Category Archives: Not Cycling

Bollards to that…apologies to Attilla the Stockbroker

Dear Rouleurs,

I just had to post this one.  Post – that luntatic ice addict driving his car down Bourke St Mall and all the terrible, terrible acts of religious fanatics in London, Melbourne has received its own fleet of hideous concrete bollards.  They are scattered all over the CBD. Whilst these things seem to be unfortunately necessary, they are unspeakably ugly.  The picture below is sufficient proof of that.

A row of concrete eyesores near Fed Square.

So much to MMT’s surprise, an interesting article, documenting a wonderful public spirited response to these eyesores, appeared in the Age a few days ago.  I assume for reasons of cost cutting, after all its Fairfax print, the online version appeared only in the Sydney Morning Herald…WTF.

I’m surprised that anyone in the emerald city of Sydney would give 2 proverbial Shi#ts about these things in Melbourne???’

Another row of concrete eyesores near Southern Cross Station. One of them is just a little prettier, thanks to David Gray, the infamous Bollard Bandit.

Nevertheless, MMT feels compelled offer a polite and heartfelt ‘chapeau’ to Melbourne’s very own Bollard Bandit, David Gray for improving the city scape of Melbourne just a little bit.

Chapeau Monsieur Gray 🙂

Until next time, ride safe, avoiding bollards,

Marv

Off yer bike, Boris

Dear Rouleurs,

Team MMT has been having split brain conversations about that scion of UK Politics…Boris Johnson.  Whilst Boris has perfected the art of looking scruffy and speaking like someone who might be barking mad, he’s clearly not.  In his time as Lord Mayor of London Boris did big things for cyclists.  The “Boris” Hire Bike scheme and establishment dedicated bike lane ways has moved London from being one of the most dangerous places to ride a bike to one of the best. Chapeau Mr Johnson.  By the way, I think this dilemma about how to regard Boris is captured perfectly in this photo.

No... Boris Brexit is dumb idea.

No… Boris Brexit is dumb idea.

However, his entry into national politics has resulted many WTF moments, for example BREXIT. Educated Britons are wondering exactly how it was that Boris decided that siding with looney far right of Nigel Farrage’s UKIP was a good idea.  That coup etat resulted in both the Prime Minister David Cameron and some non-descript guy that was leading Labour, no longer leading their respective political parties.  Now Boris has the job of Foreign Secretary, presumably to salvage some kind of relationship with Europe and now has the added bonus of dealing with Trump foreign policy.  Also it seems that he’s now too important to be allowed to ride one of his own Boris bikes.

Today the Age syndicated an article called “Boris Johnson gives up his Boris Bike but London pedals on”,  where Boris bemoans the fact that he’s had to give up cycling –

“I used to cycle everywhere and I do miss it.” He said he had given up cycling more than 570 kilometres per year.  Mr Johnson said he had been banned from pedalling because “it involves a sort of convoy of police cyclists, plus cars, plus God knows what.”

Poor Boris, all those luxury armoured limousines, that must be really tough.  Oh and by the way, 570 km means he was doing about 12km a week.  MMT thinks this is pretty feeble effort anyway.

Dear God, who in their right mind would allow Boris to steer.

Dear God, who in their right mind would allow Boris to steer.

Do you really need your mother to dress you properly???

Do you really need your mother to dress you properly???

A simple post-Brexit message to Boris..perhaps.

A simple post-Brexit message to Boris..perhaps.

Opps...sorry about that send the complaint to my office. I'm sure that no one will look at it.

Opps…sorry about that. Send the complaint to my office. I’m sure that no one will look at it.

Any how to celebrate that MMT can ride his bike as much as he likes and Boris can’t, here’s a picture montage of Boris, cycling hero and dud politician on bike.  A sight that sadly we will no longer see, given its enormous entertainment value.

Until next blog, ride better than Boris

Marv

Marv’s bogan ute revenge fantasy

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Dear Rouleurs,

Over the last couple of months I’ve been harbouring feelings of ill will towards tradies.  Presumably, they are all male, driving at breakneck speeds early in the morning in utes, vans and 4WDs along my local ride, early in the morning.  Whilst MMT realises that every working ‘person’…(let’s see if I’ve hit the right tone of political correctness ;-)…has an obligation to arrive at work on time, he wonders whether it is necessary to speed at 20 or 30 km/h above the speed limit to get there.  As there is  no police presence  at that time of the morning they get away with it, almost every single time.

So I’ve been harbouring feelings of ill which had started to develop into a full blown revenge fantasy.  It involves a bit of tweaking to a scene from ‘Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story’.  The scene involves the aging, wheelchair-bound Patches, who volunteers to coach the Average Joes dodgeball team.  Patches’ training regimen includes throwing wrenches at the team members (“If you can dodge a wrench you can dodge a ball!”).

I imagine riding along, pulling a wrench out of my jersey pocket and throwing through the back window of a ute that has just illegally sped by.  The wrench shatters the back window and hits the bogan dickhead in the back of the head with a satisfying ‘thwok’.  Yes its a bit juvenile and cartoon-ish in a Super Mario way, but goddamnit it brings an evil smile to my face every time.

Revenge fantasies never come true, which is probably best for the continued existence of our society.  In reality, the chances of MMT throwing a spanner that accurately at a speeding ute is pretty much zero.  Its much more likely MMT would overbalance and donate a lot of skin and possibly bone to the ashpalt.   Then one day coming back from Truman on a coffee run, I saw this and laughed my ass off.

Somewhere near Albert Park a dickhead bogan is crying in his beer over his wheel clamped ute :-)

Somewhere near Albert Park a dickhead bogan is crying in his beer over his wheel clamped ute 🙂

This is poetry and karma  sweetly connected in the form of a wheel clamp.  I would have loved to have seen the face of the dickhead bogan ute owner, just after he discovered this.  Just to be clear the Sherrif’s Department has the right to do this, under the Infringements Act 2006, when a vehicle owner has an outstanding infringement warrant…possibly for something like not paying speeding fines 😉

So here’s to karma, ride safe in the knowledge that there is one less dickhead on the road.

Marv

Richmonditis, La Vuelta coverage and the flying bike

 

Dear Rouleurs,

I’m suffering from a severe case of Richmonditis.  Its symptoms include bouts of Tourette’s syndrome like swearing, depression, and a desperate need to curl up in the foetal position on the floor, spontaneous crying and occasional abdominal pain.  It strikes epidemic like levels in Melbourne in the first few weeks of September each year. Its symptoms subside in early October.  It is followed by amnesia and irrational optimism in the months leading up to March of the following year.  Unfortunately once contracted its incurable. Those of you, that are fellow Richmond supporters, will know exactly what I mean.

Also, my current disposition is not helped by being unable to follow the La Vuelta on SBS this year.  Thirty minutes on a few sequential Saturdays is hardly sufficient.  Yes there is that wonderful thing called the Internet…but still.  It is almost enough for me to sign up for Foxtel cable tv. I’ve deliberately avoided doing this in the past for fear of further exceeding the maximum level of “pearshaped”-ness that my 45 year body is allowed to have. I digress.

Oh that's going to hurt Matthew......

Oh that’s going to hurt Matthew……

So the main reason for this particular blog entry was the spectacular crash captured in today’s Sun Herald on page 3. See above.  Dear God, I hope this kid Matthew Rice is ok.  What a horrible crash.  It’s a minor miracle that no-one else was injured. Likewise,  a big “hope you’re ok” to the rider who had a heart attack at Amy’s Grand Fondo.

It’s amazing photo by Stephen Harman and unfortunately I can’t include a link to the online equivalent.  Hopefully this newspaper’s or photographer’s lawyers are too litigious 😉

Until next time,

Marv