Where the cyclists in America belong: back alleys, gutters andsidewalks

On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 13:32:32 -0800, pyotr filipivich
wrote:

[Default] I missed the Staff Meeting but the Minutes record that
Gunner Asch reported Elvis on Tue, 15
Apr 2008 10:29:16 -0700 in misc.survivalism :
On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 06:21:31 -0700 (PDT), ComandanteBanana
wrote:

On Apr 14, 9:54*pm, Gunner Asch wrote:
On Mon, 14 Apr 2008 15:06:42 -0700 (PDT), donquijote1954

wrote:
Something funny happens though. The more you move to the right, the
more they squeeze you. It's a power game, I believe, where only the
strong (read SUVs and cars) survive.

Evidently you have never heard the phrase "Right or Dead Right"

Might want to ponder on that one for a bit.

Yep, and I have changed my survival strategy accordingly.

I have realized that America, despite her claims to democracy and
Christianity, is now ruled by the Law of the Jungle. The world seems
to know it now too. It's evident in her foreign policies that she's
getting hungrier. And it's even more clear when you live inside and
you notice that the top predators want to have an SUV to show their
power and wealth --if not to impose their might...

However dinosaurs are not forever. Actually, the hungrier they get,
the quicker they exhaust the resources, and the quicker they
disappear. But they were not known for having big brains either.

Someone may ponder about that too.

And this has what to do with assholes on bikes thinking they can
survive an encounter with a motor vehicle?

Bikers feel that they too can pick and chose which laws apply to
them. Including the laws of physics.
Unfortunately, there are certain objective realities; just because
you're rather have a diagnosis of athelete's foot, doesn't make the
compound fracture go away.



tschus
pyotr
Most excellently spoken.

Gunner

On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 17:40:33 -0400, Fred Clydesdale
wrote:

In article ,
Gunner Asch wrote:

Its gonna be hard for me to ride one of my bikes..yes I do also ride
bicycles...to work every day with the 900 lbs of tools, welders and
parts that I drag around for the average 135 miles per day that I
drive.

On the other hand..its bad kharma to leave a bike rider a red smear on
the roadway because the spandex clad dip**** decided that he is above
all traffic laws and the laws of physics dont apply to the big assed
trucks he cuts in front of. Much like the rainbow stickered idjits in
tiny cars who do the same.

perhaps you have been a Bad Man through several lives already, and
the 900 lbs of tools (i assume that includes at least one 250
lb tool) are the burden you must bear for your past transgressions.

all you need is a begging bowl, sandals and two full outfits by
pearl izumi. 'kharma' will reward you a thousandfold in your next
life.


I do take Paypal as well.

Gunner

On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 21:36:28 -0500, "Edward Dolan"
wrote:


"Tom Sherman" wrote in message
...
Gunner Asch wrote:
[...]
Its gonna be hard for me to ride one of my bikes..yes I do also ride
bicycles...to work every day with the 900 lbs of tools, welders and
parts that I drag around for the average 135 miles per day that I
drive. [...]
my two biggest fears when driving are kids chasing a ball across the
roadway,[...]

Why? Children are hardly large enough to do more than cosmetic damage to
your truck.

Well, he loves his god damn ****ing truck more than he cares about children
as befits any self-respecting truck driver. Yea, macho man!

Your missing your meds, right?

Regards,

Ed Dolan the Great - Minnesota
aka
Saint Edward the Great - Order of the Perpetual Sorrows - Minnesota

On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 21:02:27 -0500, Tom Sherman
wrote:

Gunner Asch wrote:
[...]
Its gonna be hard for me to ride one of my bikes..yes I do also ride
bicycles...to work every day with the 900 lbs of tools, welders and
parts that I drag around for the average 135 miles per day that I
drive. [...]
my two biggest fears when driving are kids chasing a ball across the
roadway,[...]

Why? Children are hardly large enough to do more than cosmetic damage to
your truck.

Bad Kharma and the wailing of the next of kin can be irritating.

Gunner

Gunner Asch wrote:
On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 21:02:27 -0500, Tom Sherman
wrote:

Gunner Asch wrote:
[...]
Its gonna be hard for me to ride one of my bikes..yes I do also ride
bicycles...to work every day with the 900 lbs of tools, welders and
parts that I drag around for the average 135 miles per day that I
drive. [...]
my two biggest fears when driving are kids chasing a ball across the
roadway,[...]
Why? Children are hardly large enough to do more than cosmetic damage to
your truck.

Bad Kharma and the wailing of the next of kin can be irritating.

Natural selection - only the quick and alert survive.

--
Tom Sherman - Holstein-Friesland Bovinia
The weather is here, wish you were beautiful

On Apr 16, 12:19*am, Gunner wrote:
On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 13:02:28 -0700 (PDT), ComandanteBanana

wrote:
You know, I can't quite recall which Bible verse talks about
bicycling. *I'd
be happy to look it up in my own copy if you could provide book,
chapter
and verse.

Cindy Hamilton- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

It's evident enough... HE RODE A DONKEY.

You get the point? He chose the most humble mode of transportation
around, saying like a bike today.

Would that be a $20 *Huffy..or the latest deep pocket custom made *hip
slick and cool hiteck carbonfibre and titanium ultralight ride so
prefered by the "humble bike riders"?

Hummmm???

Or perhaps a "Big Wheel" in Barbie color scheme?

Gunner

No, Huffies are more for the beggars that Jesus helped. He being God
would have need something more stately, like a pedal forward bike that
keeps your back straight and your head high for scanning the horizon.
Two choices are obvious: Electra bikes, or the cheaper brand that I
use, Sun. Well, I don't make any claims to being God either, so I'm
happy with it.

Or he may have used another option I'm considering, a trike. Yeah,
that would have allowed him to carry his Bibles and other gadgets...

On Apr 15, 8:26 pm, (Bill Z.) wrote:

It hurts me to read about incidents like this. I have no idea what
caused this altercation, or why the cyclist felt it was necessary to
stab the motorist. I was honked at and flipped off by a motorist on
Dundas St. this morning, then almost nailed by a left-turning car near
my work. But even when bad things happen to me on the road, I never
even come close to wanting to stab someone.

I was in one incident (fortunately no injuries or crashes) in which
an irate driver passed me in very light traffic on a perfectly straight
road, and then, when the road went from 4 lanes to 2, he tried to
close the gap between us and would slam on his breaks, repeating this
behavior 3 times. I managed to avoid an accident, but it was very
close.

I got his license number and reported it to the police. With the reaction
I got from the f___tards in the DA's office, coupled with the lies and
run-arounds, I can see why someone might react the way this Canadian
cyclist did. If society wants people to do the "right" thing and let
the criminal justice system handle it, the criminal justice system has
to uphold its part of the bargain.

BTW, the driver admitted to the braking. His excuse was that I was
supposedly going 30 in a 25 zone and he couldn't outrun me, but I
was blocking traffic anyway. And that was on a knobby-tired mountain
bike on basically level ground.

--
My real name backwards: nemuaZ lliB

I forgot to get his plate, but for the reasons above, I don't think
there would have been justice --and definitely I'd have gone through a
lot of trouble.

I have another strategy in dealing with the beasts and it's based on a
saying of mine, "My struggle is not against the puppet, but against
the puppeteer"...

Who's the puppeteer who could change things and GIVE RESPECT to the
cyclists? The police, the politicians, the president? Or all of them?
The puppet only takes life in an atmosphere where the cyclists are
equivalent to a stray dog. Even if you screwdrive him, it's not worth
it. Never waste your time with the puppet. Go for the puppeteer. And
that's what I'm doing here.

On Apr 16, 10:17 am, Pat wrote:

(Hey, this goes to show that I'm not repeating stuff here. What you
want me to talk about next?)- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Talk about the role of the bicycler in ensuring his/her own safety
with a brief forray into bicycle edicate. A sidebar and politeness
and civility would also be nice. Then you could cap this with a
discussion on respect for other people, the end to ego-centricism,
recognition that all people are different (and want different things)
and how the world would be better if we all did our part to get along.

That would be a nice this for discussion.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Not until we see the connection between the victims of the law of the
jungle in Haiti and our own roads we will realize we are under attack
by the rich and powerful...

On Apr 13, 8:49 am, Igor The Terrible
wrote:
My...imagine that! The repercussions of the maldistribution of wealth
will soon turn on new avenues and come back to rattle the cages of the
economically oppressive whose reasoning has been all but squashed by
insatiable greed. Potable water is a becoming an endangered commodity
and now food is right behind it. This **** doesn't look good at all.
A word to the wise; address this emerging crisis promptly as it should
be...or resign yourselves to a fate of your own making. It's no
longer a game of money being used as beans to keep score. It is now
becoming a matter of survival and the law of the jungle will rapidly
eclipse the laws of intellectuals for the promotion of an orderly
society. Riots are already breaking out in our hemisphere. (See
Haiti)

We can't simply get along because a few want to keep their lion's
share of the pie, whether that pie is resources or a piece of road.
And every monkey who does something about it, gets us one step closer
toward fixing the jungle --or making it real wild for all. WELCOME TO
THE JUNGLE!

I put this question to the Scandinavians...

I challenge the lady who had these incidents to tell me if she thinks
that could have happened to her in Sweden. While I was in Norway, I
generally saw good behavior. I'm writing from the jungle
(Miami)...

"Actually, I know this first hand. I grew up on the key and there is
a toll you have to pay to get on there. The residents always
complained about how their tolls were being raised because of people
running the tolls. At one town meeting, they all decided that if they
ever saw someone trying to run the toll, they would alert a toll booth
collector (the emblem lane was a clear lane without an attendant) and
so they did; stopping in the lane to call over attendants to charge
the scammers trying to sneak in behind them. You heard stories of
arguments and road rage farther down the causeway but one day a
busybody troublemaker my mom was driving through there with me in the
car. She saw through her rear view mirror that the guy behind us did
not have an emblem so she stopped and started honking until the
attendant came over to collect his measly dollar and off she drove.
Right before the bridge, the man pulls up next to us, on my side, and
pulls out a gun- A GUN. I was still in elementary school. I remember
how scared my mom looked and how TERRIFIED I was when she physically
started taking my seatbelt off and pushing me towards the floor of the
car. She flew to the first gas station she could find and she NEVER
tried that hall monitor **** again.

I, on the other hand, did not learn my lesson that day. When I was
16, a few days shy of leaving for college, I was driving through the
Gables with my best pal Laura and there was this car of guys that kept
pulling up next to us. We ignored them- actually, we screwed with
them by turning up the radio at the light by the Coral Gables
library. We played this game the whole way through the Gables. At
the light of Coral Way/Miracle Mile and Le Jeune, they pulled up next
to us again. With that they make some dumb ass comments and we
laugh. One of them yells 'what you laughing at white cracker bitch?'
To which my smart ass responds 'F U.' The guy got out of the car and
grabbed my friends hair. Not thinking that there are lunatics out
there and because I can't leave well enough alone empowered by the
whole teen/live forever bit, I get out of the car to get the guy's tag
number. There was a quick verbal exchange but it ended in the guy
punching me. 3 am and 12 stitches later, I decided life pays you back
for your crimes that and I finally understood Newton's Law of Motion."

HAVE YOU BEEN THE VICTIM OF HORROR STORIES LIKE THESE?

Like I said, I put the question to the Scandinavians (isn't Internet
wonderful?) as to whether they too turn to the law of the jungle in
traffic. But in the meantime, see what I've found...

"I have already mentioned about driving in right, in Sweden. One
another thing I observed is, the way pedestrians are given the
priority. Maybe it’s the same all over Europe and somewhere else. But
whenever a pedestrian is about to cross the road, all vehicles come to
a stop and allow the pedestrian to cross. And I have seen Swedish
people nod at the driver and smile, everytime someone stops their
vehicle. Being a good mannered person(Ahem), I tried to follow suit.
But then old habits die hard. I look at the driver, and invariably end
up looking at the co-passenger since the driver sits here on the left
side of the car. And most of the times, it happens to be a girl. So it
is like this. Driver stops the vehicle, I cross the road and then
smile at the girl sitting next to the driver. Poor driver. What he
must be thinking of me? ‘Saala! I stopped the vehicle for you and you
smile at the girl next to me. Hmph!’"

They seem to be pretty civilized. Here the guy will come out of the
car with a bat for looking at his girlfriend. But in India is pretty
bad too...

"good one. in india the drivers have their fun trying to run down the
people and well mannered people too"

And yet their politicians are addressing the issue...


Where are your manners, PM asks motorists

June 24, 2006 15:57 IST

Appalled by the chaos on Indian roads, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh
on Saturday said that wind swept roads and fancy cars alone did not
reflect progress, it had to be accompanied by good road manners and
discipline.

“Building modern roads and driving modern cars are not the end all and
be all of progress. Good road manners and adherence to road discipline
are equally important,” he said at a national highway project
inauguration function in Bangalore.

“I think we must ask ourselves, why can’t we be more polite to each
other, more caring of each other, more respectful of each other,” Dr
Singh asked.

The prime minister said people must learn road manners, how to give
way to pedestrians, how to observe normal rules while overtaking, how
to park and when not to blow a horn.

“These are simple rules, but their observance makes a lot of
difference to our daily lives,” he said, adding: “We Indians behave
with great courtesy at home and with our family and friends. But
sometimes, when we go out we leave these good manners at home. On the
road, we lose control of our good senses. Why should this be so.”

http://prabhukrish.net/2006/06/22/say-cheese/