Social Cycling ATX Presents: Thursday Night Social Ride, and a gentle admonishion from yours truly.

Last night while I was riding around in my drawers I received the following Social Cycling ATX Thursday Ride notice from Keith. I know a lot of y'all are old hat at these rides, but he added a few important notes and requests in this one that you may not have seen before, so please keep reading:

Alright everyone, Thursday night is almost here so let me give you the lowdown on this weeks ride and a couple of other pieces of Social Ride business.

As always, we meet at 7:30 at the Pfluger pedestrian bridge. You will need to bring lights, a lock, some water and an ID(if you plan to attend the after party).

I was riding around with my friend, Sara, last week and we dropped into a bike shop called Longhorn Bikes that I have never been to before, which is crazy, because this bike shop owner is seriously of the old school. The shop owner, Rene Martinez has been around Austin riding bikes and working in shops since the Austin Cruzer Bike Shop days. His shop is a crazy mix of lowrider bikes with 120 spoked wheels, cool lightweight commuter bikes and cruisers with actual longhorns (you know, from the bull) for handlebars.

He wants us to come by his shop on Cesar Chavez for a keg and some footdown this Thursday. And who am I to deny ya'll of two of ya'lls favorite things? So we'll cruise the eastside for a bit, drop by his shop and have a little fun in the parking lot. After we are done, we'll take off again for some more riding until we are ready for some more hospitality at our original bar host, the Jackalope. They are throwing down some ice cold kegs our way and serving up the dollar Lonestar after that is done. As well, pints of any other beer are only two dollars for those of you with fancier tastes. In addition, I have arranged for entry into the Chupacabra (a couple of doors down from Jackalope) where they will have a DJ on the patio for us and are giving us dollar Tecate beers. You all decide which place suits you the best.

For all of you new riders, here is how we ride. We obey traffic laws as best we can. We stay to the right, take up one lane, let cars pass and stop at red lights. Sure it seems stupid to wait at a light in downtown when there are no cars coming, but think of this as time to socialize with your fellow cyclists, or break into an impromptu dance party until the light changes to green. Also, LISTEN TO YOUR GROUP'S LEADER. They are not trying to be jerks when letting everyone know what is up. They are looking out for your SAFETY. If you have a problem with that, please come let me know or email me. I welcome any comments or criticisms.

Social Cycling ATX is looking for some help. If you are interest in leading a group, planning routes, are a graphic designer, a bike mechanic or just want to lend a hand in general, please email me at helpout@socialcyclingatx.com.

If you have any suggestions on where to take the ride, or you are a dj or band that would like to play for 300 friendly and sweaty cyclists. Or if you just want to comment (good or bad) please email me at yo@socialcyclingatx.com.

I told you last week that Social Cycling ATX is having a t-shirt contest. We are taking submissions at yo@socialcyclingatx.com. I am looking for a single-color design that contains both "Social Cycling ATX" and "Thursday Night Social Ride". The shirts the winning design will be printed on will be white, so keep that in mind. The winner will be announced in November (date to be decided soon) and will receive a nice package of cycling stuff (still working out details... coming soon, but it will kick ass.)

And speaking of T Shirts, the Austin Texas Bike Polo Social Club will be out on the ride selling their really cool shirts this week. The proceeds towards funding their East Coast tournament tour coming up this November. I hear they are only charging $10. Just look for the people with long metal poles sticking out of their bike bags. Only $10 dollars folks... and these people will represent us well. And you get a cool Austin bike shirt. What a deal.

See ya'll at the bridge!

Now my own personal comments. Rumor has it that we've been slouching on the tips again. I know times are tough, the economy is in the shitter, and the national deficit is building at an astronomical rate, but THERE'S NO EXCUSE FOR NOT TIPPING. I shouldn't even have to be saying this, y'all. These rides rule for NUMEROUS reasons, and the fact that they end at FREE BEER (and in this case at a mid-ride stop as well) is just the icing on the cake. The key to the free beer is happy bartenders. If word gets back to the owners that we aren't taking care of them, guess what happens to the free beer? That's right, it ceases to be free. I hang out with a lot of you people outside these rides. I know you're perfectly willing to drop six bucks on a six pack of shitty beer at the corner store. When you're at a bar that isn't sponsoring your drinking, you'll even stoop to BUYING the shit at the bar! So why does it seem lately that a buck here and there for the freebies is so hard? You're all adults, I'm done chiding you on the internet, so I'll just leave it at this:

If you don't and I see it, expect to be given a lot of shit at the bar this week.

Another thing I've been noticing lately: Due to the rapid growth in popularity of the Thursday Night Social Ride, Keith has been trying different methods of breaking things up to make the ride more manageable, including appointing a couple ride leaders to run smaller groups of cyclists, rather than run the entire ride as one massive, unruly pack. There are plenty of opportunities to go on less organized rides, blow lights, and behave a little wilder than you usually would when cruising through downtown on your bicycle. THIS RIDE is not that opportunity. Keith, Brooks and the other organizers/ride leaders really want to keep this ride as close to traffic-legal as possible, so as to build goodwill with the driving population of Austin as opposed to animosity. As an aside, if word got back to the bars that people were fucking around, pissing off traffic, attracting the ire of the cops and getting hurt on the rides, do you think they'd still want to give us free beer?

Whatever. Be a jackass on the ride, and I'LL fucking kick you off myself. I don't even care if I have no authority to do so, I'm just that big a douchebag. Play nice and tip your bartenders, folks. Do it for Keith. Do it for yourselves. But most importantly, DO IT FOR THE FREE BEER.

Thanks for reading my rant, and I'll see y'all on the ride.