Westchester is still digging out after the two-foot ass-kicking we took late last week. Much of the county lost power for a significant amount of time; some are still without power, I think,

Chappaqua resident Peter Applebome, who writes the My Town Our Towns column for the NY Times, writes about the misery of being off the grid for three days up there in Clintonville. To be fair, Applebome says it ain’t exactly the same as being an earthquake victim.

I saw stretches of outages while walking home Friday, including Broad just east of Bradhurst.

While we were able to keep Dinosaur Train airing on Sprout for Little G all weekend, we were nonetheless dismayed to find our beloved little bike rack–the one we pestered Town Hall for 2 1/2 years ago, the most publicized little bike rack in the free world–flattened from the snow.

What fond memories we have of the rack: Seeing it arrive that fateful day in July 2007. Seeing it become a popular hangout for two-wheeled vehicles when gas got freakishly expensive. Seeing it get totally full of bikes after some initial resistance.

[The curvy black bar behind the fence]

Well, perhaps it was not entirely flattened, but it’s looking for all the world like it is not something you will ever again lock your bike on, at least not in its current state.

It appears the snow plows, while clearing out the Hawthorne station lot, shoved a mountain of snow against the rack, which has been lifted off its moorings on one side and now is raised to the sky at a 45 degree angle, as opposed to the right angle more commonly seen on bike racks. The plows presumably busted the thing right out of its concrete platforms, which, frankly, didn’t look so secure from the start.

We’ll see what it looks like when the mound of snow clears. For now, there’s so much snow keeping the rack in place that it seems safe to lock your bike to–heck, I did this morning, and the long vacated Power Climber bike is still there, more neglected than Kirstie Allie’s StairMaster.

But the Town maintenance guys are going to have to do some jiggering to make it viable after the snow’s gone.

I was chatting with Saugatucker about the merits of biking to the train recently. Sure, it’s a few minutes of misery on those 20 degree mornings. But we agreed there’s something about driving to the train that just feels like the ultimate suburban cliche…wait, the image of the angry commuter chipping ice off his windshield before driving to the train would be the ultimate suburban cliche.

Saugatucker carves almost three miles through the Westport terrain each morning on his bike, a much lengthier jaunt than mine. We mentioned the quiet delight we experience when seeing neighbors climb into their cars around the same time we set out on our bikes, both looking to make the same train, but only one of us having to navigate the labyrinthian misery of the commuter parking lot.

Of course, on those bleak wintry-mix mornings when I set out on foot, I’m all too happy to have those neighbors give my sorry ass a ride to the station.

So I was torn between walking to the train and riding the trusty steed this morning, with all the precipitation nonsense that fell yesterday. I was fearful of the dreaded black ice this morning, but also tired of all the walking to the station I’ve done of late due to all the snow. So I decided to set out a few minutes early and bike cautiously.

At the end of my driveway, I saw my neighbor T climbing into the passenger seat of her car, with stone-faced husband D at the wheel. Young V was in tow too–heading to the city with mom due to winter break from school.

The roads were fine and I resumed my normal speed after descending Heartbreak Hill to Memorial Drive. I pulled into the station parking lot just as the stone-faced D was dropping off T and Little V–chalk another one up for the bike guys.

My morning momentum was short-lived, however, as the 8:16 was late. At 8:22, the loudspeaker crackled to life.

“Ladies and gentlemen, the 8:16 is running 10 to 15 minutes late,” it said.

Us platform pigeons performed a collective exhale to show Metro-North our displeasure, and sought refuge from the morning chill in the plexiglass shelter.

At 8:29, the 8:16 rolled in. No explanation for the delay was forthcoming, and the 8:16 pulled into Grand Central at 9:13, a full nine minutes late. That’s even late by Metro-North’s generous 5:59 rule, which says trains arriving up to six minutes late are, in fact, on time by the railroad’s standards. In fact, the latest issue of MNR mouthpiece Mileposts said the Harlem Line was “on time” 98.6% of the time in 2009–meaning us poor suckers on the so called “8:16″ this morning were privy to something that only happens 1.4% of the time.

How special! Perhaps I was better off riding the bike to the city.  

I generally have no qualms with the taxi guys based out of the old Hawthorne station house. I mean, I was OK with it that night when they took the drunk ass to the far end of Thornwood before bringing me and another Hawthorner to our homes first.

I don’t really mind the landfill of cigarette butts the dispatchers create outside their window.

And I’m really perfectly fine with the fact that the old station house is used as storage for the cab company’s junk, instead of something useful and attractive like the Starbucks over at Hartsdale station, and I don’t hold them responsible for the time the disgruntled cabbie slaughtered the rabbit on the cab station steps. 

Not their fault.

But geez, are they making a mess where they park over by the bike rack. Earlier this week, I noticed a giant brown puddle of something that looked like milk chocolate but surely doesn’t taste like it. The puddle was about the size of an inflatable kiddie pool, and sat underneath a taxi that looked like it was out of commission. The puddle had oozed its way to a storm drain about 40 feet away, an ugly river of brown and weird toxic rainbow colors. Some unidentified car part–some sort of liquid holding vessel the same color as the ooze–has been sitting next to the bike rack all week.

The dioxin puddle has subsided a bit, but it’s still there.

Then, this morning, I spied a porno mag open spread-eagle, if you will, next to the bike rack. The fold revealed several pics of a woman named “Gianna”–hey, it’s an Italian neighborhood–and the bold type stated that Gianna is, indeed, “100% Genuine.” 100% Genuine as she sat perched upon a Harley, 100% Genuine as she did a little gardening in the buff.

I would’ve turned the page to see what other fleshy treasures the mag held, but a full platform of 8:16ers were looking down on me.

I’m a grown-up and I’m not offended by the smut. But hey–there’s a kid’s dirt bike locked to the rack…there are kids present!!

So the teeny, tiny kid’s dirtbike I wrote about a few weeks ago was at the rack just about every day this week, including the tundra-esque morning today, where the temps were in the teens. I’m cold just recalling it. (I didn’t notice if the bike was there on the Wednesday morning SuperSoaker Slushfest. I had other things on my mind.)

The bike raises a million questions. Foremost: why is what seems like an 8 or 9 year old riding his bike to Hawthorne train station each day during the school year. Where does he go? And what sort of parent sends their 8 year old off on his bike in 18 degree weather? Are we to call child services?

The little blue Schwinn is so small that I don’t think any sort of undersized adult could ride the thing.

What gives?

I may have to perform a little stakeout this weekend.

The kid bike was on the rack at Hawthorne again this morning.

It’s a tiny little dirt bike, with a lock so flimsy that I was surprised did not pop open in this morning’s sharp winds.

It looks like it’s suited for a kid that’s about 8 or 9.

In fact, the rack had all of five cycles on it once I pulled up. So for the second time this week, I did not get to chain my ride to one of the four nice U- (or upside down U, depending on your perspective) shaped bars in the middle of the rack (those are Park Place and Boardwalk), and instead had to chain myself to one of the outside bars and lean my bike against the side of the rack (that would be Baltic or Mediterranean Ave.).

But back to the kid bike. What’s the kid doing chaining his bike to the rack on the school day? Where is he going? Frankly, as Swiss nanny author Joyce Egginton points out, Mount Pleasant ain’t much of a draw for young people. Is he hopping the train to Gotham? Despite the considerable progress from Mount Pleasant Today, I wouldn’t exactly encourage kids to ride their bikes around Hawthorne.

Is the kid bike related to what looks like the dad bike–a beat-up mountain bike that showed up the same day the wee dirt bike did? Do kid and dad venture off together on dusty adventures, like the grim father-son combos on Cormac McCarthy novels? 

Maybe it’s not a kid riding the tiny bike at all. Maybe it’s a munchkin, a Smurf, a garden gnome. Hey, times are tough–maybe those guys have to commute to the city too.

I’ll get to the bottom of this soon.

By the way, our train featured six cars instead of the usual eight, so it was jammed, with people occupying the middle seat (”sittin’ bitch”, as the bikers say). The conductor acknowledged the shortfall but not the reason why. 

The short train reminded me of the dark days of 2006, when I was a commuting novice and Metro-North was very much at the mercy of the dreaded late fall Slippery Rail season.

Kudos to Metro-North for getting through this past fall without being victimized by the pesky leaf residue that used to knock cars out of commission.  

The Little Bike Rack That Could set its all-time record for customers today. As I pulled in on my trusty Trek (damn, it was cold this morning!), I became the fifth–the fifth!–wheeled vehicle on the Hawthorne rack. It only took 2 1/2 years, but it appears the bike rack I pushed Town Hall for has finally caught on.

Bookending the cycles on the rack were the mysterious motor scooter known as the Black Rider and the Power Climber Ghost Bike that hasn’t moved for about a month. But even more intriguing were two in the middle that I’ve never seen before: a beat-up old mountain bike and a kid’s blue dirt bike.

The pair of newcomer bikes looked like a father and son combo, like the Dad told the kid to pack a lunch because they were skipping school for a day of fun. Maybe they parked their bikes, hopped the 7:52, and jetted down to Gotham for a full day of Laser Tag, shopping at Toys R Us, lunch at Virgil’s, and a Jersey Boys matinee.

Or maybe the dad had a court date, couldn’t find a babysitter, has no driver’s license, and got the kid’s bike in a poker game.

I have no idea.

A little over two years since the bike rack was installed at our request, the most written about bike rack in America has finally become a more popular bike-parking destination than the blue iron fence under the overpass at Hawthorne station.

Yes, yesterday, the wee rack featured all of four bipedal machines: TJ’s trusty steed, some faceless station bike, the abandoned Ghost Bike, and a shiny black motor scooter whose chain appeared heavier than the bike rack itself. (For what it’s worth, it’s not the first time a fancy Italian scooter has parked at the rack.) The tally over at the underpass? One lonely bike wearing an expression like a kid who got to the carnival seconds after it closed.

I’ve noticed that the bike-to-the-train contingent has shrunk a bit in recent months. Not drastically, since the original number was quiet small. Either a few guys got laid off, or started leaving the bike at home to use the new Hawthorne crosswalks (thanks, Mt Pleasant Today!), or finally succumbed to Car Culture and bought a Hummer.

So there’s plenty of room at the shiny (not so) new bike rack, where the parking is always free, the overpass is just steps away, and there’s plenty of room…at least for now.

Us folks who bike to the train tend to keep an eye on each other, so I must admit some concern over the well-being of a fellow cyclist. See, a bike who goes by the lofty title of “Power-Climber” and shares the rack with my trusty rusty Trek hasn’t moved for a couple weeks.

Around mid October, I noticed that Power-Climber’s owner seemed to work some long hours (come to think of it, I guess that befits a “Power-Climber”). The ride was there when I pulled up to the rack in the morning, and he was there when I got back from a day in the city–locked up, seat taken with the owner. (For what it’s worth, I would not be writing about a neglected bike locked up in a public place if it was a true target for thieves. Wal-Mart sells the Power-Climber new for about $85.)

Then I had a black-tie function that had me out pretty late one night, and when I returned to my home station, Power-Climber was still there. Power-Climber is there in the rain, he’s there in the cold.

Yesterday, I engaged in a bit of spycraft by putting a balled-up bit of tissue on the stem that holds the seat, to see if it was displaced at all over the next 24 hours. It wasn’t touched.

I wonder what happened to Power-Climber’s owner. I remember getting driven to the station by a neighbor once who told me about a guy who was killed on Sept. 11, and how his bike sat locked up at the station for months, no one thinking of the orphaned bike, or knowing quite what to do about it.

I hope Power-Climber’s owner is OK.

Jeez, what a morning. I was cutting it close this morning, and had to park the steel chariot (I’ve rebranded my bicycle) in the usual bike rack, not against the fence under the overpass, which provides a bit of protection in the rain.

Turns out I had more time than I thought. Way more.

Right around 8:16, the would-be 8:16 could be seen on the horizon beyond Gordo’s, but it never let up its pace and blasted right by the anxious commuters.

So we waited. I grabbed a seat on the three-person metal mesh bench. A portly 20-something was yammering on her cell. She had a yellow plastic grocery bag with a box of oatmeal inside. With nothing else to do, and without the energy to take out my Blackberry or newspaper from my bag, I listened in.

“I went to Donnie’s Facebook page, and it was, like, so weird–it was his four year anniversary! I know, weird, huh? And he had all this weird writing on his Wall, like, 40 days to go! I’m like, what happens in 40 days? He’s joining the Air Force! I’m like, what the hell, like, why the hell did you go to college, what a waste! I mean the Air Force is awwwsummm and everything, but still.

And then I was tawkin’ to Shane. Do you know what Shane is doing? The Peace Corps! I’m like, Donnie’s in the Air Force, Shane’s in the Peace Corps, like, what the f***’s wrong with these people!”

[EDITOR’S NOTE: Indeed, serving your country, and the impoverished around the world, is extremely silly–especially if you’re college-educated. Taking the train to some mindless job in the city, however, is noble.]

It was 8:25, and still, no sign of the 8:16. No word of the delay either from the MTA advisory service or Clever Commute.

The blabbing went on, loud enough for people within, oh, 15 feet to hear.

“What wuz I gonna say to you…It was good, what was it gonna be. I’ll come down on Thursday, drive in after work. Steve’s going to Montreal–in that case I’m outtie!!! Four-day weekend at Ashley’s house! Oooo-wooooh!”

Mercifully, the loudspeaker broke the cacaphony with an announcement at 8:29:

“Ladies and gentlemen, the next train arriving on Track 2 will be your express, stopping at White Plains, Harlem 125th Street and Grand Central.”

Undaunted, “Ashley” blabbed on: $80 shoes from Nine West that were going back (”awwwsummm, but, like, $80?”), the laptop she forgot to bring, the party at her house this weekend.

Finally, the 8:16 turned up at 8:33. The rain continued to fall, turning the soil company on the other side of the tracks to mud. Ashley kept up her end of the convo.

“It’s such a shitty morning,” she said. “I should’ve slept in.”

Word up, Ash.

This is a bit hard to rap one’s head around, but let us try. A bike-to-the-station type erroneously chained not only his bike, but the bike next to his, to the rack at a Jersey Transit station. So when the owner of the bike that had been mistakenly chained up got back to the station, he or she was unable to ride home.

Stuck at the station, that person had all the time in the world to pen the following note:

Love how “Dude” is the accepted form of greeting among Ultimate Frisbee players and those who bike to train stations.  

JerseyJim adds:

When I came to unlock my bike at the end of the day on Monday, the bike next to me had a note on the back fender, written on a napkin that said:

“DUDE, YOU CHAINED MY BIKE!! DO NOT TO THAT AGAIN!”

Now it was oddly crowded at the bike rack on Monday - there are usually only one or two bikes, but on this day, there were about five bikes, and it’s a small /U”U\ rack that doesn’t allow for much variety.

I guess that someone running late just leaned their bike near the rack, and slung their chain around without much technique, and lassoed the innocent bike along with theirs.

Usually the peloton of bike folks at my station [Editor’s Note: Nice use of “peleton”!] are a friendly bunch, but I was just glad that I wasn’t the one that made the faux-pas. Over in Summit station, they would probably wait around and jump you.