I managed to get to bike party too late to get a lot of pictures at the beginning. That was too bad, because there was a lot to see there. You have to use your imagination. These were just the people that got near me in a long thin line of bikers that somebody found to be more than 1100 of us. What finally inspired me to drop everything else and get out my camera was that old hip hop song with the line "California knows how to party" in it over and over. It was coming out of that Sweety Style shark cart. Thank you sir for elevating my mood!

     

After that I just shot as many animals as I could.

     

        

        

        

        

The bag piper was awesome even though he didn't remind me of anything more furry than a Scott or an Arab.

        

Not long after I took these pictures I came across an old friend having a bad trip on the grass. I saw him kind of pull over and collapse just ahead of me. I doubled back to find out what was going on. He muttered something. He'd eaten one of those huge THC laced brownies that somebody else was giving out. The whole thing. The guy isn't used to eating marijuana treats and he'd had a big dose even for people that consume a lot. The guy was just not ready to get back on his bike at all. I bailed after I figured out that I couldn't help much. Several people stayed with him. By this time I was near the back of the pack, where there just weren't many others. I found myself just riding along hoping those blinking lights in the distance were really bike party riders.

I found out later my friend ended up in the hospital. Haven't heard much since hearing that. Hope it works out okay.

If you've eaten too much good stuff, the best thing to do is start ralphing it up. I told my friend that I'd done that after realizing my mistake when the same thing happened to me a month or so before. My theory is that the more of it you can upchuck, the less of it is going to end up in your blood. I felt miserable, but not collapsed on the grass miserable. Sitting on the curb wondering what's up and hurling miserable. I didn't manage to inspire him to do that kind of thing. All I can say for sure is watch out for those brownies! There could be mischief in them. My advice is maybe start with just a quarter of one. If you still want more in an hour then have another quarter. Being too stoned is just not much fun.

        

This was the only real dog that took I managed to get good pictures of.

     

This woman was really fun. She said she had seen me catching orange riders one time and had decided to spend this evening getting all the sharks she could find. She must have had some kind of fun with the project because she was still at it and the ride was almost over. I'd love to see what she found.

Cameron had made these LED flashlights into headlights with rubber band and steel wire mountings. His plan had been to give them out to ninja riders who wanted to upgrade to having headlights. Unfortunately he'd not done enough publicity ahead of time to make the demand outstrip supply. If you see him with all those headlights another time and you need one he'll probably be glad to share.

Speaking of his headlights, that's a miners lantern he was really using for a headlight. It had a gas flame that actually provided quite a bit of light. That was the only one of those I saw in the entire evening.

     

        

I know I've met that blond with the gray knit hat before. She told me her name again this time. I hope I remember it next time she tells me.

     

The Easter Bunny was handing out chocolate!

  

Those dark triangles on the yellow and blue bandannas are ventilation. They also have a Velcro closure that makes it easy to get one on just right. I think Ian is the creative force behind them. They look comfortable.

  

As the evening drove to a close I was having trouble getting myself to head home. I realized it was time to go when the parking lot was empty of all other humans except a few guys around a pickup talking in a mellow way. There wasn't much trash either. Bryan got some, I got some, and people didn't leave much anyhow. Thank you bike party! I started pedaling home.



They used to have a "Welcome to Mountain View" sign, but now at the city line they just have a this thing. Getting to it means "you're almost home." That means fifteen more minutes of pedaling or something like that. Easy St. gives me the same kind of feeling again, but by that time I have maybe four minutes of pedaling to go.