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.