(Photos © J. Maus)
Last Saturday night was a memorable night in Portland. The Handmade Bike Show was in town, Rapha held their Roller Race event, the Slap Dash Alleycat was on, and tons of people showed up to my little benefit party.
Just wanted to say thanks to everyone that came out to The Plan B, bought raffle tickets, and shared the night with us. It was great to meet a bunch of new people from Portland and beyond and from the looks of things, it seemed like everyone had a great time (including Commissioner Sam Adams who was in great spirits all night).
By the end of the night we sold 800 raffle tickets! That’s $800 (make that $700 after tipping those hard-working bartenders) towards making sure BikePortland.org stays alive and well.
Special thanks to Michael Kloeppel for making it happen, and to New Belgium, Ortlieb, Castelli, Gretchen Kloeppel, Keen Footwear, and SRAM/Rock Shox for the raffle prizes.
I think we’ll have to do it again some time.
Thanks for reading.
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personal THANKS to Jeff and his staff at the plan B for putting up with us for the night…
Yeah, that was a good time for sure. It was cool to see so many bike folks that I didn\’t know. I talked to riders from Colorado and Kansas City that had come to Portland for the bike show.
I was glad to pitch in some dollars for raffle tickets to support this website which is truly a valuable asset to the bike community. Thanks for all your hard work, Jonathan.
Thanks also to Carl for organizing the Slap Dash Alleycat, and to the folks who hosted the checkpoints.
Between touring those booths at the handmade bike show, making memories with my nine year old son on the worst day of the year ride and the plan B party for Jonathan (where I finally put some faces with screen names from this site and shift) I was reminded why we moved here, back before Y2K was the threat de jour and Bushy had yet to muck up the whole deal – for a budding bike community of course… which has grown into such a kick ass proposition I couldn\’t be more proud. Much of the credit for the scenes substance and momentum goes to Mr. Maus, who, and I must say this in a public forum one more time, asked my advice about whether a website devoted to local news and muse of all things bike related could make an industrious soul a living – I marveled at an original idea in a sea of posers and repeaters, then promptly shot it down as utter folly, \”You\’ll starve my good man, they will find your sweat soaked body quivering in the dark mumbling something about bike boxes and zoobombers.\”
I\’m so glad I was wrong! That pocket of raffle tickets I bought should be taken as an act of contrition. BTW, what in bloody hell was I doing jumping around for a pair of bike socks on a dark patio? I spilled some perfect good New Belgium in the process!
Metal:
It was great fun going around the room with you demanding I introduce everybody to you. I said I only know these guys when I\’m drunk, so it\’s good we took care of the sobriety problem right away!
Jonathan:
Great gig, and you deserve it all. I hope you don\’t quit this to become Mayor Adams\’ Special Assistant in Charge of Human-Powered Transport. We\’re not done needing your site to keep us going. Hold out for a cabinet position when Sam takes the White House in 2020.
It was super fun. Met a kid from Salt Lake on the way. Talked to some other folks while we where at Plan B. Got some New Belgium swag and even got something with our fist full of raffle tickets. It was a wonderful night, more over I am happy to support you. This is one of the only blog we read daily.
Where else would you meat a person that turned a clear raincoat into a side emitting fiber optic color wheel light safety coat who also welds tig silverware purchased from goodwill into religious art in his living room. Crazy night and goodtimes.
Nice to finally meet you John and Metal Cowboy.
I got myself a pair of socks and rode home happy.
i have pictures to post!
thanks for the party jon, and thanks for the race Carl!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/butterbits/sets/72157603947241853/