Bringing Up Baby (Carrier)

According to an urban legend, red cars get more speeding tickets than vehicles of other colors.  That's almost true:  Red cars came in second to, interestingly, white cars in a recent study.  Surprisingly (at least to me), gray and silver came in third and fourth, respectively.

I thought of that study when I came across a report of a Belgian study.  According to researchers, bicycles with baby carriers attached to their rears are given a wider berth by motorists, whether or not there's a baby in the carrier.  Cyclists with child-towing trailers are also given more room by drivers, according to this study.

Carlton Reid, the excellent transportation reporter for Forbes, makes an intriguing (and, I believe, valid) point:  Drivers, whether consciously or unconsciously, might give more room to cyclists they deem more "worthy."  Someone riding with a child or baby in tow is seen as doing something that contributes to the welfare and mental health of that child or baby, while the single cyclist--especially if he or she is young--incurs the resentment, and even wrath, of drivers who see us as "privileged."

Photo by Constance Bannister, New York State, 1946

Hmm...Maybe I should attach a carrier--or trailer--to one of my bikes.  Can you see someone weighing down his $12,000 S-Works rig with one?

"Real" Men...

Sometimes I feel the Reagan administration had truly arrived when Real Men Don't Eat Quiche was published.

Of course, Bruce Feirstein wrote it tongue-in-cheek. (After all, a real man never would have written such a book, right?) It spawned all sorts of "real men don't" and "real men do" lists.

So what does--or doesn't--a "real" man ride?

Far be it from me to tell you what a "real" man needs, or doesn't, need.  While "real" men might not need motors, more than a few dudes I know absolutely revere pistons.

(Tell me "I'm in Love With My Car" isn't a masturbation song.)

Now, I will state with absolute certainty that the sentiment expressed on the T-shirt is right. Moreover (Would a "real" man ever use such a word?), I can tell you, with absolute certainty, that real men ride steel frames.   

As if I know about "real" men....    

From Watts To Lumens...To Lux

Until recently, we chose light bulbs according to watts because the wattage of an incandescent bulbs correlated to its size.  The number of watts, however, was an expression of the amount of energy it used.

During the 1980s, halogen bulbs replaced incandescent bulbs in bike lights. Still, bike lights were rated by wattage.  That designation continued even after Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) replaced incandescent and halogen bulbs about twenty years ago.

Since LEDs use so much less energy, watts aren't a useful way to measure a bike light.  Bike lights thus came to be rated in lumens, which a measure of their light output.  (One lumen equals one candle.)  However, Kryptonite, which has just introduced a new line of bike lights, argues that lumens don't tell the story:  While a lumen count tells us how much illumination a bike light emits, it doesn't measure the effectiveness of the beam.  We want a light that allows us to see or be seen, but doesn't blind someone driving in the opposite direction.

That is why Kryptonite is rating its lights by a new unit:  the lux, which measures the illumination of a surface at a specific distance. According to the company, this measurement takes into account the quality, rather than mere quantity, of light because it takes into account how the light is focused.

Note:  I have not seen Kryptonite's new lights, so please don't take this as an endorsement of them.  However, I use, and have used, their locks.  If their lights are as well-designed, I think they'll be very, very good.