As May is National Bike Month, I thought this would be as good a time as any to tell you about my shiny red bike! Besides, I love my bike, and I love talking about it. Yes, it’s the beautiful bike you see above — a K2 T-Nine Breeze.

I bought my shiny red bike last November (prime cycling season, haha!) and haven’t been able to get enough of it since. I’m lucky enough to live near the beach, so I ride it along the oceanfront a lot, especially at sunrise when it’s quiet and peaceful out. And sometimes I ride to the farmers’ market and fill the basket with yummy fruits and veggies. Something about riding around on a bike with a basket full of good fresh produce makes me feel very Euro. I’ve even ridden my bike to special occasions dressed up and in high heels — fashion first!

I get around on my bike pretty easily now, but that wasn’t true in the beginning. I literally hadn’t ridden a bike in 25 years when I bought the Breeze. You do pick it back up pretty quickly — “just like riding a bike” — and fortunately my bike handles beautifully, but some nuances can get lost at first. My second time out, I was pedaling along, lost in thought, and then suddenly realized I was headed straight for a hedge. There wasn”t room to swerve, so I started pedaling backwards to brake, just like I used to when I was a little kid on my kid”s bike. The problem is that I have hand brakes now. Oops! Thankfully neither my bike nor I incurred serious injury — mainly just a bunch of twigs stuck in my hair and the wheel spokes. It did look pretty spectacular!

Of course, being a green gal, I’d considered the possibility that using my bike instead of a car or public transportation would reduce my carbon footprint. But one unforeseen consequence of riding my bike everywhere was an insatiable appetite. I could not stop eating!

And though I normally eat a healthy and lower-carbon diet high in vegetables, and usually eat meat just a couple of times a week, once I started riding my bike, I was craving meat and potatoes all the time. I’m pretty sure I had beef for several nights in a row at one point. I wondered if my beef-eating habits were negating all the carbon benefits from biking instead of driving. Now, I’ve heard from trustworthy sources that for most people, driving is a bigger source of carbon than eating beef, so normally that wouldn’t be the case. But I sure was eating a lot, so I don’t know…

After a couple of months, my metabolism adjusted, and I’m now back to my previous, healthier eating habits. But I was pretty worried for a while — I mean, who GAINS weight because she gives up her car for a bicycle? That said, there is no seasoning in the world that makes food taste as delicious as fresh air and lots of exercise. Everything tasted so good!

If you’re thinking about getting a bike, or riding your bike more, I highly recommend it! It’s so much fun and so relaxing, and it makes your food taste really good.