On my way back from my afternoon snack trip, I walked by a scraped up, shirtless biker talking to a paunchy business suit. Obviously the cyclist had just gotten hit by this guy. The older guy was trying to convince the kid that his bike was fine, as the kid looked for obvious damage.

“Take it to a shop.” I blurted. Couldn’t help myself. “Don’t just eye it, take it to a shop.”

“Yeah… ” said the kid, agreeing with me. He then noticed that his break lever was hanging off by a thread. “See!?” he gestured to the older guy.

“Call the cops, now. File a report.”, I said. I was so pissed off that the old dude was just trying to drive away from this.

“Nice shirt..” the biker said to me.

I walked into  my office, peed, and grabbed a bottle of water, running outside to give it to the biker as he waited for the police…

… and he was gone. They both were. Obviously they didn’t wait for the police. I really hope the guy is on his way to the station now to report this. I’m so pissed off.

Wherever you are guy, good luck. And I also hope you were wearing sunblock.

A 64 bus ran the red light right in front of me as I was trying to take off on Harvard Street and Cambridge today, emulating to the very micron the scenario that sparked my crusade against the MBTA. Nothing has changed at all. I am very depressed by this. It is time to get uncivil.

There, I said it. I’m just not that interested. I have an electric kettle that boils water in like three seconds flat, I’ll make my own coffee with it. End of problem, moving on.

Aaaanyway, hullo children! I’ve had a busy and exciting few weeks. And luckily, I haven’t run into a ton of trouble with motorists/buses. There was one particular bus that I seriously believe tried to kill me: I was in the bike lane on Harvard, once again, and the bus passed me just enough to put me halfway down it’s length. It then started turning into the bike lane to approach the next bus stop. I hollered, rang my bell like mad and I could actually see the bored-looking woman driving glance into the rearview mirror and look DIRECTLY INTO MY EYES. Of course, she kept turning. I had to angle into the curb and dive off my bike in order to avoid getting squashed or pulled under the bus. While she was stopped I tried to approach the door to give her a piece of my mind, but she quickly closed the door and sped away, as I stood their screaming with my heart in my throat. I called the MBTA right away to report it, but of course was put on hold for 15 minutes, after which the recording came on telling me they were closed for the day. I fucking give up. I’m just going to start carrying large rocks with me. If it tries to hit me, I will hit IT. I have every right to defend myself.

Other than that it’s been a smashing time for riding this spring. Even the rainy days have been mostly tolerable. Mostly. I rode from my house in Somerville last week to a friend’s house in Waltham, and though it was only raining slightly both before and after my ride, it of course decided to drown me during the 45 minutes it took to go that far. I was dressed nice, too, and I had to show up looking like a grime-speckled drowned chicken. Luckily my friends know what to expect, and generally don’t give me shit if I don’t look like I just walked out of a salon.

This weekend I spent time in Newburyport for a friend’s birthday. We had planned a bike ride, and I showed up expecting to see said friend (who shall remain nameless) on a beat up fixed gear, old road bike or at the very least a cheap hybrid. Maybe I overestimate people. As I rolled Krankenberry off the train I caught sight of him sitting astride a tiny, cheap old BMX with half-inflated tires. My excitement for the bike ride quickly deflated.

That bike-snobbery aside, we had a great time tooling around Maudsley State Park, and though I can’t really vouch for it being a great place to ride (I saw no other bikers and the paths we took were definitely walking only), it was a beautiful place, quiet clean and green. Just hide your booze well – we had to dump half a bottle out because an over-protective ranger pegged us as hooligans and tailed us in. Hooligans! Well, I never!

Sunday was mostly a travel/recovery day but I did have time to clean up and cruise around for Somerville Open Studios, with a late night stop at Redbones for thirst-quenching beer and some deep fried okra. Om nom nom.

Today it is rains again, but it’s also 80f outside. I realize now that I have no ‘hot weather’ rain gear. I opted to just wear as little as possible and let it air dry as I sat in the office, and I wasn’t disappointed.

So, guys… I’m essentially stalled in my activism for the moment. I see that though I’ve been heard, and many pro-bike changes are being made, I’m still making zero headway with that which sparked this drive in me: the MBTA. There has been zero improvement in their observation of traffic laws, their accountability, and their vigilance when it comes to keeping others safe. I’m concerned that it might take gestures possibly viewed as less than civil to really create some recognition of these ongoing problems. Concerned, but not unwilling to take these steps. We shall see.

There’s a whole lot going on in the Bikeosphere lately, what with DOT secretary Ray LaHood’s announcements, and Mayor Menino’s declaration of intent concerning bicycle advocacy in Boston. I almost feel as if all our hard work making noise for the bike community has actually been fruitful. Maybe this small bit of complacency is why I haven’t been keeping up with this ranty blog, but it’s also the fact that this April is treating us so very very well in terms of weather. Do you remember last April in the Boston area? Yeah, we had nine whole days without rain all month. That’s right, 21 days of rain in one month. I think that’s about the time I started planning to move the hell out of New England, preferably to somewhere VERY DRY, like Arizona, New Mexico, or Hell. This year we’ve gotten a couple serious rain days, but it’s been mostly blush and flowers, and breezy days of sun. Fucking spectacular. To the point, I’ve been more preoccupied with riding than with blogging about riding.

But of course, the war isn’t even close to won, despite our victory in battles here and there. I’m still seeing the same negligence on the part of the MBTA drivers, and I’m still seeing dangerous riding practices (though I have noticed an uptick in the number of helmets being worn by casual cyclists).

In personal bikey notes: my roommate Sadiya is learning to ride a bike. She had started learning last year, on a tiny but heavy as hell 10 speed. It was… not very successful. Recently however, the Goondocks has become home to a delightful little coaster-brake Schwinn stingray. I urged her to try this as a training bike – her feet can easily touch the ground, and the coaster brake is intuitive and dependable to a noob biker. My logic is essentially grounded in the idea that this is the type of bike we learned to ride on as kids. She’s doing really well with it. I am so proud!

Cyclist killed by National Guard truck during Nuclear Security Summit.

Humvee driver probably didn’t even see her until it was too late. Those things should be illegal on city streets.

Bikeleague.org Blog » Blog Archive » Cyclist hit by car, VA State Trooper charges driver

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This has happened to me a couple times, and I did call the police. They told me, “I’m sorry but unless you were injured and want to press charges, there’s nothing we can do about it.”

I guess next time I should call a State Trooper, rather than the BPD or other local enforcement agency.

I had an amazing day today with Ltrain and Racheline: we dressed up as the Mad Hatter, March Hare and Doormouse and rode our bikes to the Boston Common for the Palin Tea Party Rally. On the way we sang a gut-wrenchingly horrible acapella rendition of Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody, and boggled the minds of many a driver and pedestrian. Sadly, it seems that we got there after much of the brouhaha had died down. Though we did find our Mad Tea Party friends and had a lovely spot of tea and some finger foods on the common, we did not get yelled at or menaced by the raging halfwit Palin supporters. We also got photographed by about three thousand people – it turns out we were the ONLY full set of Mad Wonderlanders in the crowd, and they loved us! I can’t wait to find my own picture on some horrible Red State blogroll.

MBTA = MURDER

If you’ve been following this blog you know my story – I’ve been hit twice and menaced countless times by negligent, distracted MBTA drivers. I am not a daredevil – I ride in the bike lane, signal, wear a helmet. These precautions did not prevent me from being hit, and when I contacted the MBTA I was denied information about the drivers who hit me. Apparently they only have to report to a higher authority if someone dies. Horrifyingly, on Wednesday Eric Michael Hunt, 23, did die. Though many details have both been released and speculated upon, the details of this one particular instance are less important than the fact that this  ongoing safety issue has been ignored by the MBTA, law enforcement officials, and government representatives. Despite whatever findings are made in terms of responsibility in this case, the real blame lays on the power structure responsible for the competence of the MBTA operators, the department of transportation planning, and the Boston Police Department.

Thursday the 15th I will be be at the Dudley Square stop between 7 and 9 a.m. to address this issue to Richard Davey. I hope you will be, too.

via Universalhub.com –

Ask the manager, MBTA style

By adamg – 4/7/10 – 12:12 pm

Have something to say to the guy in charge of the T? Of course you do. Tomorrow’s your chance: Richard Davey will be at the North Quincy stop on the Red Line between 7 and 9 a.m. “to customers concerns, and promote public transportation.”

Nowhere near the City of Presidents? He’ll be doing a whole lot of listening every Friday for the next few weeks, including Thursday, April 15 between 7 and 9 a.m. at Dudley Square and the same time on April 22 at Kenmore.