Delirious Ramblings

Supersymmetry

There's something elegant about this:

Of course, the only place you'll see such things is in front of the engineering college...

Murphy's First Law of Cycling

If Murphy had been a road cyclist he would've added this law to his list:

"Given two vehicles moving in opposing directions on a two-lane road and a cyclist, no matter what time the vehicles depart or their relative speeds, they will always arrive at the narrowest part of the road at the same time as the cyclist."

It may not be demonstrable via Newton's equations, but I've proven this law empirically again and again during my weekend road-rides. Maybe it's just bad luck, but it seems like every time I get into the 200-yard "death zone" right at the end of my ride a gigantic RV comes bumbling up from behind and a monster-truck pulling a boat trailer approaches from up ahead. Much saddle-puckering and teeth-clenching usually ensues.

Bike Commuting

I happen to be one of those lucky people who have the option to commute to their jobs via bicycle. Over the last couple of years I've been slowly increasing my number of weekly commutes to work from zero to almost 100%. I still keep a car around and drive it to work sometimes but mostly I just take the bike. During a recent morning's ride I found myself thinking about what factors affect one's ability to successfully bike commute. I came up with the following list.

The Successful Bike Commuter:

• Lives a "reasonable" distance from work
• Lives in an area with good secondary roads to ride on with calm traffic
• Lives in a "bike friendly" climate
• Has a "bike friendly" employer
• Is reasonably fit or at least capable of becoming fit

A serious deficit in one or more of these items will make bike commuting inordinately inconvenient or difficult. For example, you're not going to be able to commute via bike if you live 30 miles away from work or the only available road is a 75mph expressway of death. If the temperature is 120F most of the time (Phoenix, AZ!) then you're not going to be spending much time on the bike, either. And if you suffer from extreme asthma or your boss refuses to put in bike racks then nichts for the bike commuting.

Notice that the only item in the list that the potential bike commuter has much control over is that last one: Is reasonably fit or capable of becoming fit. The other ones are (mostly) out of the cyclist's control. And even worse, the layout of most U.S. cities and the "car culture" we have here has conspired to amp these negative factors out of proportion to other countries in the world.

When you stop and think about how many things can derail a potential bike commuter's ambitions it's amazing that anyone can do it at all. Yet thousands (millions?) of us are doing it here in the U.S.  every day. Somehow, people are finding a way. And that's pretty darn cool!