Posted On Monday, November 9th, 2009 By David Veatch
It’s a bit dark in the mornings these days to break out the camera and provide visual evidence of how gorgeous it is. Not that that’s anything new to the huge number of readers I have the pleasure of counting as my audience. I have really nice camera, but I just can’t seem to stop myself while riding long enough to take pictures. Maybe one day I’ll learn to slow down and enjoy the views a bit more. Maybe some day I’ll come up with a safe way to store the camera so that it’s easily accessible. Until then, my flowery language will have to suffice. At better than 60°F this morning, cloudy and just slightly damp, it was a truly spectacular 5 mile ride in to work. I couldn’t have driven even if I’d wanted to, as my car is in the shop getting it’s transmission and fuel system flushed, a tire repaired, and some drying and cracking belt that apparently runs lots of really important systems replaced. Would I have driven? Maybe. I might have driven and brought with me a week’s worth of clothes so I didn’t have to pack each day. Then I would have driven more »
Posted On Wednesday, November 4th, 2009 By David Veatch
Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner of California released regulations permitting and authorizing mileage verification for pay-as-you-drive. The idea being that Californians won’t drive as much if they pay-per-mile. Spokesmen from a few Insurance companies, including State Farm and Allstate, have stated that they are considering pay-per-mile auto insurance but haven’t decided whether or not it’ll actually become a reality. With the economy being the way it is, getting a…Read More Is it just me, or would this be of great benefit to those of us who ride our bikes as much as, if not more than, we drive? I can hear the detractors now, though… “Pay your fair share of the road costs! Register your bike so you have a right to the road just like we do!” Bah. As if insurance payments go to road maintenance. I wonder if, after a year on a pay-as-you-go plan, they’d be willing to go the same route as utility companies who offer “Budget Billing” rates based on the average of your last 12 months?
Posted On Wednesday, November 4th, 2009 By David Veatch
“Hi Readers — When you get right down to it, a lot of Free-Range Kids ends up being a plea for more community. More helping each other, more trusting each other, even more hanging out with each other. And here is a story of just that: A brief glimpse of how nice it is when [...] When zero-discretion policies and accurate risk calculus collide we have… common sense. This story is remarkable by the very fact that it’s unremarkable.
Posted On Thursday, October 29th, 2009 By David Veatch
I meant to post about this yesterday, but I got busy right when I got home, and then when the busy wore off, I got relaxed on the couch in front of the television. To set the scene, as I was riding home yesterday, around the corner of 91st and Lamar, I was part of a long line of traffic caught behind a school bus that had stopped to let off some kiddos. The woman in the car in front of me was reading what looked like business documents. The papers were propped up on her steering wheel, and she was reading them the entire time I was behind her. Granted, it was very slow moving traffic, and it was stop-and-go while we approached the stop sign, but she was reading while she was driving. She was reading. While she was driving. Nothing is so important that it couldn’t wait until she got to where she was going. I don’t care what it was. Nope. Not even that. It could have waited. Remember the school bus? There were children all around. They were running this way and that on either side of the street. How many of you haven’t seen more »
Posted On Monday, October 12th, 2009 By David Veatch
I just dropped my car off at the shop to get the ignition looked at. It doesn’t like to start in the cold. Contrary to all previous experience, they were unable to give me a ride home after I dropped the car off. I had a feeling this would be the case, so I’m glad I called to confirm it. Rather than scramble to find a ride, I just used it as a test ride to make sure all was in order for the bike commuting, which I start tomorrow. All was in order with the bike. With me, however… I’m a touch out of shape.
Posted On Wednesday, October 7th, 2009 By David Veatch
I really do miss the daily riding. Every day I see one or two people riding their bikes to work. Ironically, I see more people riding bikes now that I’m driving, than I saw while I was riding. They look like well seasoned and responsible riders too. No wrong-way bike ninjas, these. They’re sporting all the requisite lights, panniers, layers and neon wind breakers. I think one of them even has the new 2010 Kona Dew Drop. It probably has more miles on it already than my ’09 model. Sigh. It wasn’t all fun and games. I know there was pain. I know that there were days when my fingers and toes hurt so bad from the cold and wind I could barely stand it, and honestly wondered if I’d arrive to find frostbite setting in. I know there was frustration. It was sometimes burdensome having to plan so carefully for weather that goes by barely noticed from inside my car. Wearing winter clothing on the way to work, and summer clothing on the way home was tough to plan for. I got used to it, and learned my temperature comfort thresholds, but I had to get used to. While more »
Posted On Friday, June 26th, 2009 By David Veatch
In the manual, the 2004 Saturn ION is listed as “No Fit”. On their website, they say I need a custom fitting in order to get it to work. I say they’re wrong. I installed the King Joe 3 on my 2004 Saturn ION Quad Coupe yesterday without any problem whatsoever.
Posted On Wednesday, January 28th, 2009 By David Veatch
I’ve gotten pretty good at the rollers*. Every day I ride a little longer and a little harder. There’s no doubt that it’s good preparation, even if it’s neither ideal, nor as enjoyable as actual outdoor riding. Still, I miss my new bike. It’s hanging on the wall in the little bike alcove I made last year, and hasn’t seen any action in weeks. I console it every day as I pass by, knowing that at my approach, it’s gears start to vibrate and it’s chain starts to glisten, but I continue on my way, and it’s left hanging. Poor thing. I’m a bad bikefriend. But it’s just too cold out for me. I proved I could do it last year, and realized that it just wasn’t any fun at all. Furthermore, I don’t have any way to have a car both at work and at home when I commute by bike these days. I could feasibly stop with the wussing, and deal with the cold, but the logistics of needing a car here and there, and only having the one for both places are, at least for the moment, prohibitively difficult to overcome. When it warms up, I may more »
Posted On Monday, December 15th, 2008 By David Veatch
When, at the same time one encounters temperatures below 10… verily, below 5, and a persistent cough due to cold, one might be tempted to throw on layer after wind breaking layer, air up the tires, lube up the chain with a durable lubricant, wheel the bicycle out of the garage and make ones way against 10+ mph cross and head winds the 8 miles to work. Not me. This morning, I resisted the temptation, utter and compelling though it was, and decided to eschew the saddle for the seat… the handlebar for the steering wheel… the painful yet oddly numb fingers and toes and lips and nose for the same, but toasty and warm. I’m proud of myself. It’s not often that I’ll be so staunch and resolute in the resistance of temptation, hedonist that I am. But this morning, I put my foot down, and though the Drop was calling my name loudly and clearly, I had to let her down, pass her by, and sit my butt down in the seat behind a steering wheel instead. My cough, painful and persistent as it is, might have bolstered my ability to resist the temptation to ride this morning, more »
Posted On Thursday, November 20th, 2008 By David Veatch
Though I be in Texas, far away from home and the bike that awaits me, new and unridden, with virgin saddle, as it were, my thoughts stray now and again, all the same, to the subject of cycling. I think on how nice it will be to once again sit astride the saddle, my arms outstretched holding brake levers and handlebars. I think on how nice it will be to see my waistline diminish once again, rather than continue it’s current trend of slow expansion. I think on how nice it will be to once again stride out the front doors with pride, knowing that I will be making it home on my own power, while at the same time clowning around like a fool for the cadre of lustful (though unfortunately married) women who have come to be a sort of 4:30pm Fan Club for yours truly (I take the ego boosts where I can get them). But lately, one thought presses forward as I spend minute after empty minute in the cabin of an automobile instead of the saddle of a bicycle… that thought is what I will share with you now. And here it is, then. That more »