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May 25

Tokyo Critical Mass

After Kyoko woke up with a headache and fever, we just hung out, made blueberry and banana hot cakes, and watched the movie Erin Brokovich. Around noon I headed out to catch the Odaiba-Hinode Ferry, which gets me to Tokyo proper with my bike. I ride the 45 minutes across the city to get to Yoyogi park, where Critical Mass meets.

Critical Mass was a pretty low turnout this time, around 30 peoples. They meet at 3 p.m., but we didn't ride until 4:30 or so. It was a nice slow ride, especially because of the traffic. We did get to see the kilometer long line outside some stadium... perhaps it was soccer / World Cup related?

After the ride, the bulk of us headed over to Yoyogi Park, and had a little picnic. Some of us headed over to the local supermarket and picked up drinks and snacks (I hadn't really eaten yet, so grabbed some quick food, as well). We hung out in the park until around midnight, talking and joking around. Around 11 p.m. someone noticed the wobble my back tire has. It was at this point that one of the bike mechanics there decided to try and fix it. Unfortunately the problem was rather complex because the tire actually has 2 little wobbles, and the problem just became worse! Soon, the bike was unrideable. I thought I was stuck, but then another guy quickly did some tuning, and voila! Back to just the small wobble. I was able to ride back to Shimbashi station. It was still too late to catch a ferry or train to Odaiba, however, and I was stuck locking my bike, and then taking a Taxi over the Rainbow Bridge to Odaiba, a costly affair.