A Ride To The Truth?

The other day, on a pleasant summer afternoon, I was riding back from a trek to Westchester County.  I couldn't help but to notice more work crews than I normally see on the streets.  Some came from ConEd or Verizon, others from the city's transportation department.  They confirm one of my from-the-saddle observations:  streets and roads are in worse shape than I've seen in some time.  Whether it's a result of the weather (climate change?) or simply deferred maintenance, I don't know.

One detour led me down Prospect Avenue in the South Bronx.  I actually didn't mind:  The stretch south of the number 2 and 5 elevated train lines has some rather nice old row houses, and the people seemed to be in a rather relaxed mood.  

Occasionally, I'll stop if a building or detail looks interesting. But I never expected to see, anywhere, something that sums up so many of the truths I hold to be self-evident, to paraphrase the Declaration of Independence.  

Within the past two weeks, the Supreme Court has voted to curtail a woman's right to her own body and, possibly, a bunch of other rights-- but not the one to carry a gun with you.  Why can't they support the simple truths expressed in that sign?  

  

I Wooon't Park There!

I confess...I haven't done a lot of riding since my latest trek to Connecticut.  That was almost a month ago!

Since then, I commuted until the end of the semester and, last week, took a ride to the Rockaways with Bill.  But for much of the week before that--including Christmas Day--I was languishing with a virus frolicking inside me.

I am feeling better now.  I started to notice improvement after that ride with Bill, last Thursday--before a snowstorm.

Today I took another, shorter ride before--you guessed it!--another snowstorm that's coming our way tonight.  The coming snow squall, like the one we just had, shouldn't leave us with a lot of white stuff.  But the weatherfolk are promising lots of wind and colder temperatures.

So I felt I just needed to get out today.  I wasn't going to stop for anything--especially after seeing this:

Noooo parking.  No, I woooon't park.  And I won't ride sloooow.  At least, I'll try not to!

Seeing The Signs

Caterina, Charlie (I), Candice, Charlie (II), Max and Marlee.

I have loved them all.  I miss Caterina, both Charlies and Candice.  At least I have Max and Marlee.

They all did, and gave, everything I ever could have wanted from the likes of them.  Well, all except one thing.

I never could get any of them to do this:

For that matter, I've never been able to persuade any cat to ride with me.  

A few years ago, on New Years' morning, I stopped for a cat I saw and who looked almost pleadingly at me.  As soon as I got off my bike, he darted to my ankles and rubbed himself against me.  I picked him up.  For a moment, he curled on my shoulder and I tried getting on my bike, figuring I could start off the new year by rescuing a feline friend.  But he was having none of it:  As soon as I lifted my leg over the bike, he dropped himself off my chest and landed on his feet.

I tried a similar rescue about a year ago, on another cat who greeted me.  It ended much like the first one I tried:  When I got on the bike, the cat decided to go airborne.

Perhaps those felines--and my own--saw this sign:

Well, now I know what they're doing while I'm riding!  Hmm...Maybe that's the reason they won't ride with me. 

A Sign For The Road I Was On

Today was warm and sunny, without much humidity.  So, of course, I rode--Arielle, my Mercian Audax, to be exact.

We took another spin to Connecticut.  I spent some more time on back roads that wind through farms where horses are stabled and, I assume, taxes are sheletered.

That last assumption comes from something someone pointed out while I was riding through Vermont years ago.  On a road near Killington, I passed three organic herb farms within a stretch of about three kilometers.  I wondered, aloud, what it was like to farm in such a place.  After all, late in the previous afternoon, the temperature dropped from 52 F to 15F  (from +11 to -9 C) and rain turned to sleet and snow from skies that, that morning, had nary a cloud.

The local who accompanied me on that ride said that those farms "most likely" belonged to "rich people from Boston or New York" who, he said, "probably lost money but wrote it off." But they "didn't care," he explained: "It's a hobby, a tax shelter, for them."

Now, one would think that anyone who could think of how to such a thing is pretty smart, and possibly has some education.  And, perhaps not surprisingly, Connecticut perennially ranks among the top five US states in the percentage of its population who hold college degrees.  By that metric, Greenwich is one of the most educated municipalities in the Nutmeg State.

As someone who's taught in colleges, I've spent lots of time with educated people--or, at least, people who've spent lots of time in school.  Let me tell you, they are not immune to saying things that make you wonder just how educated they are.  I'll confess:  I make such blunders, too.  But I make sure that nobody notices them! ;-)

At least, I've always been careful to make sure that my mistakes won't be seen by some smart-ass cyclist:

A "dismissal entrance"?  One has to wonder what is being taught in a school where tuition is $66,060 for the Upper and Lower Schools (and a mere $45,000 for the Foundations program).  

After passing that sign, I continued along Glenville Road, which leads to the Empire State.  Someone at Eagle Hill, I am sure, was quoting Groucho Marx: "There's the road out of town.  It's the one I wish you were on."

What Are They Trying To Say--And To Whom?

Unless you do all of your cycling on unpaved surfaces, you are bound to see road signs during your rides.

We don't notice, or think about, most of them because we see them so often.  Others simply don't apply to us.

But some are really strange. For example, there was the one that said, "Graffiti is a crime camera enforced".   Was that sign trying to tell us that graffiti is camera-enforced?  Or that graffiti is a camera-enforced crime?

Then there was the one that warned us, "Use of cameras prohibited and strictly enforced".  Now, perhaps I'm not the smartest person in the world, but I can't, for the life of me, understand how something can be prohibited and strictly enforced.

Some signs leave you wondering who is their intended audience and what, exactly, they are trying to tell said audience.  I saw an example today not far from my apartment.

About a kilometer from my place, next to the East River (which isn't actually a river), there's a Con Ed power plant.  It's located on Vernon Boulevard, which rims the river, just south of the bridge to Roosevelt Island.

(Interestingly, there's a Moishe's storage facility across Vernon Boulevard that used to be a factory that made Loft candy.  Now I wonder how much I--and members of my family ate!  Well, I guess I shouldn't worry yet:  Nobody's glowing in the dark!)

Anyway, a bike lane now runs along the western edge of Vernon.  As it happens, the lane directly crosses the path of the Con Ed plant's driveway, through which trucks enter and exit.

The traffic lane that borders the bike lane handles southbound traffic.  A driver headed in that direction would not be able to read the sign, except perhaps in a rearview mirror.  The northbound traffic is so far to the right that most drivers probably wouldn't see the sign.  Even if they did, it probably wouldn't matter, as neither the driveway nor the bike lane enter, or intersect with, the northbound traffic lane.

The bike lane is sub-divided into a northbound and southbound lane.  As with the auto traffic, southbound riders wouldn't see this sign.  Even if they glanced back to look at it, the sign would be useless to them, as they would have already crossed the driveway.

So, I have to wonder:  For whom was this sign intended? (Or, in market-research speak:  Who is the intended audience?)  And what was the sign's creator trying to tell the intended audience?

You have to wonder what some people are thinking when they make and post signs.