Finally, huge cry arose from the vacant industrial street as the swarm headed out into the night, warmed by adrenaline, stewed in locally brewed beer and relieved by nervous laughter.

As festival fate would have it we were headed for downtown, on the biggest tourist night in Portland's annual social calendar....It was the eve of the Rose Festival Parade, Portland's equivalent of a two week county fair all packed into two days. As we rode glistening across the blushing Burnside Bridge at midnight-thirty, polly anna families from Greshem were setting up their lawn chairs, sleeping bags and mosquito nets in the bike lane to secure a seat for the floral floats scheduled to come by some 11 hours later. More than they bargained for: "look kids, its the bicycle burlesque bouncing by!"

In the first few seconds of the ride I did my normal "going out for a ride at night" systems check. 1. Bike, Helmet and Lights? Check. 2. Enough warm clothes? Forget it. 3. Feeling confident and safe? Welllll.... It could have felt dangerous, riding a rickety bike across an interstate highway bridge after midnight, on a drinking night, for a naked guy in a sometimes homophobic big city. As we started to ride, the impatient cars started blaring their horns and high beams from behind. But I reassured myself: our strength was in numbers. Who would dare to harass a naked ass where there were so many buns to contend with. So I DECIDED to feel safe as we rose the up ramp to cross the bridge...completely safe and in control....until I got the funking FLAT TIRE!

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooo!

Lickety spit, an unknown, unabashed bike mechanic showed up and offered his assistance. He may have been clothes-free, but he carried a full tool belt!

As rest of the excited mob rode away, we hauled my bike onto the side walk cement and began the fastest flat tire surgery in naked bicycle history.

"Shit!" I said, as the beautiful people pedaling faded away. "Why does this have to happen to me!?!?"

"Don't worry" he said, looking nervously over his shoulder at hungry headlamps headed our way. "Maybe it's just a slow leak!" He whipped out his trusty extendable bicycle pump and rammed air into my tire. After what seemed like a full 3/4 of a second he shouted,

"It WORKED! Let's GO!"

We bounded back on our bikes and raced across the bridge guided by the distant shimmer of sweaty backs and clothing stuffed into bike packs. We caught up to the stragglers: the wizened older guy with the cowboy hat and his gray haired running dog; the blonde couple: he peddling with all his might, she, a competition ice skater, heroically straddled the seat in third position plea-aye the entire ride. I saw more interesting and deeply moving tattoos than I had ever seen before. And the fun was just beginning.

After crossing the bridge we we ballyhooed into the beast: the dark, festival littered streets of the down town bar district dungeon.

Now I am full grown adult, but have to admit I had 3 fears about this ride: 1. Would some drunken frat boys jump me and beat me up as I attempted my frail bicycle streak across the train tracks through the Business District?

2. Would some bevy of drunken beauties look at me, point at my cold shivering body and start laughing as I rode by?

3. Would my borrowed bike with the sandpaper seat cause lasting dermatologic damage?

Fortunately the greek gods looked down on me and protected me.

1. The frat boys were out numbered by the hundreds of salacious Sailors, who where all on shore leave from the three navy cruisers that had docked riverside for the festival. They were so grateful to see liberated landlubbers gliding by that they smiled and cheered with disbelief and gratitude. And they weren't just cheering at me! By the time we hit downtown for our first round, our naked members had swelled to 169 riders!

2. The bevy of intoxicated ladies were screaming and shouting cheers to their liberated sisters "YOU GO GIRL!" and other pro-feminist dialectics. I saw a few not-so-innocent bystanders swinging their own clothes and personal fetters around their heads in support. (a "fetter" is a double sling of cloth used by some local women to show support). Not all of the spectators started taking off their clothes, but neither did all of the bikers. It was simply a clothing optional event. Very optional.

3. As we rounded through the downtown drinking alleys, all the cars stopped, the drivers cheer and gawked. The traffic lights turned an embarrassed shade of red. Did that stop us? Noooooooo. Some how we all became color blind, as did the police, as we ran through every red light like naked ponies on a merry go-round. And round and round and round we went. Three tours through the down town, until you couldn't tell who to follow,which way was forward, all the streams of a joyous human river crossed paths and nipples. There were very few collisions. We converted the drunken dark of Sin City in into a festival of blinking bike-lighted laughter, giggling bike bells, cheering dogs and barking sailors.

As we raced back over the bridge, giddy, sweaty and accomplished we saw the affect our sacrifice of decorum had made. There on the side of the bridge a lone cyclist was struggling to tear off his clothes to join the tail end of our ride. As we arrived back in the street outside of FREE GEEK for the rest of the warm down party, people were ebullient andshrieking. "We should do this every weekend!" and "Dang-it! Let's go AGAIN!" The street lamps waited as the shy clothes slowly tugged on between hugs and laughter.

"OH my god, Did you see the cops just SIT there!"

"Has anyone seen my hello-kitty underwear?"

"Listen to this, I got offered a ride by a wealthy guy in a stretch Limo....I told him to GO GET A BIKE!"

In the final analysis, the prophylactic terry-cloth towel I attached to my bike seat proved to be the real saving grace of the night. As you can imagine, I took my bumps and hard knocks on the road, but I suffered no long term dermatologic damage.

- Dr. Wasabi