Get Off the Road Indeed

Problem: Deaths and injuries of cyclists in collision with motor vehicles.

Proposed Solution: Move cyclists onto pedestrian paths instead.

Oh, so those pesky cyclists are injuring themselves by letting motor vehicles hit them. Shall we move them out of the way, so you drivers are free of all culpability now? Let’s make life even more miserable for non-drivers: terrorise the pedestrians the way motor vehicles terrorise cyclists!

Now, of course, motor vehicles are much more dangerous to cyclists than cyclists are to pedestrians. Nevertheless, it does not make sense that when motorists present a danger through their own doing, that those who are made to pay are non-motorists. How about actually educating motorists on how to accommodate cyclists and making cyclist-friendly provisions on the roads? Oh, I forgot, it’ll slow down traffic and reduce economic productivity.

My Last Critical Mass

I forgot to bring my camera. Pity, because the endpoint was the best I’ve been to. Montrose Harbour. Lots of space, and people were dancing to the music from the trailer-boomboxes on the grass, with the tinny flashing ferris wheel of Navy Pier and the pink-lighted Hancock and Sears towers on the horizon.

Critical Mass is a street party on two wheels, but without all that artificial stuff people do at parties to have fun: there the fun is had by simply pedalling. The most primitive of enjoyments: endorphins from physical movement.

I wasn’t sure if I should leave the after-party at Montrose Harbour. I liked the atmosphere and the scenery, but I wasn’t completely enjoying it because of the ache knowing it was my last time at such an occasion. If anything was bittersweet, that was it. When I’d agonised over it to the point where I was about to blub, I decided to leave. Pedalling against the wind was, as usual, sufficiently distracting that I didn’t blub on the way back. Too exhausted when I reached home to blub either.

The lake was stunning, etc.

I will not meet such a wonderfully crazy group of people in Singapore. I will miss them.

I will try to start one, but I am not optimistic.

Vicious Cycle

Tempted to buy a T-shirt with the following graphic:

Mastering the Alley Pee

One of my biggest missed photo opportunities in the last Critical Mass was to take a shot of the line of male cyclists lining up to pee against a fence in the south side (I think this was somewhere along King Dr, or close to it anyway). After the mass, there was a discussion on the listhost of how to deal with the need to pee. Someone suggested that rather than stink up alleys with pee, to do it between parked cars instead. This prompted the following suggestion:

The Kneel Technique

Back in the day a friend and I developed the kneel technique for males urinating outdoors in conspicuous places with autos around. (This may satisfy an additional urge for those on this list.) One lowers themselves next to a car tire, the inside knee on the ground and the outside leg with
the foot on the ground and bent at the knee–assuming a posture as though one were inspecting the tire (“inspecting tire” thoughts help the scenario). Be mindful of the slope of the ground and let nature run its course from there.

Update: A masser sent a link to the following photo: