Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Dude, that's what the "do Not Disturb" sign is for

A man in Scotland has been arrested for allegedly having sex with his bicycle.

According to a story on the BBC News Service, a 51-year-old man was surprised in the act by housekeeping personnel at the hotel where he was staying, after he failed to answer repeated knocks at the door.

The witnesses reported that he was naked from the waist down, moving his hips suggestively over the bicycle.

He has been placed on probation and placed on the sex offender registry for three years.

Excuse me? How is it anyone's business how a guy loves his bike in the privacy of his home, however temporary that home may be?

Attempting to figure out where the sex offense comes in, I can only conclude it was because the bike has a men's frame and may be new enough to fall below the age of consent. What is the age of consent for a bicycle? It should be fairly young, a year or less, considering how so many riders frack their bikes up within a few weeks after buying them. If only we knew we had statutes under which to charge them. But no one seems to enforce outmoded sodomy laws anymore, so the fact that the frame had a high top tube instead of a dropped one should never have been a factor.

Perhaps the new two-piece cranks, that come out almost instantly with a couple of simple tools, present too much of a temptation to susceptible members of society. One more simple wrench for the outboard bearings and you've got even more room to rock and roll.

Voice of experience? I admit NOTHING. But I did sketch ideas for a humorous photo montage back in 1979 involving a Cinelli frame and satin sheets.

The bike has been placed in a safe house and now enjoys a temporary restraining order against its owner until this whole thing is sorted out.

(actually, a second look at the date stamp on the news item shows it's from November last year, 2007. The privacy issue immediately came up. See follow-up story.)

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