Unstealable Bikes And "Smart" Locks

Why is it that "smart" things are always invented for dumb people?

That question is the premise behind today's post in "The Retrogrouch."  Its author seems to have some sort of radar that finds all of the most ridiculous and useless "innovations" in cycling.  The latest is the Noke U-Lock, which promises to "eliminate the hassle and frustration of lost keys and forgotten combinations".

Just as there are people who know how to communicate only on Facebook and Twitter, there are those who can't do anything without a smartphone app.  (Actually, they're the same people. Or so I assume.  I don't have a smartphone, or a Facebook or Twitter account!)  The Noke U-Lock is apparently made for such people. 

In reading about it, I had the same question "Retrogrouch" asked:  If people can't be bothered to use a key, or can't remember a combination or where they parked their bike, how in the world can they ride a bike--or function in this world?

Ironically, just before I read "Retrogrouch's" post, I came across something almost as ridiculous.  What's even more ironic is that it's something that, while just as pointless as the Noke U-Lock, will probably never be used by someone who'd use a Noke. 

The Yerka "unstealable" bike

The Yerka is an "unstealable" bike?  Oh, please.  What I find really funny is that the promo video starts off with someone cutting a bike lock. If a thief can do that, what's to say that he or she can't cut the downtube or seatpost that makes the bike "unstealable"?




If that bike were parked in some parts of NYC, the wheels would disappear. Hmm...Maybe the Yerka's owner would need another lock after all. The Noke, perhaps?&lt;/span></div>

A Way I Never Graduated

Today I managed to escape from grading papers for a couple of hours.  I pedaled hard even though, thankfully, I don't have to ride very fast to escape from papers, even the good ones.  It's nice to know that at my age, and after a winter of inactivity, I can still outrun something.

Exams are this week.  Some students will beg and cajole me to accept long-overdue work.  Their stories will get longer and more pitiful by the day.  Then, after I finish reading them and the exams--and dealing with the shock expressed by those students upon seeing the grades they earned for their late work--there will be graduations, where I teach and at other schools.  Some have had them already.

I didn't attend my graduation for my master's degree.  I don't think anybody in my class did.  I walked up to the podium, absurdly overdressed considering how hot it was and the fact that the gown covered what I was wearing, to get my bachelor's degree and high school diploma mainly because my family attended those ceremonies.   

While riding today, I wondered what it would have been like to pedal up to the podium.  Do schools have official policies against such things?  If they do, it's probably because they know people like me would snatch their sheepskins (or whatever those degrees and diplomas are printed on) and ride like hell, as fast and as far away as possible, from the ceremony, the commencement speakers who didn't say anything anyone would remember and all of the people I never wanted to see again. (I've never been to any of my class reunions.  Are you surprised?)

Or maybe I would've had more fun if I could have gotten my degree from the saddle (or ex cathedra).  Maybe if others did the same, we could have made a game of tossing our caps in the air: We could catch our own caps, or someone else's. Or we could dodge them.  Hmm...If you catch someone else's cap, will you end up marrying that person?

All right.  I'm sure that some school has a bike procession up to the podium, but I'm not aware of it.  It wouldn't surprise me to learn that in some college, everyone rode to his or her graduation ceremony and rode out of it.  Now that would make for some interesting group photos.

Turns out, my musings aren't so far-fetched after all.  Last year, some graduates of Liaocheng University in China posed for this:

From China Daily

They were lying on the lawn for this photo, taken in Shandong Province.  Maybe it was their final project for a degree in performing or visual arts.

How Practical Are My Cats? (Apologies to T.S. Eliot)

Rain on and off today.  But it's not the reason I didn't ride.  You see, the semester is drawing to a close.  Exams will be given this coming week.  Meantime, I had a whole bunch of papers to read and grade.  So that's how I spent my day.

Max and Marlee got to spend time with me.  Every once in a while, one of them would climb onto the table and park him or herself on the papers.  They must know that I'd rather play with them than grade students' assignments. (No offense to my students intended!) 

I wonder what they see in those papers.  For that matter, I wonder how my bicycles look to them.  They see me leave with one of them.  Then I'm gone for a while.  When I come back, they want to cuddle.  What do they think I'm doing while I'm gone?  What do they think a bicycle does?

The only time Max and Marlee have actually seen me on one of my bikes is when I'm adjusting it after, say, swapping a handlebar or saddle.  They've seen my bikes hanging from my wall, on the repair stand, leaning against walls and bookshelves and even on the floor.  But they've never seen them quite this way:

From Still Amazed

How Much Are Those Lilacs On The Wall?

One way I know it's really spring is when I'm riding--whether to work or for fun--and my peripheral vision increases.

It seems that as the days grow longer and the air milder, I am less focused on my immediate space than I am when I'm exhaling steam and there's snow and ice around me.  Could it be that I simply have to notice more (ice patches and such) immediately in front of, and around, me during the winter?  Or does my scope increase when I remove hoods, balaclavas and such and have only my helmet on my head?

Maybe I've discovered a corollary to the material world:  Perhaps the human field of vision expands when warmed and contracts when chilled.

Hmm...Could I have made some discovery that, for once and for all, links the physical sciences with what we know about human consciousness?

All right...Before I get all grandiose on you (too late?), I'll show you a couple of things I saw while riding to work this week.  There's nothing profound here:  just a couple of moments I captured on my cell phone.


Make what you will of this, but the things that make me happiest about Spring are cherry blossoms and lilacs.  Both came late this year, which is probably why they seemed all the more vivid to me.  I paid ten bucks for a bouquet of lilacs that's on my table.  Perhaps I could have taken them from here:

With the money I saved, maybe I wouldn't have to ask, "How much is that doggie in the window?" 

 Instead, I'd leave it to Patti Page:

Bicycle Report Cards, State-By-State

It's that time of year.

Yesterday, rough winds did shake the darling buds of May. Today the air is calmer but for some--especially my students, not to mention me--it is not a temperate day, lovely as it is.

You see, the semester is nearing its end. Some time after Memorial Day, my students will get their report cards in the same sense that we "dial" telephone numbers and "ship" items.   That is to say, no school or university (at least, none that I know of) uses cards anymore:  Students get their grades online.

In a similar fashion, all fifty states of the US have just received "report cards."  They weren't, however, graded in English or Math or History.  Their grades didn't come from me or any other professor or teacher, and their cards weren't issued by any educational insititution.

Instead, they came from the League of American Bicyclists. The "grades"--or, more precisely, scores--each state received were in categories that included Legislation & Enforcement, Policies & Programs, Infrastructure & Funding, Education & Encouragement and Evaluation & Planning.

This is not CNN's electoral map.  Yes, the states deemed most "bike friendly" are in blue.  But the next-most "bike friendly" are red.  Strangely, the states labelled least bike-friendly are in green!

So, which state finished at "the top of the class"?  That would be the Evergreen State--Washington--which also finished first last year.  So, while the efforts of advocates and planners there are to be commended, the ranking is bittersweet, as the state still scored only 66 out of 100 in both years for "bicycle friendliness".

Its neighbor to the south, Oregon, came in sixth and California eighth. Some of the states you'd expect to be high in the rankings--such as Massachusetts (fourth) and Colorado (seventh) are also there.  Not surprisingly, most of the states near the top of the table are in the Far West or Northeastern parts of the US. 

Also not surprisingly, the most of the lowest-ranking states are in the South, with Alabama bringing up the rear (with a score of 12.4, which was actually worse than their 2014 tally of 17.4) and Kentucky immediately in front of them.

My home state of New York ranked 29th in both years, though its score improved slightly from 33.9 to 35.4.

If my students had scores like those, I'd have appointments with my department chair and a dean--and they wouldn't be for lunch!