It never ceases to amaze me...

I've always considered myself to be a pretty level headed and logical kind of guy. Per my Buddhist tendencies and Lutheran background and upbringing, I don't tend to react to situations in any sort of extreme manner. I don't get terribly excited about the good things, and I don't get too upset about the bad things. I figure that things tend to even out over time.

Along those same lines, I don't get surprised by too many things either. You don't tend to get knocked off of your feet by a wave, if you're content to bob along with the tide.

(Wow, that's actually pretty deep. Feel free to quote me on that.)

But the other day, I was surprised by a couple of things. Allow me to give you a not so brief synopsis of what happened.

Last Saturday, my wife and I were on our way to pick up our son Michael, as he was participating in a chess tournament over in Plano.

(We are currently training him to be a nerd. It appears to be going well.)

As we're driving along, I noticed up ahead, something swerving all over the right hand lane of the two lane road we were driving on. We got closer, and I realized it was a cyclist. As we come up behind him, we all arrived at a red light. I'm guessing that most of you know what's coming next. That's right, the guy runs the red light.

I should have figured the guy was going to run the red light, as he was wearing a tank top skin suit. A dead give away that the guy was a triathlete. No offense to any triathletes who happen to be reading this, or are having someone read it to them, (I'm kidding.), but it is my opinion, and only my opinion, that triathletes tend to ride their bicycles in a more haphazard, slightly illegal fashion that other cyclist. I'm not saying all triathletes ride this way, or even most triathletes. I'm just saying that they tend to be slightly ahead of the curve on illegal riding habits. For more of my opinions on triathletes, please click here.

So, the guy runs the red light. I suppress my desire to immediately run the guy down.

(Again, I'm kidding, sort of.)

After Trish and I wait for the light to turn green, I move to the left lane and roll my passenger's window down. As I pull up along side of him, I shout out the window, "You really should stop at those red lights!". To his credit, showing that he's not a complete idiot, he doesn't respond in any fashion, at least not yet, which is the correct response in this situation. Having said my piece, we go on down the road, where we catch the red light at the next intersection. Since we're making a left turn at this intersection, we're in the left turn lane. I glance in my mirror and I notice that the guy on the bike has now moved from the right lane, to the left lane, which is right next to the left turn lane. I continue to watch him, and he has now moved to the left side of that left lane, so that he is now going to pass right next to my car. Again, I imagine that most of you can guess what's going to happen next. For those of you who guessed that he flipped me off as he went by, you would once again be correct.

The finger flip is actually the retort of last resort. If you've completely run out of arguments and you have no logical responses to an adversaries arguments, and you finally admit to yourself that you were indeed wrong, but you refuse to admit it to your opponent, the the finger flip is what you resort too. It is the 'dirty bomb' of verbal confrontation.

He then proceeds to pedal up to the front of the line of cars waiting for the red light, were he cuts in front of the left lane of traffic and the cars in left turn lane, making an illegal u-turn, and once again, running another red light. So he is now traveling back down the 4 lane divided road towards me. I won't bore you with the detail, but needless to say, as he went by, we exchanged more pleasantries and obscure hand gestures.

So what, might you ask, surprised me about this encounter?

The first thing that surprised me about this, and it's something that continues to surprise me every time I see it, is the moronic way some people ride their bicycles. I don't know about you, but when I ride my bike on the road, I try and give the automobiles a healthy amount of respect. Not that most of them have earned that respect, but by the shear size of them, compared to the size of me and my bike, and the amount of damage they could potentially do to me and my bike, they should be given that respect. If for no other reason that simple self preservation.

The second thing that surprised me about this encounter, arose from a very intelligent question that Trish asked. It wasn't surprising that Trish asked an intelligent question. You can believe me when I say that if an intelligent question is going to be asked at our house, it is more than likely going to come from Trish. Next would be our 10 year old son Michael, then our cat Boo. Currently, I rate slightly ahead of our dog Pepper, but she's only 8 months old. I expect that she'll pass me in the rankings sometime this winter.

No, what was surprising was that I didn't immediately have a good answer for her. Now in all fairness to me, (I usually try and be as fair as possible to me), the fact that I was screaming out the window at this guy was probably distracting me from forming an intelligent response to Trish.

So, as I rolled my passenger window down and was getting ready to shout at the guy, Trish asked, "Why do you need to say something to this guy? What do you care how he rides his bike?"

That's actually a pretty good question. Why would I need to say something to this guy? What do I care if this guy goes out and rides like an idiot?

How this guy rides actually falls under my famous and much talked about theory of the "Self-Correcting Problem".

The problem here is that this guy, and others like him, ride in an unsafe, illegal, and moronic fashion.

The correction to this problem is that eventually, if this guys continues to ride like this, he's going to do something unsafe and moronic at the wrong time, and he'll wind up getting squashed under a large vehicle.

And the problem will have corrected itself.

So if the odds are that eventually this problem will correct itself, why do I feel the need to address it with him. Until this guy gets himself squashed under a big vehicle, he not only makes himself look bad, but he makes all cyclist look bad. When motorist see this guy run a red light, they don't think "Look at that cyclist run that red light! That cyclist is riding illegally." No, what they actually think is that "All cyclist ride illegally." Motorist don't make the distinction between the actions of a single rider, and the actions of all riders. When riders like my new red light running friend ride illegally, they make us all look bad. I have enough problems keeping myself out of trouble, without getting lumped in with this guy. This guy riding like he does, makes it more difficult for all of us to go out and ride our bikes without getting beer bottles thrown at our heads. We should all be upset about how this guy rides. We should all want to say something to him.

When the city of Anna, Texas, just north of McKinney, banned bicyclist from FM 455, that didn't just ban the cyclist who had been riding in a large, fake, Tour de France peleton, and causing all of the problems. They banned all cyclist from that road. That's the danger to the rest of us law abiding riders, that cyclist like my new friend pose. While this guy, and the others like him, may be in the minority of cyclist, they are the ones that get the vast majority of the attention of motorist. Who are motorist more likely to remember? This guy running the red light on his bicycle, or me stopping at the red light on my bike, and waiting for it to turn green. They'll have forgotten about me 10 seconds after that light turns green. But they'll remember this guy every time they see a cyclist on the road.

That's why I needed to say something to this guy.

On a more personal note, if you happen to be in the McKinney, TX area either riding your bike, or just driving your car, and you happen to find yourself on McKinney Ranch Parkway, between Alma Rd and Custer Rd, keep a look out for my new friend. He would be the guy on his bike, in a tank top skin suit, swerving all over the road, and not stopping at the stop signs or the red lights. If you happen to see him, be sure to roll your window down and express your opinion on how he's riding. Also, be sure to tell him the Nearly Famous Fred said hi.

Peace out.....Nearly Famous Fred

P.S....Next week we have Nearly Famous Fred first. I'll be reporting remotely from Wichita Falls, TX. What, you might ask, in the name of God, could possibly make me spend a weekend in Wichita Falls, TX. Just about the only thing that could do that, is a bike ride. And not just any bike ride, but The Hotter-N-Hell 100 bike ride. Nothing says "Good Times!" like riding your bicycle through the lovely Wichita Falls scrub brush country side, in the 105 degree heat, for 100 mikes. Or in my case, 100 kilometers. Now that's living. I'll even be taking a day of vacation from work next Friday, so I can spend even more time in Wichita Falls. These are the kind of decisions that will eventually force Trish to put me in some sort of sub-standard nursing home.

NFF

OK, let's try this again

Over the last few months, I've made a startling discovery about myself. There's the very real possibility that I may be lazier than even I had thought. I might be lazier than I thought was humanly possible. The reason I gave myself, (whenever I asked myself), for stopping posting to this blog was that "I'm just way too busy to write a blog. I've just got too much going on to take the time to write every day."

But as I started examining my day to day activities, I made the aforementioned startingly discovery. While I certainly had a lot that needed to get done, I very rarely actually did any of those things. If I had actually done, or even attempted to do, any of the many things that I needed to do, then yes, I would have been very busy.

As those of you who have spent, i.e...wasted, any of your time reading this blog in the past can attest to, I am a self-confessed very lazy person. I haven't seen any official ratings, but I very well could be the laziest person. I'm certainly in the top 10.

I recently heard someone actually say the following:

"I just can't sit still and do nothing. That would just drive me crazy!"

As this person said these words, I became very confused. I recognized the words as being English, and I knew what each individual word meant. But as they were constructed into sentences, they just didn't make any sense to me. I've spent the greater part of my life striving towards "sit still and doing nothing". Call it a dream if you will. The fact that I have so much that needs to get done, yet I spend an amazingly large percentage of my time avoiding actually doing anything, only serves to amplify my laziness.

You see, there are two schools of thought on laziness. First, there is the person who doesn't really have anything to do, and doesn't invest any time in actually looking for something to do. Let's call this person the Entry Level Lazy Person. It's a good place to start, but it takes no real self discipline to achieve. Basically, you have nothing to do, and you spend most of your time not doing it. Pretty easy.

Existing on a whole other level, is the Advanced Lazy Person. This is the category that I surprisingly find myself in. This is the person, that while they have a lot that needs to be done, they have the self discipline to force themselves not to do it. They have the drive to remain sitting in their big leather man-chair and do nothing, all the while, any number of task remain to be completed. They have the internal fortitude to ignore the guilt of letting deadlines pass, and still continue to watch TV. It's pretty damned heroic if you think about it.

I tell you this because I've been getting the itch to start posting to this blog again. As a card carrying Advanced Lazy Person, I find this extremely annoying. I've been perfectly content over the last several months, to sit around and do nothing, (aside from riding my bike every chance I get), and now I've got this nagging urge to get up and go do something. Personally, I view this as some sort of failure on my part. I've resisted the urge to actually accomplish something for so long, and now I just have to get up and get something done. It's like the last few months of doing nothing have been wasted.

So here's the deal. Since I'm still clinging to the idea that I'm just too busy to post to this blog everyday, (self delusion can really be a very handy thing), I'm going to make this a weekly column. I will post to this blog once a week, probably on Saturday evenings. If I happened to stumble across something that I just have to write about before the weekend, then I'll post a Nearly Famous Fred Special Edition. Even I, being as lazy as I am, should be able to come up with something, (hopefully something entertaining, but I make no guarantees), just once a week. We'll see how that goes.

OK, I've been typing for almost 15 consecutive minutes now. I should probably go take a nap.

Peace out.....Nearly Famous Fred

I do not like surprises

Sorry for my recent disappearing act from this blog. It seems that between work, spring break with my family, and yes, getting the course ready for Tour Dallas, I haven't had a lot of time for blogging. And this may come as a bit of a surprise, but given that it is nearly impossible to make a mortgage payment by writing a free blog, I do have to give work priority. If anyone has an idea of how I can make a living writing this blog, I'm all ears.

But things have settled down just enough that I'm able to resume my blogging responsibilities.

A quick review. The last time we spoke 3 weeks ago, we were discussing the ongoing preparations of the route for Tour Dallas. A lot has happened since then. We had a big meeting with the Dallas Police Department, along with people from Dallas City Hall where the ride will be starting. Maybe it's just me, but it always makes me nervous to go down to police headquarters. Don't get me wrong. I'm a fairly law abiding citizen, but I'm always afraid that something I did 20 years ago, that I have since completely forgotten about, will come back to bite me.

We've used the same basic route for Tour Dallas for the last 4 or 5 years, so you would think that getting things ready would be a pretty simple matter by now. You'd think that, wouldn't you. Well, you'd be wrong. It seems that every year, there are a few thinks that come up that cause me, Nearly Famous Fred - Route Coordinator, headaches. This year would be no exception.

This past Sunday I, along with my friend, cycling buddy, and all around good egg, Cliff DeWitt, went out and rode the Tour Dallas route. Along with Cliff and myself, we also road with a new friend of Cliff's named Brian. We try and do this pre-event ride every year, just to make sure that there are no surprises on the route that we weren't previously aware of. Well guess what, we encountered a couple of surprises.

Headache Causing Surprise # 1 - While riding the route, we discovered a previously undisclosed spot of construction on the route. While this was a very small bit of construction, it had to be dealt with. Apparently, as they are want to do sometimes, the City of Dallas had to dig a hole in one of the roads we are using for the ride. The hole is now covered with a very large piece of steel plate, but the transition over this steel plate is very rough. After confirming with the city that this hole and steel plate are still going to be in place next Saturday, we made arrangements to have the plate coned off.

To any Tour Dallas riders who might be reading this blog: I did not dig this hole in the road. I did not place the large piece of steel plate on top of the hole. I did not make the transition over the steel plate so rough. It is not my fault that it is there, and there is exactly nothing that I can do about it, but to cone off the hole and the steel plate. If you stay out of the coned off area, you will be just fine. You have been warned.

Headache Causing Surprise # 2 - Last year, part of the route was under construction, so we had to alter the course to avoid this section. This year, the construction is complete, so we went back to the original route. Now again, you'd think that a brand new section of road would be the last part of the course that you'd have to be concerned about regarding the condition of the road surface. Well once again, you'd be wrong. When we came to this section of the course on our Sunday pre-ride, imagine our surprise when we encountered several one inch wide seams between the sections of poured concrete. Just wide enough for a bicycle tire to slip into and cause all sorts of mayhem and destruction as 4000 riders go by. This was a little more serious than the hole and steel plate that we encountered earlier in the ride. Phone calls were placed, names were called, insults were traded. After looking at the section of road with the Dallas Police, it was determined that if we coned off the right hand lane of this part of the course, we could avoid these evil road seams.

Again, to any Tour Dallas riders: I had literally nothing to do with the construction of this section of road. I did not make the seams so wide. If you stay out of the coned off sections, you just might live long enough to finish the ride.

Headache Causing Surprise # 3 - As we approached downtown Dallas, we round a corner and what do we see. The road that we are currently riding on, the same road that the cyclist are supposed to ride on in six days, is completely shut down and blocked with barricades and cones. There are cranes in the road, (the construction equipment type of crane, not the bird type), along with all other sorts of heavy machinery. I immediately suspect that this could be a problem if this is still here next Saturday, considering that 4000 cyclist are supposed to ride their bikes down this road. I'm smart that way. I didn't get to be a Route Coordinator based on my smile and my charming personality.

After we complete our ride, in a panic I notify Bikin Mike of this situation, and how, I my opinion, it would be unsafe for our 4000 riders to ride through this construction zone, what with the constant threat of large pieces of construction material being dropped on the riders from great heights. Mike agrees that this could be a problem. And so more phone calls are placed, more names are called, and more insults are traded. It turns out that this is a temporary construction site and it should all be gone by next Saturday. Piece and tranquility reined over the land once again.

These are the types of problems that present themselves every year. There is always something to be dealt with, even on a route that hasn't changed in 5 years.

So, we've got our course finalized. I've prepared all of the signs. I've prioritized all of the corners on the route, so that the most important corners are the first to get a route volunteer. We basically have only two things to do; paint the arrows on the pavement, and train the volunteers. In tomorrow's post, we review our day painting arrows. It was a good day, no one died.

Peace out.....Nearly Famous Fred