show and tell.

So last week I was again not riding my bike (feel free to judge me) because the Green Building Blitz.... I had to be on Wadamalaw Island at 7am everyday with a whole car full of supplies and somehow the 3 hours it would take me to get there on a bike just didn't seem rational, so a co-worker lent me her car. If you want to see pics from that, check out: http://picasaweb.google.com/SeibertN/Greenbuild08#

It was a great event and if you are going to drive a car for something, it might as well be something like this. So anyway... I spent a lot of time talking to a variety of people, many of which had seen my blog and wanted to exchange biking stories. I always love hearing about the adventures, seeing the scars, and bonding over similar experiences with a fellow biker. This week, I heard one of the best stories yet. I was talking to one of the guys from charleston green ideaz (http://greenideaz.org/) about the evil drivers that harass bikers since I was recently nailed by a half full bottle of coke... which of course I thought was a car hitting me, so I practically jumped off the bridge trying to get off my bike (don't worry, I was fine, just a little pissed off at the redneck in the ginormous truck). So anyway, the greenideaz guys said that one day while bike commuting through a less than nice part of town when he heard a loud noise and then BAM something hit the back of his head so hard it almost knocked him off his bike. When he reached back to feel his head, it was all gooey and he panicked because he was sure he had been shot and that his brains were leaking out the back of his head. Then he looked down and saw eggshell and realized that, no, he was not dying, and yes, he had been the victim of a drive-by-egging. I am pretty sure that he is the first person to be relieved that he had been egged. Awesome.


So when I told this story to a friend, he mentioned that now there is a law against harassing bikers- which is HUGE considering beforehand, you basically had no rights. Check out more info at:http://www.scbikelaw.com/news.html?id=13 If you are wondering if it actually works, have no fear. My friend said that he was sideswiped while biking recently and he memorized the license plate (I have to give him props for remembering to do this), then called it in to the police. They ran the plates, looked up the person, called them and gave them a warning about harassing bikers! Can you imagine how awful/embarrassed/stupid you would feel if a cop called you and chewed you out for clipping a biker! I am going to have to try and stay cool next time someone harasses me and get their plates- haHA, that will teach them. I am still considering keeping tennis ball in my water bottle holder to hurl at cars that get too close or almost squish me when backing out of their driveways.


Either way, I will delight in my once a month outing with Critical Mass when we get to take back the streets for an hour. Check out a pic from last month below:


Tomorrow, we will be biking in full costume- come and join!!