Rolling, rolling
Today marks the very first time I nearly hit another cyclist! And I don't mean "Oops, got a little close on the trail there, sorry" hit (that happens a lot). I mean "That would've been a spectacular and deadly crash!" hit. This fantastic buttmunch ran a red light while I was leaving from a green light (because I stop at lights when they're red) and was riding in the crosswalk, which is acceptable only when... never. I expect this kind of behavior from bike messengers, and, in fact, I tend to shrug it off when they do something that looks like it would kill anyone else who tried it. But that kind of risk is their job, and I generally assume that they do crazy things with an understanding of the consequences. Also none of them have ever killed me. Generally, though, they don't run red lights in the crosswalk, because that's just dumb, and the sort of thing only a helmetless blue button-downed crazy McBroker face would do on his thousand-dollar Yupster bike just to show how fast he could pedal (Note: Not Fast Enough, given how slow I am out of the starting blocks).
I'm all for the bike commuting. I'd go so far as to say I love it. But this guy clearly thought he was cool, and that's just not how it works. Today I left work with one plaid pant leg rubber-banded up almost to my knee so my chain wouldn't eat it... I was wearing a tight black tank top with my work shirt on over it, because I was going to the store and didn't want to walk in looking half-undressed. I was also wearing bright green and purple athletic shoes. It's humid now, too, so every time I take my helmet off my hair is apparently replaced by the top half of a lion. Point being: You cannot effectively commute by bike without looking like a looney. (Part of my particular problem is that I'm too lazy to get proper biking clothes. The other part is that I don't want to haul an extra pair of pants to work in addition to my lunch, snacks, proper topside attire, and my bike tools. Looking a fool is efficient. Also I'm hoping it'll stop the evening janitor hitting on me quite so much when I leave work late. Which is always.) And have you ever seen a bike messenger? They only look cool because they've been mismatched and weird for so long they've become one with it (or they were mismatched and weird to begin with and that's why they thought it'd be cool to be a bike messenger).
Lesson for everyone here being... um. Don't be a tool. I'm starting to think the reason people in cars hate people on bikes is that we're unpredictable and behave like we have an inalienable right not to ever have to brake or lose momentum. And by "starting to think" I pretty much mean "realized as soon as I got up the nerve to start biking downtown." We'd all be much better off if people would just signal and obey reasonable traffic courtesy. I mean... weaving in and out of a traffic jam is one thing (that "one thing" being "very satisfying"), as is riding very wide of parked cars (which I acknowledge is very annoying for anyone behind me, but man guys car doors hurt, I'm sorry, some day I'll get over it), but blowing through a busy intersection during rush hour is entirely different. I was in a car with a friend a few weeks ago and we were coming up toward Millennium Park and I had to warn him that a couple of cyclists were going to cut him off because no one in their right mind wants to be on a bike next to a taxi in the turning lane (something you learn on about day two of biking downtown, but never learn if you've never biked downtown). But did they give any indication that they were going to cut over in front of him? Did they even look? Nope! And if he had hit them there's no way they would've been at fault. (This is actually part of why I refuse to drive downtown.)
I was going to whine about something else, like how my internet is so slow lately that I can't even use Hulu or how work is insane, but this will do for now.
But oh! Okay, one more thing, and then I'm going to bed. Has anyone else read Kafka's Metamorphosis? I finally got around to reading it (... as a break from Finnegan's Wake. Let's just ignore this bit, okay?). And... um. I found it kind of cute, poignant, and sad. It's supposed to be really crushingly depressing, right? But mostly I was thinking "Wow, Kafka leaves this all up to interpretation, nice!" Perhaps this is because I'm used to The Angst being hammered home very obviously. Maybe it's also because the translation I read was pretty matter-of-fact and not flowery at all (I think the only bit of extraneous description that I remember was to do with the light from the street outside). I mean, I know I'm meant to employ the sort of literary tools I left sitting next to those dissected seasons of Doctor Who I have lying around over there, but lots of people have done that already, and I was just after the gestalt of the thing. I was afraid I was going to read this and go "Oh man my job... it's turning me into a bug too!" but instead I read it going "... You know, this just gave me an excellent idea for a backstory for a character. Or a children's book." Perhaps this is a sign that it's already too late for me? (Day 9317: Still no apple lodged in my carapace. Things are a-ok!)
I'm all for the bike commuting. I'd go so far as to say I love it. But this guy clearly thought he was cool, and that's just not how it works. Today I left work with one plaid pant leg rubber-banded up almost to my knee so my chain wouldn't eat it... I was wearing a tight black tank top with my work shirt on over it, because I was going to the store and didn't want to walk in looking half-undressed. I was also wearing bright green and purple athletic shoes. It's humid now, too, so every time I take my helmet off my hair is apparently replaced by the top half of a lion. Point being: You cannot effectively commute by bike without looking like a looney. (Part of my particular problem is that I'm too lazy to get proper biking clothes. The other part is that I don't want to haul an extra pair of pants to work in addition to my lunch, snacks, proper topside attire, and my bike tools. Looking a fool is efficient. Also I'm hoping it'll stop the evening janitor hitting on me quite so much when I leave work late. Which is always.) And have you ever seen a bike messenger? They only look cool because they've been mismatched and weird for so long they've become one with it (or they were mismatched and weird to begin with and that's why they thought it'd be cool to be a bike messenger).
Lesson for everyone here being... um. Don't be a tool. I'm starting to think the reason people in cars hate people on bikes is that we're unpredictable and behave like we have an inalienable right not to ever have to brake or lose momentum. And by "starting to think" I pretty much mean "realized as soon as I got up the nerve to start biking downtown." We'd all be much better off if people would just signal and obey reasonable traffic courtesy. I mean... weaving in and out of a traffic jam is one thing (that "one thing" being "very satisfying"), as is riding very wide of parked cars (which I acknowledge is very annoying for anyone behind me, but man guys car doors hurt, I'm sorry, some day I'll get over it), but blowing through a busy intersection during rush hour is entirely different. I was in a car with a friend a few weeks ago and we were coming up toward Millennium Park and I had to warn him that a couple of cyclists were going to cut him off because no one in their right mind wants to be on a bike next to a taxi in the turning lane (something you learn on about day two of biking downtown, but never learn if you've never biked downtown). But did they give any indication that they were going to cut over in front of him? Did they even look? Nope! And if he had hit them there's no way they would've been at fault. (This is actually part of why I refuse to drive downtown.)
I was going to whine about something else, like how my internet is so slow lately that I can't even use Hulu or how work is insane, but this will do for now.
But oh! Okay, one more thing, and then I'm going to bed. Has anyone else read Kafka's Metamorphosis? I finally got around to reading it (... as a break from Finnegan's Wake. Let's just ignore this bit, okay?). And... um. I found it kind of cute, poignant, and sad. It's supposed to be really crushingly depressing, right? But mostly I was thinking "Wow, Kafka leaves this all up to interpretation, nice!" Perhaps this is because I'm used to The Angst being hammered home very obviously. Maybe it's also because the translation I read was pretty matter-of-fact and not flowery at all (I think the only bit of extraneous description that I remember was to do with the light from the street outside). I mean, I know I'm meant to employ the sort of literary tools I left sitting next to those dissected seasons of Doctor Who I have lying around over there, but lots of people have done that already, and I was just after the gestalt of the thing. I was afraid I was going to read this and go "Oh man my job... it's turning me into a bug too!" but instead I read it going "... You know, this just gave me an excellent idea for a backstory for a character. Or a children's book." Perhaps this is a sign that it's already too late for me? (Day 9317: Still no apple lodged in my carapace. Things are a-ok!)