Comic sans

Dan Piraro and wife Ashley on the P125 (photo courtesy Dan Piraro)

It’s hardly news that the fashionable and the famous are embracing scooters at the moment. But you may not know that someone famous is an old-skool scooterist, and has been for a long, long time.

If you’re one of the dwindling number of Americans who read a newspaper every day (I’m a real relic—I read both daily Seattle papers every day), you may be familiar with Bizarro, the single-panel feature drawn by Dan Piraro. If you aren’t, click here.

The feature has been syndicated since 1985 and appears in approximately 250 media markets. Additionally, Piraro writes a humor column for Veg News Magazine, is a regular contributor of cartoons to Parade Magazine (stuffed into Sunday papers), and is a founding board member of Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary.

He is also the original and only owner of the P125 (which has been kitted to 175cc) in the picture above. “For years, It was covered in crash bars, stadium mirrors, etc., and looked very ‘Quadrophenia’,” he writes. “It still has the crash bars but I’ve taken off the stadium mirrors so I can lane split here in NYC (Piraro and wife Ashley are longtime residents of the Big Apple). I’d love to put them back on, but I use it all the time in the city and need it to be more utilitarian.”

I’ve always wanted to ride in New York City. People think I’m crazy. Writes Dan, “NYC is the safest place I’ve ever ridden precisely because of the traffic and chaos that makes people think otherwise. Heavy traffic keeps speeds down and the chaos of pedestrians, bicycle messengers, roller bladers, scooters, mopeds, skateboarders, whathaveyou, keeps drivers on constant alert.” 

So where’s a dangerous place? “Soccer moms on the phone, driving an SUV full of noisy kids in Dallas were the scariest kinds of drivers I’ve ever faced, by far.” Piraro grew up in Oklahoma and spent time in Dallas before moving to NYC.

If you read the comic regularly, you’ll occasionally see the P125.