Dear People/person who invented the first concept cars, I hate you. Dear People/person who invented the first car cup holder, I hate you even more. Dear People/person who invented the first light up mirror on a car visor, I think i might hate you the most. Dear People/person who invented the system for an automobile to park itself, I was previously wrong about the person who invented the light up mirror in the visor, because I definitely hate YOU the most!!!
A quick must share story about my commute to work a couple days ago: I'm in the left most turn lane of 2 left turn lanes on St Pauls in Downtown Norfolk getting ready to turn to get on Waterside Dr to take the interstate ramp towards Virginia Beach. The light changes to green, I start driving/turning, I noticed the car in the other turn lane is kinda creepin over into my lane halfway through the turn, I slow down and watch the driver casually take the lane, no turn signal, no driver looking back with an urgent look to see if there was room, no abnormal acceleration to get out in front of my car to make sure they could get into the lane and not miss an exit or whatever. Nothing. Just this person not looking and swerving into the other turn lane negligently. If I'd accelerated at the same rate the other driver did, which i was til i got the weird stomach feeling of "THAT PERSON IS GOING TO HIT MY CAR!", the other car would've hit my car. The shitty thing is when I'm on my bicycles, I see this ALL THE TIME!!! Waiting at the front of a red light, almost halfway in the intersection being 6' 2" tall, I have a pretty nice view of the flow of cars and their lane positions. I see it at almost every major intersection. People always lazily cut into the inside lane next to them whether there are other drivers there or not, then the driver in the inside lane has to slow down or travel outside of the lane to the inside to avoid a collision. This is crazy. When I turn, I stay in the lane I'm traveling in! It got me thinking though... What if I stayed there? What if I held my lane position? Would they run into me? Would I be blamed for the accident? Would my insurance premium go up? Would it ruin my day? What if the other driver didn't have insurance? BUT?!?! What if they did and I called the police and went through the whole process and let's say my fender and door or my rear bumper got damaged. Would I somehow profit from the other driver's negligence? Probably.
The day after that happened, i rode my bicycle to work and got honked at then flicked off and had another driver do the pass then slam the brakes maneuver after realizing they weren't going to get in front of me in time to turn right in front of me (the right hook almost got me!!!!!). I hadn't been flipped the bird in a while. Does anybody still call it "the bird"? Am i old because I just called it that"? Oh well... So the driver honked as they passed, I turned around abruptly to see what was going on right behind me and saw the little pickup swerve around me without slowing down at all. Realizing this was the source of the offending honk, I put one hand up with a shrug of my shoulders to say "why are you honking at me?" and I got an aggressively extended middle finger. The classic "get the fuck out of my way you idiot" response that even on roads with slower (35mph) speed limits, some drivers still look at cyclers as something that shouldn't be in their way on the road. (THERE'S A SIDEWALK RIGHT THERE!!! I haven't heard that one in a while!) I don't get too worked up by drivers giving me the middle finger while I'm riding anymore. I don't remember the first time it happened but I'm sure I was furious. Eventually you almost expect it. I remember a time when i chased and caught up to a car at a red light that had a couple teenaged girls in it who had just yelled "GET ON THE FUCKING SIDEWALK!!!" and honked at me while passing. When I rolled up in front of that car and saw how young these people were, it was somehow MORE upsetting to me. I screamed at them, "DO YOU KNOW WHAT SHARE THE ROAD MEANS?!?!?! IT MEANS SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!!" I scared them. I knew it. I saw the fear in their eyes as a man obviously older than they were and fuming with anger screamed at them while they sat in their four wheeled steel pod of "protection". I wasn't ashamed of my self reaction and in some ways I'm still not. Alot of people might never understand what that's like. But i hope those teenagers felt vulnerable in that car at that intersection and I hope they never yell ignorantly at cyclists again. Sometimes there's no reasoning that will teach people things. There's certainly no reasoning that's going to teach someone driving a car to not swerve around a cyclist while honking and immediately maneuver their vehicle to the extreme right side of the lane that the cyclist is traveling in to "cut them off". Someone that would do this can't be reasoned with. They feel invincible in their car. Most people do. Cars create what some perceive as an impenetrable force field of protection. Yelling at them while you're riding a 20ish pound metal bicycle in the same flow of traffic they are is only going to make things less safe for you. Yelling at the teenagers that I yelled at surely was not the safest thing but sometimes, it's just the right thing to do. That doesn't make sense. Let's move on.
It's hot outside right now. and really humid. My ride to work the other day when i got honked at and flicked off was the hottest ride I've been on this year so far and I was thinking that day that I should blog about smart riding habits when it's 100 degrees outside. So here we go: DRINK WATER!!! Don't even go out for a 5 mile quick ride without water. When i go out for recreational bicycle adventures, I usually have an idea of how far or how much time I'm intending on being out, but it usually doesn't end up being what I intended. I usually end up going a little further or cutting my ride short and hanging out in a park watching squirrels for an hour (still outside, still needing water when it's this hot!). I also don't like to expose more skin than necessary when riding. I wear shorts, usually 2 pairs, my bike shorts (specialized bg comp, which I'd highly recommend to anyone!!!) and my Rivendell MUSA shorts over the bikeshorts. Some think I'm crazy, but I don't wear short sleeve shirts when I bike commute in the summer. I try to keep my arms protected from the sun as much as I can. I wear moisture wicking long sleeve shirts with my screaming yellow vest over it. I'm intending on acquiring a seersucker shirt or one of those outdoorsy hiking/camping patagonia shirts that has a decent sun protection rating soon. I've been wearing the moisture wicking athletic long sleeve shirts for a few years now and still by the end of summer my arms are always super tan which brings me to: ALWAYS WEAR SUNSCREEN!!!!! AND PUT IT ON YOUR FACE!!! Ask any 65-70 year old what their dermatologist tells them about protecting their skin from the sun, my Dad wears specialty shirts and hats from a company that only makes sun protection clothing. After going through cancer treatment for his throat cancer 9 years ago, his body has taken a beating, but he's also had minor procedures to remove cancerous tissue from his face in little spots a couple times, so have several other older folks that are near and dear to my heart. We have to be smart about these things now so later on we can enjoy our lives! And people who are are now in their late 60's and early 70's had a more intact ozone layer, blocking out more of the harmful uv rays than we do now. So... we need to be even more careful to protect ourselves! Don't push yourself too hard when it's uncomfortably hot outside, be proud that you're riding your bike, but don't be a rockstar about it, when you work hard, you get hot, when the air around you is already hot, you're going to be alot hotter and there's not much relief when your water bottles get warm and you're sweating like OJ Simpson trying on a crusty glove (90's reference +50 points!). Be smart. I've learned this the hard way. I used to get headaches alot in the summer time. Then I did some research and found out about "overexertion head aches", i still don't 100% understand what caused them, but i kept riding and stopped pushing myself as hard, drank more water, started wearing a cycling cap to keep the sun out of my eyes (less squinting!) and now I don't get them anymore. I never thought I'd be comfortable riding when it's 90+ degrees outside, but you can be. You're going to be soaked in sweat, probably almost immediately after you start riding. You need to keep up with how much you're sweating, don't chug a bottle of water as soon as you start sweating but be conscious of how you feel. Is your mouth getting dry? Take a sip of water. Don't wait to start drinking your water til it's too late. If you start feeling super shitty, it's too late. Pull over, find some shade, drink some water and dump some on your head too. When commuting, give yourself some extra time when it's hot outside. I like to get to work and stop outside and relax for a minute, let my heart rate come down a little, instead of rushing into the cold air conditioned building soaked in sweat and roasting. I try to convince myself that maybe some of the sweat will evaporate when i do this too, the math of it makes sense, but i probably still look like a sweaty monster when i walk through the store after a 95 degree bike commute. Oh well.
I really planned on this being a short post, it never turns out that way. Welp, until next time, WEAR YOUR GOD DAMN SUNSCREEN AND DRINK WATER!!! and when you drive, don't cut that inside lane short when you turn, or the guy in the red civic with really faded paint might let you hit him. He'd rather be riding a bike than driving that car anyway.
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