09/05/2020 – Bony M
The summer is over, but not the heat. It is still above 25 °C on most days. This past month I cycled religiously every day to keep my calorie expenditure up in conjunction with changing my eating habits. As a result, I lost more than twice my original weight loss goal. Not only did I lose my fat (as intended) but my muscle mass as well (not intended). The good part: I fit in all my pants with ease and maybe I’ll be able to sneak our of the Corona-stricken US unnoticed, hiding behind a broomstick. The bad part: my ass is so bony, no amount of padding helps to absorb road bumps. Instead of Bromptomaniac I could be called Bony Maniac.
On the last day of August I was stopped by the NYPD for burning through a red light. I wasn’t in a hurry but there were no cars or pedestrians and I guess I was absentminded because, not only I “failed to stop at the red light”, I also failed to see the police officer on the other side of the narrow street. Result: a traffic ticket. The officer was actually trying to give me two tickets, one for the red light and the other for lacking a bell (all in the name of my safety of course) but this time it was he who failed to see that Bromptons have an integrated bell on the shifter.
I don’t think police fining a few unlucky cyclists at the end of the month to fulfill their ticket quota is an efficient way to change NYC’s cycling culture. Maybe they should learn from those Scandinavian socialist governments and their law-abiding cyclists.
This summer in numbers:
2378 km – distance cycled, most of it in the past six weeks
11 kg – maximum weight loss, from 85 to 74 kg
$190 – NYC bicycle fine for red light violation