walkitout | Monday’s Activities Include: hair cut, Sunbasket, minor housekeeping

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I had a phone call this morning to make dining reservations. I got my hair cut. The Sunbasket arrived, as did A.’s new kick scooter, a cup holder to go on the kick scooter, and the pink envirocycle. That’s going to be weird. I had leftovers for lunch, thus clearing a bunch of things out of the fridge. I finished off yesterday’s avocado from the fish tacos.

Catching up on laundry. After that I should probably change some sheets, but it’s sort of nice to have a lazy day, watch some TRMS and NCIS:LA and do as little else as humanly possible. There’s a buyout offer for AthenaHealth. I don’t think private equity in general, or that particular operation will run the company better, so I mostly hope it does not go through. But it is hard to become too concerned — there are always more opportunities.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

ethelmay

There are cup holders on kick scooters now? That is possibly the most American thing I have ever heard.

From:

walkitout

If you’ve ever been a half mile away from home with an autistic kid who REALLY wants water right now, you’d probably put a cup holder on your kick scooter, too. Altho perhaps you would just wear a backpack or carry a messenger bag. At the time, I was having some health issues that made backpacks and messenger bags and some purses a little tricky. Those are fortunately all in my past now.

I also have a bicycle basket that can be clipped onto my kick scooter. I’ve taken it to and from the grocery store with my son, in years gone by, and may again do so with my daughter, if we get into it that much. But I’m trying to talk her into riding the tandem with me.

It’s funny you think of that as “American”. A lovely woman I know who is raising her children to be American (her term) says her husband attributes the innovation that occurs in the United States to our desire to be comfortable at all times, and because we value comfort. I think he specifically said that India is really hot, but air conditioning was invented in the United States, was one of the examples she gave me. I had never at any point thought of this as a uniquely American thing, but now, of course, I see this value everywhere.

Personally, I’m in favor of it.

ETA: It’s really an indication of things that a lot of what would only a few years ago have only been labeled as a bike bottle holder are now marketed (labeled / titled / keyworded) as for “strollers, walkers, wheelchairs” and then in the specifications, the range of bars to which the device can be attached, and the angle at which the bar can be and adjust the cup to still be upright is also specified. Where once, clever consumers adapted what the market provided, and the market mostly ignored that that was happening and continued to promote the products in question to the original purpose, NOW the clever consumer adaption is noticed by the seller, and the new market is aggressively targeted, and the product is pre-adapted to better meet their needs. I’m _really_ in favor of this.

Edited Date: 2018-05-09 06:21 pm (UTC)

From:

ethelmay

Didn't say it was bad, just, well, very American in flavor. Also I associate the specific term "cup holder" with lattes and sodas rather than water bottles, even though obviously people put water bottles in cup holders all the time (and the various categories of beverage holder are morphing anyway, as you point out).

My kids never used scooters as actual transportation, either, just for riding round and round at the playground or up and down in front of the house. So to me it sounded a little like getting a cup holder for a Big Wheel or a backyard swing or something. I knew it wasn't, you understand. It just sounded humorous.

From:

walkitout

While obviously the clarification is nice, I didn’t think you meant it in a bad way. I thought you meant it it an “American” way, and lately I’ve been thinking about what it means to be American because of the aforementioned conversation about what people who have simultaneously insider and outsider status think of what it means to be American. And that launched me on a whole bunch of questions about, how do people here vs. in the Netherlands use scooters. And the answer is complicated!

The Dutch part of my Dutch-Americanness shows up in my use of scooters to actually go places and run errands. But the American part of me is embedded in having a cup holder (vs. a more general purpose basket). It is very interesting to think about how culture influences modifications we make to otherwise utilitarian things.