I don't understand.

I was out riding my bicycle on Sunday and a jerk in an SUV nearly ran me over. The kicker was that he intentionally buzzed me because he was annoyed with my placement on the road. After I got over my rage and desire to have had a grenade launcher in my backpack, I started to really think about this age-old bicycle/car feud. I don't understand it. I get that cars don't like being held up by cyclists in the road. I myself have found myself wondering why someone is taking up so much of my road when I am just trying to get from point A to point B in my car and I don't want to be delayed. I get the inconvenience. However, the thing is that A) Cyclists are not allowed to ride on the sidewalk, by law, so we have to be in the road. B) We have to be a few feet off of the side of the road to avoid being clobbered by an opening car door. We are not in the road to annoy you. In total, you are probably being delayed about 30 seconds while we pass some cars and get over so you can pass us.

More importantly, intentionally trying to scare someone on a bicycle by speeding past them and basically brushing against them is just stupid. Not only is it mean, but think about it- would you like to be in prison for vehicular manslaughter picking up the soap for some dude named Bubba because you had to wait 30 seconds to get by me? I highly doubt it.

I don't know where this vehicular rage comes from towards the cyclists who are basically just trying to be healthy, active, and environmentally friendly, but people need to take a deep breath and really think about what they are doing. If you live in Colorado and you hate cyclists, this is not the place for you to live. A lot of people ride bikes here. Why don't you and your SUV move to Houston or one of the other cities that have the highest obesity rate and weather that keeps people from going outside at all in the summer, and then you won't have to worry about it.

Sheesh.

Got It!

So today I was riding my bicycle in a big group ride and I got to thinking, "I wonder how many people are here... I would say there are 500 people here." Then I thought about how there is always a estimate of how many people showed up at an event. You know, when you see on the news that there were an estimated 1,000 people at an event. So I got to thinking... who gets the job of estimating the amount of people in attendance? That is what I would like to do. I want to be that person. I'm pretty "ok" at it... I mean, even if i'm wrong, no one would know. So that is my next career choice. I will be the person who guesses how many people are in attendance somewhere. Who wants to hire me?

My Police Scanner

Hello World... I know it has been a long time. I honestly haven't had too much I feel compelled to write about these days. Although, I think I actually have a lot to say. So, I am going to make an effort to re-emerge like Willy Wonka. Consider this my grand re-entrance.

So, for my first blog posting in a while I would like to talk about my police scanner. For starters, lets just get this out of the way right now: I don't watch cops, I have no desire to be a police officer (especially because I am extremely jumpy and I'm sure the force wouldn't appreciate one of their officers shrieking at the sight of something startling), and I never had the desire to do a "ride along" with a police officer. However, I recently got my phone (that has an app for everything....) an app for a police scanner. This thing is cool. I can listen to police frequencies all over the country. Believe me, Compton and Oakland are much more interesting than Denver. But, I like to listen and hear what's happening around town. When I first got it I was kind of addicted. I'd be hanging out with my friends and they'd be like, "KATE! Are you listening to that scanner again!?!?".. So I had to reel myself in and only do it in the privacy of my own home. I also used to like to listen to it if I was trying to fall asleep, but that was a bad idea because there are lulls in the transmissions and then all of a sudden I would hear a man's voice in my apartment and forget the scanner was on and it would scare the bajesus out of me (again, jumpy). So, I hadn't listened to the scanner in a while. But the other day I was coming home fairly late and as I pulled onto my street, I saw a homeless man in the process of breaking into a BMW. So I called the police non-emergency line, which I have saved in my phone because I live in the city and weird stuff happens all the time. I gave the officer the report and then went on my way but it occurred to me that I should turn on my scanner and see if I hear the report go through. Sure enough, within a few minutes I heard my own report get broadcast ! It was very exciting.

In summary, I feel a little guilty telling this story because hearing my own police report on my beloved police scanner really made my day. However, I am sure the owner of the BMW would have preferred not to fulfill my scanner dreams by having their car broken into. Sorry BMW person... next time don't park there.