quote:

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Only inches from me and from the van's door, he sprinted forward between us, ducking beneath the van's broad side-view mirror to pass me. He was moving like a barracuda, navigating across the ocean floor through sharp rocks and crags without a thought. I tried to imitate his moves, clumsily, apprehensively, desperate to regain my lead. He fought back, ducking around sport cars in adjacent lanes.

We muscled each other neck and neck until he quietly dissapeared behind me, along with the blur of brownstones, storefronts, and construction sites. Even as I started to feel confident, my thighs were heating up like an overworked engine. I was sweating, panting, but I pushed forward, slashing the front tire right and left as I shifted my weight around for extra speed.

I glanced backward to check his position. He was tailing me, smiling. It was cool to be in the lead, but somehow he still had the upper hand. I pushed myself so hard that my breath was narrowed, and my eyes darted with panic through the world of blurring colors and shapes (the truck backing up, the white car rolling out blindly from the right, the red Camaro coming up behind us).

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"The Immortal Class: Bike Messengers & The Cult of Human Power" by Travis Hugh Culley, based on his experiences as a bike courier in Chicago. AMAZING READ.
 

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Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
 
SMOOTH MOVE, EX-LAX
 

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Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
 
Take out the bike refrences and it reads like a homoerotic short story.

Not my style.
 

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Posted by Lee (Member # 393) on :
 
Far as I can tell, the only allure of bike messaging is that the application form is shorter than that for jobs at McDonalds. Back in 1990 I had a choice of getting a summer job in London as a bike courier or working at McDonalds. Guess which I took.
 

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Posted by Malnurtured Snay (Member # 411) on :
 
I've never read a homoerotic short story, so I'll take your word for it. Does it read the same as a homoerotic long story?
 

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Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
 
...because you've read those?
 

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Posted by Malnurtured Snay (Member # 411) on :
 
No, because, logically, if the bit above is similar to a homoerotic short story (minus the bike references), and a homoerotic short story is similar to a homoerotic long story, then if I had read a homoerotic long story I would recognize the style as being similar to that used in a homoerotic short story and not have to inquire as to the style of a homoerotic long story.
 

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Posted by Cartmaniac (Member # 256) on :
 
I'm tempted to coin a certain colon-related catchphrase, but I have a quota to keep.
 

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Posted by Balaam Xumucane (Member # 419) on :
 
UP TEH BIKE !!
 

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Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
 
You get a prize. Of some sort. Go buy a cookie, or something.
 

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