Bike Blog

“Maybe this wasn’t a good idea,” I thought as I came out of the drive this morning into the face of a sinister western sky. “Maybe I should turn back,” I considered as it started to spit. By the time I hit 17-92, this was a bad-idea, full-fledged. The rain was pouring down, the water was spanking off the spokes, and I was shaking my glasses to clean them. But I was committed now, and kept the push up all the way to work. I did notice that all the fossil-burners came in an hour late, fuming about the horrible […]

Typical Friday for a commuter cyclist. My Indian coworkers have been screwing around (watching cricket finals on tiny tellies), and now we’ve got broken code and fumbled patches, all after quitting time. By the time I’m rolling off the dock, it’s 7pm. The sunlight is getting long so I’m running lights and I’ve got my yellow bee-jacket on. At least traffic will be light. But then again, it only takes one car. Going through Eatonville on the bike lane, nice tailwind. Observe a car coming in from the right, a sloppy cross-the-line stop. Figuring the flubbery woman driver is going […]

Got assaulted (as Oddball said about Tiger Tanks) by traffic the other day. This caused me to toss a hypothetical onto Facebook, a trick question with a tripwire rant-trap. Thus: Assume there is a new law where if you struck and injured a bicyclist with your car, your oldest child would have the same injuries surgically introduced to their body. So, would you drive any safer? The answer should be, no, I’m driving as carefully as I can, and I treat every cyclist with the same care as I would my own family. The instinctive answer – Yes – would […]

I’ve got a Road ID, which, as you can see from the link, is a handy corpse-tag that goes around your wrist, helpful to paramedics and morgue workers to figure out what to do with what’s left of you after a motorist boo-boos you. It velcros fast and contains my name and contact numbers (and that I don’t have any allergic reactions). Nice to have. Until it fell off – somewhere along Fridays’ ride in, it somehow came loose. Got to work, it wasn’t on my wrist. Backtracked to the loading dock, it wasn’t there. Got home and checked around […]

Came out of the driveway a week ago for the ride in – as I swung onto the work route, I looked back to see a flamingo (i.e. a road biker with colorful plumage)  coming up the street. Quick calculations – the only reason someone would come that way is if they were running my route. Sure enough, when I got to the bottom of the hill at Merritt and slowed for the stop (it’s a blind intersection), I could see the guy leaning into the turn behind me, not even looking. When I got to the spot where the […]

So what’s cycling like during an apocalypse? 4:30 at work. Just finishing up an email to a friend. Another couple minutes of boning about, a little small talk, then down to the locker to swap out clothing and away. Nice thought. But suddenly my screen, the overheads, my lava lamp, all the computers around me, all snapped off. In the silence I could hear the fans spin down. Power failure. We hung around for a bit, watching the major intersection on Maitland, the cars careening though it beneath blackened signals. Nobody stopped. Nobody yielded. I was certain I’d see a […]

Like Oddball and Kelly in Kelly’s Heroes, I don’ like officers. Corporate officers. They tend to frown at me, lie to me, and indirectly fire me. I trust them like I would a hungry lion pacing about. Or, as noted in Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Universe, as far as I could spit a dead rat. But my current one, my managing director (i.e. my boss’s boss) is slowly winning my respect. He seems…. decent. How strange that is to me. He’s been straight-up, even when the company hasn’t been. He’s asked for my opinions and forwarded them up. And, most […]

I knew it was going to rain today. Right there in the weather forecast – couldn’t miss it. Rode anyway. How to explain this? Can’t tell you. Of course, there was a late afternoon meeting that went on until 5:45pm. Rain’s hitting the window, it’s dark as pitch, and everyone is gassing their way through everything they can possibly say. Finally, done. I go out as the woman who sits near me is leaving. She’s shaking her head at my madness – of course, she also told me about her recent white-water rafting expedition and how they flipped (twice). You’d […]

Was riding home today, coming up on the busiest intersection (Lee and 17-92) when I heard this repeating noise, not quite a hiss, not quite a click, sorta like a something stuck to the tire or flapping against the supports. Put my head down as I took the sidewalk at the corner to wait for the light (call me a coward, but drivers come around that curve like Ben Hur in a chariot). Looked it over but couldn’t see anything wrong. Kicked off when I had the cross light, heard the noise again. Strange. Pulled over on the other side, […]