Visibility

I've discussed visibility a fair bit lately. One thing I haven't mentioned in the "motorist claims (s)he didn't see me" bit is that as I travel Westport Road, I am able to notice how far back people pay attention to my presence. When they see me, some even use their turn signals to indicate to others their intention to change lanes. Many motorists see me far enough back that they are able to integrate into the left-lane traffic as far as a couple hundred yards behind me.

Rhetorical question time: If they can see me that far away, why can't the rest?

To play with that question a bit, one possible answer is that so many motorists simply don't think that far ahead. They are too busy fiddling with the doo-dad of the moment, whether it be their cell phone, their fast-(urp!)food, their GPS navigation, radio, electric razor, makeup or what-the-hell-ever to pay attention to their surroundings in a meaningful way. As a result, they are surprised to see a slower road user, and their surprise leads to their anger, which in turn becomes a tirade at me when the real problem is their own inattention.

Think they are mad at themselves? I doubt they would admit it. They are too busy blaming "that d@#$%! cyclist" for making them pay attention to their driving.

One of the reasons I like my Vanguard is that visibility from the bike is wonderful. I'm in a fairly natural seated position, with my head upright--much like the position of an automobile driver. I have good lateral vision, and excellent long-range sight lines without neck strain. My view to the rear is a bit different than what someone on a conventional bike would have, but I'm also pretty adept at using a helmet-mounted rear view mirror. Since I'm not wrapped in a glass, steel and plastic coccoon, I can hear other traffic from far enough away to tell something about the intentions of the operators.

Given that folks so often change lanes so far back from me, I have to believe I'm fairly easy to see as well. I've made it easier, certainly, with the large reflectors I made and my habitual choice of brightly-colored shirts, not to mention the various "be seen" active lights I use (I counted the Planet Bike Superflash lights in my garage the other day--not counting the two on Jenn's Peugeot that are now in Sarah's keeping, we have about a dozen). All of the bikes used for commuting have reflective stripes on the tires (the lone exception being the front tire on my Vanguard, and if that tire ever wears out...). All of the utility bikes have extra reflectors in addition to the CPSC stuff. And Jenn's bike has those Halo rims...

In short, anyone who cannot see me is either a) not looking, b) is vision-impaired enough that they shouldn't be driving or c) lying about it. I've had reports that I was hard to see in certain situations, even from a fairly astute driver. Those situations included a fair number of reflective barrels lining the roadway (construction zone) on which the speed limit was 25 (and was not enforced, but that's a separate issue), and where motorists are supposed to be going slower and watching for unusual things to happen. What do I need to add there? A Xenon strobe? How irritating is THAT for a motorist who gets stuck behind me at a long traffic light?

How well do YOU know the rules?

During the hour and a half to two hours I spend getting to and from work most days, I have a bit of time to ruminate on the state of drivers' education--and several opportunities to see just how poor that state is.

I frequently think that we don't retest enough (ONCE being more than we do...). I'm sure that many folks would have trouble passing the same test they took at the age of sixteen (or whenever they take it now--I've lost track since I don't have any kids who are just learning to drive).

Imagine how pleased I was to find this online test, then. It's a "written" test put out by GMAC Insurance, as a way of bringing attention to the need for more knowledge about driving.GMAC reports an over-20% failure rate (defined as score less than 70%). Kentucky ranks 42nd in the country at passing this test, with state average score of 74.9%. It's appalling to me that drivers don't know any better than this, but not terribly surprising.

When I am driving, I sometimes think along the lines of "would I pass a driving test today?" I'm not always so sure. I know I do things that would cost me points (one hand on the wheel, protocol issues regarding my use of the clutch and shifter, I'm not always good about using my turn signals (although I do use them more than the average motorist in this town, I don't use them all the time), and who knows what else. Given my score on the written test (90%), I suspect I would do well enough--especially if I would be aware of being tested.

As a League Cycling Instructor, I have reason to say that I know the traffic rules better than many motorists. Indeed, I frequently encounter motorists who I am SURE would flunk this written test, and who I'm equally sure would not care that they flunk it unless they would lose their current driving privileges by failing. Of course, some of them probably know this at some level, and would refuse to take the test out of fear of what they would see quantified.

I think the same thing about vision testing. I get the occasional motorist telling me I'm hard to see. Mine is the one on the left, but neither of these bikes are hard to see:

I have to think that a person who cannot see me on this bike is either a) vision-impaired to the point that it would be illegal for him or her to drive or b) needs to scan for smaller other road users. There is no third option that does not challenge the honesty of the person claiming to have not seen me. Given the number of crash reports where the at-fault party has said, "I just didn't see that car/bike/pedestrian," I think people are showing criminal neglect when driving. Paying attention to one's surroundings is of paramount importance when using the roads. Knowing the rules of the road--and following them--is part of the contractual obligation of a driver's license.

News Flash: Red Pickup dude found

I'm admittedly short on the details, but rumor has it that the Oldham County Police have found the owner of the red Dodge pickup that has been harassing cyclists. The OCPD asks that if you have LEGITIMATE information about incidents you have had or experienced others having with this guy that you please contact them with that information. I don't think they want speculation or second-hand stuff so much as first-hand accounts with time and date at this point.

My hopes are that they will find a way to use him as an object lesson on traffic safety. Perhaps this series of events will aid efforts to get HB88 passed in some legislative session SOON.

I'm for public service work for this guy, partnered with a few hours of instruction and a requirement that he ride a bike for a couple thousand miles over the next year.

It rained last night

Yes, it's newsworthy that we had rain last night. We had more rain from that storm system than we had experienced in over a month, mostly as a function of drought conditions from the latter part of August until, well, last night.

The official (or officious) weather service report called it at a bit more than a third of an inch, with a total for October of .44 inches. I've fired pistols with wider bullets (I was in ROTC in high school, and during summer camp got to fire a total of six rounds of .45 caliber ammunition--haven't fired a pistol or rifle since about that time in my life).

Of course, the weather was coming my way as I was heading home. There is an observation involving my old pal Murphy and his law somewhere in all this...

As I was getting ready to leave the store, Jenn called to see if I needed a ride. I told her I'd be fine for a while, and would call her if I changed my mind at some point. Three minutes later, as I was spooling up the revs on the pedals, I heard my cell phone ringing. I'm not in the habit of answering the thing when I'm pedaling, so I left it be.

As I was working through Crestwood and toward Pewee Valley, I decided that instead of going via Westport Road as is my usual route, I would go through Anchorage and follow LaGrange Road home from there, to put me closer to Jenn's workplace should I need to get her assistance (she had driven the truck to work). I was seeing lightning off to my north, but it wasn't close enough that I felt threatened. I got to Lucas Lane in Anchorage before I started getting rained on, but it went from sprinkle to hard rain in moments. Visibility was getting worse, but was still manageable--until I got in front of Central State Hospital (not to be confused with Central (state) High School at 12th and Chestnut in Louisville, my alma mater).

I stopped for a few seconds under the Hurstbourne Parkway bridge to clear my eyes a bit--salt from my helmet was washing down into them causing part of my visibility problems. Deciding my stopping place was not as safe as I'd prefer, I got moving again and went to the "stop and rob" at the corner of LaGrange Road and UPS Drive.

I called Jenn, to find that she was out looking for me, and had gotten off my usual course by a mile or more. I told her where I was, and she was amazed that I'd gotten that far without being concerned over lightning strikes. She came to where I was, and as there was still a fair bit of lightning in the area, took me the rest of the way home.

An hour later, the rain lessened enough that the visibility was again tolerable, but I'm just as glad I wasn't waiting out that hour in front of a Circle K "stop and rob" store. I could find edible food at home, for example...

The episode will, I'm sure, lead to some discussion over how I deal with weather when I'm on a bike. I apparently have a different idea of what is manageable from the bike seat than Jenn, even setting aside my well-known dislike for riding in rain. Of course, rain and night mixed are even less fun than either alone, but can still be managed with reasonable care. I have no desire to get hit by lightning, but haven't done any deep research to tell me how much of a problem that is likely to be when cycling on a thirty-pound steel bike with an additional ten or fifteen pounds of stuff hanging on it.

Christian rudeness

I was riding home from work the other day, and near the intersection of Westport Road and Indian Springs Drive, a motorist honked his horn at me just before passing me too closely. I caught up to him at the Freys Hill Road intersection, and challenged him on his horn use. He claimed it was to let me know he was passing me. I told him I could hear his car from more than a hundred yards away, and blowing his horn was viewed as more of an "in your face" statement--sort of a "get the F&$^ off the road" thing. He replied that he'd blow his horn any time he wanted.

It was no real surprise to me that there was one of those little icthus things on the rear of his car--no doubt put there to proclaim that he's a good Christian. The overwhelming majority of the people who are rude to me on the road has either one of those little fishy things, a license plate with "In God We Trust," or some other broadcast of "I'm a christian!"

If they have to tell the world that they're Christian, instead of letting us figure it out by their acts and attitudes, are they really? Or are they, as a friend of mine quipped a couple decades ago, "hypocristians?"

In other words, I found this motorist's behavior decidedly un-Christian, or decidedly christian in its hypocrisy--you decide.

It's ROADWORTHY!! Jenn's bike update project, part II

In June of 2010, I presented Jenn with her birthday present: Her own Ryan Vanguard. A week or so later, I had accessorized it so that she could show it off during a "show off your ride" day at work. It looked like this until recently:


With the new parts installed, it looks like this:

In the second picture, the bits of reflective vinyl I put on the handlebar to make the bike a bit more visible show up a bit more. The reflective stripe on the tire shows well, too. You can get a sense of the reflectivity of the back rim, but it is overshadowed, if you will, by the reflective sidewall stripe on the tire. The rack trunk is mounted above the rack instead of right down on it to facilitate easier pannier installation and removal.

Part of the component selection included that the Apex parts are black. The brakes I chose are dark grey enough that they look almost black at a glance. I had to replace the fork, as noted before, to allow using linear-pull brakes at the front wheel. The caliper brakes that were on the bike originally were what a friend and I refer to as vacuum brakes. Yes, they suck.

The hardware issues I mentioned in a prior post were easy enough to resolve, once I focused on them. One fender strut was rattling against a rack stay, so I adjusted its angle a bit to separate them more. The screw holding that rack stay to the frame had loosened a bit as well, so it now has some threadlocking compound on its threads (as does its companion on the other side) to keep such from being an issue going forward. I raised the rack trunk a bit more from the rack, as the panniers were getting hard to mount and remove.

It's little tweaks like this that make a bike far more enjoyable--one doesn't have to worry about things falling off, and can thus focus more on keeping the bike upright and in the right part of the road. The bike rides well now. Jenn is happy with her birthday present.

A couple of quick disjointed items:

Car-Free Happy Hour is back for its first birthday bash! The latest event will be held at Vernon Lanes on Story Avenue on the 21st of October, starting at 5:30 pm!

On my way to work, I sometimes see a recent-model Toyota FJ. You've probably seen them, even if you paid them no mind. They are a "sport cute" designed to evoke sentimental memories of (or wishes for such sentimental memories of) the Toyota Land Cruisers of the mid-1970s, but with lots more luxury. It looks like this:

Supposedly making you think of this:

At any rate, the one I have seen a couple times now has a sign on its back window that reads, "It's a mid-life crisis thing...you probably understand."

I didn't understand.



Jenn's bike rode well for her on its test ride last night. We went on a five- or six-mile shakedown run, and the biggest complaint is that there seems to be some loose hardware in the rear rack or fender mounting systems. I need to do a minor tweak on one shifter's position to make it easier to use as well. I hope to get some images in the next few days.

Jenn's bike updates, part I

When we returned from our RAAM adventure, I presented Jenn with her birthday present--a shiny black Ryan Vanguard of her own. I had planned on updating the drive train from the beginning, but it was a while until I could make it happen.

Over the last few weeks, I've been gathering parts, ordering stuff, having Jenn take part in selecting components and so on. Everything finally was on hand at the end of last week (or so we thought--more on that in a moment), so reconstruction started yesterday.

I had offered to Jenn that she could do the work if she wanted--after all, she wanted to do the overhaul on her Peugeot she used as her commuter rig until this summer. She responded that she wanted to think of the bike as custom-refitted by me, so I have been doing the work.

I enjoy doing refits like this, so that's a good thing.

A partial list of upgrades:
SRAM Apex drive train (crankset, derailleurs, chain & cassette), black in color
Avid Single Digit brakes and levers, dark grey in color
new fork to support the linear pull brakes, black powdercoat to match the frame
Velocity Aeroheat rims in their nifty Halo powdercoat (reflective!!), which is dark grey in daylight
Schwalbe Marathon Racer tires with reflective sidewall stripe (hey, it's a commuter rig--I want there to be NO mistake that someone is there!)
black spokes with nickel-plated spoke nipples for durability (and a little "pop" against the darker rims and spokes)

and the low point: the only hubs I could find that were a) black in color, b) reasonably priced and c) didn't have disc mounts were Shimano Deore. Given that these are essentially the same as the 2001 LX hubs, and as good as the late-90s XT stuff, I think they'll be fine. They may have the Shimano labels removed from them at some point, though...

The wheels went together well, of course. Velocity rims usually build well for me. The fork installation was no problem, either--of course no problem was expected. Components that bolt on rarely give me troubles, either, and didn't this time.

Murphy's Law did rear its ugly head a couple times, though. The shifters (SRAM TT bar-end shifters) wouldn't fit into the ends of the handlebar extensions without some filing. I spent some quality time with a file, and resolved that issue. Then, as I was installing the cables, I was reminded that the front brake requires a tandem-length cable, of which I had exactly zero on hand. I'm not satisfied with my routing of the rear brake cable, but that's a five-minute fix. The front cable will take me another five or so to install and adjust.

Hopefully I will be able to get some pictures online soon. I sent a few to Jenn by phone while I was working, just to tease her a bit. They were phone images, so they weren't as useful as they would have been had they been from a decent camera.

I figure she'll get to test-ride it tonight. I know I'll have some tweaking to do with shifter angles, brake lever angles and such. The shifting adjustments should be done already, though. I found that the deraileur hanger was bent a little bit, which was keeping it from shifting as well as I would expect Apex to work. Having the tools to deal with that problem, I made the adjustments and things worked as expected.

Maybe I'll get some pictures on here in the next few days...

car free lite, sort of

I got to spend a short week totally without a car.

My 1994 Ford Ranger has over 220,000 miles on it. Stuff has worn out. Stuff has rusted to breaking point. I think I did a post on here over a year ago telling how I had dropped it off at a service provider after realizing that a support for one of the rear axle springs had rusted to failure.

Some time last week, I discovered that the rear end of that spring was unattached to the frame of the truck. I took it to the same garage Monday morning and left it with them with instructions that it didn't have to be done that day or the next. I also asked them to inspect the drive shaft, as I suspected failed universal joints and carrier bearing. Sure enough, all three universal joints were worn out, as was the carrier bearing. After having a little sticker shock over the estimate, I approved the work. The next day, I received a call informing me that I could pay an extra $40 to have the truck back the next day, or not pay it and pick it up Friday--it seems a part was not on hand in town and had to be shipped in from out of town.

Of course, I chose to wait another day. I can do without a truck for a day for $40 without much drama, even if I want to haul boxes (as I did Thursday) or rims (as I did Friday).

In the course of the week, it occured to me that I was REALLY car-free for a few days. I didn't have the option of the fallback position of driving if I was late to work, or whatever. It was neat to think that I'm in a much better place to deal with that than many folks in town who would have to rent a car to deal with their auto-addiction.

I don't pretend to be car-free. I still have uses for my truck, and am not ready to get rid of it. I'll keep it--or one like it--as long as I feel justified in maintaining the thing (and price for the work done this week is a factor I had to justify), as it enables me to do things I want to do, like haul a kayak to the river or the lake, haul the tandem to a bike ride that's farther away than I want to ride, haul material for home projects in one trip rather than buy a Bikes at Work trailer and need to make two or more trips, and so on.

It's also nice to have the truck when the roads are too crappy for me to enjoy my ride to work, as I'm sure will be the case some time in the next six months or so.

My log shows that I rode a bit less than six hundred miles in September. I have not corrected entries for the computer mis-calibration noted before, but I don't think the error is large enough to get me to seven hundred.

The numbers on a web site, however, are just that. They are only numbers. My leg muscles aren't as worried about the formal number--they just know I'll be riding until they won't work any longer.

The last couple days have seen me pulling a trailer a bit. We had a part-availability issue at the store, so Thursday I went to another shop to get the right size part (none of our suppliers carry Cannondale-specific hardware, and Cannondale won't sell to non-dealers). We had a couple boxes of stuff to donate at Goodwill, so I stuffed one of the boxes in my non-Burley trailer for drop-off at their St. Matthews location. I stopped at Kroger to get some stuff for dinner later that day, as my path to work would go right past the house (more or less--we aren't right on Westport Road). From the house, where I got the smaller box of donation stuff, I stopped at the Whipps Mill Goodwill store which is closer to my to-work route.

That got the trailer closer to work--enough so that it made as much sense to dead-head it to work with me as take it home before going to work. Since the rims for Jenn's bike upgrade were scheduled to arrive yesterday, having the trailer at the store was a good thing--it's easier to haul them in a trailer than on top of my bike. The rims (and the trailer) are at home now, and the wheels will likely be built this weekend.

Tomorrow is Harvest Homecoming bike ride. We have not pre-registered. We may go, or not. We may ride out to watch some Cyclocross racing at Fisherman's Park. We may stay home and rebuild Jenn's bike.

Cyclometer calibration

I rode the Strada to work the other day, as noted in my pages on mycyclinglog.com. When I got home, I looked at my average speed and distance, and was puzzled that I was showing over 25 miles instead of my 22 miles I usually got on the Vanguard.

The next day, I watched for--and found--mile markers on Westport Road. I found that over the course of four miles, I was off by half a mile--eleven percent.

The cyclometer on the Vanguard is a Vetta RT55, purchased when BikeE was still around. It's served me with minor problems--mostly that the bracket kit was not well-designed and has to have the contacts tweaked from time to time to keep the thing working. I've gotten to work some days to find that the thing didn't read a mile of my journey and was in sleep mode. I haven't bothered to replace the thing for one reason or another--mostly bordering-on-apathy. Still, having it work right is a good thing. Anyway, it doesn't keep its calibration when I change the battery. I had calibrated it well years ago, but at the time of the last battery change I couldn't find the paper on which I had written the calibration number. I got lazy, and used the number I thought was right, based on memory of calibrating another model of computer a LOT of times over the years I worked at Scheller's.

It was off by eleven percent.

Rats.

I was off that bike for a few days--the last day I rode it was Tuesday the 21st. I tried re-calibrating the computer that day before I left the store, but used the online instructions rather than actually measuring the roll-out, and was off by even MORE than eleven percent.I had some time Thursday, and measured the roll-out to calibrate the thing properly, but didn't test it against mile markers until this evening on my way home from the store.

It was within a few yards of dead on. I MIGHT tweak the calibration a bit, but I may leave it alone.

Now to decide whether to edit all my mileages for that bike since early this year based on more accurate calibration. It will add another couple hundred miles to my overall total, of course.


On a different topic--at least slightly--one of the things I enjoy about riding instead of driving is the amount of cool stuff I find along the roadside. I have, among other things, two or three pair of Vice-Grip pliers (the real deal, not imitations!), a four-D-Cell MagLite flashlight, and a couple of screwdrivers that were roadside finds. I've found several dollars in change over the last six months that I would have missed had I not been on a bicycle. This morning, I found a pair of bandage scissors in the middle of Goose Creek Road at Westport Road. They had not been damaged by tires going over them, as they were in one of the inevitable gravel patches found in such an intersection.

Finding stuff--yet another reason to ride instead of driving!

UPS Flight 6

A few weeks ago, UPS had an inflight disaster involving a 747-400 freighter. You probably saw something about it in the news.

It was especially poignant for me, as the pilot's wife is a customer of ours at the store. Jenn works for UPS, and reported that it was a day of interruptions in the work schedule (to understate things a bit). The UPS Air Group building has been flying the UPS flag at half-staff since.

The remains of the air crew are to be repatriated Friday morning. As an employee of the UPS Airline, Jenn is able to go. I may get to go also--an opportunity to pay my respects.

There has been much speculation regarding the cause of the crash--much of it including discussion of smoke in the cockpit and ways UPS could have equipped the airplane to improve survivability of such a thing. I don't know enough to say that this or that could have made things better (or worse). I only know that UPS lost some important people that day--important to UPS, to their families, to their friends and neighbors.

And to me.

Oldham County News

Over the last couple weeks, I've been reading about incidents involving a red Dodge pickup truck, the driver of which seems to have a thing about bicyclists being on "his" roads. Todd (coincidentally, a recent (ringer) student in the LBC New Rider Clinics) reported that the guy driving the truck came across the center line to play head-on chicken with him, resulting in Todd's departure from the pavement as a self-preservation move.

As the Oldham County Attorney is a cyclist (and a customer of ours at the store)--or perhaps regardless of her being a cyclist--the County is taking this seriously. There is now a blurb about it in the Oldham County Era newspaper.

Bubba truck driver has been warned, at least in public. It would be purely speculation to say that Bubba will read about his exploits and cheer about his notoriety. Perhaps his literate cousin will tell him he's doing a good job "scarin' them durned bikers off'n the roads!"

The ideal goal is to get Bubba (or whatever his name is) to treat bicycle riders as people, not as targets for stupid games of chicken. Of course, one can imagine Bubba saying to himself something along the lines of, "them durned bikers ain't got no reason to be on my roads, and any lawman who tells me otherwise is bullshittin' me."


Bubba is not alone. He has friends and other allies who would like me off the road, just as I have friends who want him off the road. I have a right to be there. He has the privilege to drive there--a privilege that may have to be revoked to get him to realize that aggravating cyclists is wrong. Even losing his license may not convince him--one can readily imagine Bubba blaming cyclists for his misfortune should he be jailed for harassment or terroristic threatening.

It'll be interesting to see what happens.

Seriously? Can this guy be for real?

While not a huge issue in world events, it's still puzzling that the head of what used to be considered an institution of some sort of higher education would post such comments.

I'm referring to Albert Mohler, President of the Southern Bat-shit, er, Baptist Seminary, and his opinion that the practice of yoga is antithetical to christianity.

Huh?

Okay, he's entitled to his opinion. I get that. I have opinions to which I'm entitled, also. I can be batshit about them, too, but I usually try to support my position with facts rather than scripture, as the latter is, at least to many of us, purely conjecture and not supportable with anything approaching the rigors of scientific research. Christianity is one more in a long line of mythologies, designed to explain what humans did not understand and keep said non-understanding humans in line with what the power structure wanted (want everlasting life? Do as I say and worship this deity...).

Yoga is, to be sure, closely associated with Hinduism and/or Buddhism, and is thus decidedly NOT something Mohler wants christians to practice, lest they lose some perceived favor with his god. In his blog post (which was painful to read, I might add, given the level of dogma so often found in writings of the pious), he admitted that the physical exercises associated with yoga are not in and of themselves bad for christians, but that following the spiritualism associated with many forms of yoga is a bad thing to do.

He even said something about christians having to meditate on sentences from the bible rather than on incomprehensible syllables. I guess he never heard of "speaking in tongues," which I hear of from time to time in certain other christian sects--notably not baptists.

What a shame that this guy is given any status at all...

It's Car Free Day!

It would be no surprise to any regular reader of this blog (I think there is one) that I rode a bicycle to work today instead of driving a car.

At Car-Free Happy Hour last week, I scored several copies of a poster made for the 2007 Car Free day from Tim Darst. I brought a few to work with me yesterday, intending to give one to the store owner so that he could put it on his car when he rode his bike to the store today. He wound up having to stay home with a sick kiddo today, so I'm by myself at the store (It's a quiet day, so we don't need more staff than me. The repair work is done. The parts order gets submitted in a couple hours.).

Anyway, I kept a couple copies for myself, and gave a couple more to Jenn. I taped one to the back of the Burley trailer, and pulled it to work this morning. I'm sure I over-politicized something I do on a regular basis in the eyes of a few motorists that had time to read my sign. As I rode to work, I realized that I had a good reason for having the trailer with me beyond having a place to put the sign--there is a box of parts at the store to fit Jenn's bike that will be easier to haul home this way. Of course, in strict accordance with Murphy's Law, the rims haven't arrived yet, so I'll probably have to either leave the trailer at the store for a couple days or pull it back another day (more likely the latter, as I have some minor need for it at home). At least it pulls well.

Car-Free day coming up

This is especially for folks who don't typically ride to work: This Wednesday, the 22nd of September, is "Car Free Day." The challenge is to do as many of your daily tasks that involve transportation without using a car or other form of motorized transport.

CART is planning a celebration of Car Free Day that includes a parking space on Market at Fourth (unless I got that confused with the discussion of Park(ing) Day this past Friday).

Going car-free takes a bit of planning, to be sure. I often do things like pre-place clothing at work, plan errands that require I carry large items or lots of stuff for other days (or use a bike trailer for what I can haul--up to a hundred pounds or a few cubic feet, depending), plan trips longer than I want to ride (or to those few areas where cycling is not a good idea for whatever reason) for different days, and so on. Over time, the planning becomes more automatic, though.

Two of my three bikes are rigged to carry at least some cargo beyond the volume of the seat back bag I have on my Strada (which is huge by performance bike standards--I can put a spare helmet in there). I can pull a trailer with my Vanguard, my Raleigh, or the tandem (Jenn and I did an errands run on Saturday using the tandem and one of our trailers).

My ride to work is eleven miles or so, each way. It takes me less than an hour by bike--usually fifty or fifty-five minutes each way. It takes me between twenty and thirty minutes by car, depending on traffic volume and my fortunes with traffic lights. That extra twenty minutes each way allows me to get miles on my bike (more on miles in a moment), NOT have to pay for gym membership to get a cardio work plan going, pay less for car insurance, improve my health and mood without drugs, and more in addition to the more obvious benefits like paying for less gasoline and less frequently having to work on the car.

I'm tempted to use the expression from those old television commercials for Alka-Seltzer: "Try it! You'll LIKE it!" However, in that context, the food being pushed was considered the cause of gastric distress, so I have to consider it a bit more.

Yeah, there are elements of cycling instead of driving that raise one's awareness of one's frailty. Some of those motorists are really jerks about sharing the road with cyclists. The law is what it is, however, and they have agreed to act in accordance with the law when they obtained their drivers' licences.

My observation, though, is that most drivers are pretty good--even those who don't really know as much as I'd like for them to know about dealing with bicycles. They don't hold any malice toward me--or you--as cyclists or as road users. I like to wave at them when they've given me more room than they might have (with all five fingers, of course!), to show them I've noticed their kindness and encourage further kindness to other cyclists. It's not entirely altruistic, of course: I want them to recognize me in the future as a legitimate and courteous road user, as well, since I ride the Westport Road corridor almost daily.


I was running late for my normal departure time this morning. I could have opted for the car, but I chose to ride a bike I don't normally use for my commute. My Strada is MUCH faster than my Vanguard--I averaged about 18 miles an hour on the way to work instead of the usual 12 or so. I didn't get to carry some things I wanted to carry, as I don't have the cargo capacity, but I got to work on time.

A peek at my stats on mycyclinglog.com showed me that I will break four thousand miles for 2010 later this week--probably some time Thursday or Friday, depending on what I do Thursday. A bit over twelve hundred of those miles are club miles. A bit under three thousand of those miles are in leiu of using a car (i.e. utility cycling), something that touches on that planning stuff I mentioned earlier.

I find that by using the bike instead of the car, I do my errands more efficiently. I plan them for loops instead of multiple trips when I can. If I don't really need something, I leave it at the store. I get to re-allocate money I would otherwise use for gas or other stuff I don't need to buy nicer food instead.

Share the lane with whom?

Most mornings, I have uneventful rides to work. This morning was almost uneventful.

I was on Westport Road, approaching the traffic light just west of Hurstbourne Parkway that gives access to the shopping plaza where Kroger and Louisville Athletic Center are located. A motorist in a Honda CR-V rolled down his window and opined that "we would all be safer if you stay farther to the right." I replied that, no, he was wrong--I was far safer where I was in the lane (about the middle of the lane, tending toward the right tire track). He would hear none of it, of course, as he was plainly not in the mood for dialog. I offered to discuss it with him, and share with him why I felt I was safer, but he drove off, yelling something about the world revolving around me, and no doubt muttering to the two small children in his car how "that cyclist is such a selfish bastard."

Motorists make such claims to get cyclists out of their way. They think that having a cyclist out at the edge of the pavement is somehow safer, or at least that telling me it's safer will get me out there so they can pass me illegally in my lane instead of having to slow down a bit and wait for a chance to use the next lane over. Their imprecation for me to change my behavior has not a whit to do with my safety as much as it has to do with their perceived inconvenience at having to deal with a cyclist on "their" roadway.

I periodically sift through the Kentucky Driver's Manual looking for passages that support such viewpoints as expressed by that motorist from this morning. I've yet to find any. I keep finding things that are directly opposed to his viewpoint. It makes me wonder whether that driver ever read the manual he was required to read when he "earned" his license. I keep wanting to challenge people like him with a copy of the manual, and ask them to find for me the part that supports their outlandish claims. Of course, none of them want to take the time to find it--they are in far too much of a hurry to get where they want to go to have any dialog at all about traffic rules, especially a dialog that could lead to their discovery that they are wrong.

Keri posted on her Cycling Orlando blog about Cyclist Inferiority Complex, in the context of her description of what otherwise was an excellent trip. I don't think anyone would diagnose me as having it, given what I freely admit is something of a metaphorical chip on my shoulder regarding my place in traffic. I really need to get some signs made with the image on the back of Keri's jersey, and mount them on flags hanging from my bike.

I was reminded recently of the horizontal flags that some cyclists had a couple decades ago. They seem to be available in other countries even today. I keep thinking about having one with a very sharp barb on the end for motorists that crowd me as they pass--maybe even figuring out a way to spread acidic gel on a car that is especially egregious about crowding me...

Then I find something better to do than daydream.

Second place!

Since starting to log my miles on mycyclinglog.com, I've bumped along in fourth or fifth place among the Louisville group started by Dominic. I'm sure that at least a couple people in that group have ceased logging their miles, as I'm sure they are still riding. However, as noted, I've bumped along behind Rick, Ray and David, sometimes behind Manton, for most of the year. June saw me drop further behind, since I was off the bikes for the two weeks that I was out of town working Race Across America.

Imagine my surprise, then, to note that I'm now in second place. Ahead of David, who has been a more steadfast commuter than I for much of the last two years!

I had a good month in August, as previously discussed here. I rode a LOT of miles in August and July. I may ride a fair bit in September as well, although I'm going to be driving this weekend.

I'm driving because I'm going to be hauling more tools and supplies than I want to carry by bike as I support the Old Kentucky Home Tour. I'll be staffing the store during business hours Saturday, then hauling my self and my supplies to Bardstown to work on bikes for a while. I'm scheduled to leave Bardstown about 0700 Sunday to do roving support for cyclists on the route home, which includes the famous "cookie stop" near Wilsonville, about half-way home. It's a good time for me, to be sure, as I get to put on my metaphorical white hat and rescue folks' bike rides.

The Old Kentucky Home Tour won't be over for me until the coolers, water jugs, tables and supplies are stowed in the club's storage unit, though, and that will be some time after five pm that Sunday. Still, it's a good time, and a great cycling party.

I hope you will join us on the ride!

Labor Day weekend stuff

I finally got Jenn on our new-to-us tandem today!

She decided some days ago that she would use riding the tandem as a reward for doing some paperwork she's been putting off. I finally sat her down and got that done last night--at least far enough along that she'd ride the bike with me today.

Of course, by the time we were getting ready to go, we were going to be a bit rushed to arrive at the 2:00 PM club ride and do all I wanted to do. Still, we got there with enough time that I could fiddle with the steering a bit before the club ride left the parking lot (I needed to fine-tune my adjustments a bit). While riding, I learned what Larry meant when he was telling me that the captain's seat has an unnerving roll about the axis of the main frame tube. I'd heard that some of these seats did that with the Rad-Loc mounting system, but had no idea how disconcerting the experience was.

The roll-axis motion in the seat mounting was most of why the bike felt squirrelly compared to Bill and Kate's bike. I hope so, anyway. I'll need to have some conversations with the folks at RANS this week, as this will not do for long-term use. Otherwise, the bike felt good. I need to fine-tune the rear shifting a bit--the barrel adjuster on the shifter wouldn't move for me during the ride, and it's not quite where I want it. Hopefully I will remember to work on that before we leave for the Mayor's Hike and Bike in the morning.

As it turned out, some of the problem was loose hardware on the "sprint braces" supporting the seat back. Some of the problem was resolved--at least until I discuss the situation further with RANS--by adding some aluminum foil at the Rad-Loc rail to shim the seat in a more upright position. I'm not sure all the creaking has gone away--I didn't have enough time to fully test my work before departing to meet a friend with whom I planned to mark part of the Old Kentucky Home Tour route.

Yep, that's right, it's OKHT time again! This weekend will see the Bardstown ride in its thirty-third iteration. I don't get to ride it this year, but will see folks in Bardstown Saturday evening and Sunday morning in my bike-fixing-person capacity. I'll be wandering about the route on Sunday, looking for folks who need help getting their bikes working as well.

See you out there!

August is over already?

August was a good month for me, cycling-wise. I looked at my log on mycyclinglog.com, and realized that there were exactly five days in August on which I didn't ride at least twenty miles. Given that three of those days were Sundays, it also means I rode to work every day I worked in August--the second month this year I've been able to say that. In April, I rode to work every day, but Jenn brought me home using my truck twice--once to look at houses, once because it was raining cats, dogs and the occasional pot-bellied pig.

Jenn bailed me out one time in August--after a club ride I captained got rained on heavily shortly before we finished. Even so, that day was good for thirty miles. She also picked me up one other time, as we were attending a party one of her co-workers was having that afternoon. The remaining day for which I logged less than twenty miles was the day I had the road and written tests for the New Rider Clinic, as I was stuck at the parking lot proctoring the written test while others rode the road test for me.

All in all, August was good for 710 miles. It still didn't beat my high-mileage month for this year--July, with 777, but I haven't done any centuries or RAIN in August.

Naturally, I wound up driving to work on Wednesday. I had an appointment to meet a reporter from the Ceej in the afternoon, and as the appointment was in Fern Creek, I opted for a faster mode of travel to minimize my time away from the store during the day. I'm not sure whether the story he was writing will be published, or when, so I'll leave it for a later discussion. I'm not sure I'm happy about things at the moment, anyway, as I would have preferred to know a bit more about the issue at hand before commenting. That said, knowing what I know today, I probably wouldn't have changed a whole lot of my comments. We'll see how it sounds when the article shows.

I still haven't gotten Jenn on the tandem. There is this issue of some paperwork she's been putting off, and she has decided that it has to be done before she'll ride the bike. It looks like I'll have to do this paperwork--the things I will do for my wife--but she's going to have to help. Maybe I'll find time to do it this week.

A couple summers ago, I bought a real, er, reel mower. I found it at Home Despot, and as the packing materials were missing, I looked it over a bit closer before loading it on my cart. One of the smaller wheels was damaged, so I asked the sales guy what kind of discount I could get on the thing.

I got it for half price--about $65.

A month or so later, I found a flier on my front door advertising a lawn mowing service that was going to charge me $35 per week to cut my grass. For less than two weeks worth of such a service, I had a perfectly serviceable mower. My mower is quiet, so I can mow whenever I want without disturbing any neighbors. My mower doesn't kick up the clouds of dust I associate with gas-powered rotary mowers, so my allergies don't flare when I cut the grass.

The handle broke when I was cutting the grass a week or two ago. The front yard at the new house grows pretty slow this time of year, and judging from the assortment of lawn care herbicides and such the prior owner was having something of a battle getting nice grass to grow consistently. When I do cut the grass, I keep wondering about re-seeding the yard this fall with something that will do better at choking out weeds and not need expensive fertilizers.

Anyway, back to the broken handle. I contacted a company online that advertised the mower, and learned that they don't carry replacement parts like handles. The manufacturer is willing to deal with end users, however, and I called them to order a replacement part. I was informed that they had changed the handle design a bit, in part due to failures like the one I was reporting. The nice woman on the phone decided that my mower was new enough that it was under warranty, and sent me a new handle assembly (not just the part that failed) at no charge. It arrived today.

I get to cut my grass tomorrow evening. My yard will look better. I'll be happier.