when Ritsuko times out

Today I went out with the express purpose of neglecting things you ought to do while leaving a country and check out road bikes. I went to Drahtesel, where they had only one, and it was by Univega, never heard of them before, it’s okay.

Then I went to Buhl’s, and they had a Ferrari red Specialized Allez for 799, 100 Euros cheaper than the Poison Cyanit. At first I felt it was really long, but after a saddle and stem change, the bike finally felt small enough for me.

I dunno much about road bikes. But coming from a 60s or 70s era city bike that seemed to have been converted into a road bike by slapping on some dropbars, this was pure bliss. I glided on smooth roads just like a razor through a sheet of paper – must be the carbon fork and true rims compared to the slightly bent rim and steel fork on the other bike I had. Despite the aerodynamic position these bikes were supposed to promote, the wind was blowing against me all the time from every direction. I must have been riding that fast. It’s a shame that I have to change positions to shift up, but that’s a cheap Shimano Sora for you, the Tiagra solves the problem. And I can’t get used to the new fashioned hand position where you have to put your hands on top and steer it like a bull’s horns. I just don’t get enough leverage to pull the brakes hard enough. And it makes my hands tense after a while. I much prefer the drops, or the horizontal part of the handlebars.

I must also mention that I got a lot of looks while riding this bike. Even though everybody knows that there’s a bike shop around the corner, and I’m just testing the bike out. Maybe they were looking at the bike instead, and I can’t blame them. I was thinking of getting a road bike in all black and christening it “Black Beauty”, but I might have to change that. After riding the Specialized Allez, I thought: maybe red isn’t so bad after all.

It seems I’ll have to judge everything with the Allez as a benchmark then. It put a smile on my face for a few hours, until I saw the price tag for the gifts that I was about to buy my aunts in Taiwan – as I said before, the Allez is a reasonably priced bike. Some time in the winter break, I should go down to Koln and test ride a Poison Cyanit/Opiat, just so I’m not biased anymore. I really couldn’t get it out of my mind, shame that I’ll have to wait until next semester to find a job and next year to actually buy one.

Speaking of things that couldn’t get out of my mind, Isayama Yomi was one. I might be able to think better of Akiyama Mio after seeing Yomi – I just fell in love with her and her predicament. Never mind that I traditionally fall for chicks with long, straight black hair – this one has to be different. After finishing Ga-Rei Zero, I felt loved, which augmented my smile after riding that Allez even more. That’s incredible… very few anime can do that to me, I’m usually too skeptical. Although I should have been more skeptical when watching this one, for instance, Kagura’s father just got sliced in half and he’s in good enough condition for nurses to use defibrillators on him?

So it seems in the manga, Kagura is the protagonist and Yomi is the antagonist? Sigh… that means I won’t be seeing much of her then, so I’ll just stick to Zero. What a girl…