Mamil

Please stop using chat GPT to write blurb ... race looks tempting though

I recently sold a car to we ..... cars - it was completely buggered - (minor fender bender issues, torn leather upholstery AND a fault in the central control box which intermittently discharged the battery and which only the agents could fix for 40k.) Car 15 years old, book value of 80K. I disclosed every single fault to them in detail, would have taken X for the car, was offered 1.5 times X which I took and converted into (another) bicycle. I would sell to we......cars again but there is not a snowball's chance I would buy from them. PS: If they offer you a 15 year old Honda at a cheap price .... don't.

Also massive changes in traffic management (discouraging cars) and cycling infrastructure in Paris I read

"While it is not sustainable .... ", makes me chuckle, a somewhat bitter chuckle, more irony laced growl than a laugh.

Don't mind a bit of shameless self promotion - this is the latest vid

Thanks - Ja that's a good idea - I suppose I've ridden those roads so often I just take it as read. Drone is a DJI Neo 2 which is a truly miraculous piece of tech

When I grow up I want to be like @capediver

Excellent advice. I see thise kids often. Gave one of them a choob a while back. I remember thinking he looked terrified of me. Hope the ppa can do something here. Please let us know

One day when I'm big

That really does look like a medical issue - a sudden veering to the left, no effort to correct, no brake light. Doesn't look like he registered the sudden change of direction at all.

You mean one of those rear view mirrors i see some other mamils have on their handlebars. So you can see just how fast the mofo in his Q12 or x19 or whatever is coming up behind?

Also no sticker and a bunch of snaps .... most of which leave me thinking "Who's that hoary old hill giant". I joked the other day that as a young person I didn't think I was particularly good looking / borderline ugly. Now in my late middle age, and actually do look like a worn our tennis ball, I walk around feeling pretty confident about my physical appearance and I look at pictures of the younger man I was and think "Wow you looked fantastic". Life is full of these quirks.

That's a classic and an excellent route - another option is over hawequa on gravel, down bains on road - hang a left at the bottom and head to Tulbagh for a coffee and cake then there is a railway track dodge and a hairy bit of road before hitting the retuen gravel section to Welly - let me know if you are interested and I'll find a gpx - it's longer by a good bit than 50 though

@ChrisFWRT yoir second question ill tell you what i do. 2 powerful rear lights, one a radar. Front light in flashing mode. 2 strips red reflective tape on heel of shoes because i read that moving light sources predict better visibility. I hand signal and aggressively take tje lane at pinch points and either slow down or take the lane on left hand corners where cars are likely to cut the apex. I obey most traffic lights except when it is safe to cross AND i see that I will be safer when doing so. If radar detects a fast moving vehicle i will routinely make a hand signal which sometimes slows them down. I am super alert about being dutch doored and ensure i am out of range of doors as much as i can. I am punctilious about pedestrian right of way. If I am in a lot of traffic i will work as hard as possible to be at tje same speed as the vehicles. I realise that in so many of the fatal incidents (accidents is the wrong word, murders might be a bit strong, neglectful homicide might be closer) nonenof the above will matter a jot. Also, the position that I hold appears to be misrepresented by some to mean an abdication of responsibility for our own safety which is absurd. Cyclists and motorists are false categories, this is a contextual, legal and socio cultural problem and the terms imposed by these categories restrict thinking about solutions. That having been said i am increasingly vehement in my dislike for cars and my disdain for what they represent and reveal about our societal attitude to a range of topics, from the environment to our hubristic emphasis on the individual and power. If it was not necessary to own one i wouldnt (we are a one car household, i ride most places i need to be). Rubber side down every one of us and watch out for @sshats . Ps edit. In convo with a someone inntje know and i learned that one of tje retailers built a model siggesting that 700 delivery bike riders were killed on the roads last year. Theres another category, another other ...Let's all start going on about how tjey are to blame.

I suspect that you are the troll and you sound hungry

The fixing of it is the reclamation of public space from the motor industry. The car distances people from each other and from the world. We see taxis, sports cars, bicycles, suvs, bakkies, land rovers instead of kids, moms with infants, fathers and sons. On my commute or a walk on tje neighbourhood i see the naughty little teenagers with their zol, the woman with her dog in matching jerseys, the plumbers mate waiting for his boss, etc. I am the grumpy old.man yelling at the schoolkids to behave, the friendly geezer on the bike who waves at tje security guard at the adolescent psychiatry unit in mowbray. im not a cyclist im a person and i can relate to the other persons i share the commons with. I cannot relate to the cars because the people in them.are not inntje commons. Tjey are in their own private space, anonymised in plastic and metal. But a change like that this takes political will. National gvt is broken. Local western cape govt thinks the economy is.going to save us (it wont). Write, lobby, talk, and occupy the mutha f^*kn lane.

Are we at the point where tightening the boas and clipping in to the road bike is tickling the lions nuts? I mean ive seen some big p0×ses on tje roads but im not really a mane ou so ... Riding a bike is more than a hobby or a recreation for me. Its part of a lifestyle and theres a political and social stance to it as well. I wont stop. I have changed the pattern of my riding but i think the proper response of this loose and heterogenous group called cyclists to this crisis is to draw attention to the absurdity of a society that views the motor car in the way @Solly Moeng article describes so well. I knock off early on a friday and i ride through the school traffic to get home. No kids on bikes. They all in the cars. Its too dangerous for the kids to ride home so the parents take @Paul Ruinaard risk management strategy and say "dont ride". Its not hard to see the escalating feedback.loop that sees another yummy mummy in an overpriced SUV overtake me and cut me off. I cant help but imagine how the stretch from grooteschuur HS, past the primary, to bishops and Rondebosch to Rustenburg Girl's and on to st georges and tje other one wjose name i cant remember and whos kids i scolded on my bike commute for smoking a zol inntje middlenof tje road and then in tje otjer direction to sans souci, westerford and Herschel would look if even half the kids rode to school and back Our response ought to be one of increased advocacy, more bikes, confrontation of our useless poltical leaders, writing like sollys article, op eds on daily maverick but above all, more bikes on the roads.

God forbid I get hit and you can post here, "Well what did he expect, he went riding on one of the most famous routes in the world." MAybe someone of a similar mindset will add "What colour was his shirt? ... oh it was that nice dark maroon one from Ciovita, no wonder". As my last engagement with you on this topic, your again tacit assumption that riding on the road constitutes ignoring the danger and not taking steps to ensure safety is incorrect and arrogant

Your victim blaming lies in the tacit implication that if "cyclists" cleaned up their act and/or simply weren't on the road we wouldn't be being killed. In the context of the recent deaths (2x car doors, a tourist bus turning across oncoming traffic, a taxi overtaking recklessly, a drunk driver in Worcester ... I could go on, your statement is at a minimum insensitive to the context of the conversation and in my view, falls squarely in the realm of "She was walking in a mini skirt and therefore can be blamed for a sexual assault".

An absurd position to adopt - at the risk of reductio ad absurdum in my own argument, "It is dangerous to walk to the corner cafe, don't do it", "Public space offers little to no options for disabled people, they should not go out in public spaces".

Ja. When you get and renew your license you should be made to swear an oath. Might be fun to write the text for that promise. Its a great piece that you wrote @Solly Moeng

I actually can't see things improving on any time horizon. There is clearly minimal political will to take NMT seriously and perhaps also a lack of competence in that domain too. Walking anywhere in the city with one or two notable exceptions is very difficult and often dangerous, riding a bicycle we can all tell that story and live it everytime we go for a ride and if you've ever tried to push a wheelchair around town you'll know that the more vulnerable you are as a user of pub lic space the less the design and implementation of infrastructure caters to your needs and the harder and more dangerous it is. There's a woman in a wheelchair at the robot on Durban and Liesbeek parkway most evenings and I've seen her barelling down Durban road with all the skill of a downhill racer and all the disregard for the rules of a taxi driver and I say "GO GIRL"

I'm waiting for the call for mamils who don't jump but who know how to have fun and who train super hard to be slightly above average.

*****