day 45. Thurs June 7, 2001.

The Leader Post mentioned a few days ago that the International Space Station was visible from Regina, so I've been keeping my eyes open for it. Today I finally saw it, a bright light moving slowly overhead in the twilight. I wish I had a telescope.

Day 46. Fri June 8, 2001.
Unsettled weather. I got caught in some seriously heavy rain, the kind where the drops have individual 'heft.' I was on my way to the IMAX theater and Science World, but lost my enthusiasm. If you think about it, all Science Worlds are basically the same. I just hung out in the gift shop until the sun came out again.

Day 47. Sat June 9, 2001.
The Wiserider Event

For the last few weeks, I've seen advertisements for a bicycle festival, so I decided to go. Unfortunately, it turned out to be aimed more at 4-8 year-olds, with a theme of promoting bike safety. Entertainment was by performers from a local kids show. At least they had 50 cent hotdogs (proceeds to the foodbank -- anyone else find that odd?). The performers were introduced by a local weatherman, and since the weather was so beautiful, he made a joke about how we should be thanking him. After all, we always blame him when the weather is bad.

You're probably so far ahead of me that I don't even have to finish. Guess what the weather was like by three? They had to close early due to rain, and while they were handing out the raffle prizes, I had an almost insurmountable urge to yell "Lynch the weatherman!"

Still, the morning was nice, sitting in the shade on the grass watching a steady stream of lost balloons drifting past.

Helmets were a big theme in the displays, but honestly I'm not much of a believer in them. I do wear one, because it is the law, and because it's a handy place to attach a mirror, but I don't think they serve much purpose. I think the real reason they've been pushed into the realm of PC (you've gotta wear a helmet!) by legislators is because it's an easy way to appear that they've done something meaningful to help cyclists.

I mean, think about it. For starters, cycling isn't all that high-risk an activity for head injuries anyway. I've taken my share of tumbles, and it's always been my knees and palms that were at greatest risk, not my head. And if I were to get a bump somehow, I've got a very high quality helmet built right into my head already; certainly a better one than I'm wearing!

There was a pamphlet circulating which said that 75% of bicycle deaths were caused by head injuries. Ok, fair enough, but that doesn't address the fact that only a small minority of bicycle injuries result in death. Once an accident becomes severe enough to kill a cyclist, it's fair to ask if a helmet would have made any difference anyway. I don't think so. Helmets are good for preventing minor scrapes and bumps, but won't do much to save your life. They are, after all, only styrofoam.

You might say, "Every little bit helps," and I suppose I can't argue with that. So, I guess my opinion on helmets is that if, somehow, I had an accident in which my head were struck with slightly more force than it could normally withstand, then yes, a helmet would be a useful thing to have. Otherwise....

Day 48. Sun June 10, 2001.
I went all the way to Chapters, hoping to find a book that just came out called "The Wizard's Dilemma." Not only didn't they have it, they didn't even have a record of it so they can't order it. Chapters is overrated. I'd order it off the Net if I had an address to send it to.

Day 49. Mon June 11, 2001.

McVeigh was executed today, which is as good a reason as any for everybody to express an opinion on the death penalty. I have to admit, I don't have a strong opinion either way. I wouldn't fight to get it, but then if we had it, I wouldn't fight to abolish it either. I do support it in principle though, which may surprise some. (On the basis of no data whatsoever, I suspect most atheists oppose the death penalty).

I think that the discussion on the death penalty often misses the point. It's not about deterrence, or the prevention of recidivism. It's not about restoring peace of mind to the victims, or even about vengeance. I think the importance of the death penalty is to serve as a statement of our values as a society. It says that some things just cannot be tolerated; some things are so heinous, so beyond the pale, that by committing them you give up your right to belong to the human race.

I will say that I don't think it should be on the books as a punishment for specific crimes, with the factors calculated like a mathematical proof: malice / number of victims times liklihood to reoffend, etc etc. I think it should be up to juries to use when they think it's appropriate. Or maybe even the general public. In those small number of crimes for which death seems appropriate, there hasn't been any difficulty in gauging public opinion on whether they should die or not (just think of Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka).

Day 50. Tues June 12, 2001.

Someone has got a HUGE touring bike outside, with all sorts of baggage attached. This guy must have legs like a giraffe. I never did find out whose it was.

Day 51. Wed June 13, 2001.
Interesting story on the news today. Food sellers are being forced to remove labels that say their foods are free of genetically modified products, because there is no way to check if they're telling the truth or not (maybe some feel that people add the labels just as a selling point). Predictibly, public opinion was in favor of the labels, so they can "make an informed opinion" but honestly, they sound like they really just want to avoid GMPs. It's a knee-jerk reaction.

Not that one can't make a case against GMPs, but using terms like 'Frankenfoods' is a pretty stupid way to do it. Mixing, say, fish DNA with wheat DNA is about as likely to product a risk to human health as putting tuna on a sandwich. DNA is DNA.

My question is: Why is it that the people who complain about genetically modified foods, which have to pass legislated safety tests, are often the same people who believe in herbal remedies, which don't?

Day 52. Thurs June 14, 2001.

I may have inadvertantly made the news. A few days ago I was on the Albert St Bridge (quick aside: I've heard that this bridge has the highest 'length to water distance' index in the world. Translation: It's the longest bridge over the shortest stretch of water.) at sunrise to, well, watch the sunrise obviously. On the news today there was a story about somebody reporting a guy on a bike climbing over the rail and jumping, but the police found nothing and they concluded that the guy just rode away again. No, I didn't climb over the rail, but perhaps if someone driving past saw me raising my leg to get off my bike, he might have thought I was going over the side. Human observation sucks.

Anyway, I have no idea if I really was the guy reported, but I'll bet I was.

Day 53. Fri June 15, 2001.

Bought a new toy at the photoshop today: a little teeny tripod for my camera. Cute little thing, fits right into my pocket.

Went to the movies tonight. Saw Tomb Raider, then the new Disney movie Atlantis. Tomb Raider wasn't bad, even if it's harder to enjoy this kind of movie ever since The Matrix set the bar so high.

Atlantis on the other hand just sucked. I'm not sure if I've ever mentioned being an animation buff, but I am. And I just don't know what's wrong with Disney; this film makes it clear that they aren't even trying anymore. Then again, they probably don't have to, since the reviews I've seen have been incredibly generous. I guess if it's Disney, people think it must be good, but this film just didn't cut it. Now that everybody has computers, even Pokemon has special effects as good as this. And the actual character animation isn't much better. Disney seems determined to remove all curved lines from their characters, to make them more and more stylized and geometric in appearance, and as a result, they get uglier and uglier.

I should probably drop it now, for risk of boring you, but I just can't. Feel free to skip ahead. There's a movie called "The Secret of NIMH" that I've been a fan of for years (my family just rolled their eyes and said 'here he goes'), and I mention it because there's a case here of comparing apples with apples. Atlantis climaxes with a big special effects scene in which the female lead is filled with power from a magical artifact. By a remarkable coincidence, NIMH ends in exactly the same way. Purely as eye-candy, which scene is better? Decide for yourselves. And remember that NIMH was released twenty years ago, before computers took a lot of the time and expense out of it. Disney just isn't trying.

Here's another interesting coincidence. The character Milo in Atlantis was animated by John Pomeroy, who is a semi-legend of animation. 20 years ago, Pomeroy also animated NIMH's Mrs. Brisby. So I just can't figure out why the animation in Atlantis is so clumsy. Unless they just don't care anymore.

Day 54. Sat June 16, 2001.

I haven't shaved for about a week, so when I did I decided to take the opportunity to experiment a little. Long story short, I'm trying out a goatee.

More to come, but I'm too tired to type. I'll just let you know that the big disaster I mentioned was that my bike was stolen.

I'm finally out of Regina! The hiatus is over. Shit, more than two months. I can't even really call it a hiatus; it would be more accurate to say that I lived in Regina for a short time. You might notice that I'm not including my stay in Regina in the daycount. This may be cheating, but I don't care. I can't believe I've only been actually cycling for 25 days, less if you don't count brief stops in Kamloops and Calgary.

I have to admit I'm coming out of Regina with a lot of bad feelings. Not toward the city, in fact I'll probably always have a soft spot for it. I've started thinking of it as home. It's just so much time wasted, so much money wasted. And of course the loss of my bike. I've said that I hate loose ends, and it bugs me that I'll never get it back, or find out what happened to it. And, while I know that the police can't exactly say 'Bob, Jim, I'm pulling you off undercover to look for Steve's bike', I wish they could have done something more, so that I didn't feel like my report might as well have been shouted down a well.

I know that I'm not entirely to blame -- there really were a lot of external factors keeping me there -- but then again, I stayed more than two more weeks, after everything was finally sorted out and I could have left. I'm a terrible procrastinator, and after being there so long, it became all too easy to think that one more day wouldn't matter. And like I said, Regina now feels like home and I didn't want to leave.

But, some things make me feel better. It was, at least, a great place to get to know more intimately than simply passing through would allow. I wouldn't mind making similar stays in a few other places along the way. Halifax, for example. And it gave me a chance to reconnect with people online that I haven't talked to for a long time, and also spend some time promoting my site. I had 200 visitors when I arrived, now I have 2000.

One more thing that makes me feel better: I got an email from Micheal Shermer, who I've mentioned before, but never explained who he was. He's the founder and editor of "Skeptic" magazine, and author of books like "How We Believe" and "Why People Believe Weird Things," but most important (in this context), he's a former semi-professional cyclist. He wrote:

Steve:
"What a great trip. I'm envious. In my five transcontinental crossings by bike I never took the time to smell the flowers. Do so."

I'm glad to have smelled the flowers of Regina.

Two months makes a big difference. The fields are greener, and there's a lot more bugs. I was curious about whether I'd lost my bike legs, and while my legs were more or less fine, my hips are aching again. I stopped in Sintaluta and looked through their museum, and in Woseley, where I nearly decided to stay the night (two cute girls in the info center seemed on the verge of offering me a yard), but decided to go on. I'm now at the campground at Grenfell, listening to the chatter of kids in the swimming pool as the sun goes down. With any luck, I'll be in Manitoba tomorrow.

My hip joints were aching in the morning, to the point that if I was in a chair and wanted to cross my legs, I had to lift it by hand. Guess I overdid it yesterday. Probably the result of guilt, the great motivator. Anyway, I decided to stay in town another day.

I may have to rethink what I've said about small towns. Having decided to stay, I quickly realized that there's simply nothing to do. Grenfell is a one-tavern, one-motel, one-restaurant kind of town, with not much for entertainment. Last night, I'd have had nothing to do either, if a minor-league softball game hadn't been played at the campground ballpark. I did meet a guy and girl from Vancouver named Bob and Lydia who were driving to Ontario with Lydia's mother. (Bob was her ex-boyfriend, which I thought was strange. How many parents take their daughters' exes along on family trips?)

Fortunately, the library was open today, so I sat in there most of the day, read "The Wind in the Door" by Madeleine L'Engle, which I hadn't read in years. I also browsed some of the shops in town, but there wasn't much of interest. The main street strip probably looked old in the fifties. I did buy a crossword book, and a paperback of "Hannibal."

The rest of the town was surprisingly nice though. It looked less like a farming town, and more like an upper-middle-class bedroom community transplanted to the middle of the prairie. Big houses, lots of trees and landscaping.

Staying a day turned out to be a good choice though, because the weather was bad all day. In the evening, I saw most of another game, but had to leave when the rain started in earnest. It rained heavily all night, the first time, believe it or not, that I've been rained on in my tent at night.

Part 1

Manitoba