10:48 PM
Today was a Saturday and it was a very productive one. Last night I didn't know what I would be doing today, but I found time to work on my projects, and I basically worked on those the entire day. I woke up at around 6 AM? Something like that, something very early like that. Pretty much throughout the morning I was working on something, I ate breakfast while working. It was unbelievable. Basically until today, I would waste all my Saturdays, literally spending 12+ hours on something unproductive (gaming, watching videos, etc). How am I so productive now? I don't know, but I'm pretty happy with what I was able to get done today.
Around maybe 1:30 PM or so, I wasn't actually paying much attention to the time, I went out and started bicycling. There was no one outside today. I went out to the nearby park, where last week and two weeks ago this place was so packed with 100+ people walking around this park. Today it was empty, not totally empty, I encountered like 5-10 people total, but it was deserted compared to normal. Sure it was a somewhat cloudy day today, but it's still normally packed.
I was actually planning on wearing an advertisement shirt I got custom made, but I was pretty frightened to wear it, so I went out in a normal shirt. After cycling for around an hour, I fixed my initial fear and went back home to change shirts. I then went around cycling with the message I wanted displayed on the front and back. It was serious fun cycling around, I felt that psychologically my performance improved maybe 20%. I didn't encounter many other people though, because no one was out today.
It's so unbelievable, I remember the first time I went down this one path on a bike, there were a bunch of turns that I could not do. I remember thinking at the time, these turns are not physically possible to do. These turns were so sharp and so complicated, oh my gosh. Well, I was able to do them today. The first hard turn I encountered, I thought, wait that was easy, maybe the impossible ones are up ahead. I cycled up ahead and found a lot more turns, but I ended up being able to do all of them without getting off the bike. How the heck?
I learned an easier way to handle hard turns. One way is to try going super slow. Another other way is to incorporate a slight turn to the opposite direction, before doing a hard turn in the direction you want to go. I don't know how turning away helps, but it just does for me. I combined both of those techniques to be able to get through these turns which I deemed impossible before. I mean some of the turns are so tight and close to each other, and then it's on the sidewalk, so you have to balance on this fine area or else you fall. I have no idea who designed these freaking sidewalk turns, but wow.
One of the turns you enter from the right, then you have to do this half circle going a bit backwards, and then a sharp right turn. Also, instead of fearing falling off a sidewalk, it's inverted so that you have sidewalk walls keeping you in the center. I don't know how to visually describe that, but it's one of the crazy turns I found. That turn was so hard. I actually did have to stop do to this turn, but this wasn't one of the original impossible turns I encountered the first time I went around, this turn was on the other side of the road which I took on the way back home. I was able to do all the ones I thought were impossible earlier. This is a new impossible one I found just today, this one I still cannot do with my skill level.
Anyway I went back home. At one point in the path, the sidewalk was closed? What? There was a bunch of yellow tape and construction cones everywhere, I could not enter the sidewalk. And it stretched for probably a half a mile. I had to get on the road for the rest of that, and it was scary. I cycled on the furthest right lane, and then I tried to cycle as far right as I could.
Most of the time people would switch to the left lane when passing me, and that's what I do when I encounter cyclists, or they at least try to move more to the left. Sometimes people do not do that, Wtf, I almost got pushed out of the road or run over a few times. One was this huge truck with this huge trailer in the back, he did not even make a little bit of room for me even though the roads were practically empty and no cars were on his left, he just had to drive in the right and and inches to me too, I was scared that the trailer would hit me since it was rattling enormous, I'm glad to have survived that encounter. I really imagined just being dead on the side of the road after seeing that enormous truck pass by and trailer just passing so close I could almost elbow it if I nudged my elbow a bit.
This kind of behavior isn't new though. I cycled back in 2013 to college, and I don't know why I did that, it was like 20 miles away or something, but I did it. I also had several encounters there where I almost got whacked or pushed by vehicles passing by. My bike handling back then wasn't as good as it is now too. I remember not being able to do right turns that well back then, and was one of the reasons I stopped bicycling, because I could not do some right turns and I thought it was dangerous for me to continue.
I don't like cycling on the road. I got in my car today because it's been a week since I last drove, and I have to drive it at least once a week. I scouted out some possible cycling routes for me to get to my workplace, and it was not possible. It's only 7 miles away from my home to work, so I could cycle if there were some sidewalks available, but there are none. No matter what route I take, I have to eventually go on some main road with hundreds of cars, and no way was I going to do that. Especially when no matter what route I take, I have to cycle in front of some right turn exits for cars.
Anyway when I got back home, I watched some videos for a few hours, bored. Then I worked on some projects again, and that was basically it. Could write more, but I'm tired, I need to go to sleep.
You must be signed in to post a comment!