Transportation, in my daily work, is a means to an end. It isn’t usually a thing done for its own sake—it’s how we get where we need to go. “Travel” might be a better word for those times when we…Continue Reading
Tag: words
Well over a year ago I started a new habit: reading poetry every morning with my coffee. Why poetry? Partly for what it isn’t. And I read it for what it is, for what it gives me: Along the way…Continue Reading
What to call a bicycle that isn’t an e-bike? The debate around terms like “acoustic bike” or “analog bike” isn’t always friendly. What do you call those original battery-free bikes?
Inspired by a tweet a while back on kids “texting about transit” (see below), herewith my guide to some of the messaging shortcuts that are really all about riding your bike. A couple of these are straight-up an accepted meaning,…Continue Reading
I Absolutely Adore Alliteration. My fondness for that particular form of wordplay is possibly exceeded by the joy of coming up with a clever acronym, but not by much. Thus when I served as “guest prof” for #bikeschool* on Thanksgiving…Continue Reading
A related post of mine appeared on the Washington Bikes blog and another one on my personal random-life-and-stuff blog I haven’t made New Year’s resolutions for years because I recognize how quickly those good intentions start paving a road to somewhere. A…Continue Reading
Many thanks to QuickRelease TV for quite a few of these quotations. I’ve been saving for a while so I no longer know the sources of all of them. An engineer designing from scratch could hardly concoct a better device…Continue Reading
The Efficiency of Cycling The bicycle is the perfect transducer to match man’s metabolic energy to the impedance of locomotion. Equipped with this tool, man outstrips the efficiency of not only all machines but all other animals as well. —Ivan…Continue Reading
This post is Part II, continuing yesterday’s diatribe meditation on use of the word “accident” to describe a preventable negative interaction between a driver and a cyclist or pedestrian. The conversations I often have after someone on a bike is hit tend to…Continue Reading
This post has its origins in my brush with fate this week, and before that in fall 2010, when two things happened within a few days of each other: Arleigh Jenkins AKA Bike Shop Girl (a blogger whose work I read) was…Continue Reading
“When the spirits are low, when the day appears dark, when work becomes monotonous, when hope hardly seems worth having, just mount a bicycle and go out for a spin down the road, without thought on anything but the ride…Continue Reading