Jul 09 2006
cargo pants parade
A local celebration of specialness involved walking around in khaki cargo pants demonstrating evidence of fertility (children) herded on bicycles. At least, that’s what it looked like to me. Me = Furriner.
I was baffled by the city parade today. “What are we celebrating?” No-one seemed to know. “It’s Derby Days“, “What’s that?”. The sheer abundance of khaki cargo pants was overwhelming. Is there a conspiracy to reduce visual diversity? Even women appear to wear variations on the theme. In this city the dress trends appear to conspire to dampen evidence of diversity.
cargo pants parade
The Redmond Derby is the oldest cycling criterium in the U.S. Cyclists go round and round on a short course around a Redmond city block. The races were yesterday afternoon. We saw the top women’s and men’s races in the evening.
One of my colleagues asked a City of Redmond employee, “What *is* Derby Days?” He received this very perceptive reply: “Derby Days is a very important cultural event for the people who organize it.”
2007 update. The khaki is out in force again this year.
Hmmm, Fizzz’s suggestion sounds plausable. If so, maybe that is why Redmond is the cycling capital of the Northwest…