Cats Make Lousy Drivers

Certainly texting while driving is
safer (and easier) than this!

When I was around 10 years old, I began to walk down that dark, narrow road that leads one to become a cat lover.  I won’t go into the details of that journey now; suffice it to say that while I enjoy other people’s dogs, I haven’t had a dog of my own since I was a kid. 

Part of the problem is that I have little (or NO) patience when it comes to training a dog, nor do I have the time to do a proper job.  This isn’t to say that we might not get a dog once we’ve retired… we’ll have nothing but time on our hands to learn how to bring up a canine properly.  I’m almost certain that whatever kind of dog we get, it won’t be a “real” dog, but one of those miniaturized designer dogs that yap and shake for their entire lifespan.  But the major prerequisite for determining breed suitability is if it will fit into a bag on the tandem.  The dog must be portable!

Back to the real subject, and that is “cats”.  They’re apparently made by Ronco^®; with a cat you just “set it and forget it”.  Bring a kitten home; show it where the litter box is and then drop them in the middle of the delightful mixture and they’ll start to dig in no time, giving you a lifetime of toxic fumes filling the house for your amusement.  Catch them sleeping on top of the dining room table?  Not a problem.  Hit them a couple of times with a spray bottle and they’ll learn to only sleep on the table when you’re not at home.  But try teaching a cat road manners?  It just won’t happen.

My father worked as a quality control inspector at a foundry just north of San Diego proper.  The foundry had a cat named “Sootie”, because she was just as grey as all the ash that could be found on the workroom floors.  Sootie had a litter of kittens, and my mother picked one out to come live with us.  (The ones I had picked out previously kept getting run over in front of our house.)

This little tabby was dark gray with accents of black and tan.  Her pelt was such that if you split her along the belly and made a cat-skin rug out of her, every marking on the left side had a corresponding match on the right side.  So perfect was her patterning that they named her Rorschach.  This name was appropriate, but didn’t roll of the tongue easily and eventually her name morphed into “Little Bit”.

Little Bit grew and, unlike any cat I picked out, lived a long life and died a natural death.  Maybe this was because she just wasn’t as friendly as the other cats; she loved her family but didn’t warm up to strangers nearly as well as “my” cats did.  Mine would trot right across the road to go see someone who might be standing there… a recipe for disaster as some point.  But Little Bit?  Street smart and long-lived.

She was allowed one litter of kittens and then it was off to the vet to make sure the cycle didn’t repeat itself.  After being there a couple of days it was time to go pick her up and bring her back home.  My mother was driving our new VW bus, and for anyone who remembers those vehicles, the steering wheel was mounted more horizontally than it was vertically.

We picked the cat up, got back in the bus and started for home.  The most direct route would be along Interstate 8, which was just a couple of blocks away from the veterinarian’s clinic.  All we had to do was come to a stop sign, make a right turn and then head for home.  There was one vehicle in front of us: a cruiser from the California Highway Patrol.

It was at this very moment that Little Bit sprouted a wild hair and leapt from my lap in the passenger’s seat to my mother’s lap in the driver’s seat and then in the blink of an eye climbed up onto the mostly horizontal steering wheel.  Of course she placed most of her weight on her left rear foot, and she placed that foot right in the middle of the horn button.  If ever there were a time for the horn to malfunction, this would have been it.  But, noooo… the horn worked perfectly. 

My mother said something, probably along the line of “oh, crap!”  She grabbed the cat, trying to avoid upsetting her stitches, and held Little Bit up close to the windshield as she handed her back to me.  In the rear view mirror of the patrol car, we could see the glaring eyes of the officer soften and his shoulders start to jiggle a little as he realized what had happened and found a little humor in the moment.  Phew!  That was a close one!  Thanks a lot, cat…

Into the time machine, which is now set for 2006.  We are driving our cats from Garden Valley, Idaho down to a veterinarian’s office in Boise – roughly a 50-mile drive.  We have learned three things: first, the cats howl and carry on if we put them into their little “cat kennels”.  Secondly, if we let them out to roam around the truck they will shut up.  And the third point is that no matter how hard the passenger tries to keep the cats entertained and over on her lap, they will both go bother the driver.  This is an unwritten law.

Have you ever tried driving with a lapful of cats?  It’s cute, heart-warming and something I would heartily recommend every driver in his or her right mind should clearly avoid!

The Art of Winter

Sometimes nature's beauty can go unnoticed.
The ice on the window is obvious, but did
you notice the ice forming on the wild
grass at the left edge of the photo?

Winter is a treacherous time of year for people who spend a majority of their time working outdoors.  Whether driving or walking, danger abounds for those folks whose attention span wanes.  Ice on the roadways or ice on the sidewalks – take your pick, there’s always the potential for trouble just around the bend.

Take for instance what my wife and I do for a living:  delivering the mail.  People have a romantic view of us in the warmth of the summer sun, wearing comfortable shorts and skipping merrily through the neighborhood amidst the chirping birds and chattering squirrels.  “You must have the best job in the world” a number of folks will say.  Yet I never hear anything like this from these same people from November to April.  As a matter of fact, I rarely ever SEE these people.  Why?  Because being intelligent people, they’re indoors where it’s warm and dry!

When I first started the mailman racket, I had a walking route in Boise’s “North End”.  One street, Harrison Boulevard, is split in the middle with a strip of grass and trees that run the length of the road.  In the springtime these trees bloom with pink or white flowers and would make a great picture-postcard of this historic street.  But this isn’t about springtime, is it?  Nope.  Back to winter.  Bare trees, and ice on the roads.

As I was delivering the mail one December morning, I had to cross Harrison Boulevard to continue delivery and work my way back toward my truck.  Just as I got to the center of the road (sometimes a major feat in itself because of the seemingly constant flow of traffic) I managed to find a patch of ice that was at just the right angle.  And by “right” I of course mean “wrong”.

In a less than graceful move that could best be described to you as slipping on a banana peel, I found myself flat on my back with a pile of letters fluttering through the air, landing on top of me.  Bad enough to be taking a short time-out in the ice and snow, but unfortunately the people driving by had a front-row view of my misfortune.  To make matters worse, several of them were honking and waving as they drove by.  One clown had the joyful idea to roll his window down and shout, “Nice job!”

Sadly, that same guy died on Christmas Eve when he choked on a fruitcake.  Or at least if I got my Christmas wish that year, he did.  I guess I’ll never really know.

I was reminded about this little incident from the mid 80’s because just last week I once again had the opportunity to get a little closer to Mother Earth.  My current route is situated at the base of, and upon, some of Boise’s foothills.  One street gets a little on the slick side every winter, and never sees the sun during the winter months.  It also rarely gets any sanding from the city because it’s a dead-end street that doesn’t have a lot of traffic.  Consequently this street gets slicker than snot.

At the very end of the street sits a house on top of a slope that is impossible for me to drive to the mailbox safely in the winter, so I get out and try to walk up instead.  This house once belonged to “Morley” Nelson, and rather than tell you about him now, I’d suggest you visit this website to get a better understanding of the man. 

After placing the mail in the mailbox, I turned to walk back down to the truck and suddenly found myself flat on my back  (just like 30 years before) sliding back down to where the truck was parked.  This was actually the faster way back to the truck, and I should remember to use this technique in the future to cut down on my delivery time!

But what about “The Art of Winter”?  That was the title of this piece of… uh… literature.  Well, for starters, take a look at (or click on) the photo at the top of this article.  Notice the way ice has formed around the window on this house, and clings to the wild grasses growing in front of the home.  I get to see displays like this all during the winter months, whenever the conditions come together to create the proper conditions.

Not all icicles are found in town.
These cliff-dwelling icicles were spotted 15 years
ago alongside the road to Garden Valley, Idaho.

Don’t forget about icicles that form from the eaves of houses or any other spot where there is enough heat during the day to cause a slow melt and then enough cold air to refreeze the water as it trickles downward toward the ground.  Some are tiny and delicate, while others tend to get so big they resemble a lance that a medieval knight would carry when jousting with an opponent.

There are nights when the air is damp but still, and frost crystals form on everything from twigs on the trees to the wire in a chain link fence.  They project outward from everything they form on like millions of icy little fingers, reaching for something that can’t be seen through the eyes of mortals.  There’s that brief moment when the sun comes out and lights up these fuzzy little ice formations, and then they melt away – gone from view, but not from memory.

There is so much beauty in the world, no matter what the season.  You just need to be out in the world enough to actually experience it. You just need to go outside long enough to really experience the joys of nature.  It’s there for you, waiting to be enjoyed, no matter what your position in life is… even like me, especially when I find my position is laying flat on my back!

Understanding a Few of the Things Cyclists Do

I’ve whined about drivers.  I’ve whined about bicyclists.  Now I suppose that I need to let non-cyclists have a quick peek into the secret world of cycling.  This is all very hush-hush, so don’t tell a soul what you learn here today!

In my last bit of written sniveling, I made mention of the clothing many bicyclists wear.  Cycling gear is mystery to many, and function is confused with func-choo (yeah, sound it out and then let your mind wander downhill a bit).  Many non-cyclists seem to think that we of the cycling persuasion wear these odd fashions as a way to thumb our noses at “ordinary” people, or perhaps as a way to show how aloof we are while fashionably flipping the middle finger to the motoring public specifically, and to the rest of the world in general.

The simple truth is that we wear cycling clothing because it’s comfortable, and because most of today’s technical fabrics are highly effective at wicking sweat away from our bodies and keeping us a little bit dryer and a little bit cooler.  The shorts have a built-in pad that protects the nether regions from chafing after being on the saddle for several hours.  Or you could say that it buffers our buns from bedsores.  Well, you could say that… but why bother?  It’s the thought that counts, and I’m all for staying as comfortable as possible when riding several hours in a day.

Another little secret I’ll let you in on – chamois cream.  This is something I laughed at when I was younger, but I use religiously now.  It seems the older one gets, the more easily irritated your skin can become.  This product is applied to the areas that are in contact with the saddle, and your butt can live to cycle another day.

Shoes are another item of curiosity.  Many people have figured out that most cyclists wear shoes that actually lock onto the pedal.  This seems a little counter-intuitive; certainly you need to get your foot back off of the pedal in a hurry sometimes, right?  Absolutely.  A slight flexing rotation of the foot to the right or left and the shoe clicks out of the pedal, freeing your foot to perform whatever task you need.  Why lock into a pedal in the first place?  You get a much more efficient pedal stroke, being able to apply force much earlier in a revolution and carrying the pedaling force through the revolution much further in each rotation. 

If you simply relied on gravity to keep your foot on the pedal, there is only perhaps a third of each pedal stroke where you can apply a lot of force without your foot flying off.  When you’re locked into a clipless pedal you can start your down stroke earlier, follow through the rotation further and even learn how to pull upward on the pedal if you so desire.  Just as the cages and straps gave toe-clips a big advantage over cycling on a bare pedal, clipless pedals are even more efficient than their predecessors.

Another item that weighs heavily on my mind is the push for, and the adoption of, the 3-foot law.  This law simply states that when overtaking a cyclist a motorist needs to give the cyclist a buffer of at least three feet between the car and the bike when passing.  This in itself doesn’t seem like it should be nearly as contentious a topic as it is.  When I’m passing a bicyclist, I’m going to give them as much room as possible; it’s not a game to see how close you can come to the biker without actually touching them.  In NASCAR, “rubbin’ is racin’ “, but doing that to someone on a bike causes injury or death.

As I’ve stated before, I ride a tandem.  This means that I’m not only responsible for my own life, but the life of the person riding behind me as well.  (In my case, this is my wife.)  She doesn’t get any input when it comes to braking and steering, and she needs to trust that I will make correct decisions concerning our safety each and every time a decision is required. 

I try to ride as far to the right side of the road as is possible.  Most of the roads I ride on have enough room from the painted line in the middle of the road to the edge of the asphalt to fit one-and-a-half to two cars (side by side) – so there is enough room for a car and a bicycle to coexist in the same lane and even obey the 3-foot law.  So why is it then, that many bicyclists don’t ride all the way over to the right?

The main reason is debris in the roadway.  Sand, gravel, bits of trash and chunks of glass get blown to the sides of the road from the wake of passing traffic.  This stuff usually manages to settle in the part of the road that cyclists normally would ride in.  We sometimes have to move a little bit to the left of where we’d ideally like to ride because the surface in unsafe to ride on.  If it’s overly sandy, we run the risk of crashing, and pieces of glass or sharp gravel can cause flat tires (which can also cause a crash when you lose air rapidly).

So if you see us riding a little further left from the edge of the road than you think we need to be, the odds are good that we see something in the roadway that you don’t.  One last thing I’d like to comment on.  I’ve noticed in areas where the 3 foot law is in effect that drivers seems to be quite aware of the law, and are sometimes almost too cautious about going around us. 

Not all cyclists ride with a mirror, but I do.  I love my helmet-mounted mirror and will never ride without it.  When I see that there are cars coming up from behind, I will always ride as far to the right as I possibly can.  But holding a position right along the edge of the road for an extended period of time can be tough, especially when a road’s edge is broken up in spots, or there’s a lot of debris on the highway.  So if you notice me waving at you to come around, it means that I’m aware of your presence, and I’m giving you permission to pass me.  The sooner you’ve gone around me, the sooner I can move over to the left a little bit and ride on a slightly safer surface. 

In closing, I appreciate when motorists show caution and consideration to bicyclists.  I might give them a friendly wave, or a smile followed by a “thank you” when they offer to let us go first at a four-way stop, or when they clearly make it known that they see us coming when they’re about to make a turn onto the road, but are waiting for us to pass.  I realize that usually the only interactions between motorists and bicyclists are unpleasant ones, but I would encourage my fellow cyclists to start changing that image by one smile or one wave at a time.  The roads are there for everybody; we all can, and should, get along!

A Tale of Three Bikers

In my last post, I promised to whine about bicyclists in the “near future”.  Well… why not in the very next post?  So here we go!  Why would someone who bicycles bitch about other bicyclists?  (Why would motorists complain about irresponsible drivers?  Are you sensing a theme?)

As I previously wrote, I like the “Idaho Stop” and believe it should be adopted on a nationwide scale.  Arguments against this law come from several viewpoints, one of which is that drivers could never predict the behavior of bicyclists.  This is a silly argument at best; you certainly may depend upon the road etiquette of law-abiding, conscientious cyclists.  But there are those other idiots out there that give all bicyclists a black eye.  Let’s meet a few of them.

“Cruiser Chrissy” is on her way to the local coffee house to meet with her friends.  It’s easier to find parking downtown by the espresso shop with a bike than with a car, and she’s so much more environmentally conscious by riding her bike.  The trouble with Chrissy is that she’s got her ear-buds in and music blaring, so she’s not going to hear any traffic noise from the street as cars pull up from behind. 

Another problem Chrissy has is that she doesn’t like riding in the street because the drivers are “rude” to bicyclists.  So she rides on the sidewalk… going full-tilt… which is not only rude to pedestrians, it puts them at danger on what should be their turf.  To top it off, when Chrissy comes to an intersection (that conveniently has the handicapped access ramps) she simply bombs through from one corner to the next without ever slowing down, checking to see if the light is green in her direction… OR LOOKING FOR TRAFFIC.  Someday she will either be hit by a car, or come very close to getting creamed… and will wonder why the driver wasn’t paying closer attention!

Conrad the Commuter is on his way to work in the early morning hours.  The sun is up, which apparently means that he is no longer “invisible” other people sharing the road as they, too, drive to their jobs.  Conrad is dressed for work, although he wears a helmet and has flashing lights facing front and rear for “safety”.  As Conrad approaches an intersection controlled by a traffic light (which for him is currently red), he can be observed constantly looking left and then right, left, right… all the while never slowing down to come to a stop. 

With near-surgical skill, Conrad suddenly jumps on the pedals and cuts his way through the cross traffic as he finds a slight (and somehow navigable) break in traffic in both directions.  Off he pedals to greet his busy day while anyone who just witnessed his display of idiocy is currently seething with animosity towards bicyclists.  (This wasn’t even close to what is intended with the Idaho Stop laws.)

Ron the Roadie is out with a small pack of his buddies riding along a popular road for cyclists.  They’re all decked out in the kit of their local cycling club, and the bikes they’re riding are all upscale carbon-fiber machines that don’t come cheap!  Drivers see a couple of things they don’t understand in this scenario.

First of all, the “kit”.  It’s the cycling clothing that bikers wear, but it pertains more to a team design.  So when you see cyclists with shorts and jerseys that seem to match (or without any question DO match), that’s a cycling kit.  Then there’s “everybody else” who are still wearing spandex-like shorts and (usually) colorful cycling jerseys, but don’t quite fit into that “ultra-cool” category of wearing matching-everything.  Non-cyclists, pay attention here.  Bikers aren’t trying to be self-righteous assbags when they wear this stuff!  They wear it because it’s comfortable, functional and doesn’t cause personal injury when you’re putting in a lot of miles on the saddle.  The thought of trying to put in a fifty mile ride wearing a pair of blue jeans makes my butt chafe just thinking about it.

The second thing drivers notice is that these guys are riding two or three abreast, and that there’s no room to get around them.  This point is aggravated when the bicyclists are aware that there is a car behind them (which is obviously faster) and would like to pass, and the cyclists still won’t make an effort to get into a single file pace line so the traffic may pass.  At some point the car will go around the gaggle of bikers, displaying a gesture of frustration or a honk on the horn, which is met with equally rude gesturing and yelling.  (Idaho allows for two cyclists riding abreast, unless there is traffic behind them.)

These three examples of cycling faux pas are good examples of why drivers hate bicyclists.  Additionally, I think drivers have a rightto be pissed off at these idiots.  I have personally seen examples of these three scenarios from both the seat of a car and from the seat of our tandem, and these actions infuriate me.  Why?  Because it goes against the cause of establishing equal rights and respect for the bicycling segment of our population.

When you’re driving down the road, and a car blows right through a red light in front of you, what happens?  You get angry toward that idiot, blow the horn, flip ‘em off, and then shortly forget about the incident entirely.  Yet when a bicycle does the same thing (or something equally as stupid), you mentally file the action away for all time and eternity, and all cyclists become the enemy.  Do you doubt this?  The three examples I previously listed were things that I have SEEN, and I still vividly remember them all!  I’ve witnessed many more bone-headed stunts that motorists have pulled, and yet none of them really stand out in my memory like the biker blunders.

Two points need to be made here.  First, not ALL cyclists are pinheads.  The few that you see behaving like idiots are not the majority (just like the bad drivers ).  Motorists need to be a little more forgiving.  But the bigger point is for the cyclists.  YOU are the ambassadors of your sport, lifestyle or choice of transportation.  You are extremely visible, and people will remember every stupid stunt you pull.  So when it comes to stupid stunts – knock it off!  There is plenty of room for everybody on the roads, when we are all civil toward one another and actually respect and obey the laws.

Bicycling in Idaho

The “Idaho Stop”

Back in 1988 a progressive law was enacted in, of all places, Idaho.  (This should serve as the basis for another argument: conservative states ARE capable of progressive thinking!)  But back to the law… which is part of the vehicle code and deals with bicycles and human powered vehicles.

This law, which is not understood by a big margin of motorists and cyclists alike, is relatively straightforward.  Bicyclists may treat a stop sign like a yield sign, and a red light like a stop sign.  This law generates a lot of controversy; cyclists herald it as being common sense while motorists (who often don’t understand the law) decry it as being special treatment for a class of vehicles that keep lobbying to be treated on equal footing.

Bicycling is not necessarily an “easy” form of transportation.  Few people will deny the health benefits it offers.  But in a populated area where stop signs abound, it gets a little tiring having to start and stop repeatedly, rather than getting a steady rhythm going.  Non-cyclists don’t get annoyance of having to stop, dismount, push off and remount to continue riding.  If there’s no cross traffic, why not just keep pedaling?  No harm, no foul… no total loss of momentum.

Motorists don’t experience the same degree of disengagement when they come to a stop sign.  You move your foot from the accelerator to the brake, and then it’s back to the gas and off you go.  Try this the next time you come to a stop sign; shift the transmission to park, turn off the ignition and remove the key.  When it’s your turn to go put the key back in, fire up the engine, shift to “drive” and hit the gas.  “What a waste of time and effort” I hear you say.  It’s the same thing to a bicyclist when they come to a stop sign with no immediate cross traffic, and yet they still need to come to a full stop.

Frankly, it’s my opinion that this law should be standard fare in all 50 states.  This is a good law for cyclists, and it should have no effect on motorists one way or another.  Okay, at least in a perfect world.  One of the arguments against this law is that bicyclists should be as predictable as motorized traffic.  For the bicyclists that obey this law as it is intended, and use good judgement when crossing an intersection, a motorist shouldn’t find any issues of predictability.  Sadly, there are jackasses that feel that if they put the hammer down, they can beat the oncoming traffic.

This mentality gets people injured or killed daily.  However, it’s rarely the bicyclists at issue here.  It’s a driver that punches the gas and turns in front of you because they just can’t wait a few seconds more… even though the roadway behind you is clear.  It’s the driver who enters an intersection when the yellow light has been displayed, knowing full well the red will come out as he enters the intersection.  It’s the idiot who ignores the lowered gates at a railroad crossing and tries to drive around them, only to get creamed by an oncoming train.  Need I go on? 

It’s motorists that you really need to worry about when it comes to bad behavior and unpredictability.  They are encased inside a vehicle that has weight and mass working in its favor that will cause you damage, injury or death depending on how severe the impact is.  There are many more motorists than bicyclists on the road each day, and whenever you climb behind the wheel you will witness some boneheaded, thoughtless or just plain dangerous drivers showing why perhaps they should become a nominee for the Darwin Awards.

In the near future, I’ll talk about the stupid things bicyclist do that serve as arguments (albeit poor ones) against enacting the “Idaho Stop” laws in other states.