Day 21: U is for Unthinkingness, Underwater Shenanigans

Oh dear I can feel another rant coming.

As you know, I've been cycling "the long way home" to get my Janathon exercise in.  About 60% of that is round the Oxford ring-road, which sounds dangerous, but there is a very wide, well-appointed, and hardly used bike track all the way.  It gives me quite a long time to think, because there's nobody else around and it's completely dark.  Part of the time is of course filled with Tourettes, a large percentage of the rest is filled with the Swimmy Fishy Song, but the rest I spend in thought decrying all the UNTHINKINGNESS we have in this world.

What I mean by "Unthinking" is where someone is presented with a situation, thinks about it for, oooh about a nanosecond, picks an answer and says "that'll do - it doesn't affect me anyway". Unthinking means not looking at it from other people's point of view.

Like the one that got me this evening. There are excellent cycle paths all around the Oxford ring road.  Someone probably put them there to increase their cycle lane quota.  The trouble is, cyclists hardly ever want to cycle around ring roads. That's what cars do.  Other cycle lanes in Oxford go wiggling around all over the place to get out of the way of the cars, and again nobody uses them. I just KNOW that the "cycle lane Tsar" or whatever he/she is called in Oxford actually drives a car around town.  They reason thusly: - "Of course, cyclists want to stay out of the way of the traffic, and they are really slow, so they probably aren't in a hurry so it doesn't matter if it's a bit further. Let's route this cycle lane around the back of this industrial estate because there's room to put some new paths there".

AAAAARRRRGGGHHHHHHH.  Nobody uses them because if they ACTUALLY THOUGHT ABOUT IT for a NANOSECOND from a cyclist's point of view they would realise:

• Cycles are slow, so cyclists are probable in EVEN MORE OF A HURRY than cars
• Cycles are people powered, so distance REALLY MATTERS in a much more fundamental way than it does with cars
• Cyclists don't want to get away from the cars, THEY WANT THE CARS TO GO AWAY
• Cars are quite happy to go a bit further (quite a lot further sometimes) if it is FASTER (e.g. M25)
• If you put cycle lanes in SH*T places, CYCLISTS WILL NOT USE THEM
• If you think that painting a few dotted lines near the left hand kerb and then just stopping when it get's inconvenient (like there's a parked car in the way or something) counts, you are NOT THINKING IT THROUGH PROPERLY
• If you want people to get out of their cars and get on their bikes then it might be a good idea to MAKE IT EASIER AND LESS DANGEROUS TO CYCLE TO PLACES THAN TO DRIVE

That's my rant for the day.

Underwater Shenanigans

To cheer you up after that, I'd like to share a picture of my Son having his daily bath this evening. Aaaaah. Hmmmm. What's he doing under the water there ... like father like son? Or maybe it's just me.

Hello Daddy

Janathon Stats:

Today:  Bike 14.83km / 45:20 min, Total cals: 384

[Run equivalency calculation: ]

Today: 6.55km / 4.07 miles

Total: 119.56km / 74.29 miles