I thought the Canadians were making it tough for foreigners to get runs in on the speed skate track and bobsled track, but now they're just making it rough on themselves for future Olympics. On the heels of the news that climbing could be included in the Summer Olympics about 12 years from now, Ottawa is considering a rock climbing ban in the only park that has climbing accessible within an hour's drive. You know, it wouldn't be that big of a deal if we lost access to climbing in the States because we have lots of access to things like movie theaters, malls, and shooting ranges, but there's really nothing to do in Canada besides climb.

An unidentified New York man scaled the Brooklyn tower of the Manhattan Bridge. Only one photo of the free solo seems to have made it onto the internet, but I guess that's what happens when you don't choose a newspaper's building to climb. I'm not sure what he did when he got to the top--that blank face overhang looks brutal. Maybe he just climbed back down.

David Byrne is worrying about the government. The musician and writer designed 11 bike racks to be placed in neighborhoods around Manhattan. The DOT apparently has the authority to put these things in place, but if they're going to stay for more than a year and be considered 'permanent fixtures,' the city's Design Commission gets final say. That year expired last week, and Byrne wrote a testy blog post about the Commission's decision. Seems the city accepted the 9 racks that had already been placed, but as a political move, they denied installing the last two. The decision to require that the last two racks get tossed in the trash, Byrne says, is because the Design Commission was angry that they were passed over on the DOT's original decision to install the racks. Why is this important? Well, one of the bike racks that will never be installed was based on a brand of the cheap liquor Thunderbird. Such a shame.