I have managed to let go of minor things like a honk here and an undecipherable shout there but I was not really prepared for what was aimed  at me this time. The traffic proceeded and a right turning lane appeared. She vroomed into it, rolled her window down and cowardly flicked her cigarette at me. It missed me by a few feet. I had an impulse of disgust which I quickly quietened down to concentrate on the left turn coming up ahead. No bird was flipped by either party. I rode back home keeping the recent incident in mind. The slow cycling with a combination of cold breeze and warm sun kept my temperament rational.

Not knowing what to think, I decided to take a long walk. In the first ten minutes of walking with Laya, the matter seemed to get clearer. What Dodge-Woman had really done was throw the most harmless part of the cancer stick at me: the stub. The addictive nicotine was already in her blood and the cancerous smoke was already in her lungs. Dodge-Woman had vicariously suffered my punishment.

In your face!

If a person was to improve his finances, he would achieve the goal faster if he stopped spending on the largest ticket item, say car related, than he would if he was to go frugal on smaller things like drying clothes on the clothes rack and not the drier. When I started to read personal finance blogs, I was motivated to cut down on these small expenses: buy food in bulk, drive less, eat out less, buy generic etc. It barely caused a dent in my expenses and my savings barely went up. It was frustrating. I was restricted from doing the things I like and there were not enough savings to show for it.

Similarly, when I set on the path of reducing my carbon footprint, the suggestions floating around in the web were the high-effort-low-impact ones. I stopped using disposable plastic bottles, used the water heater only half an hour every other day, said no to Styrofoam and looked up information on offsetting carbon. The largest impact, to both, my personal finances and my carbon footprint were when I sold my car. All I had to do was ride my bike everywhere. My savings have gone up, my carbon footprint has shrunk and I have lost weight without even trying. Win Win. I did not even have to invest in high capital initiatives like solar panels. My living in a small apartment lets me not have energy wastage like yard maintenance and cooling costs that most single family homes are plagued with.

The primary reason Shek’s Footprint talks about bicycle advocacy more than about recycling and alternative fuels is that bicycling takes a large chunk out of the footprint in one swift go. It is the rational and healthy way of getting around. Therefore, the million dollar question is: how do I get other people to adopt this idea? The gridlock of political awareness of bicycling and subjective safety of bicycling in people’s minds prevents more people to discover this way of life. In several conversations with bicycle advocate David Hembrow (link), I have come to the conclusion that for real impact towards citizen’s personal finances and health, the government needs to realize that bicycling is the future of daily commute. In my recent conversations with Matt Uhrig from Bikejax (link), I have realized that talking about sharrows (wikipedia link) and urban trails is like putting band-aid on a large wound. It raises awareness but does not much for subjective safety of the people.

To do it right, like these guys did (link), one must look at Netherland’s bicycle infrastructure. Till then the gridlock lives and it will take a lot of courage on the people’s part to get out and try this way of life. They are the true heros.

Katrien is surely excited with her new name though she is no dainty lady. She prefers her older saddle back on her and now sports a new Wald 137 basket in front. The basket is very efficient in carrying breakfast and lunch to work, bread and salad from the grocery store or even a six pack of Yuengling. The Minnehaha canvas bag under the original saddle holds the extra tube, tools, a small towel and handcuff locks. The book rack usually holds a folded jacket (for the days that I begin by being too optimistic about the Florida fall).

Since the housing buble burst, we have come to know a new term called sub-prime. The neat little unassuming term makes drowning home ownership look like a minor technicality. The car-sale industry uses a different term to keep our minds off the obvious problem that cars often depreciate faster than they can be paid for. Upside-down. Another little unassuming term. How about we all call the bull shit and tell people that these assets, the pillars of North America’s economy are usually worth less than money owed on them?

To avoid people from shying away from monster car-loan banks like GMAC, dealers politely explain the new car owner that he is ‘upside-down’ on his old car, so the difference will be effortlessly tacked on to the purchase price of his new car. The not-so-lucky-new-car-owner takes it with a pinch of salt, grabs the keys to his new car, sub-prime from day one and goes into a deeper circle of more debt than equity.

I ended my debt today. CarMax took my car for a decent retail price that was about one thousand dollars more than I had expected. I paid the difference between the retail and the loan remainder and walked off the parking lot completely and absolutely car free. That means, no payments, no insurance, no gas, no maintenance, no new tires, no road rage and above all, complete independence from this addiction.

I may not be as popular as this guy (link) in finding a name but I am sure going to try. The bike no longer has the OYB bag. A cool new Minnehaha small saddle bag sits under the seat.

The rules are simple. I want an female European name because I think it is a girl. A brief justification of the name would be appreciated.

Update: Running list of suggestions

• Rochelle by Jeremiah
• Genevieve by Jack “Ghost Rider” Sweeney
• Guenevere by me, endorsed by Dillon
• Rowena by me, inspired by Rowena
• Katrien by Rowena, meaning pure, natural and simple. This one seems to be the most aligned to my views.
• Ninon by Terri Hartley, influenced by the life of Anne “Ninon” de l’Enclos (link)
• Daphne by pam
• Else by pam, german origin, this word is short for Elizabeth
• Anke by Andrew Cline (link), tough but cute, I agree
• Anja by me, inspired by my cousin’s wife, Anja. German origin.

It feels like the free-radical was always a part of the bike and the bike was built with the free-radical in mind. The way it attaches itself to an existing bike is the most attractive feature of the xtracycle. You can go for longer rides and not feel any different than before the conversion. I rode it 10 miles to a friend’s house today and at times I forgot that I was riding an xtracycle. This is a genius invention and deserves a lot of credit.

I am Abhishek Mukherjee and on behalf of Bajrang, I approve this message.

By the way, I am looking for a name for my Dutch bike. Suggestions will be helpful. I do think it is a ’she’!

Brooklyn at Cycledelic-Fixity has voluntered to be the only reasonable bicycle shop owner that will put it together for a reasonable price. His cool shop is around 14 miles from my apartment in the historic Riverside area of Downtown. He came out of his shop to greet me as I had started to un-strap the bike rack. He said that he recognized my bike as I am a celebrity thanks to these guys: link.

I browsed around his shop a little drooled on the fixies in various stages of completion. Some day after the car is sold! I did pop in at Jax Ebikes (link) but it was closed, so I decided to head back home. I have never ridden my bike from Downtown to home. Since I may have to do it tomorrow, I decided to give the route a shot in the car. I went up the Acosta bridge and then on Philips all the way south to Baymeadows (see route: View Larger Map)

The section of Philips between San Marco and Emerson is pretty desolate and sad. It is one slip away form being a ghost town. I hope the road is as less crowded tomorrow as it was today. Maybe I should have Brooklyn install a Katana holder while he is at it, a custom from Hattori Hanzo none the less!

As for the name of this post, well, that is the new name of my xtracycle-attched-specialized. The god of strength in the Indian mythology is the name of this bike which is my strength to go car free. In today’s car-dependent world, this bike is my Plan B and my extra set of bollocks! Eat this Big Oil!

“I’ve used up gas just looking for gas,”

 ”Right now, I’ll pay anything for gas,” Jenkins said. “I don’t care if it’s $5 or $6 a gallon. I need it.”

A quote from the recent gas shortages in Atlanta sounds very familiar to parts of the script of ‘Trainspotting‘. See news article for the complete story (article). 

I dont understand why people have forgotton the meaning of freedom. Freedom dependent on goods and services other than basic necessities like food, clothing and shelter is addiction. See more information on addiction here (link).

Does Jacksonville have a plan B if this were to happen here or are we going to be stuck in our SUVs? I am sure that Jacksonville will be worse off because Atlanta atleast has MARTA. Jacksonville has nothing. This is a list of Jacksonville’s illustrious projects (link).

I have put it up on Craigslist with a link to my sale site. Next in line is to put it up for sale on Autotrader, Cars.com and Cars4Jax. I will wait for a few days to see if I get any response from Craigslist though. Some color printouts of the sale site will go up on the apartment complex notice board and the break room at work too.

Update:

Cars.com ad: link

Cars4Jax ad: link

My plan is to switch off the water heater all day and switch it on at 6:30 am when I wake up. I shower by 7:15 am which is plenty of time to heat up enough stored water for the whole day, which involves another shower. The only problem is to remember to switch it on in the morning! I did not remember this morning and was left with low pressure mildly warm water to bathe with. Thankfully, the fall weather in Jacksonville has been pleasant, some what windy too so I did not have to scrub too much.

Not using the drier and switching off the water heater should reduce my usage significantly. 80% of the light in my apartment is CFLs. I know about the mercury problem and I promise to dispose of them safely if they ever go bad!

On a separate note, I am not tracking my carbon footprint yet. I understand the benefits of measurement but downsizing usage is a proven method of reducing ones footprint. I also want my footprint measured more accurately and not an approximate as provided by most websites.