I recently aquired a bicycle. Actually MY bicycle. From my childhood, age 13. Surprisingly enough it’s actually a good size for me still. Apparently I was taller than I thought back then. Overall, great news. I think it was actually a pretty nice bike for back in the day. It seems to have held up pretty well overall. Rust free, brakes work, shifters work, good to go. My sister even used it for a while and hooked it up with a rear blinky light and a decent basket and rack on the back.
The equipment seems to be ready to roll. I, however, don’t feel quite so prepared. When I was a kid I would ride this bike around our North Raleigh suburban subdivision to get to the pool and that was about it. Now I am getting ready to use this thing as a downtown transportation alternative. I’ve never ridden on any city streets along with traffic. My first instinct is just to use sidewalks and whatnot, but I think that’s kinda frowned upon. Seems like the only way to really learn is just to get out there and do it.
That said a little investigation seemed in order. It’s kinda how I roll. I get some new idea in life and I use the great intarweb to research it to death. I found an informative site on bicycle safety. Aptly named BicycleSafe. It’s full of great tips on how to not get hit by cars. This seems like a very important thing and so I am thrilled to get some expert advise on the subject. Unfortunately it also led me to this. “Doored” is what they call it and apparently it leads to a great deal of mayhem and pain. Let’s hope that I don’t end up in such a position.
Now equiped with bike and basic safety knowledge it is time to go forth and pedal. Wish me luck tomorrow. I hope to be back in one piece to tell the story.
I have made a pretty regular habit of stopping in at the Brueger’s Bagels on my way into the office most mornings now for a bagel\cream cheese and a Diet Coke. I’m an American dammit and I can eat anything I want while I drive. If I want to smoke a cigarette and eat a bagel and make a phone call and drive all at the same time then that’s my right! Everyone else is doing it. Much to the detriment to the safety of our highways and byways. We all bitch and moan when we see others do it, only to crawl back to our corner to indulge in a little drive and shave\makeup.
Why bagels? It’s fast and easy and convenient to me. Sometimes. The issue I have is that hot bagel + cream cheese = big giant mess. I’m serious, it’s ridiculous. People in other cars must look over at me and have some pretty strange thoughts. There I am sipping on my coke with a big white ring of sticky goo all over my mouth. Gross, right? I mean the napkins help and all, but I can’t be cleaning up like a dainty little tea and crumpets girl after every bite as I cruise down Wade Ave. So every time I roll into Brueger’s most people are franticly searching for their favorite flavor “HOT!” while I search for something old and crusty so I don’t have to drive around looking like some kind of circus clown. Today I found Assiago Parmesan and Lite Veggie Cream Cheese. Sadly, the “HOT!” sign was lacking even though they were hot.
So if someone saw me cruising through Raleigh today and was a little concerned that there might be some ravenous lunatic in the left hand lane, don’t be alarmed, it’s just hot bagels.
I’ve recently grown a pretty serious twitter addiction. And at this very moment there is no twitter. It’s toast. Maybe it’s my connection, but other sites are working. So this leaves me to think about what the heck I do with myself without it. This seems fairly insane to me at this moment, but here are the reasons it’s making me batty:
I like to know what my friends are up to. Now how do I know what the universe has been doing for the last fifteen minutes?
I like to tell other people what I am doing. I don’t care if they want to listen. If a tree falls in the woods and there is no one there to hear it, it does still make a noise. Well if I tweet something irrelevant and pointless, even if no one cares, the twitter-bots still hear me. Close enough for me.
So at the moment if twitter was there I would probably say something like:
Pandora is working pretty well to entertain me today.
I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. Clearly we wouldn’t all be here if it really bothered us that much. With that said it’s pretty amazing how accessible our day to day lives are. Twitter and BrightKite definitely are the biggest cuplrits of this. It’s like voluntarily putting a GPS locater on ourselves. Most people who provide this information are under house arrest for being an escape risk or something.
The funny thing is that it’s the most technically savvy that are doing this. The rest of the world is busy hiding themselves online due to shear paranoia. But really, why even bother. Sites like Yahoo and Pipl able to easily locate all kinds of info about you. Addresses, phone numbers, past addresses, you name it. Odds are good you probably show up on some employers web site somewhere. Your email address is EVERYWHERE.
I am happy to share my life on the internet. It’s fun. It’s a great time killer. It’s therapeutic. It’s a great way to meet some like minded souls.
So I was reading this post over at TUAW that describes how to get unlimited iPhone data and pay as you go voice and I thought to myself if I REALLY needed a phone line that much. Looking at my statements it looks like I use about 300 minutes a month, 170 text messages, and 70 megs of data. Maybe someone out there has a calculator to figure out which way is cheaper for me to go. I don’t HATE that the iPhone is costing me 60 bucks a month for the plan, it’s a good deal overall. Just one of those things that makes me wonder if I could somehow find a way to be smarter about my cell plan.
What Phones, Plans, wireless, landline, skype, etc are you using? What is your monthly “staying connected” cost?
Was cruising my RSS feeds earlier today and came across this post on TUAW about a short video that Dennis Liu put together. I don’t think I can emphasize enough how amazing this thing is. Turns out the music is pretty solid as well. I just picked it up on iTunes for 8 bucks and I don’t feel bad about it because it’s iTunes+ so it means it isn’t total garbage.
I have made a pretty regular habit of stopping in at the Brueger’s Bagels on my way into the office most mornings now for a bagel\cream cheese and a Diet Coke. I’m an American dammit and I can eat anything I want while I drive. If I want to smoke a cigarette and eat a bagel and make a phone call and drive all at the same time then that’s my right! Everyone else is doing it. Much to the detriment to the safety of our highways and byways. We all bitch and moan when we see others do it, only to crawl back to our corner to indulge in a little drive and shave\makeup.
I’ve recently grown a pretty serious 
