Suburb Replaced By City Center!!!

I started jury duty today, which means a drastic change in my work commute. Normally I drive the car to work, as my home and place of employment are far far apart, with clogged roads between them (though occasionally I do bike it, that being the subject of another post), but now that I've got jury duty it's a sub-10 minute bike commute. Humming, we're humming, my bike and I.

My commute, by bike or car, starts with getting my godson to preschool. Normally we're in the car, but thanks to the Seventh Amendment we are our own engines today. I start out slowly pedaling, but after about 1 block I'm walking. This was our first rest stop. Getting to school took FOREVER. He started to get his lunch out to stave off hunger about 3 blocks into the 5 block journey. Finally, we made it. The other preschoolers were impressed with his scooter. He thoughtfully announced it was my birthday and my knees got hugged:)

I went straight up Eighth Street, right past our village blacksmith, Fred Hutt. I should have included the long line of drays, hansom cabs, and phaetons in this picture. Kentucky is truly the horse capital of the world, as the large number of horses waiting in line for Mr. Hutt to shoe them would have demonstrated (darn that sticky shutter).

After some fancy navigating to avoid horsey-pie and a newly broke bay mare who was running wild down the street, I finally made it to the Hall of Justice (which I later found out isn't really the Hall of Justice (that's across the pedway) but, really, with those columns? It needs to be the Hall of Justice, not the boring old "Judicial Center").

There were two crappy bikes at the bike rack at lunchtime, but at quitting time there was just me and young-guy-on-a-Surly. It was an exciting moment, meeting a fellow bike commuter. We discussed the possibility of rain tomorrow (bike or bus?) and the appeal of the Surly CrossCheck (although he was on a Steamroller).

Note the toeclips, reflective pants band, and SS (or is it a fixie?). I didn't notice if he had a front brake or not. I guess that's something we can chat about during voir dire.

Many new bike lanes have been added to the Metro's streets in the past couple of years (thanks, Jerry). I got to actually ride on one when I went home today. It's not too often that my route coincides with bicycle infrastructure, so when it happens I'm sure to forget to take a picture. I did, however, ride past the famous L & N building on Broadway. My mom retired from Adult Protective Services this past Spring, which, like many other state social services, is housed in this building. My grandma and great-uncle worked for L & N back in the day (though I'm not revealing which day), before this was built. I had this fantasy that all three had worked in the same building, but it turns out my granny and her brother worked down by the railroad yards near Central Ave. Oh well.

Most of my students are from Somalia. Everybody calls this the Somali Mall, not the International Mall. As near as I can tell, only Somali-owned businesses are there. You can get sambosa for a dollar (meat fried in dough; is there a culture without some version of this?), a fancy hijab, go to Koran classes, and rent Indian movies (Somalis love Indian movies - I think it's because there is a lot of romance but no smooching).

And then, BOOM, I'm home again. I didn't even pay attention when the deputy sheriff was telling us about where we could park and which garages gave juror discounts. That self-righteous feeling can be soooo good.