I was schlepping around town on my cool urban bike today. I had some errands to run on my day off, and I wasn't sure if my Honda would even start after not driving it for four weeks. It still has the full tank of antique gas that I purchased for $2.55 a gallon, but I figured that I would spend less if I had to bunchee my purchases to my bike rack and pedal them all home. I don't know about the city that you live in, but today I noticed that Washington DC is very difficult for cyclists. I'm so grateful that the Americans With Disabilities Act has made curb cuts mandatory in most modern US cities, it makes it easier for us wussie bike riders who prefer sidewalks to sharing the road with Hummers. I'm sure that the pedestrians wish that I would get off of their sidewalks, but my cool urban bike is an all terrain bike, (ATB) so if they refuse to move, I just slide over onto the lawn of someone's house, sometimes running over expensive landscaping, but I figure that the plants will grow back, while the little old ladies on the sidewalk might not. I had to go the the hardware store in my least favorite suburb, Bethesda. I don't even like to drive to Bethesda, because it's like the mini-van capital of the country, and all the mom's ride around with half of their attention on the cell phone, and the other half on the baby seat in back of the mini-van. When they do turn their full attention to the road, it is usually as they are about to crush you and your tiny Honda with 4 tons of baby-toting front and side door re-enforced steel. It's scary enough when I'm driving my car, but the cool urban bike doesn't have any airbags, so I feel a little bit vulnerable.
I made it to the hardware store without becoming pavement pizza. But once in the parking lot, I couldn't find anywhere to lock up my bike. I searched for about ten minutes and finally found a bike rack about three blocks away in front of a metro stop. If you can take the metro, why would you need to lock up your bike? Shouldn't all businesses in addition to having parking for the disabled have places to lock your bike? It doesn't even require that much space, you can cut out one extrawide slot for the Hummers, and be able to park 5 bikes in the same spot. I got a little peeved, and found a huge parking spot right in front of the store with a lamppost that would be small enough to fit my chain around. This lady in a Ford Explorer with two screaming brats in the back honked her horn at me, but I continued to secure the Cool Urban Bike (CUB) in a spot wide enough for her gas sucking, planet killing monstrosity. She glared at me and revved her engine, but I didn't budge.
I wonder how she can fault me for worrying about her kids future, with my careful choice of emissionless transportation, while she rides around in that gargantuan gas guzzler.
She's clueless.
So I get home, and I go immediately for the family sized bottle of Advil that I have kept handy ever since my purchase of the Cool Urban Bike. My CUB is really cool, and really fast, but unfortunately it's owner is not. My couch beckoned me, the big indent in the middle was perfectly fitted to my middle aged ass, unlike the seat on the CUB that was better suited for a teenager. The remote was in the same place that I had left it, I had to lift my arm a mere three inches, and flip on the TV.
Bush was addressing the United Nations. While most of the people of the Gulf Coast are homeless and those that remain wade around in fetid water exposed to dangerous microscopic bacteria and industrial sized carcinogens, while the shrimping and fishing industries have been destroyed, while the citizens of a country that he chose to invade and occupy are facing just another day in the life, but one where 160 died today, while Africa faces hunger, disease, rape and genocide, while Rome burns, what does he choose to speak about?
