Commuting: The strange. The Odd. And the FUN

I wouldn't usually post cage commuting in this thread, but...

Coming in at 530am, I have a section of 5 miles of straight, open, rural, 2 lane road thru farm country. Come up on a few cars doing 12 mph under usual; wait for a passing zone; nobody pulls out, so I pass all of them. Leading the pack was a dodge truck with Harley Davidson in big bold letters.

All I'll say is 'be careful, it's deer season.' I've seen lots of roadkill along the sides of the road lately

M

Most of my 40 mile each way commute is through deer country. When I am on the bike in the dark this time of year it isn't unusual for me to run 60 instead of the normal 70 or 80 just because I am scanning the ditches for eyes. If I find a big truck to run blocker I will pace them. I hit a deer hard at 70+ on a bike a couple years ago and don't recomend it.

First ride on my 'new to me' ST3 I had a deer come out of the woods in front of me. I wasn't honking on it (1st ride...) so it managed to get in front of me. Either it left a little poo on it's way past or a hoof hit the fairing 'cause there was a brown spot on the right side after the encounter.

Mid-afternoon during the summer! Stupid hoofed rats!

M

Riding into DC this morning on the Tiger and got stuck behind a guy going 45 on I-66 (55mph zone). Dude was riding the left line hard and hit a construction barrel, which I had the pleasure of dodging. Good times....

I've gone back and forth on the blocker idea, as I've seen a few episodes where the point rig spooks/flushes a critter (turkey, deer) that then bolts - occasionally onto the hardtop versus the natural-selection-suggested reverse azimuth. If it's a long empty stretch in the boonies and a big vehicle is hauling at my preferred speed, I am happy to follow but at some vaguely-comfortable remove; trying to get the benefit w/o the penalty.

maineDave

that construction barrel probably hosed traffic up enough that it'll still be there for me when I go deliver a bike at 1300hrs



M

Rode with a student to a dive site. On the way he got in the left lane about 5 mph under the limit. Big line of cars behind us and more passing on the right.
When I suggested moving over he told me "this is fast enough for everybody." I found another ride back

This. This right here is why the Europeans laugh at us. The U.S. has a surfeit of self-entitled hall monitors. Ugh.

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On a mildly related note: I've noticed lately that when I tap the horn to signal the lead driver to proceed on a green, when they haven't done so due to inattentiveness, they tend to really put their foot down. This is new, and considering that the problem of not paying attention isn't going away, I can't say that it's entirely unwelcome.

For years, and in response to a horn toot to get moving, the offending driver would tend to look in their rearview mirror to see who had the temerity to interrupt their reverie. A middle finger would sometimes accompany their backward glance. Now, though, and as I mention, the trend is to Go, Now! the nanosecond after the horn press.

A mild improvement, I suppose.

I've had this happen to me few times and never understood it . Especially since you have to set there on a green light three or four seconds to merit a horn honk from me. They flip me off because they are not paying attention? Confusing. Especially with how fast they fly the bird...like its pure reflex.

People are assholes. Especially when they are in their cage and think they are invincible.

Please don't forget guys and gals , some of us commuters are paying attention while sitting at a red light , and first in line , even though the light turns green we look both ways and count 2 or 3 seconds before going through the intersection... around here there are a lot of red light runners and if you blast off when the green light says go... well , good luck on the carnage...

Now if you are not first in line and you wait while playing with your phone , feel free to honk the horn at them

What gets me are the asshole who flip me off and lay on their horns after I honk at them for doing something incredibly stupid. I had someone drift into my lane and I hit the horn, and they felt they had to gun it, get in front of me, slam on the brakes, and flip me off. All because HE did something stupid. Wtf?!?

Charles.

And you managed to stick to my observed rule: he who is in the biggest hurry is usually going the shortest distance.

I’m all for passing a slow moving vehicle, but for a 2-mile end-point?

Tactics don’t make strategy.

Pet peeve. Very light traffic on an expressway. Why is it that people in traveling lane tap the brakes, slow down, then pull into passing lane under the speed of passing lane traffic, causing all of us to slow down? I've seen it when we are the only 3 on the road, like this am. Is it really too hard for them to check their mirrors every 10 seconds or so and plan? I fear the answer...

No, I happened to stop and get gas. I still had a long ways to go.

'cause people are stupid.

Actually it's more of a lack of training, specifically freeway training. People commonly slow down before changing lanes or entering an off ramp, both of which just fuck it up for the entire road. They also try to merge onto the freeway way under the speed limit, which is even worse.

They were never taught that you need to match and maintain speed with traffic when maneuvering, and most people are too self absorbed to figure it out on their own without being taught.

Actually, I think some of it is that they were on cruise control, tapped the brakes to kick it off, after realizing they were coming up too fast on the slower car ahead. Also the car in the passing lane was coming up faster than they were cruising at, or anticipated.
With the way that some cops write tickets willy-nilly if you exceed 7 over in a pass, which causes people to cruise control at just that and no more, I find this is common on rural interstates. If the passing lane is populated by people comfortable with 10 over, the stage is set for this.

I definitely know what you're saying. I'm teaching my daughter to drive and I tell her and she understands, but is afraid to accelerate /merge. But these people may be older and just do the exact wrong thing on purpose. Don't get it.

I usually come down an on-ramp well above nominal speeds to merge...slowing down to merge only when needed. I came down my local on-ramp one time going 85MPH on the motorcycle. I looked in my left mirror to merge and noticed I was about to merge in front of a state trooper while doing 15MPH over the speed limit. I settled down a little bit after that.