Check out that cold activated label! Blue means it’s cold as the rockies.
[I haven’t been announcing these lately, but I’ve decided that such a bikey new state deserved its own post.]
Colorado is one of my favorite non-New England states, and I’m proud to announce that they now have their own version of the Bicyclist’s Accident Report. Hooray!
My favorite part is when Emily Rooney says that what I do is horrible (@6:12).
In all seriousness, it was really cool of WGBH to ask me to come on and join in the conversation, and I’d like to thank the producers of Greater Boston for the opportunity. I’m always happy to talk about biking, and how we can make it even better.
-JZ
We’ve all probably heard about the importance of getting a police report after a crash, but it doesn’t always seem worth the trouble. Why bother if you weren’t even hurt? Getting hit by a car is just about the worst thing there is, so it’s understandable that you’d just want to go on with your life and not get the police involved.
But there’s one very important reason why you should always file a police report after any crash: data.
Male and female Eastern Bluebirds, looking adorable (photo by Stu Watson)
The following is a guest post from my dear friend, the esteemed naturalist Stuart Watson. He’s the author of regarding nature, an excellent blog that chronicles his adventures in the Massachusetts woods (you should follow him on twitter).
Asked by
Anonymous
I’m not sure. Maybe when I feel like things are “back to normal”? Or maybe when I don’t get totally freaked out whenever I hear sirens. That could be a while, though.
Freedom.
The craziness of the past 12 hours is hard to imagine. I stayed up listening to the police scanner and reading twitter till 5:00 AM.
My apartment is right on Mass Ave, overlooking the intersection at Main Street. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the area, it’s about three blocks from where MIT Police Officer Sean Collier was fatally shot last night. I pass by the spot twice daily on my commute.
It was hard enough to digest that tragic piece of news, but things quickly got crazier, somehow, as the night progressed. Grenades? IEDs? A prolonged firefight with police in a familiar residential neighborhood? I feel like I’m living in some alternate reality. None of this seems real.
And now, waking up to find that the entire city and surrounding towns have been shut down? How does this keep happening?
I don’t really know what else there is to say. I feel empty and disconnected. There’s only one thing that we can do in this moment, and that’s wait. If the city wasn’t locked down, I’d go for a bike ride to clear my head. Why did it have to be so goddamn beautiful out today?
Hope everyone is staying safe out there.
Yours,
Josh
I don’t really know what to write here. It’s 4:00 PM and I’m sitting in my office, trying to figure out how to get back home to Cambridge. This has been a terrible day.
Riding the marathon route last night was one of the best times I’ve had in recent memory. It was one of those perfect memories that you can carry with you as an example of the best of times. There was so much excitement, so much hope for what this sort of event could mean. Can you believe how many people there are? Look at all these bikes! We all looked forward to the possibilities of next year’s ride.
Now, the memory of last night’s ride has been poisoned. It has been consumed by this horrible, ugly event. My legs are still sore, but there’s a new pain now, an aching in the pit of my stomach.
My thoughts go out to the friends and families of those affected by today’s tragedy. Please stay safe out there.
Yours,
The 5th annual Midnight Marathon Ride is coming up, and I’m super excited about it. This will be my first time participating in the ride, and it looks like there’s gonna be a record turnout. Tickets for the special “bikes only” commuter rail train to the start of the ride sold out in less than 8 hours!
In preparing for this epic event, I wanted to remind everyone about a crucial bit of safety info that may come in handy.
I got back from Portland, OR last week, and I’ve been meaning to write about some of the fantastic experiences I had there. However, as I started to compose the post, I realized that quite a bit of what I was writing fell into either one (or both) of the following categories:
a. things you probably wouldn’t care about
b. things I cannot disclose for confidentiality reasons
So instead of attempting to sidestep those issues in a long post of my experiences, I decided I’d just publish some of the “observations” I jotted down in my phone as I biked/walked/drank my way through the city. Hope you enjoy them.
Yours,
Josh
PS: I’m going to put together a separate post describing what I was riding while I was there. Special thanks to Clever Cycles and Kalkhoff USA for loaning me a couple bikes to ride during my stay!
