http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120457877&sc=fb&cc=fp

Not too much new to be had here, the usual finger pointing between drivers and cyclists. But keeping this in the news is important.

http://www.citizen-times.com/article/20091121/NEWS01/911200352

120 days.

Simons described being confronted by the 17-year Fire Department veteran on the morning of July 26 as he was riding his bike along Tunnel Road with his 4-year-old son in a seat on the back and his wife on another bike.He said Diez yelled at him from his car, claiming he was putting the boy’s life in danger by riding on the busy roadway.

sigh.

http://velonews.com/article/99800/

The good doctor was found guilty of six felonies and one misdemeanor and could face as much as five years in prison. Hopefully he serves the time.

Since im a designer, well an awful one anyway, I found this interesting from an aesthetic and historical standpoint. Its a pretty nice collection of cycling board games.

http://www.copenhagenize.com/2009/09/fear-of-cycling-01-essay-in-five-parts.html

Written by Dave Horton of Lancaster, England. A sociologist by training, and currently working at Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster University, on an interdisciplinary project concerning walking and cycling, and the capacity of these most sustainable modes of mobility to re-make cities and towns fit for the twenty-first century.

“Most obviously this fear relates to anxieties about being in close and unprotected proximity to speeding cars, it’s to do with a fear of crashes, injury and death. But fear of cycling is also more complex than this. People on bikes move through public space in a much more open, less mediated way than people in cars. That’s one of the pleasures of cycling, but it also potentially heightens feelings of existential vulnerability. Some people also undoubtedly fear looking inept on a bike, fear working their bodies in public, fear harassment or violence from strangers. Cities are full of fear, which is partly why and partly because people move in cars. “

Read the rest of the article!

NOW. I WANT ONE.

NO I HAVEN’T BEEN DRINKING.

ONE OF THE HORRIBLE WALKERS FLAVORS WOULD BE QUITE NICE, THATS ALL.

From Yay Bikes!:

Mike Reed

Plagiarism is unethical. It is also the hallmark of a complete lack of innovation and original ideas. How bad are things going when the very words your use to describe your group are taken from another source?

courtesy of someecards.com – get some

Join me for a trip in the Wayback Machine to December of 2007 where we’ll learn that Bike PGH has used the language describing their organization for quite some time (Bike PGH circa 12/2007)

Let’s look at a local bicycle advocacy group, Consider Biking. This is just sad. I’ve bolded the parts that differ- they are hard to spot as they are so few and far between. I will break my own rule about not linking to this group in this one case to point out the plagiarism.

COBAC/Consider Biking’s about page:

Bike Pittsburgh’s About Page:

Wait, there’s more.

COBAC

PGH

Who knew that Pittsburgh and Columbus had the exact same kinds of cyclists with the same needs, and employed the same exact tactics for promoting cycling? Exactly.

Here are some original ideas- and COBAC even can have my permission to loot from these as they please. A strong cycling constituency begins with a group that has and is founded on integrity. Integrity means, among other things, not helping yourself to things that are not yours because you feel like it. To effect any real mode shift people are going to have to dig deep and muster up some original ideas. This group appears to lack them at the core. At the very least know what your organization is “about” and think up some of your own words to describe it. Respect ideas and intellectual property. It may seem like a small matter in your group to lift content from some other advocacy group’s site, but it suggests much about your organization. Finally, Columbus has unique cyclists and our cyclists have unique needs. Do them a service by doing your own work and thereby demonstrating that you have a clue about their needs beyond some boilerplate copy/paste text you took from someone else.

I love Pittsburgh and I’ve talked with folks from Bike PGH at BikeBike- they are an innovative, cutting edge advocacy group and don’t deserve to have their hard work appropriated in any way, no matter how large or small. I’ve sent them a quick note to let them know. I’m not sure if they’ll be outraged or not, but I get pretty miffed when people take the stuff I think up.

A word of caution. Know what you are getting into if you work with Consider Biking/COBAC- in my opinion this group lacks of original ideas and has demonstrated that they are not above taking ideas from some other source to fill that big, empty void… down to the very words that describe their organization.

Screenshot attached- these kinds of things have a way of disappearing or getting corrected once you shine a light on them.

________________________________________________________

I’m really loving Mike right now, hes got me feeling that special feeling deep in my loins.

From Married to the Sea

I totally know how she feels. I mean at least about getting off the fixie.

A story about a woman who was “disgusted” by finding the head of a chicken in the package with the rest of the bird she bought at a grocery.

“Miss Kirby said: “I bought it a few weeks ago and put it in the freezer but when I took it out and cooked it, I saw its head and neck were tucked underneath.”
“It was disgusting. It was cooked but I took it into the shop because they weren’t answering the phones.”

How is this any more disgusting than the carcass of the bird? People are silly animals.

I mean, really. Clicky here.

No, really, like this:

Reasonable.

In addition this quote from 70 year old footballer Roger Craddock :

“I’ve got one cartilage left in my knee, so it would be absolutely stupid to pack it in before I tear that.”

Pretty much sums it up. I’m thinking he know what its about.