I KEEL YOU
Attention bicyclists of the world:
You may either decide to be a pedestrian or a motor vehicle. On campus, you choose to zip across sidewalks with rampant disregard for pedestrians or automobiles at crosswalks. Or maybe you decide that you deserve a full lane of space on a campus road -- until you come to a four-way stop and you decide to eke by the stopped vehicles and the curb. Kansas law says you're a motor vehicle, but if the consensus would rather, I will entertain the notion of a bicycle being simply an enhanced pedestrian, especially given traffic patterns on campus.
But here's the thing. Pick one and stick with it. I've almost killed three people today because they decided to switch from one to the other, to dart into and out of traffic, intermittently obey walk-don't-walk signs. Maybe you deserve to die, but I don't deserve to have to live with that.
Pedestrians: hang up and cross at crosswalks. Do not step in front of me while you're talking to Jake about that awesome beer bong he made out of a pumpkin. You may have the right of way on campus, and yes, the onus may fall upon me to read your stupid fucking mind as to at which moment you're going to decide to zip across the street. The right of way is a wonderful thing, but so is an intact skeletal system. I teach one class, it's physics 101, and it involves independent study in asphalt. Prerequisites are abyssal stupidity and reveling in obliviousness. It's pass/fail, and it meets in your skull once a semester.
You may either decide to be a pedestrian or a motor vehicle. On campus, you choose to zip across sidewalks with rampant disregard for pedestrians or automobiles at crosswalks. Or maybe you decide that you deserve a full lane of space on a campus road -- until you come to a four-way stop and you decide to eke by the stopped vehicles and the curb. Kansas law says you're a motor vehicle, but if the consensus would rather, I will entertain the notion of a bicycle being simply an enhanced pedestrian, especially given traffic patterns on campus.
But here's the thing. Pick one and stick with it. I've almost killed three people today because they decided to switch from one to the other, to dart into and out of traffic, intermittently obey walk-don't-walk signs. Maybe you deserve to die, but I don't deserve to have to live with that.
Pedestrians: hang up and cross at crosswalks. Do not step in front of me while you're talking to Jake about that awesome beer bong he made out of a pumpkin. You may have the right of way on campus, and yes, the onus may fall upon me to read your stupid fucking mind as to at which moment you're going to decide to zip across the street. The right of way is a wonderful thing, but so is an intact skeletal system. I teach one class, it's physics 101, and it involves independent study in asphalt. Prerequisites are abyssal stupidity and reveling in obliviousness. It's pass/fail, and it meets in your skull once a semester.