On Guangdong

We did not stay in Shanghai very long. It was cold, horribly cold. A Siberian airmass blew south and with it temperatures that made Toronto in late January look positively tropical. As I have already noted the Chinese set a standard for energy efficiency that sadly extends as far as not heating buildings through the winter cold.

We went to to Lesley's father's primary place of business, a town in Guangdong called Humen. Students of Chinese history will know of Humen as the place where Qing officials burned the Opium during the First Opium War.

Guangdong to most westerners is usually known as Canton. It is a tropical province of about one hundred million and many of China's emigrants started the journey in Guangdong. When North Americans eat "Chinese Food" typically they are in fact eating a bastardization of Guangdongese (Cantonese) food. The most significant town in Guangdong was built on the "fragrant harbour" of Shang Guang or Hong Kong at the delta of the Perl River, the major river in Guangdong.

Guangdong is also home of a vast amount of China's industrial capacity, Lenovo (and before that IBM) makes the Thinkpad here, today we drove past the Liteon factory, skinheads take note, your Dr. Martens were made here too!

Anyway so much for the geography lesson, sort of. Obviously in Canton the locals speak Cantonese, but many have become fantastically rich, I feel sorry in a way for anyone in Humen who is only middle class, all their neighbours drive around in BMWs, Audis, Lexis (Lexii?) and they are still on mopeds!

Actually I rather doubt any of the locals did not make it HUGE. In the 80s and 90s Deng Xiaoping and later Jiang Zemin went to some length to promote private business here and the result was a capitalists wet dream as a vast labour force went to work with ludicrously lame labour and environmental laws coupled with one of the great shipping ports, Hong Kong right across the delta made financial success a certainty. Well the locals got money, so much that they had to outsource all the manual labour jobs, restaurant server, nurses, doctors, teachers, you name it - if getting rich was not a certainty with a particular job, it was outsourced to someone else from China's teaming masses. The result, everyone has to speak Putonghua (Mandarin) as almost no one in town is actually Cantonese.

Tonight we had dinner with Lesley's father's extended family, everyone was using Cantonese and everyone was yelling, a pretty typical method of communicating, when the language is Cantonese. One of Lesley's uncles lives, and works, in Shang Guang (Hong Kong), the rest work in Guangdong proper. There was a noticeable difference between the Cantonese spoken by Hong Kongers and the Cantonese of mainlanders. Cantonese is a language where the last syllable of a sentence is drawn out and when spoken by someone from Hong Kong that last syllable becomes vaguely lyrical.

For myself I speak about three words of Cantonese, it is a difficult language and probably has a greater proportion of native Cantonese speakers in Toronto than Humen.

One way I can always tell I am in China though, the forgeries. We went to a supermarket in Shenzhen (a city across the river from Hong Kong). While in Shenzhen we went to a supermarket that sold wines from around the World. For context a bottle of Masi went for about 500 RMB (about $100 cdn). We found some horribly over priced sparkling wines and champagnes, Moet et Chandon was over 700RMB. But the thing that got me, a bottle of Maple Fly ice wine from Canada, 1794, between the Jackson-Triggs and Inniskillin. Now last I consulted my grade 8 history text there was no such thing as Canada in 1794, and last time I drove on the QEW through wine country there was no Maple Fly. (The Jackson-Triggs and Innskilin both had Chinese labels over the English labels, but the Maple Fly only had the Chinese labels. The lack of labels is the only evidence someone who does not drive the QEW often would have to warn them off the Maple Fly... That and the fact that no self respecting Ontario Vinter would ever call his, or her, grapes something that conjures up images of insects.)

In other news I have had the chance to reflect more on economics. Late in 2008 the government of China announced it would spend something in the neighbourhood of $500 billion (US) on economic recovery, money that would take the form of tax cuts and export subsidies. Now to my way of thinking the last thing the World needs right now is even more cheap Chinese exports, the completely skewed imbalance in trade between the United States and China plays no small part in the financial crisis the World is in.

The fact is Chinese people don't spend money, they cannot afford to, in the West we have Social Security or Social Insurance, all nations in the G7 have some form of health care for the elderly, (if not everybody in the whole country). In "Communist" China, if you are sick and have no money, you are up a creak without a paddle. Well anyway the reason for the trade imbalance is in no small part because while we in the west are not afraid of consumer debt and having our last cheque bounce, the Chinese are, understandably petrified of not having enough to make it through retirement. The result, we rack up the credit card debts buying the cheap Chinese made goods, while the Chinese people take our money and sock it away, unwilling to spend it.

Well I had an idea of shocking simplicity. Beijing should spend that $500 billion or about 4 trillion RMB on something that would make Hu Jintao as popular in China as Tommy Douglas is in Canada - well alright, nobody besides me has heard of Douglas, but that does not mean this is not a good idea. Beijing should take that $500 billion and establish universal old age health care. By my rough estimates, based on the stupid low price of hospital visits currently (all unsubsidized by the government) that $500 billion should be enough to pay for old age health care for the next ten years.

How would government pay for health care thereafter? Well there are a few options, enforce tax laws uniformly, reduce defence spending, join international space flight efforts instead of going it alone, allow freedom of the press to shine a light in the entirely corrupt regional levels of government. It would probably help if it were obvious to the lower classes that the law and law-makers were not totally at the beck and call of the rich and well connected. Such changes, in attitude mostly, would make the necessary tax hikes far more palatable while having a a very strong stabilizing influence in society.

Sadly it seems to me Beijing would rather whip up nationalist fervor than make the social improvements that would actually improve the quality of life for so many people. That is a real shame.

Observations on the Chinese people

For a Westerner China is a culture shock no matter how many times you come. Drivers, no matter if it is an electric bike or a ten ton truck, are insane, red lights here seem to be a suggestion, nothing more. Personal privacy, in a country of nearly one and a half billion is quite impossible. Probably because of the immense population people are very pushy. So many experiences are so alien, being positive can be impossible, but here are some observations.

I would have to look through my old passport to be sure but I think this is my seventh trip to the middle kingdom and there are a few observations I can make right away. Before I do though, I should point out I am writing to illustrate the difference between my attitude as a Canadian and the thoughts and attitudes of the Chinese people as a group. If a reader finds my writing insulting or offensive they would be wise to remember the reason I have been to China so many times is not because some of my best friends are Chinese, rather my best friend (and wife!) is Chinese.

1. The number of cyclists and motorized bikes is down. Particularly cyclists. Traffic is moving more smoothly but I am not so sure that is a good thing, there are many more highways and not nearly as much construction compared with trips I made here back in 2003 or even 2006. At least the big dirty trucks that used to poison the air seem to be off the road, hopefully cleaner engines are prevailing across the country, but one must always remember, Shanghai is one of the most developed and wealthy cities in the country.


2. With all the progress some of my personal favorites are gone. The dirty hole in the wall restaurants are disappearing replaced with upscale ho-hummery that belongs in Yorkville. It seems that for Chinese people, if it is not glamorous, it is not worth building, or preserving. One hundred years from now I suspect the grandchildren will regret the bulk destruction of history their grandparents committed here.


3. The rules, no matter how silly or on what authority are always obeyed. Suppose you walk into a store in Toronto and want to buy something but the owner is not around, typically any assistant is empowered enough to sell, sometimes even lower the price for frequent 'preferred' customers, in China it is all to often the case that if the owner is not around, no business will take place. And woe be he who dares to push the envelope. Two thousand years ago if you had a good idea there was no need to innovate, if you were a peasant you stayed a peasant and that was just the way it was. Makes ambition a waste of desire. Well some things don't change. This fact makes dealing with sales clerks rather difficult, imagine buying a pizza but being told no you cannot exchange mushrooms for tomatoes (has happened) - why? Because that is the rule and this just the way it is going to work. And for the alert reader, no on this trip I have no intention of getting pizza but back in 2002 I was in China for about four months and frankly got sick of the low quality food I was eating at one point, a tour of Yunnan.


4. There has been significant progress in many areas despite all of my complaining. Smoking has clearly gone out of vogue in Shanghai. There was a time when eating out required a gas mask and a lung transplant, although there is still the occasional smoker there numbers are significantly reduced from the bad old days. Oddly most smokers now appear to be women, historically, in China, good girls did not smoke. Some things certainly changed.


5. The pushing and shoving a requirement, along with a modest free was needed for riding the subway, is no longer essential, well the modest fee is still required, but the subway sure is vast. I wish the TTC were this good, then again, there eighteen million people in Shanghai and something like one million cars between them, Toronto probably has almost twice as many cars for its two and a half million souls.


6. The energy efficiency of the Chinese puts us in the west to shame. Compact Florescent lights, electric bikes, or gas bikes instead of cars, smaller cars, or at least large cars with smaller engines. Use of solar hot water heating. Lights go off promptly as office are closed and people go to bed. Granted the lack of home heating just cannot work in a place where the pipes would burst in our subzero winters, but we are overly decadent with our use of energy. Maybe if our salaries were more modest vis-a-vie the price the price of gas and electricity we would be more conservative?

There are things about the Chinese that I find exceedingly frustrating, particularly crossing the street. For example, there are crossing guards all over the place, I remember very clearly when I was a child, a crossing guard on seeing me would make the cars stop so I could cross the street. Well it works differently in China. In China the crossing guards do not allow pedestrians to cross until they get a green light and then do nothing if a turning car (possibly a left turning car, i.e. entering the intersection against the light and the law) cuts off the pedestrian who is crossing legally. Why there are not dead pedestrians splattered across the major roads of every city and town in the country is frankly a mystery, a miracle to my way of thinking.

However I must remember I am a stranger to this place and it is not my place to judge the way people drive, or enforce their own laws.

On Thoughts From 30 Thousand Feet‏

I started writing this post before we got to the airport. Final boarding was called just as Senator Biden was about to become Vice President Biden. I continued to write from the air assuming that President Elect Obama has become President Obama but since I cannot actually confirm this for now I still write with a President Bush and Vice President Biden.

As I have written earlier, Lesley and I are going to China, there will be more on that in a moment but for now in honour of President Elect Obama I had some thoughts on the Bush Administration I just had to make known.

It is not great secret, I am a dyed to the wool pinko by American standards, but then by American standards there are very few "conservatives". Still what President Bush said in the farewell address has to go down as one of the most insulting and idiotic remarks ever to be spoken by an adult, let alone the President of the United States. When Bush said something to the effect of: "history will be kind to me, I was faced with tough decisions and I made them." Who on Earth did this man think he was talking to? The Mouseketiers? Does he believe that we are all so ignorant as to not think the President of the United States will have to face difficult decisions? Does he honestly think that being POTUS is nothing more than joining some frat house? Did he ever grow up?

Of course the president has momentous issues dozens, every single day. Do I send fine young people off to die in some far away land? Do I incur the wrath of my base by raising their taxes? Do I risk my chances of re-election by offering the body politic a more elevated form of debate that forces the audience to engage "the better angles of their nature" and not just their id? In every single example I cited the President was faced with just that situation and he made the wrong call, in those examples and almost every other time.

Making a decision is easy even if it is tough, making the right decision - that is a different animal. It was this profound inability to do the right thing even when he knew what the right thing to do was: "most of my [tax] cuts go to those at the top" he once (possibly many times) said during the 2000 primary then general campaign, he was supposed to say "most of my cuts go to those at the bottom". Bottom, top, easy to mistake after months of speaking but that is just one of dozens of Freudian slips well documented by Mark Crispen Miller in The Bush Dyslexicon. The man knew it was wrong but went ahead with it anyway because he George anointed by his Poppy's Supreme Court picks.

Perhaps that explains things? Perhaps Bush never saw himself as legitimate either and so every call, every decision was hard and he never should have taken it - and he knew it. I watched "An Inconvenient Truth" again, on the flight over, I kept thinking if the Supremes had let the vote counting continue so that Gore could win Florida as he almost certainly would have, would we be in the same mess we are in now? I strongly doubt it.

Speaking of Inconvenient Truths, I know we are a pretty inventive bunch and we can usually find a way out of ugly problems but as I fly at almost 600 miles an hour towards Shanghai (covering about 11500 miles in 16 hours) I wonder, what if we cannot find a replacement before the oil runs out? Oil is a non-renewable, it will run out, current prices not-withstanding. The period between my Grandparents and my Grandchildren might very represent the extent of cheap energy. if that is the case, no more jetting around, no more driving, no more fancy foods, mangos become something my great grandchildren would only know in songs, I don't think it is a coincidence that all of our modern inventiveness is thanks to cheap energy, it takes a lot of energy to build a silicon chip and the first stage of a Saturn 5 moon bound missile is fueled by kerosene. What if it all stops? It is going to really suck when the music stops.

Anyway we are making our final decent towards Shanghai Pudong Airport, we are near Wuxi home of the World's largest Buddha. An aside before I shutdown, my Parents, Lesley and I once went to Wuxi. On the way to Wuxi Lesley told my parents that Wuxi is a small town, only a few million people. When it comes to demographics China is a whole different scale than back home.

On Ideas

I have been following my post in the Globe and Mail policy Wiki closely, actually I have been following the poll, originally two out of the three people who voted "supported" my idea, now two out of seven support it.

Naturally I am a little upset that my idea is so unpopular, but it occurs to me, if it is a bad idea I wish someone could (or would) explain to me the defect in the idea or the thought process that lead to the idea. I really would like to know what is wrong with the notion I have, in the absence of this information I still believe that my thoughts were worthy of greater consideration. On reflection, I wonder if the ney votes were from other people who posted policy proposals in an effort to 'slag' my proposal to make theirs look good. I certainly hope not, I have made a very conscious effort to avoid posting or voting on anything other than my own propositions and I would like to hope that other people who have contributed to this policy wiki are as decent in their intentions as I am.

Still it leaves unanswered the question, what is wrong with my idea of permitting RRSP withdrawals during periods of economic decline? If anyone has any constructive criticism I would welcome it.

Lately I've done a great deal of research on Specialized Transitions and bike racing, not for any constructive purpose, mostly just to keep occupied while the computer is busy with other tasks. I have watched a few videos of the Paris-Roubaix race from past years on YouTube.com. It boggles my mind, how is it a grown man can sit on a saddle for 260km of cobble stone path? Alright granted it is actually not 260km of cobble stone, but I love this story from Wikipedia:

The American television channel CBS covered Paris-Roubaix, said the writer James Startt, and was delighted to find a prominent rider who could speak English. Theo de Rooy, a Dutchman, had been in a promising position but had then crashed, losing his chance of winning. Startt wrote:

No sooner was de Rooy off his bike than the CBS crew jumped on him. His haggard face was covered with mud and blood when they asked for his race impressions. He was so exhausted he could barely speak, but he muttered something about how hard and heart-breaking Paris-Roubaix could be. So dejected did he sound and so naive was the crew (who didn't know this was the umpteenth time the Dutchman had ridden the race), that they asked if he would ever ride Paris-Roubaix again. De Rooy's face instantly transformed. 'Ride it again?' he asked incredulously. 'Of course I will. This is the most beautiful race in the world!

Both Amy and Erin are Specialized Roubaix bikes, it is not a coincidence that the Paris-Roubaix terminates in the town that my bike model is named after, the Roubaix is designed for rough roads, but then I have a soft rear end!


I also did some reading on the transition, one young lady was so inspired by her new ride that she took what I can only call a skin shot, of her, her ride and a rather inadequate, jersey - not actually worn, just covering her feminine aspects, and gave it to a friend who posted it to a Tri news group. Interested male parties can easily find this picture with a Google search, in my case "Specialized Transition" that was quite the transition from biking I must admit. Alright bad pun, but come-on, soft porn and I'm only making puns, it could be worse!

I have been thinking about racing lately. I have been warned that there is politics in bike racing, there is politics in everything, but as we all know, only too well, where the stakes are small enough the politics get ugly. Nonetheless, I'd like to race, not to win, although that would be cool, just to see how I would compare with other people.

Actually a friend of mine pointed out, I ride for the love of riding, I do not need to race to enjoy mounting the saddle, just give me a beautiful smooth piece of road (I like Nineth line coming south from Musselman's Lake and Tenth Line or Reesor Road from Stouffville South). Actually one of my favorite trips is tearing down Ninth line around Musselman's Lake, it is short, but the exhilaration of the spin around the lake is worth it.


On the Sunday before Thanksgiving I went for a BCC Sunday ride up to Rattlesnake, we took Appleby from Britannia, the trees, lined the road to thirty or forty feet, made a flaming canopy of crimson, orange and gold.

I guess the truth is I love riding, I love the freedom and the scenery. The one time the BCC did the "Simcoe Scramble" where we rode up from Elgin Mills to Lake Simcoe, the fields of corn or beats or whatever the farmers were growing, the fresh air, the serenity of it all. I suppose an ultra marathon runner can experience the same thing, or someone out on a very long walk, but a bike means freedom. Freedom in a way a person just cannot experience from a car, or any other way that I can think of.

Maybe the problem with the World is not enough people have their own road bike?

On Engineering

My employer has engaged the services of an outside Value Added Reseller (VAR). They have sent us a couple big fancy IBM servers and a guy to help us install it. The guy they sent was telling me he used to work for the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, well everyone who lived there worked for the government, it was the only job in town. His job was to configure and maintain the computer networks that monitored radiation, he worked at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in what is now the Ukraine. The consultant started Sept 1986 and worked there for a few years. In case anyone does not remember, according to the Wikipedia article I linked to above, the explosion at reactor number 4 took place in the early hours of April 26, 1986 - I remember, I was in grade 2 at the time.

Of all of the failures of engineering humanity has endured over the years, Chernobyl has to be one of the worst. It did not just kill people who were fighting the fire, or in the explosion, it decimated the land for miles. Chernobyl is probably as much to blame for the fall of the Soviet Union as the Titanic is to blame for the collapse of the European social order that existed prior to World War I. Both events destroyed the people's faith in an existing order. Naturally as I write these words I am inclined to think will historians look back at the failure of Lehman Brothers as the destroyer in faith of our complex financial system?

Well on further reflection, I never really had much faith in our complex financial system, it only works as long as a very precarious set of checks and balances are maintained, if China stops buying US treasury bills, if Americans stop spending, if commodities become too expensive the whole thing comes crashing down... ooops!

Anyway all this talk of financial ruin, I should point out that since I made my little contribution to the policy wiki on the Globe and Mail, it is policy briefing number 8 (RRSP Withdrawal), I have seen three people vote on it, no not me, I suggest it, other people vote on it. Of the three votes, two were in favour. I still think it is a good idea, sure over the short term people are given an incentive to piss away retirement savings, but they actually put their money in a very wise place, their high interest loans. I mean look at this really silly example using the numbers I used the other day when I argued that TFSA were idiotic.

Our hypothetical person earns $100,000 per year, pays 30% flat tax and contributes $5000 a year to their RRSP. Well first off, most financial advisers seem to suggest that we should set 10% of our income aside for when we are old farts, but who cares! So lets allow our hero an RRSP that we will say has a net return of 2.5% on his investments (he was smart and bought GICs in the run up to the disaster that is the current economy). Oh and lets assume our person has $5000 in personal debts that cost him say 5% interest per year.

Our guy pays back the $5,000 he "borrowed" from his RRSP within one year, and thus while his RRSP looses 2.5% of $5000 (or $125), he saves 5% on the debts he has now paid off, or $250, thus after one year, he can take his $250 savings and shove it into his RRSP.

So what I want explained to me is why is this a bad idea? Okay I will grant, my idea assumes that you cannot generate as much wealth through interest as you loose through interest, in other words, interest on debts will exceed interest or growth on savings. Of course that is almost always the case for the little people who don't have millions of dollars and uber wise investment gurus to guide them. I believe that us normal people are wisest when we pay down our debts and not run up new tabs in crazy investment schemes. The fact is, play long enough and the dealer (bank) always wins.

In other news, it is terribly cold out, still, sigh. I want to ride to a bike repair store, I have promised to fix their computer, in return they are going to give me a new front wheel for the Coppi, but it is too bloody cold. Lesley has told me she can drive me to the store, before she does her pre-trip to China shopping, I fear I will have to take her up on that offer. I hate winter, is there an employer in Phoenix or maybe San Fran... no too foggy, maybe uhm Houston, who is willing to give me lots of time off to ride and a really good salary? Real estate prices where they are if I were willing to live in Miami with our savings, we could buy a property and have no mortgage, except Florida? Ewww, they still have not figured out who won the election of 2000 down there and its been more than eight years!

On Economic Policy Redux

The Globe and Mail, along with The Dominion Institute and the Aurea Foundation put together a policy wiki where anyone can propose ways for the various governments of Canada to get the economy ticking again. Anyway as regular readers may recall, with some degree of boredom, I had my own idea. I am not sure if it is any good, nobody told me yea or ney. So I have posted my idea on what I hope is a more widely read forum.

I really think it is a good idea, I just wish I could get some feedback.

Oh and in other news, today was blood donation number 65! Another 35 and I get a certificate from the governor general. I think this summer I will stop donating until the fall, at the very least schedule donations around races.

On TFSAs and artic air

First I should apologize, the reason I have not written anything for the past couple days is I have been insanely busy with work. Normally I make these posts during my lunch break, but lately my lunch has been that thoroughly healthy meal of, stuff it down while you work. Well today I got fed up, when my manager came to my desk, instead of doing what was asked I responded, "when I am done eating". Well that was probably a good thing, even for my employer, they say people are more productive if they take a break ever so often and lord knows I need to slow down for a few minutes. (Truth is I find writing these posts to be therapeutic in a way.)

Anyway Lesley got a letter from her bank yesterday promoting a Tax Free Savings Account. Now I know some of my readers are still in a place where a savings account is a sort of mythical thing... alright truth is, we are all in that place where saving money makes wonderful sense, once we get out from under the mountain of debt, but in the meantime, since all these banks are busy promoting the concept I'd like to take a shotgun to it and blow it all away, let me explain.

A TFSA, or Tax Free Savings Account was born of one of the more poorly thought out campaign promises of the 2006 Federal election. The promise was, "interest on savings should be tax exempt". Now to be honest, even someone as wonkish as me when it comes to public policy had never really given much thought to the few bucks in interest I make every year, since it was hardly more than a rounding error next to the huge amount of interest I pay on my mortgage. But it was a campaign promise and as such once elected the Conservatives made it a fact, sort of. Starting January 1, 2009 Canadians are free to deposit as much as $5000 a year into a special savings account, the TFSA. In theory one is free to withdraw money from the account at any time in any amount, interest earned on money in the account is tax exempt.

Okay sounds good, so what's the catch? Well first, if you have money to put into a savings account, can I be your friend? If I have extra cash I think I'll pay off the line of credit, then the mortgage. Since the interest on a TFSA is maybe 2~2.5%, and the total tax paid on that interest, is now zero, it means that if I go to the trouble of opening a TFSA I will save myself the awe inspiring... nothing, I loose money! See my mortgage right now today, is 2.85% and my line of credit is probably in the neighbourhood of 5% a year, so there is no conceivable reason why I should open a TFSA, at best I will loose 2.85-2.5=0.35%/year in interest that could have gone to reducing my mortgage!

If you have money lying around the house, and you have debts the most sensible thing to do is pay down the debts! Any idiot knows that, (of course sometimes we have money that we plan to spend, but then it is not lying around the house, it is waiting to be spent, that is different.) So going back to what I was saying, if you have spare cash burning a hole in your pocket, by all means, write me a line, the new charity of "Help Michael pay down his mortgage" is now accepting donations, sorry but this is not yet a federally registered charity.

Alright, someone out there is saying, but we should still try to set some money aside shouldn't we? Well yes absolutely, but not in a TFSA, look if I get paid, say, lets make the math easy, $100,000/year. Now lets suppose I set $5000 aside. Well if I put that $5,000 in a TFSA I pay income tax on $100,000, which for arguments sakes we will say is 30% or $30,000, so I have $5000 collecting interest at maybe 2.5% tax free and I have $65,000 money after $30K in tax and $5K in TFSA savings. If, on the other hand, I make an RRSP contribution of $5,000, then I pay tax on only $95,000, or about $28,500. (I assume we are using a flat 30% income tax because I am too lazy to do the math, but it would end up being somewhere close to that $28.5K anyway even if I did factor in all the rules.) So now I have money in an RRSP which I can invest in stocks, bonds, money market, whatever, not pay tax on any gains until I withdraw from the RRSP and best of all, of the $100K I started with, I put $5K in the RRSP and gave Mr. Harper another $28.5K which means I have $67,500 to spend today.

So the question anyone who has been following my math... is anyone following my math might be the better question. But the question you should have is, 'what good is a TFSA?' And the answer is pretty obvious, not much. But it gets better, my employer recently offered me a TFSA, one of the great features of the employer TFSA was that for every withdrawal I would only pay a $25 service charge. So in other words if I get 2.5% interest and leave $1,000 in a TFSA for a year, at the end of the year I'd be just as well off if I stuck the money under my bed at home! Literally!

Speaking of really bad things, a huge Arctic air mass has descended on the Eastern half of the country. Today with the wind it felt like -30 degrees outside. Question at what point do we stop measuring in Celsius and work in Kelvins? See minus thirty sounds so much warmer than 243 Kelvins. Tomorrow will be a balmy 244Kelvins with the wind, but Friday, could be a real killer, it's 252K without the wind, if the wind is like today it will be 242K. I miss warmer air, really I miss going for a bike ride and racing the cars on Queen Street, and winning. Its hard to win when you worry about crashing on a snowy section of road.

On Riding in the snow and other things

Dan, from the BCC posted a link to the YouTube video which is helpful if someone wanted to know why a cyclist should ride in a pack.



Another thing I found is that the Subprime Primer I included here on Friday is too small to read, I tried to enlarge it but then half the images got truncated by Blogger. So here is a link to the Picasa images, you will have to click the slide button.

Anyway a random thought, if by Wednesday, everyone knows it is going to snow on Saturday, then on Saturday it does snow, say 10cm, should Queen Street be plowed by Monday? Answer, no, because Queen Street runs through Toronto and I guess the property tax I pay does not justify plowing one of the most heavily utilized streets for alternative transportation in the city. (Here Alternative transportation includes public transit, the Queen Street car carries more people than the Go Train which itself carries six times as many people as the Don Valley Park Way, and bikes, Queen is year round loaded with cyclists, like me!)

I really do not like winter. I keep day-dreaming about going for a nice long ride with nothing but shorts and a jersey. Then I come back to Earth and remember just how cold I am about to become with my upteen million layers of clothes on. Being hot is alright with me, being cold sucks. (I guess my day-dreams are not helped by the fact that there is a picture of a Transition Frame by my laptop.)

Lesley found out that a bike store in Shanghai is hiring, I replied, how good is the salary. Actually if I wanted a job in a bike shop I could just apply to Dornellas, they're hiring too, except lets be real here. I am a computer guy, not a bike mechanic, I hardly know which of a chain is up.

On Subprime Loans

A friend of mine gave this to me a while ago, I finally figured out how to get it published online. This has been circulating for some time, but it may help make the current economic debacle a little easier to understand, if not, sad to say, funnier.

On The Road Again

I got my Coppi back. I got my road bike back! I am clipped in and... well riding slow as molasses. Problem is that the cleats are starting to wear down so clipping in is getting tricky and the roads are slick.

I walked the Coppi across Queen Street this morning (lots of snow at the intersection) and sort of stopped at a perpendicular to the flow of traffic in the right lane while I mounted up. No problem, no cars at all in the left lane and no cars for quite a ways back in the right. Just as I finish mounting up, some jerk in a black CRV just mashes down the horn as they drive by, if I could have clipped in faster, or not been so worried about crashing because of the slick roads, I probably would have caught up and asked what their problem was. Why do car drivers have to be such assholes? I don't recall when I did my drivers test any sort of asshole test evaluation, I mean, I remember doing three point turns and left turns and right turns and lane changes and angle parking, but for the life of me I don't recall being asked to honk angrily at every single cyclist. Is this a new requirement?

Anyway in the Huffington Post Arianna was angry at journalists for spending more time on the silly unimportant stuff, the Blago/Burris and Kennedy/Paterson/Cuomo soap operas, than on the things that matter, the $700 billion bailout, the disaster in the Middle East (Israel or Iraq, take your pick). For what it is worth John Stewart went on a bit of tirade against the media for spending so much time covering the Obama children's first day at a new school.

All this talk got me thinking, and this is going to piss off some journalists out there, and they deserve it. Journalists are stupid, no not all of them, but the vast majority of them. Very few journalists followed in the footsteps of Ed Murrow, most follow in the lines of George 'Dubby' Bush, if it is too complicated for me I just leave it alone and hope it goes away school of thought.

Consider some examples:

1. War: the reporter says, great, something to cover, but the wise person asks, why? The reporter responds, too complicated, just support our troops, support our President! Be a good citizen.
2. Congress enacts a $700 Billion dollar bailout: the reporter says great, it will save our economy, the wise person asks, will it? who will ensure the money is wisely spent? The reporter responds, too complicated, just support our Treasury and Federal Reserve Board, support our President! Be a good citizen.
3. The Patriot Act: the reporter says great, it will protect us from "the evil doers". The wise person asks, will it? Is giving up our liberates for some security going to secure us truly? The reporter responds, too complicated, just support our singing Attorney General, support our President! Be a good citizen.

So is it just me, or are most reporters really stupid people? My apologies to any J-school grads reading this but... no never mind, no apologies at all, the disaster the world is in is partly your fault!

On Luck

A few days ago co-worker was asking me about something I dropped down the elevator shaft in July or August, not ten minutes later I got it back. Then he asked me about my bike, the one that has a crack in the frame, the Coppi, well there is a little story here.

Every day that it snows I get to work and my feet are wet, and cold, there is not much I can do about that, even if I put a fender on the front wheel I will still get soaked from passing cars, but at least I can dry my shoes under some powerful fans in the office. But when I get home my shoes are wet again and they don't dry before I have to use them the next morning. Well starting tomorrow that will change, tomorrow, Friday I will ride to work with my bike shoes, I can use my bike shoes because I will be using clip pedals, I will be using clip pedals that are attached to my Coppi, which is finally repaired a month after I brought it in, and only about three and a half weeks longer than initially expected. Let me restate all that, I am getting my Coppi back! I am getting one of my road bikes back!! Yippeee!!!

As for my co-worker, I suggested he ask me when I am going to win the lottery, now I just need to buy a ticket.

When I told this to Lesley she got peeved, it is better that I save my money for something useful. Well I guess she is right, still it's nice to dream, heck if I won just enough to pay off the mortgage I'd be rich! Maybe what I will do is take the twoonie I was going to piss away on a 6/49 ticket and put it in a jar, do that once a week and I'll have... enough money for a steak dinner at the end of the year? Ah screw it, maybe I should just buy a lottery ticket.

I remember when I was young $2.00 was a lot of money, but then back in those days after you bought something you risked being eaten by a dinosaur so you had to run really fast! Alright I am not that old, but my point was actually that when you are young a modest amount of money goes a lot further than it does as you grow older. I remember I used to be pleased as punch to spend $0.50 on candy at the local candy shop. I can still get excited when I spend money but it takes a lot more than fifty cents these days.

Lately I've been applying to a bunch of lousy part time jobs on Craig's List. I am disgusted at how low my standards are, once upon a time I wouldn't dream of applying to these jobs, now it is a case of bring it on! Here is a sad though, if my old aquatic certifications were still current I'd even be willing to lifeguard again, I really must be desperate.

On Riding in the Snow

Its is precipitating, it was snow this morning and probably rain by now. The roads are soaking, so are my socks and shoes. Obviously I biked to work. I have to admit, when I ride its like all the stress goes away for a little while and I can just zone out of everything. Until an annoying driver strikes.

Regular readers of my blog may recall that on June 12 I reported that I had told the local police at 55 Division about an altercation I had with a VW driver on Queen between Parliament and Broadview.

This time I did not even bother to tell the driver he was an idiot, I made sure to get a good look at his face so that I will recognize him in court, but my focus was get the licence plate, make and model of the car. Now here is the full story:

Yesterday, on Queen Street as I passed over the Don Valley Parkway (just East of River Street) a driver in a black Toyota Rav-4 (recent model, Toyota redesigned the Rav-4 in the 2006 model year and this was an '06 or later model) licence 'NUF STUF' (not smart to drive badly when you have vanity plates) crowded me in my own lane.

Later when I tried to catch up with the driver he ran a pedestrian cross-walk where a pedestrian was about to start crossing. (Thus violating no less than two different sections of the Ontario Highway Traffic Act, improper lane change, and illegal entry into a pedestrian cross over, I would also say reckless endangerment of human life, but that is a rant for another day.)

Since it is Queen Street and I am on the bike, naturally I went faster than the car and caught up with him at every single traffic light from Broadview until he turned off Queen just East of Carlaw. So if this matter does go to court, I'd like to think I have a pretty good idea what this guy looks like. And go to court it will, I hope, I reported it to the same people at 55 Division that I reported the VW driver to.

Drivers on Queen Street, beware of cyclists. One of them just might report your inability to operate a two ton killing machine to the authorities and then your two ton killing machine insurance will go up.

On Tech Humor

Alright, this is totally impossible, but funny just the same.

Breaking News: All Online Data Lost After Internet Crash

I have to ask a rhetorical question here, as a result of my thoughts of riding to Rochester, am I entirely sane? 350km on day one and then another 350km on day two. One things for damned sure my legs are gonna be awful sore by the end of day two, come to think of it, so will my rear end.

On Riding to Rochester

I have been doing some research on the feasibility of riding to Rochester. It turns out that both Southern Ontario and Western New York state have an extensive network of bike trails, the problem comes when one tries to cross the border. Saddly the network breaks down at the border crossing. Aledgedly it is possible to cross at all three Niagara Bridges (Queenston/Lewiston, Rainbow and Peace) but the details are rather sketchy. So far I have found the following resources:

1. This is the website of the Greater Buffalo-Niagara Regional Transporation Council and if you click on the links to maps, you get a number of maps, including bike maps for Western NY state.
2. Since I am posting links on this, here is the Lake Shore bike trail, not that I follow it all that closely, but if anyone else wants to use my page as a starting reference, here it is.
3. Someone wrote a book about riding around Lake Ontario, they noted the following,

It always happens! A day or two after I receive the latest edition or revision of a book from the printer something important along the route changes! This time the change involves crossing the Niagara River and a slightly improved route east of Toronto.

1. Niagara River Bridges: As of late May, 2008, a bicyclist can use 3 bridges to cross the Niagara River. The Peace Bridge (Fort Erie, Ontario-Buffalo, New York); the Rainbow Bridge (Niagara Falls, NY-Niagara Falls, ON); and the Queenston-Lewiston Bridge (Queenston, ON-Lewiston, NY). Use the roadway rather than the walkway on the Rainbow Bridge, since the gate leading to the walkway tends to be difficult to negociate with a pannier loaded bicycle. The Peace Bridge may have very heavy motor vehicle traffic, especially during weekday rush hours, thus the walkway might be preferrable for crossing this bridge. The Queenston-Lewiston Bridge does not
have a walkway and the entrance to the roadway on the USA side might be a bit
obscured. I will try to visit cross three bridges before
winter.

2. Lewiston-Queenston Bridge: W. Z. & son as well as J. C. suggest the following techniques when using the Lewiston-Queenston Bridge.

a. Crossing this bridge is tricky while it is under construction. (there is no side walk to use and the Canadian to US entrance is in an unusual location.)

b. Crossing US to Canada, Turn right off Military Rd onto Upper mountain rd and take first exit ramp, this takes one to the bridge. After crossing and going thru customs go to the right most toll both and pay toll, the toll attendant can direct you to the recreational trail. Basicly you back up from the toll booth and go over the curb
to the toll offices and walk around the offices into the parking lot out to the Niagara Parkway and recreational trail. (I have done this twice this year and the toll both operators were very helpful). [N. B.: Earlier editions of 'Round Lake Ontario... suggested using this technique.]

c. Crossing from Canada to the US is pretty tricky. You start on the North side of the bridge on the parkway.(this is where you exited from the parking lot coming the other direction. You will see a sign on the fence stating that bicyclists to the US must check in with the toll office. Enter the parking lot and work your way around to the back of the offices and walk the bike around to the main toll office and report to a attendant. There are several signs directing bicyclists. When I did this, they directed me to carefully cross behind the toll boths and through a opening in the curb and wait for a clearing in the traffic heading to the US and then cross this traffic and stay in the right most auto lane. Go through the customs booths (right most open auto booth). Take the first exit ramp (leads to Upper Mountain Road) then take the first exit ramp ( Rt 104 East). When I did this 3 weeks ago the customs officer said this was the first time that he had seen this done. (tho' I don't know if he was talking about my Greenspeed Trike or a bicyclist.)

On Riding far and The Middle Kingdom

It is exceedingly difficult to maintain a blog about any summer activity in the dead of winter. There really is not much to report on. I try to use the trainer, but it is horribly boring, and its not like the scenery is exciting. Last year, excuse me, two years ago, it was late 2007, when I was at Scooters, I recall making entries of the form, "did alright then thought I was gonna crash so started doing idiotic circles in the centre of the track" which basically summed up every single practice, now I know had I kept working on skating eventually my posts would be of the form "did alright". But see this is why I love cycling, the whole world is open to me.

Let me explain.

For the longest time I had the goal of skating to Hamilton via the Lakeshore trail, in 2006 I managed to get as far as Mississauga (Cumberland Dr. at Hiawatha Pkwy, just South East of the foot of Hurontario St.) In 2007 I made it just the tinest bit further, to the foot of Ben Machree Dr. (South West of the Foot of Mississagua Dr.). In both 2006 and 2007 I skated from Bathurst and Queens Quay which means in both cases I ended up skating in the neighbourhood of 50~55km.

Well last year, in 2008 I rode, my first serious attempt at reaching the next town, i.e. had enough water and it was not raining, I made it to Oakville (foot of Winston Churchill Blvd.) by comparison I still remember my first serious attempt at Mississauga, I made it as far as 23rd Street in Etobicoke. My second goal was Burlington, despite having my first inner tube failure on the way through Oakville I made it deep into Burlington (that was the first time I rode more than 100km in a single ride, I remember I was so proud of myself when that GPS when from 99.99 to 100.0). My next goal was Hamilton and as I documented earlier I did not want to burn myself out the day before climbing Rattle Snake so it took two whole efforts, the first got me to something like 2km from Hamilton, the second effort, on Canada day I made it there and back.

Except the Lakeshore trail is too easy, it is flat, and it is through some heavily built up areas. I revised my goal to be from Lake Ontario to Lake Simcoe and back, as I documented earlier that goal was also achieved, but it was a much better and harder challenge.

My point is, it seems to me that no matter what my goal on a bike it seems to be a do-able journey. There is just no way (short of closing Lakeshore Blvd. and Southdown to cars) that a person can skate to Hamilton from Toronto, not on the route I biked, the roads are too narrow and too busy. Okay there is a sidewalk but in Oakville much the sidewalk is a muddy trail.

Anyway here are some insane goals I have for this year, some are already documented on the Riding Too Far blog.

1. Tour Lake Simcoe (due to heavy traffic and poor route options on the East side this might be, go North and South on the west side of Lake Simcoe, so still a 300km distance, but not a tour.)
2. Ride to Niagara-on-the-Lake and back in a day. (Its the damned lakeshore trail again, BORRRRING!! But NotL is a pretty little town.)
3. Ride to Rochester NY, crash at my friends place for the night, ride home the next day. (Lots of issues related to not using 400 series and Interstate highways, border crossings, and so on. But can you imagine when they ask me at the border, 'anything to declare?', uhm yeah, I brought back a 40" LCD TV and a bottle of Crown Royal, it's all in the saddle bag with my inner tubes!)

Any thoughts on these feel free to post comments, and yes I have thought of riding across Canada, but I don't have enough vacation days, much as I'd love to do nothing but bike, I need to pay for food and well more important, new bikes!

Anyway I would just like to make public the fact that Lesley and I are going to China, I have the airline tickets and the Chinese Consulate in Toronto has my Visa application and passport. I will have more to say on this latter, but for now the route is: Go to Shanghai and return via Hong Kong about two weeks later.

On 2009!! (And cross training)

Happy New Year everyone! Last year Lesley and I went to Boston for a day, this year we stayed home and to be honest, home is a better place.

Nobody commented on my last reader question which is a little disappointing. In one of the books I am currently reading (The Atomic Bazaar: The Rise of the Nuclear Poor by William Langewiesche) Langewiesche notes that a reporter for a particular periodical that reports on potential violations of the NPT gets very little feedback from his readers. It turns out that while the reporter is very widely read by people in the field these people often have security clearance and would even deny reading these articles if asked.

I would like to stress, here there is no security violation by publishing in this blog. There is a risk, particularly if the post is anonymous, of the post being summarily removed, but there is no risk in telling me how much you (don't?) enjoy reading what I have to say. Readers can be confident that their posts will remain in the strictest of confidence because hardly anyone ever reads this blog. :-P

Anyway today I had to run through the Hudson Bay store downtown, I had to deposit a cheque in the CIBC machines. As I was charging around the store dodging in and out of the crowd I noticed that I was using a cross-over to make turns on a sharp angle. That is to say, if I had to turn left I would throw my right foot clear over and to the left of my left foot forcing me to do a near 90 degree turn without loosing momentum.

It dawned on me, I was good at that from skating then I thought to myself, maybe I should use skating for cross training, heck it would improve my balance and co-ordination. I put more thought into the idea and came up with a better idea, I should swim more. After all I am not cross training for running through The Bay, maybe a Triathlon, most likely a pure road race, but not a department store sprint.

There is a pool just down the street from home and the great thing about swimming is that you cannot hurt yourself if you swim intelligently. Skaters crash and hurt themselves all the time, but an endurance swimmer cannot possibly crash, even if they hit someone else at full speed, well full speed is a slow walking speed, how could that hurt? The great thing about swimming is it forces you to breath properly and make the most effective use of your lung capacity, that and since I don't want to spend money, the other great thing is, swimming is basically free, I am not going to buy a Michael Phelps Speedo LZR swim suit, I'll make do on my old lifeguard bathing suit and do lengths during the free length swims, assuming there are such things.

Of course if I did swim, Lesley would probably come to watch and then she would laugh at me and say I look like silly. Maybe I should run instead?

I could start a survey, how should Michael cross-train, swim, skate, run, ride more baby! Any other suggestions before I put out a survey?