@Pierre – because it’s totally out of character. Just to remind you: o Yehuda – beard, cap, sandles. Official job title at the Kickstand: Business Prevention Officer o Joe – Mono-brow, Lycra / Spandex, helmet, fair-weather use only. Probably made of sugar. o Thistle – formerly overweight, cargo biking mum. Electronic genius reduced to hanging around a bike shop. o Fred – Fred’s dead, baby. Fred’s dead. o Shakers – Alchemists who transmute base metals into unobtanium. Probably actually in league with Satan. o Chunkbait – Fat kid. o Captain Dashboard – Cyborg, probably made by Skynet. o Sister Sprocket – Pipe-smoking, smoking-hot nun. Has repressed feelings about beards & sandals. o Bike Ninja – The Shakers’ Black Ops department. o Blue Car Driver – will we ever know…?
i wonder what kind of snacks he is going to get?? my problem with snacking in the shop while working on bikes is that my hands are never really clean enough to eat properly.
I remember the days when a ‘helmet war’ used to last all day and cover many pages of comments!
Thing is, shops sell a range of protective apparel to give us choice. We don’t go out on the mountains without wearing suitable clothing if we are serious about our health and safety. Like doing a major rock climb without ropes – dangerous fun and it affects only the participants if they have nobody that likes them. Apart from those who get to scrape up the remains!
So wearing a helmet may have a questionable level of protection but at the very least it can help prevent some of the road-rash injuries. The heavier knocks will hurt us regardless of the helmet, yes, but at least all the pieces are kept in one place and are simpler to remove from the scene and identify the owner from!
what most people fail to see ist: Compared to rock climbing, car driving, stair walking, taking a shower aso riding a bike even in city traffic is not dangerous. It may feel, but is tha a reason to wear a helmet? if so, then why does nobody take in account to wear one in his car? or on stairs?
Best simply look to the netherlands. A lot of bike drivers on the street, but nobody even talks about helmets. Not even childreen use them. Wearing a bike helmet in Holland says: ” I am an german tourist”
Don’t forget the shower – by far, the most head injuries occur while slipping in the shower. Wear it if you feel you need it, don’t if you feel you don’t. Life is risk.
Ok this UK Englishman has some idea of the reference but is ignorant of the actual team - Is this ‘The St. Louis Cardinals’ or the Denver ‘Browns’ or some Shaker Heights team?
Actually the team is the Cleveland Browns. An expansion team after the first Browns moved to Baltimore and wre re-named the Ravens (after the poem written by Baltimore resident corpse Edgar Allen Poe). It’s all part of a very sordid history of the NFL after Baltimore’s team the Colts left town unannounced in the middle of the night (literally) to move to Indianapolis.
@Opus the Poet: NFL teams moving around is not a recent invention. The Rams, now of St. Louis, Missouri, were originally a Cleveland team (Wikipedia: <http://tinyurl.com/7wdpsxr> . In between, the Rams played in Los Angeles and Anaheim, California. And then there’s the Raiders, the team I grew up cheering… (Oakland, Los Angeles, Oakland — all in California.)
@Tencon: As a courtesy to Browns fans, I suggest you don’t use Denver and Browns in the same sentence. For an explanation, you can look up Cleveland and “The Drive” or “The Fumble.” Wailing and gnashing of teeth is also provoked by mentioning “Red Right 88.”
And before Browns fans come after me with their daggers for reminding them of these tragedies, I point out in my defense that I too hate the Steelers — since 1972 and “The Immaculate Reception” against the Oakland Raiders. (I grew up in Northern California.)
Yes but I still don’t know whether it is baseball or football?
(note that English cricket players wear protection as a 90mph cricket ball has been known to cause injury!)
I had this thought yesterday. I did not doubt my studded tires’ ability to keep me under control, but I had a whole lot of doubts about drivers’ abilities to keep their four-wheelers under control. I took the bus.
It’s not just in Cleveland that this happens, either. We just got our first significant snowfall of the season — about four inches between Wednesday night and this AM — and even so there are people driving out there who must think that the white stuff on the roads is beach sand, or that this is going to be the year that snow is *NOT* going to be slippery.
Living in Wisconsin or other parts of the North Country you’d think folks would remember that winter is going to come again, just as it does every year, and that each year snow and ice will continue to be hazardous. It should be in our genes by now, but it still generally takes at least two good snowfalls for most people before their winter driving skills return.
Come to Richmond if you want to have a real laugh. 1″ snowfall will have the same effect here as a 24″ snowfall would anywhere from Erie, PA (used to live there) north. The native-born down here have absolutely no clue how to drive in winter weather. Or the approach of winter weather. Or the prediction (three days ahead) of winter weather.
As to getting the annual driving skills back: I miss the old Sunday Blue Laws. When winter hit, you could always go to a close mall parking lot on Sunday and practice spinning and sliding away from traffic until you got your skills back. And the police were usually pretty good about it as long as you stayed away from the light standards and weren’t acting too overtly stupid.
That’s how my Dad instructed me. He was an Army instructer and used to teach M/C use by letting them loose on a large muddy field before letting them anywhere near the road. They soon ‘got’ the skills of clutch/brake control etc and were much better riders as a result. When I got my first m/c he told me to practise figure-of-eights in the area of lockup garages about 30 feet wide. With handlebar clearnce to consider and the downhill slope on the ‘width’ of the space, I had a tricky time learning to stay upright at 0 mph for a while. Sort of a ‘trackstand’ for motorcycles. With the 200cc 2-stroke it did not take long! The ‘GL1000A’ Gold Wing was a different matter but I eventually mastered it… A matter of balancing throttle and clutch against the brake, standing on the pegs instead of sitting (The ‘Wing had a low c-o-g but this lowered it further, like standing on the pedals on our bikes) and and taking it very slowly. I could do it but it took me months to get it right with the ‘Wing. After that, Snow, Ice etc was no problem, I just had to be careful with the speed and never go faster than I had control at I might add that all this assumes traction as you are going knowhere if you have NO grip at all! One can balance on black ice but any change in speed is only possible when spreadeagled or using metal spikes! The wrong sort of muddy clay etc even makes spikes useless…
the relative temperature of the snow has effect too. I’d rather drive on 4″ of very cold snow (-15C or better) than 1″ of wet slucky stuff on a frozen ground. The wet stuff is far slipperier, and if the temp is just right, somewhere between -5C and -12C then it also polishes into ice too easily. I find it is definitely safer to ride a bike in these conditions and choose a route that keeps me away from busy traffic.
@Tencon: The weekend break is nice. I know it’s a new paradigm for Kickstand veterans, but I like going back over the week’s discussions and adding my 2 cents (pence?) as the mood strikes me.
They are. Because they tell people “Cicling is dangerous!” So they think twice when it comes to the dicision between bike and car or in best case public transport.
Stefan, life itself is dangerous. How many people are injured every year in falls in the home?
Wise people understand the risks and take reasonable steps to alleviate them; things like grab-rails and non-slip treads in the shower stall, handrails on staircases, seatbelts in cars, and yes, a helmet on my head when cycling.
Yehuda’s wearing a helmet to cycle in. At least it isn’t a cycle helmet.
Because wearing a cycle helmet would be…?
dumb apparently.
@Pierre – because it’s totally out of character. Just to remind you:
o Yehuda – beard, cap, sandles. Official job title at the Kickstand: Business Prevention Officer
o Joe – Mono-brow, Lycra / Spandex, helmet, fair-weather use only. Probably made of sugar.
o Thistle – formerly overweight, cargo biking mum. Electronic genius reduced to hanging around a bike shop.
o Fred – Fred’s dead, baby. Fred’s dead.
o Shakers – Alchemists who transmute base metals into unobtanium. Probably actually in league with Satan.
o Chunkbait – Fat kid.
o Captain Dashboard – Cyborg, probably made by Skynet.
o Sister Sprocket – Pipe-smoking, smoking-hot nun. Has repressed feelings about beards & sandals.
o Bike Ninja – The Shakers’ Black Ops department.
o Blue Car Driver – will we ever know…?
Actually — Joe is probably made of salt. A little more bitter, but will still dissolve in water.
So when do we get to see Fred’s chopper? (it’s not a bike, it’s a chopper!)
Oh, and KarlOnSea, don’t forget…
o The Grail – Joe keeps trying to catch him
http://www.yehudamoon.com/index.php?date=2008-07-09
pointless as usual. If I felt i needed a helmet on my bike I wouldn’t settle for a flimsy stryofoam cap.
At this point I’m dreading the comments to follow and probably won’t check back in later today.
That’s a shame Syke as SOME good comments will sometimes appear anyway…
i wonder what kind of snacks he is going to get?? my problem with snacking in the shop while working on bikes is that my hands are never really clean enough to eat properly.
Dude! That’s what “Circus Animal” cookies are for! The snack of choice of every car/bike/whatever mechanic! If they get dirty, just wipe ‘em off!
I remember the days when a ‘helmet war’ used to last all day and cover many pages of comments!
Thing is, shops sell a range of protective apparel to give us choice. We don’t go out on the mountains without wearing suitable clothing if we are serious about our health and safety. Like doing a major rock climb without ropes – dangerous fun and it affects only the participants if they have nobody that likes them. Apart from those who get to scrape up the remains!
So wearing a helmet may have a questionable level of protection but at the very least it can help prevent some of the road-rash injuries. The heavier knocks will hurt us regardless of the helmet, yes, but at least all the pieces are kept in one place and are simpler to remove from the scene and identify the owner from!
Isn’t that what Walz caps are made for?
Nope. Duct tape. (Nee duck tape. See <http://www.octanecreative.com/ducttape/duckvsduct.html>
. 
Yeah the Mythbusters even made a cannon out of it!
what most people fail to see ist: Compared to rock climbing, car driving, stair walking, taking a shower aso riding a bike even in city traffic is not dangerous. It may feel, but is tha a reason to wear a helmet? if so, then why does nobody take in account to wear one in his car? or on stairs?
Best simply look to the netherlands. A lot of bike drivers on the street, but nobody even talks about helmets. Not even childreen use them. Wearing a bike helmet in Holland says: ” I am an german tourist”
Don’t forget the shower – by far, the most head injuries occur while slipping in the shower. Wear it if you feel you need it, don’t if you feel you don’t. Life is risk.
GO BROWNS!!
Ok this UK Englishman has some idea of the reference but is ignorant of the actual team - Is this ‘The St. Louis Cardinals’ or the Denver ‘Browns’ or some Shaker Heights team?
Actually the team is the Cleveland Browns. An expansion team after the first Browns moved to Baltimore and wre re-named the Ravens (after the poem written by Baltimore resident corpse Edgar Allen Poe). It’s all part of a very sordid history of the NFL after Baltimore’s team the Colts left town unannounced in the middle of the night (literally) to move to Indianapolis.
@Opus the Poet: NFL teams moving around is not a recent invention. The Rams, now of St. Louis, Missouri, were originally a Cleveland team (Wikipedia: <http://tinyurl.com/7wdpsxr>
. In between, the Rams played in Los Angeles and Anaheim, California. And then there’s the Raiders, the team I grew up cheering… (Oakland, Los Angeles, Oakland — all in California.)
@Tencon: As a courtesy to Browns fans, I suggest you don’t use Denver and Browns in the same sentence. For an explanation, you can look up Cleveland and “The Drive” or “The Fumble.” Wailing and gnashing of teeth is also provoked by mentioning “Red Right 88.”
And before Browns fans come after me with their daggers for reminding them of these tragedies, I point out in my defense that I too hate the Steelers — since 1972 and “The Immaculate Reception” against the Oakland Raiders. (I grew up in Northern California.)
Yes but I still don’t know whether it is baseball or football?
(note that English cricket players wear protection as a 90mph cricket ball has been known to cause injury!)
@Tencon: Sorry! Cleveland Browns = American football.
No such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing and bad preparation.
You know I am dyslexic, right? I first saw that as ‘Perspiration’! Ha Ha
He finally has shoulders.
An 80s flashback?
I had this thought yesterday. I did not doubt my studded tires’ ability to keep me under control, but I had a whole lot of doubts about drivers’ abilities to keep their four-wheelers under control. I took the bus.
4WD just means you can get further off-road before you get stuck
4WD means all shops have bigger parking lots, because that’s the only ‘off-road’ use those cars will ever see …
Just finally put my studs on. Hopefully that’ll make it actually snow up here in North Idaho….
It’s not just in Cleveland that this happens, either. We just got our first significant snowfall of the season — about four inches between Wednesday night and this AM — and even so there are people driving out there who must think that the white stuff on the roads is beach sand, or that this is going to be the year that snow is *NOT* going to be slippery.
Living in Wisconsin or other parts of the North Country you’d think folks would remember that winter is going to come again, just as it does every year, and that each year snow and ice will continue to be hazardous. It should be in our genes by now, but it still generally takes at least two good snowfalls for most people before their winter driving skills return.
Ah well; the body shops can use the business…….
Come to Richmond if you want to have a real laugh. 1″ snowfall will have the same effect here as a 24″ snowfall would anywhere from Erie, PA (used to live there) north. The native-born down here have absolutely no clue how to drive in winter weather. Or the approach of winter weather. Or the prediction (three days ahead) of winter weather.
As to getting the annual driving skills back: I miss the old Sunday Blue Laws. When winter hit, you could always go to a close mall parking lot on Sunday and practice spinning and sliding away from traffic until you got your skills back. And the police were usually pretty good about it as long as you stayed away from the light standards and weren’t acting too overtly stupid.
That’s how my Dad instructed me. He was an Army instructer and used to teach M/C use by letting them loose on a large muddy field before letting them anywhere near the road. They soon ‘got’ the skills of clutch/brake control etc and were much better riders as a result. When I got my first m/c he told me to practise figure-of-eights in the area of lockup garages about 30 feet wide. With handlebar clearnce to consider and the downhill slope on the ‘width’ of the space, I had a tricky time learning to stay upright at 0 mph for a while. Sort of a ‘trackstand’ for motorcycles. With the 200cc 2-stroke it did not take long! The ‘GL1000A’ Gold Wing was a different matter but I eventually mastered it… A matter of balancing throttle and clutch against the brake, standing on the pegs instead of sitting (The ‘Wing had a low c-o-g but this lowered it further, like standing on the pedals on our bikes) and and taking it very slowly. I could do it but it took me months to get it right with the ‘Wing. After that, Snow, Ice etc was no problem, I just had to be careful with the speed and never go faster than I had control at
I might add that all this assumes traction as you are going knowhere if you have NO grip at all! One can balance on black ice but any change in speed is only possible when spreadeagled or using metal spikes! The wrong sort of muddy clay etc even makes spikes useless…
the relative temperature of the snow has effect too. I’d rather drive on 4″ of very cold snow (-15C or better) than 1″ of wet slucky stuff on a frozen ground. The wet stuff is far slipperier, and if the temp is just right, somewhere between -5C and -12C then it also polishes into ice too easily. I find it is definitely safer to ride a bike in these conditions and choose a route that keeps me away from busy traffic.
Well, at least Yehuda will be mildly safe. And it’s cheaper than those motorcycle suits or that “body armor” stuff sold to downhill MTBers.
Perhaps he should wear the Spiderman outfit over all this gear. Better protection and better visibility – a beautiful synergy.
It’s Saturday and I’m bored so I logged in but then I remembered that there’s no new strip on Saturday so I’m still bored.
I am not – the comments provide happy hours of fun as long as we don’t stop commenting just becuase there is no new strip…
@Tencon: The weekend break is nice. I know it’s a new paradigm for Kickstand veterans, but I like going back over the week’s discussions and adding my 2 cents (pence?) as the mood strikes me.
Helmets are not a big problem.
Snow, yes. Ice, oh yes. Cold, oh my! We moved 1,700 miles to avoid that stuff but helmets don’t scare us in the slightest.
They are. Because they tell people “Cicling is dangerous!” So they think twice when it comes to the dicision between bike and car or in best case public transport.
Stefan, life itself is dangerous. How many people are injured every year in falls in the home?
Wise people understand the risks and take reasonable steps to alleviate them; things like grab-rails and non-slip treads in the shower stall, handrails on staircases, seatbelts in cars, and yes, a helmet on my head when cycling.
Ah yes, weekdays only, new paradigm it is indeed, but that’s okay if it means, ultimately, that yehuda and the kickstand won’t leave us again.