Friday, May 02, 2008

Amateur

The word “amateur” has at least two connotations for someone to which it refers: being a lover and being someone who recognizes his status as a doer of things in a manner that pales in comparison to those who do those things with professional expertise; I felt both meanings last evening as I adored the skill with which the Church of the Bicycle Jesus put together with their May Day event, Dead Baby Presents, a film festival/speakeasy that set the bar for bicycle/movie/drinking extravaganzas and, for me, effectively kicked off the season’s pedal-powered festivities in grand style.

Held in Belltown’s underground clubhouse that is also home to the Punk Rock Flea Market, Dead Baby Presents attracted many of the usual suspects and more; it’s always a delight to cycle up to a place where dozens upon dozens of bikes cover a chain link fence like English ivy; inside lots of familiar faces: Alex from 2020, working sound, Messman, fully-recovered from the messenger smackdown, Reverend Phil, holding forth on matters aesthetic, Cara of BCClettes fame, down from Vancouver, all the while Dead Baby Terry and his mates kept proceedings moving smartly along while simultaneously fostering the requisite sense that all could be careening towards disaster at any moment to make for a spectacularly fine time.

I also got to meet Josh of Gurldogg blog, as whipsmart in person as he is online and to conjecture with him the ethics of liberating abandoned bicycles, in particular, this noble Centurion Super Tour I’ve had my eye on all year long as it sits rusting outside Condon Hall at the UW, progressively losing first its front and recently, its rear wheel, too.

And oh, the films were uniformly excellent and curated superbly; I especially enjoyed the bike dance troupe mockumentary, the Trike Messenger, and clever parodies of the Columbia Pictures logo and the Film Rating slide, DB13, for “Bike, Cussing, Drinking, and General Carrying On.”

Last night had all that and I loved it.

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