As my work week's overlap with the Bike to Work challenge ends (on top of leaving early today, and not a moment too soon), I look back on another week that I am behind in spirit but despise in execution. If I was a new bike commuter this week, I think I would rather roll my bike through a busy intersection and never pedal again than put up with the crap that goes on this week. Biking through the neighborhood avoiding buses and cars is difficult enough w/o having to worry about avoiding bikers running red lights W/O THE RIGHT OF WAY! Is that so hard to understand? If you're running a red light good for you, but you don't have the right of way!

If I was a noob starting back up at a stop light about to get run over by someone not realizing there's more than just car traffic about to cross, not only would I resent the hell out of some douche who's only worried about his path, I'd be sorely tempted to keep driving to work and not be all together friendly to bikers when I did. I'm already pissed at the guy, and I understand where he was coming from.

I had the luck to start riding on my own and figure out things like the best route to take and how to manage different traffic situations without having to deal with the flood of other inexperienced riders at the same time. Everyone has to start somewhere, but in cases like this I think it's better to do so solo. I still bike b/c I enjoy the experience of actually biking, whether I'm passing new people or looking out for speed-freaks or not. The only way to improve my commute would be to give me a free beer at each bar I pass on the way home, and even then I'd probably try to figure out how to take them to go. Driving doesn't help, walking isn't any better and it's a lot slower. The bike is only way to go, and it's worth putting up some aggravation along the way. But jesus are we talking a LOT of aggravation some days.

Current beer-scale: 5.1