On Sticking to the Plan

A quick aside: The original plan to ride to Rochester on Friday has been postponed by one day. My manager asked if I could take Monday and Tuesday instead of Friday and Monday so that I would be in the office on Friday. A number of guys are working through Canada day and so will take Friday off, I will cover for them on Friday and they get to cover for me on Monday and Tuesday.

Erin, my sweet little Roubaix, is in several discrete pieces in the basement, and it is driving me nuts!

Let me explain.

As I noted in a previous post, my plan for the ride to Rochester (200 miles one way, in one day) entailed that I do the following:

1. Go for a nice Saturday morning ride (check!)
2. Take the wheels off Erin and get them trued (check!)
3. Take the rest of Erin apart give her a full maintenance and cleaning.
4. Train very lightly if at all, i.e. taper.

So on my little checklist I am at the point where a bike chain so clean I can see the whites of my eyes reflected in it, is sitting on the floor beside a cassette so filthy with grease and gunk from the road that I leave it on a newspaper. Meanwhile on the repair stand is a carbon fibre red and black beauty in need of a sponge bath. Over on the chair in the corner are two true wheels with old (to protect the rims - as documented earlier) tyres, new tyres are in a box on the coffee table.

Of course now everyone is asking me if I can make it out for a ride on Wednesday or Thursday. (Can I use my tri-bike, Alex?) Its not fair dammit! I wanna ride.

In other news I updated my profile on the BCC website. There is a notion in politics, the expectations game it is often called. When George Bush went into a debate with Al Gore, credit where it is due, Bush played the expectations game beautifully. Everyone thought Gore was going to paste Bush to the wall with Bush's fecal stained underwear, when Bush made a less than sensational show but still held his head above water Gore came off looking bad. Well on the BCC website I basically did the same thing, except I never debated Ann Richardson and I am no Fausto Coppi either. (Read: I wrote I was really pathetic at cycling.) Hopefully people see it for the joke that it is, but I have found people can be unusually thin skinned online - not that I am any exception. I wonder why that is?

It is a bizarre thing, but I have cycling on my mind too much. I suppose the weather is a factor, but truth is so often I just want to walk away from my day job and become a bike mechanic. Actually I should become a city employee, look at the garbage collectors, $25/hr, 18 bankable sick days per year, vacation days. Assuming those guys work a 40 hour week, their after tax income is actually not all that much less than mine and I strongly suspect the pressures they are under are significantly less than what I have - to say nothing of the fact that I had to slog through undergraduate and graduate school.

I just got an email from the organizers of the North Shore Inline Marathon. Is there an address I can send a copy of... oh the last year or so of blog entries? News flash, I am not a skater anymore. Heck I don't even have the three point frames for my customs - I sold them, all I've got is my old Rollerblade Problades. I suppose it would be really cool to ride out to Duluth, take side roads up to Sault Ste. Marie and then either highway 11 or some side road through Michigan and Wisconsin to Duluth. But lets be honest here, that's a ride for the sake of the scenery. There is no way, having done those 1700km I would even think about skating 42km.

In yet other news Kilu, my short haired round ball of cuteness was very sick this weekend. He puked up a storm would not eat and became rather antisocial. I am pleased to report Kilu is back to his usual trouble making ways, I guess he had a stomach flu? This morning he wanted to watch the birds from the window in the master bedroom so employing his sharp instinct for driving Lesley bananas he opened the shutters and at 0600 allowed the sunlight to pour in. I have to admit the part where a cat can open the shutters is pretty impressive, if he could just land himself a stable job and help pay for his food, that would be quite the puss! Anyway I've got a really nice picture of Kilu in my arms, Lesley took it with her digital camera, sadly am too good at procrastination. I'll put the picture up later, more pictures of Kilu would be a good thing for this blog!

On Preparing for another Ride to Rochester

Alright here is the plan:

Saturday the weather is supposed to be really nice to I am going to do a long ride and then come home and beg Lesley to ride with me for a short romp around the bike trails here.

Once we are done I am going to take Erin's wheels off, throw her tyres out and take the wheels to the store to be trued. (Maybe I should leave the tyres on just to protect the rims when I walk to the store?)

Sunday through Thursday I will spin very gently on the trainer for 30 minutes with Alex and ride the Coppi to work and home, no more.

Friday, a week today I saddle up on a very carefully tuned and cleaned Roubaix (Erin) and at 0545 I hit the road going South West to Hamilton then East to Rochester NY.

Sunday I return.

• Total distance, each way 200 miles (321.8km).
• Anticipated Calories burned, each way: +10,000.
• Anticipated Calories consumed while on the saddle: 3500 (each way).
• Average speed (Goal): 28km/h.
• Bragging rights if I succeed: Not nearly what Peter Oyler's got!

Speaking of Peter and the RAAM, wow! The text in blue is taken directly from the Daily Peloton:

RAAM Solo Male

It’s finally happened; the 2009 Race Across America has a new solo male leader. After five days of slowly closing the gap, wearing his rival down bit by bit, Dani Wyss caught and passed Jure Robic after the Slovenian suffered a puncture. After seven days of racing, there was the unbelievable scenario of the two frontrunners and their support teams racing just 50 metres apart, in clear view of one another.

Swopping the lead

Of course, things didn’t stay quite like this. The lead swopped hands as the riders took brief stops, before Robic put 16 minutes into Wyss. Because of his time penalty of an hour – which comes into play at TS #51 in Mt Airy - the four-time champ has to bring the fight to his rival. In the race’s closing 180 miles, he must put a further forty-five minutes into Wyss.

The advantage lies with the Swiss man; he has the motivation of knowing he is in pole position for a famous dethroning of Robic. Moreover, he can judge his effort on the Slovenian’s times; it is easier psychologically to be chasing someone than being chased. Still, it is a case of ‘easier said than done’: you can bet that Jure Robic will use every ounce of his remaining power, energy and tactical nous to outfox his opponent.

The all-important hour penalty:

Robic’s three infringements-15 minutes. Passing at night on freeway without the use of an exit ramp.-15 minutes. Inappropriate behaviour at the start.-30 minutes. Rider failed to return to departure point after making a wrong turn.

3000 miles and the gap between first and second place is less than the gap between first and second could be a criterium gap! Sometimes this sport is just amazing.

On RAAM Updates

This is taken directly from the Daily Peloton:

Peter Oyler was also forced to abandon, unable to ride through the agony of “Schermer’s Neck”. The Canadian has been almost a mainstay in sixth position over the last five days, but there was no way he could ride 1,400 more miles in such pain. He can be immensely proud of his effort. The same goes for Tony O’Keeffe – in a double blow for Canada, he too abandoned, having looked so strong only yesterday.

Well actually, it looks like that is not entirely true, you can read what Peter himself wrote on his website. He had kidney problems and had started to bloat.

Other than that, with less than 500 miles left in the RAAM, having covered a distance of over 2700 miles, the gap between Jure Robic and Daniel Wyss is seven minutes, yes that's right, these two guys are almost within visual range of each other having covered almost 5000 km!

On Pictures from a Tuesday night ride

I remember being the slowest guy in the pack. And when I say the slowest, I don't mean, one of, or just faster than some other guy, I mean I was the ultimate in pathetic.

Things sure have changed. Okay granted there was a guy, a kid from the store who didn't bring his helmet (should have been sent home if you ask me) who was faster. But I was in good form last night until the part where Lesley called me because she was locked out of the house and I had to hightail home to let her back in.

Actually I have to confess, the first part of the ride was agonizingly slow, more than once we had to throttle back to 22km/h because someone got dropped. I know I was slow, once, but even then I made sure not to get dropped during the warm up - actually even when I was weak, I was still good enough to never get dropped until Lauri or QB just dropped the hammer hard. To my way of thinking if you are struggling to keep up when things are in the warm up phase, than maybe turn around and join a more entry level group, its not like there aren't well documented disclaimers about how intense Tuesday night is.

Oh and the part where someone had absolutely no bike head lights... its a night ride, go splurge and buy a frog light for $10. Yes dear reader I rant, but right now I also shake my head in disgust. It is one thing when you are out later than expected, you weren't paying attention to the time, or you got a mechanical and had to fix it. But when the ride starts at 2030 and is 70km, bet your knickers that the sun will set (according to the Weather Office at 2104) long before you get home. Now if we know the sun sets while still riding it stands to reason it will be dark. If it is dark than maybe we should heed the oft repeated phrase on the BCC website "remember lights for safety." To my way of thinking people who forget lights, or a helmet are simply examples of Darwin waiting to strike!

Anyway as promised here are some pictures that aren't totally embarrassing.

I also read some very upsetting news, Peter Oyler is DNF in the RAAM. He covered 1614.5 miles in 4 days 22 hours 5 minutes, and withdrew at or after time station 27. I cannot even begin to imagine the disappointment but as I have said at my own failures, failure is just another practice run before the inevitable success.

On Missing the Saddle

I was reading an old post I published about a year ago. I was describing one of the early BCC rides I was on - a trip to Stoufville via Claremont. It was a beautiful day warm, but not hell raising hot and clear blue skies. It was also a hard ride for me, I was a lot weaker.

I recently proposed a route to Danny for a Sunday ride, 130km almost all of it through rolling pastoral country side. There are few things in life better than mounting the saddle and spinning for hours at a time, just your breathing, and the sound of the chain punctuating the calls of the animals and rustle of the wind. (Before anyone asks, yes Lesley is one of the few things that are better. The fact that I am at the office on a Saturday, not with Lesley should not be taken to mean I love work as much as the saddle or Lesley, far from it.)

Anyway I proposed a route for Sunday, up Leslie street all the way to New Market then across to Claremont and home. It is a far cry from the longest ride I have ever done, but this time of year and the scenery I know I would get to see, it sure would be one of the better rides.

Speaking of long rides, I have been tracking Peter Oyler who as of Monday (June 23) at noon was the fastest North American in the Race Across America. Sadly he is (was?) in sixth place and wearing a neck brace. Given that I had a chance to ride with Peter, once in 2008, and I know a lot of really good people who know him well, everything I have heard is that he is a really decent guy. So I am disappointed because I know he wanted to win this thing and that is looking increasingly unlikely.

Still the RAAM is a psycho race that takes a grown well trained and strong guy and spits out a broken husk of a man with the letters DNF beside his name (I think six DNFs and the race is only half over) and you realize even lasting a day in The RAAM ought to count for something. That Peter might make it to Annapolis in his goal of, I think, nine days constitutes a hell of a good reason - to may way of thinking - to have a ticker tape parade and national holiday in his honour.

Sadly I don't get to set national policy, but I will say this, check out the Senior Senator from the great state of New York, he's a proud cyclist. I like Chuck! Remember those old maps after the 2004 Presidential elections, where all the costal states went for Kerry (Democrat) and the inland states went red for Bush (Republican)? Well someone took one of those maps threw Canada in and relabeled things, Canada and the Blue States became the United States of Canada, the Red States became Jesus Land. I propose something a lot more modest, that we trade New York for Alberta. What a win-win! Albertans don't need to worry about how pesky environmentalism, we get Chuck, and The Greatest City in the World - which has the added bonus Canadians can stop hating Toronto and develop a grudge for New York. New Yorkers don't need to worry about terrorism and suddenly the blank stare that crosses people's face when you tell them you are from Canada can be replaced by the ugly look of, "oh you must be a New Yorker!"

On The RAAM

As I write this the Race Across America or RAAM is in its third day and at the fourth time station, in Salome Arizona, Jure Robic (Slovenia) was in first place with a time of 14 hours 17 minutes, the third person to check in, only about 33 minutes behind was Peter Oyler. I should point out that these guys had to cover some 293 miles (about 500km) just to get to the time station they still have literally thousands of miles (3016 miles to be specific) to go, and they averaged over 30km/h, so far. By contrast when I did my attempt at a double century I averaged about 20km/h.

The sound you just heard was my ego deflating! Holy smokes those guys are awesome!

The source for this post is the Daily Peloton Pro Cycling News.

Ooops!! Found a more current article, Jure Robic had cleared Time Station 10 in Kayenta Arizona (634.8 miles from Ocean Side) in 1 day, 10 hours, 2 minutes, third place Dani Wyss of Switzerland needed 1 day, 11hours and 34 minutes to get to Kayenta, but has since passed Jure, apparently Jure took time to sleep. Peter Oyler had only cleared through Time Station 9 (563 miles) after 1 day, 12 hours and 27 minutes, when the report came out putting Peter in seventh place.

The source of that paragraph is here.

On Blog Posts and Rules of the Road

Avid readers of mine, (if there are any?) may have noticed in recent weeks fewer, longer, posts. I have been writing my posts in a memo over several days and then posting them roughly once a week. Obviously this means what I say won't be quite so current but it will be better thought out - less flippant or insulting, more quality (I hope) writing. Does anyone have any thoughts on this change in writing philosophy? I hope it turns out well for my readers - stealing a couple minutes here or there to work on a memo is an awful lot easier than devoting an hour or two to a several hundred word essay (ok, rant).

Speaking of ranting... Here it comes... What the hell is up with all the cyclists on the sidewalks? Everyone who has so much as glanced at pretty much every other post I have made in this blog knows that I am militantly pro cycling. But guys, get off the damned sidewalk! Sidewalks are for pedestrians, roads are for cyclists and the wrecking yard is of course for the caged killing machines. But seriously, bikes, particularly bikes ridden by adults have less than no business on the side walk and I don't care who honked, or swore what because a cyclist was blocking their precious driving lane.

Now I know from time to time you need to cover half a block or maybe a few meters and there is some obstruction, well fine. But when a cyclist keeps jumping back and forth or worse, just stays on the sidewalk they endanger pedestrians. The fact is making life difficult for a driver is one thing, they deserve it! But pedestrians have it bad enough, leave the side walk for the really bad drivers damnit!

Oh yet another bad driver story, I mean obviously I have six or eight a day but I like this one. I am riding along Queen East going East just past Eastern/Kingston. Some gender unknown piece of work in a red TSX honks at me as I pass a guy on a single speed. Well I've got my marine air horn so as I catch up with the TSX I take the horn out of the cage and empty all the air out at the TSX. The guy on the single speed says "watch out for you" and I cannot tell if he's being sarcastic so I reply simply "I don't like being honked at" to which he responds "oh I don't blame you". I only wish the horn was still at full pressure when I gave my extended tout.

Earlier in the same ride an idiot in a minivan, stopped at a red light beside and said, "hey I'll race you!" Paused then said "I win!" Very calmly I replied "probably not". Car drivers seem to think that because they can theoretically do 120km/h they will always go that fast. News flash! In rush hour the cyclist is usually a lot faster.

I believe that I have just described, in a nutshell, what is wrong with the modern automobile driver. Car drivers think they can always go full speed and get frustrated when they cannot. For a cyclist the idea of hammering for 200 miles sounds great until you clip in and start cranking, covering 2 miles in a car is just too damn easy and so is covering 2 miles at 100 miles an hour. It is too bad more is not required of driving a car, it should be that cars are pneumatic and you have to stop and hand inflate them every couple minutes, or maybe spring loaded? But burning petrol chemical distillates is just too easy.

In unrelated news I did the Tuesday night BCC suicide ride. It was the standard York U campus route, except there was a police investigation on Lawrence between Keele and Caladonia (a shootout had taken place at a shopping plaza on Lawrence at around the same time we were doing intervals by Highway 404 between Wilson and Sheppard). Larwrence was closed so we went south on Keele to Eglinton and across Eglinton.

Apparently three people were very seriously injured according to the Star. I have to ask were the victims bystanders or not? More to the point shouldn't customs and border enforcement spend more time trying to stop gun smuggling and less time stopping undeclared bicycle parts? I mean granted I have an ulterior motive here but besides clobbering slow cyclists and swearing at drivers I don't believe my bike parts have ever hurt anyone, you cannot say the same thing about all those guns.

It is too easy to get a gun, if would be criminals could not get a gun... and if I always had a tail wind. I guess this would be a perfect world.

Anyway here is some footage of me sprinting on Tuesday. I am wearing a white jersey. Notice my upper body is hardly moving - actually I was not sprinting. Last year David Silcox suckered me into burning myself out over 50km from home so when Danny told me to sprint I told him I'd sprint if he went in front of me, that is when Dan told me "I'm filming this you nerd ball". So I picked things up, a little bit.

On The Ride for Heart

On June 7 was the Bacel Ride For Heart, the proceeds go to the Heart and Stroke Foundation. Now this ride is different in many respects from the Ride to Conquer Cancer. For one thing it is a lot shorter, options to do 25, 50 or 75km, all in one day. Another difference, two major highways are shutdown to cars and become bike trails - which is, to my way of thinking, about the best thing you can do with a highway. A final big difference, the entry fee and fundraising requirements are a great deal more modest. I raised $200 and paid a $30 entry fee, and when you factor in the cost to shutdown a couple multilane limited access freeways for a Sunday morning, the fees do not seem so prohibitive.

Anyway I tried to ride with Peter and Steve from the BCC who had made a goal of riding with the fastest people in the 75km group. (The fastest people get a police escort pace car which is great when you want to lap the casual riders.) None of us achieved our goals. I understand Peter and Steve just could not catch up with the fast guys and as I already said in a previous post I needed 2 hours, 11 minutes, thus exceeding my target time by eleven minutes.

I was riding with the guys (Peter and Steve), for about 10km, I even did some pulling, in general I was very happy with my performance for that first bit, then a guy a silver Cervelo tri bike started passing us and Steve and Peter dropped the hammer, no way anybody was passing those two speed demons. I tried to hang on, but that hill climb on The Gardiner Eastbound between Jameson and Spadina at what must have been about a million miles an hour, was just too much for me and I dropped off. A second pack came a long a little later, perhaps 200 meters after I fell off the back of the Steve and Peter speed machine and I was able to stick it out with the second pack the rest of the ride.

We rode North and somewhere between Bayview/Bloor and Don Mills the road went from bone dry to shallow ocean. Rooster Tails with engine oil, gasoline and metal flakes from crank cases became a my nutritional "supplement", not of my choosing. I decided to pull more to at least get off the damn rooster tails and for much of the next 50 or so km I would pull for a long stretch, fall back and recover two or three people from the front and then I would get fed up with the water in my face so I would leap ahead again.

As we came South at the end of the first loop we could see the casual riders doing the 25 and 50km routes. I feared they would prevent the hammer feast from continuing, to my pleasant surprise they mostly stayed out of the left lane giving our pack a chance to big ring hammer almost all the way, besides a few frustrated calls of "on your left".

At the end of the second loop who would I find but the same silver Cervelo that caused me to fall off of the Steve and Peter pack. I passed that guy with contempt. When I finally finished and got through the crowd at the finish line I found Peter and Steve, only three or four minutes faster. It turned out the Cervelo would attack, create a gap, the guys would race to close the gap, the Cervelo would recover in back then attack again. Eventually I guess the guys got fed up with the Cervelo's silliness and on some attack they let him go, he got tired all alone and when they caught up he could not hang on to their draft and ended up getting clobbered, serves him right!

Actually let me be honest, nothing the guy on the Cervelo did was unethical or morally wrong, it was stupid, but not against any rules that I know of. It made my life harder but hey in a real race stuff like that happens all the time so I should stop ragging on that guy. His strategy clearly sucked but in the end the problem I really have with his tactics is that his plans caused me to fall of the back of my preferred pack.

Anyway in other unrelated news the following letter to the editor appeared in the Tuesday June 9 Globe and Mail.

Last winter, I drove 2,100 miles in 12 days through Arizona from the Mexican
border to Utah. The only practical way to explore North America in a reasonably
short time is by driving a powered vehicle. When the condo generation has one or
two children, they'll find cars a necessity to carry all the accompanying
paraphernalia and, later, to transport them to friends and extra-curricular
activities. Meantime, many of us do really enjoy driving.

- Richard Holland, Grafton, Ontario

Here is the response I should have sent:

Last winter Richard Holland of Grafton ON drove 2100 miles in 12 days.
Which apparently justifies driving? Mr. Holland on May 15 I rode my bike 200
miles, (Toronto to Rochester), on May 17 I rode an additional 200 miles when I
returned home. Does this permit me to tell you that distance does not justify
consuming non renewable, poisonous, green house gas emitting,
resources?

Holland then goes on to say that "when the condo generation has one or two
children, they'll find cars a necessity". My wife and I used to live in a condo,
we live in a semi now and I often wonder what my great grandparents did. But
funny thing that, if Jeff Rubin is right and a litre of gas costs more than a
weeks pay I guess I'm going to find out exactly what life without gasoline is
all about. I'm ready for life without a car, Mr. Holland are you?

You know I have noticed an attitude among baby boomers, the World is theirs to fuck up as they please and to hell with everyone else. Maybe this explains the popularity of the oversized SUV? But go for a car drive on a city street with a boomer behind the wheel their attitude is the worst I have ever seen, bar none, save the taxi drivers in Toronto.

The cover of the most recent Scientific American describes how "grassoline" might save the United States from her oil addiction, roughly 50% of America's oil needs could be satisfied by using grass and plant waste that is already out there and simply being thrown out. I have to admit, I hope it turns out to be false promise, I am really looking forward to riding around empty suburban cul-de-sacs.

On Not Being Smug

I wrote this post prior to the Bacel Ride for Heart, which I did do (there will be a lot more on that ride later, for now these next few sentences will have to do). Sorry to say did not achieve my goal of 75km in 2 hours, I did 75km (partly in the rain) in 2hours 11minutes. Thank goodness for next year! Still it was a good hammerfeast, except now I am going to need to spend a good three days cleaning Erin, my ride. On the subject of the post below, I just found out, for people who do the Ride to Conquer Cancer, there is a break every hour and 30% of the money raised is actually used for administrative costs.

I would like to think that I am not a smug arrogant prick. I'd like to think that, but the sad fact is, we all think of ourselves as being better people than we really are.

No I don't think I said anything to someone to piss them off, at least I'm not aware of anything I said rocking the boat. Rather I was wandering around on the Web and started looking at The Ride To Conquer Cancer website.

For anyone who does not know, the Ride To Conquer Cancer (RTCC), is a two day ride that covers the same ground I covered in the morning of Friday May 15. The Afternoon of the 15th I would go on to double that up and Sunday May 17 I would return home, after spending much of the previous night (Saturday night, early Sunday morning) talking with Cisco engineers as they fixed a problem in our Toronto office. In short one might say the RTCC covers a quarter the distance I did in the same time. Or it covers half the distance in twice as much time - take your pick.

But see what I mean? I look at the RTCC site and next thing you know I am bragging about how good I am. (Alright I'm pretty good but I am by no means a great one.) And the people who manage to raise the minimal $2500 in required fundraising deserve a medal for managing that is this horrid economy.

Anyway I guess what gets under my skin is that people make such a big deal about how, they are going to do the RTCC. I met someone who was so proud of herself she was even buying new tyres (actually I think she used used the fact that she was buying new tyres to bring it up in conversation at a bike shop. Before anyone asks, I was at the shop because Alex, the tri bike was making an unsettling noise, turns out something is not quite right in the seat post.) People take a Valium and just chill! A person of moderate physical fitness on an entry level road bike should have no trouble at all averaging a steady 20km/h even with red lights and stop signs. No need for a year of preparatory training. So I have to ask, if the full RTCC is 160km, over two days, that means 80km/day at 20km/h is four hours. What are you going to do when you get to the half way point? If a rider leaves at 8am and takes a lunch break for an hour and goes at little more than a jogging speed they should arrive before 3 in the afternoon.

Oh sure it is for a good cause, I do the Ride for Heart because it is also for a good cause. But I don't strut, I just do it and try to raise as much money as I can ($200 and still begging). The people who train for this one ride, it all seems rather too wasteful to me, train for love of the saddle, then do the RTCC to put an end to a horrible disease.

Anyway it just seems to me that when people brag they really need to modulate what they are bragging about or they end up looking foolish.

All of this discussion takes me back to the Lake Simcoe return ride I did with Aaron Armdt last summer, 200km in seven hours (actually a lot less than seven hours, we hit the road at 0645 and stopped three times, for water or washroom, as well had a few traffic lights to stop for), we were home by 1400. To me this is more impressive in many respects than the Rochester ride, mostly because I achieved my goal but also because we actually averaged almost 30km/h for half a day. Put another way, had we gone South then East instead of North by 2pm we would have made it to Niagara Falls turned for home and been a little past St. Catherines, except going North involves a good many more hills than following the shore of Lake Ontario, so probably a lot past St. Catherines by 2pm.

Certainly if a person is not a strong cyclist riding to Niagara Falls is an achievement. But sorry to say guys, for a roadie the equivalent of running a marathon is riding a century or 100 miles (161km, not 100km, that is a cheat, and a pretty lame cheat at that!). Most serious roadies do a century quite often, it is no big deal. But it so happens that a ride to Niagara is a century so a ride to Niagara is just too easy to get in a tizzy about, particularly a century done in two days, not one morning.

If you want to do a distance that will inspire me, well maybe draft Peter Oyler, or heck, give me a draft on July 2.

On The News and Other Things

Well my letter to the Editor was not published. Shocking! Absolutely shocking! I guess members of the general public writing into the letters page, are not allowed to call city councillors chickens and thus expose newspapers to liability suits, what a horrible state of affairs eh!

Alright we all saw that coming from a mile away, but still Wong's hypocrisy is disgusting. I mean as a city councillor he should be concerned with two things above all others:

1. The state of the city.
2. The state of his ward.

Well naturally if global climate change turns Toronto into a super hot (or cold?) waste land then it would be reasonable to suppose climate change should be on the Wong agenda. (That is a reasonable supposition isn't it? Apparently not!) More to the point, as a city councillor Wong should concern himself with traffic, the disaster that is traffic in a modern first world city. But as we all know the solution to traffic congestion is not more roads. If road building were a real solution than Los Angeles would be a nice place to visit - it isn't, I've been there, three days, never going back again if I can help it, saw more of the inside of a rental car than I saw green things, like grass and trees!

The problem is, if you build roads people buy cars and drive, thus causing more congestion, so you build more roads, so people buy more cars, and repeat. Now consider another big American city, New York, sure traffic is a mess there too, but who cares? Only an idiot drives in New York! When Lesley and I drive to New York, we park the car at some lot and leave it until we are ready to go home. That is a great way to see The City, we walk we take the subway, we walk more, we see Soho, The Village, Riverside Park, the people, the smells, the sounds, New York is a truly awesome place. Ask some schmuck who got himself imprisoned in his caged killing machine what he thinks of the greatest city in the World? Something tells me he doesn't have quite the same attitude about The City that I have.

Yes but Michael when you go to Gotham you are a tourist, the natives of The Big Apple... Oh yeah, never mind. Residents of Manhattan do not, in general, drive, to my understanding most don't even have a drivers licence, why bother?

Silly question here but do we want Toronto to be more like New York or Tinsel Town? I like New York, but hey that's just me, maybe Wong is right, maybe we should pave paradise and put up a parking lot.

Except Wong still has to answer a really fundamental question about motor vehicles, with what source of energy does Wong propose to use to power his car going into the next couple decades? It seems to me that roads, not paved bike trails, bike are too light, but roads are a very expensive proposition to build and, critical point here, maintain. If Wong is going to sink his oily fingers on my property tax purse strings he'd better find a renewable substitute for that oil and right soon otherwise I'd have to say that spending money for motorists seems like some pretty reckless backward looking politics.

On the other hand when gas is too expensive and everyone is cycling I am going to really love hammering on the QEW all the way to Rochester - that will be plenty easier than hugging the shoulder on a service road.

There was a a blog entry today on The Huffingtonpost by Michael Moore. Although I agree with Moore's philosophy, I find his style, typically rather excruciating. Today he was writing about tearing apart GM but saving the manufacturing capacity. All pretty reasonable stuff, no trying to break down Roger Smith's door. Anyway I mention this because I responded, along with hundreds of others. Naturally I suggested beat those swords into plow shares, well car factories into bike factories. I like this post, chiefly its optimistic attitude.

Generally some good ideas, but one area that was missed, was bikes. I only got back into cycling a year ago and already my personal best for distance is 175 miles. Okay granted most people aren't in the same shape as me, but for intracity (i.e. within a city) ride is well within almost everyone ability.

America has a long history of bike making and some of the best bicycles are designed in the United States (Giant, Cannondale, Specialized, to name just three) - yet idiotically all made in Taiwan. Why not in-source all that manufacturing through tax breaks and other incentives, i.e. bikes that were made in America are income tax deductible. Besides helping to fight obesity, cycling massively reduces our carbon footprint and makes the morning commute (at least for me) at lot more pleasant.

Oh and before someone starts a complaining about the winter, I actually am Canadian, live in the home of Cervelo (best bikes in the world) and biked to work through the snow in minus 30 (-22F) weather.

It is possible, with the right attitude!

Anyway on Politics, I have seen some very quiet evidence that Beijing has been putting the screws to the DPRK. I hope this is true, sadly I believe the only viable long term solution is something along these lines.

1. The Kim Family gives up it's stranglehold on DPRK "leadership".
2. Temporarily the DPRK is put under a joint RoK/Beijing trusteeship until a new government can emerge after hopefully two to four years.
3. This new DPRK government works with Soul towards a Korean reunification program as the United States begins a phased withdrawal of of its own military presence.
4. The Kims and cronies are charged with war crimes or crimes against humanity thus ending one of the worst dictatorships since Stalin.

And if pigs had wings! I just don't see that first step ever happening and step 2. would be really messy. But something has to be done, the people of the DPRK are starving and everyone else is getting scared, for a good reason.