Tuesday, February 24, 2009

I'm doing some research for my sister on Google. One of my searches was for "Kid Carrying Trikes" and google responded with "Did you mean: kid carrying trucks."

No, asshole, I didn't.

Posted by Dreqan @ 08:33 PM PST Link | 64 People give a shit!

My computer is currently toasty. I blame the power supply. It's always the fucking power supply. Between our downstairs movie computer, qehn's, and mine we probably go through at least one power supply a year. That's fucking bullshit.

Posted by Dreqan @ 07:15 PM PST Link | 38 People give a shit!

Monday, February 16, 2009

Today Qehn and I hopped a couple school buses and rode an hour north to Salem (the capitol of Oregon) to rally for kids or education or something like that. The Stand For Kids people put it on and the Oregonian wrote an article about it. Keep in mind if you read the article that the Oregonian has been criticized for having a conservative slant in the past.

We had over 5,000 people rallying for Oregon schools and what not. They're main solution seemed to be raising corporate and "vice" taxes and dipping into our rainy day fund. Neither solution I'm super happy about. I'm all about corporations paying a fair amount of taxes, which in Oregon they currently aren't - but if we go too crazy it will just lead to layoffs and an even worse tax base. Raising beer and other vice taxes also seems a bit classist to me. Their other solution is to dip into the education budget's "rainy day" fund due to our 20% budget shortfall this year. The problem with that is that next year it's supposed to be even worse - so I feel this is a short sighted solution. Also, cutting the school year 1 or 2 days saves as much money as an elementary school uses in a year. (Really!) Maybe that's not such a bad idea - even though it'd fuck hourly employees like me. Some teachers and administrators are day dreaming of a four day school week - but this would be catastrophic. Probably 90% of the hourly workers like Instructional Assistants, who currently generally only work 30 hours/week as it is, would have to leave the district for jobs that could offer more hours. This would cripple the school district which relies incredibly heavily on IA support.

All in all the rally was pretty boring. I took a bunch of video in hopes of getting something not boring, but it just didn't happen. I may mix it down to some 30 second spot to show off to you guys, or I may just forget about the whole thing. The highlight for me was entertaining kids on the bus ride with my contact ball, clown nose, and rainbow hair. Lets hope none of those parents find this site, figure out it's me due to the description, and hear me swear. Swearing is bad mmmKAY?

------------

In other news at least Wisconsin is copying Oregon laws in their bid to protect bicyclists.

A careless motorist in Wisconsin who kills or seriously injures a “vulnerable user” of a public roadway, such as a bicyclist or pedestrian, should be subject to higher fines and suspension of their driver’s license. That would be possible if a new law in Oregon is passed by the Wisconsin Legislature.

~snip~

The Oregon law, which went into effect in January 2008, is the first to codify “vulnerable roadway user” as a special class of people deserving of additional protection. In Oregon the category includes all nonmotorized road users.

The article is a good, short read.

Posted by Dreqan @ 10:04 PM PST Link | 36 People give a shit!

Sunday, February 15, 2009

An interesting thing happened to me Friday night (early Saturday Morning.) I was biking home at 5am with Oregon Mark from an after party following a show we did at the WOW hall that night, and we were starving. There was a McDonald's on our way home which was open 24 hours but only drive up after 11pm. I'd successfully biked through a drive through before so we decided to try it. It all worked out well and when we got up to the window I pointed to the sign that said (paraphrased) "We do not serve customers on foot due to security reasons." and thanked the window lady for letting us bike through. She responded that The new rule is that they have to serve bikes and people in wheelchairs when they come through the drive through.

Holy shit. I was too tired to think to ask if it was a McDonald's rule or a government rule, but it's still fucking awesome. Not that McDonald's is somewhere I like to go, but at 5am there aren't many options. I'm a little confused about the wheelchair part, especially if they still aren't letting people on foot go through. It's a bit weird, but in a good way.

Posted by Dreqan @ 02:50 PM PST Link | 6 People give a shit!

Saturday, February 14, 2009

A quick update to the article I posted yesterday using aggregate information from several crappy short web articles and sketchy comments. Apparently it was night (dark) out on a county road and the biker had no light. He also had all his possessions in a sleeping bag on his bike. The driver that struck him had a suspended license due to multiple DUI's. He thought he had hit a deer which is why he didn't stop. According to multiple online comments he's a super nice guy and it was an accident. I wonder if the biker's homelessness had anything to do with the verdict as well.

Yes, biking on a highway at night is freakin' dumb - but so is driving with a suspended license. I also doubt the guy was sober, and this could easily be a story he cooked up to avoid getting piss tested after the accident. It's tragic on both sides, but the guy shouldn't have been driving anyway and already had proven to be dangerous driver by his multiple DUI's. That being said, with reasonable doubt and all that I can see why the judge did what he did. (Not that I agree with it.)

The system is fucked. Who knows what the correct response is? I know that if was someone who I knew accidentally killed someone with their car that I'm sure I'd feel differently. People need to understand the danger they put themselves and others in when they drive multi-ton vehicles at highway speeds, both legally and physically.

On brighter news I've put up a gallery of neat things I see while biking around Eugene.

The current theme is bike specific traffic devices like this one:

Yay! More later.

Posted by Dreqan @ 09:18 PM PST Link | 11 People give a shit!

Friday, February 13, 2009

All I can say is "what the fuck?" That five foot bubble is starting to sound a bit necessary in Iowa, eh?

Iowa man gets 6 months for killing cyclist

Full Text:

A Muscatine, Iowa, man accused in a hit-and-run that killed a bicyclist north of the city in 2007 will serve six months in jail, according to The Associated Press.

Clark Anderson was sentenced January 9 after he pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of a fatal accident and driving with a revoked license. Prosecutors said a charge of vehicular homicide against Anderson was dismissed because two witnesses died and a third couldn't be found.

The judge suspended a sentence of five years in prison and a fine of $750 for leaving the crash site. Anderson was instead ordered to serve 180 days in jail and pay a $1,000 fine for driving with a revoked license.

Anderson was accused of killing cyclist Jerry Person, formerly of Fort Smith, Arkansas, on September 4, 2007.

Posted by Dreqan @ 06:19 PM PST Link | 6 People give a shit!

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

I did a 3.25 mile run today after my daily 14 miles of bike commuting. It hurt, a lot. Running uses very different muscles. Cardio-wise I was fine, maintaining an 85% max heart rate for over 20 minutes without much trouble. On the downside I was running about 8.5 minute miles so that sucks ass. That's a very slow pace to be rocking an 85% heart rate on. To my credit I live on a very steep hill. (150 foot elevation drop and gain in the 3ish miles - 125 feet of it being climbed in the last half mile - which I did in 4.5 minutes - or a 9min/mile pace!)

Oh well. I haven't ran since spring of '07 - and then it was only twice right before my last x-country bike trip. Biking just doesn't work out the heart and cardio the way running does. I commuted 29 miles yesterday and it didn't even phase me. Biking = easy and lets me get fat (despite my heavy bike and fast pace.) Running = hard and hopefully won't let me get fatter.

We'll see how much I do it. On a nice day with time I'll Muni over running any day. It's harder cardio, a longer workout, and a great core workout. Plus, it's the funnest thing since sliced bread and woman's genitals. Running will be the "I only have 45 minutes to do some kind of a workout," or "It's rainy and the trails will be muddy," workout. If I can slide it in twice a week that should be just about right. Any more and I won't have enough recovery time with my daily biking. Of course, any day that I Muni would negate a day I'd have to run, since that tends to kill me for several days afterwords. I hope to do some road riding once the weather gets nice again - but the allure of Muni tends to be too much. I should start soon since I want to do a decent double century by RAGBRAI this year.

A Eugene biking picture post is coming soon.

Oh, and I have rainbow hair again - for those of you who don't follow my facebook pictures.

Posted by Dreqan @ 07:58 PM PST Link | 12 People give a shit!

Sunday, February 8, 2009

An AP story was picked up in my local newspaper headlined: Obama creates faith-based office with wide mission.

Oh Boy.

This headline is incredibly misleading. I was all ready to roll me eyes and conclude that we have yet another Reverend in President's clothing, but what he's doing seems pretty sweet. However there seems to be a lot of contradictions. It leaves me asking "just who is this guy we elected?"

I'll review it after the jump.

Read More

Posted by Dreqan @ 05:02 PM PST Link | 661 People give a shit!

Friday, February 6, 2009

TEXT AS FOLLOWS:

House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH), who has already been proven a prick, has just been joined by Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) and Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) in the annals of prickdom. They have drafted and defended legislation prohibiting funding for bike projects in the stimulus package.

BikePortland.com has the details of the bill and responses. It's a quick read - any "summary" I could produce would be just as long.

Relatedly, Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) is NOT a prick. Read the BikePortland summary to find out why.

Posted by Dreqan @ 07:21 PM PST Link | 833 People give a shit!

Thursday, February 5, 2009

My Sis gave me a heads up on an an article recently ran in the Des Moines Register. My reaction to it is probably not as positive as she expected.

For those of you just joining in, I lived in Iowa for the first 26 years of my life (except 0-1). Iowa is a great state, but cycling is still a joke there. This is ironic since it is the home of RAGBRAI, the largest state ride in the country with over 10,000 bikers riding across the state every year. If it weren't for my living in Iowa (as opposed to a different midwest state) I doubt I would have ever gotten so in to cycling. The problem is in Iowa cycling is still thought of as only a recreational activity. It's something that you do on the weekends, nice days, or on RAGBRAI - and except for RAGBRAI it should be kept on bike trails. There is no tolerance for the viewpoint that cycling is not just for recreation but is in fact a valid lifestyle, and there is no respect for the people who live this lifestyle.

Even the college towns, the only towns with any progressive bike culture in the state, are still inundated with this belief. There are diamonds in the rough but they are rare and far between. This means that bikers throughout the state risk their lives every time they venture off the bike trails. I've been run off the road, cursed at, yelled at, gestured at, etc more riding around and near Ames than anywhere else - and I barely bike commuted in Ames.

So now there is this article explaining about how a legislator is proposing some laws that will progress Iowa to only ten years behind the rest of the world in bike safety and respect. And it's being fought, hard. The comments are especially wonderful.

I'll post and review my favorites after the jump.

Read More

Posted by Dreqan @ 07:58 PM PST Link | 1755 People give a shit!

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

I WANT TO ONE:

(Actually, no I don't, but I'd love to play on one for awhile.)

The video gets pretty funny about halfway through.

It'd be fun, but there's no way in hell I'm giving up the Xtracycle.

Posted by Dreqan @ 10:42 PM PST Link | 917 People give a shit!

Monday, February 2, 2009

Hmmm... looking at my logs and thanks to a few friendly links it would appear that there are respectable people here.

Oooh...

There may come a time when I should archive this site and start anew, without the 6 years of archives that are - to put it lightly - horribly and incredibly offensive to just about everyone. The farther back you go the worse it gets. So, new people, don't read the archives. It's worse than you think. You'll think less of me. Besides, I was in college.

Not that having a post only 4-5 posts back outing myself as an Agnostic and bitching about prayer in the inauguration is really much better. That, and this page is called "Hey, is that guy peeing?" - and used to be called "Plastic Penis." I suppose people shouldn't come in here expecting anything clean. I don't even use my real name*. And I swear here. A lot. (*but for some reason I link it from my Facebook - which is just asking for it.)

It would be nice to start a blog with some legitimacy that could have readers who I'd like to respect me in real life who probably aren't all about jokes about bestiality and replacement vaginas. Maybe a bike specific blog - but so many of those already exist.

This page was always supposed to be a semi-entertaining extension of me - although over the past few years it's been much more censored. I haven't gotten less dirty or offensive minded, but I fear I can't hide behind young age to get away with it anymore so I've been hiding it.

Ahhh, fuck it. I'm not changing a thing. If a student finds this, fuck 'em. They'd probably think I was cooler for it. I talk to them about how much fun it would be to shoot a poop catapult at the highschool our "special" school shares a lot with as it is. - I not too worried about them. I even think my boss founds this page through Mark awhile back, but I don't think he remembers it. I don't pretend to be a clean "adult" around them. I openly admit to swearing like a sailor and laughing at doggy boners - the lesson I always teach is that there is a time and a place for everything. School, obviously, not the place. The internet, however...

Life's to short to fully censor yourself EVERYWHERE.

Posted by Dreqan @ 11:23 PM PST Link | 469 People give a shit!