[The Register-Guard] A man on a bicycle harassed a 15-year-old girl Monday north of the Owosso Bridge, Eugene police said.
Officers said the man, possibly in his early 40s, attempted to talk to the girl and repeatedly grabbed her arm, saying she needed to go with him. The girl pulled her arm away and ran, and saw the man riding south toward Marist High School, police said.
The incident occurred near the 4300 block of Goodpasture Loop shortly before 5:30 p.m., police said. The man was described as wearing a black Columbia-style windbreaker, black T-shirt, dark blue jeans, and white and blue Nike shoes. The bicycle was described as a black road bike with thin tires and straight handlebars, with a black bag on the back.
Anyone with information is asked to call police at 541-682-5111.
—
So, obviously there’s nothing funny about an attempted kidnapping of any kind, much less of a minor. We can all agree on that. But at the same time, this whole thing is pretty funny right?
When you get right down to it, this is just another example of a bicyclist getting a shitty idea and acting on it without bothering to give it so much as a second of critical thought. I mean, who tries to kidnap someone on a bike? Isn’t having a van (or at least a car), like, Kidnapping 101? Again, I’m not claiming to have any sort of great criminal mind, but it really seems like day one stuff to me.
I honestly can’t think of anything dumber than trying to kidnap someone on a bike. Even kidnapping someone on horseback somehow seems smarter. But that’s the bicyclist way. They don’t think their actions ever have consequences, so this guy clearly just assumed things would find a way to work out. Typical sociopath. Typical bicyclist.
[WIBX 950] A Lockport man was arrested, charged with impersonating a state trooper.
46-Year-old Richard Godfrey was taken into custody after residents called 911 when a man on a bicycle knocked on their door, identified himself as a trooper, and asked for help.
He left the house and is accused of then becoming combative. According to a written release from New York State Police, Godfrey allegedly threatening to harm the actual troopers when they caught up with him. Godfrey is facing the following charges:
Criminal Impersonation (first degree, a felony)
Resisting Arrest
Harassment (second degree)
—
Listen, I admit that I don’t have a particularly well-developed criminal mind. I’ve spent my life obeying the rules. Stop at stop signs. Maintain the flow of traffic. Don’t go the wrong way down one-way streets. Bicyclists don’t have these limitations. It would never occur to me to try to impersonate a police officer and force my way into someone’s home. It just wouldn’t enter my head. But I can definitely see how a bicyclist who has been conditioned to flaunt authority for his entire life can think up crimes that are just beyond my imagination.
Still, I have to think that if I DID decide to impersonate a police officer, the very first step I would take would probably be something along the lines of “don’t look like a crazy psychopath.” I mean, holy shit! Look at that death glare! That crazy hair! Those cold, lifeless eyes! And I’m not even trying to make a value judgment here. This guy might be the nicest guy in the world in his personal life. Maybe he just made one big mistake (two, actually: his first mistake was getting on a bicycle in the first place). But I am saying that this guy could be handing out free tickets to fuck Candice Swanepoel and I STILL wouldn’t open the door for him. Everyone involved in this situation needed to make better choices. Shape up, New York.
The 47-year-old man had been riding his bicycle along Ripple Street, Barking at around 6pm on Sunday, October 4, when the suspect allegedly drove past in a silver Audi A4, narrowly missing the cyclist before parking outside a grocery shop.
As the suspect got out of his car, the cyclist approached him and questioned him about his driving, police said.
The driver went into a greengrocers and the cyclist waited outside for him to come out. When he did, he punched the cyclist three times in the face, knocking him to the ground, before running off down King Edwards Road.
—
Okay, so I obviously don’t condone physical violence against bicyclists. But we can all agree that the bicyclist playing the victim card here is ridiculous, right?
I mean first off, this bicyclist stalked the dude all the way to the grocery store and waited outside like a psychopath. I don’t think it’s outside the realm of possibility that the dude thought his safety was being threatened and reacted appropriately.
But more importantly, how can you even call this assault? I’ve watched that video at least 45 times and I swear every single time I expect the bicyclist to move out of the way. How the fuck do you just let yourself get clocked in the face like that? In the amount of time it took the guy to wind up for that punch, that bicyclist could have literally built a brick wall between them. He could have biked to the hardware store, bought a sack of bricks, mixed a batch of cement, read a book on how to build a brick wall, and then built it. I’ve never seen a person take so long to wind up for a punch. He put his entire body weight into it. He telegraphed exactly what he was doing and where it was going to go. And the bicyclist still couldn’t get out of the way.
It’s just the latest chapter in the saga of bicyclists not living on the same planet as the rest of us. It didn’t even enter this guy’s brain that he might get punched. Nowhere in the course of him formulating a plan that involved stalking a stranger and cornering them outside a grocery store did it occur to this lunatic that things might get physical. Even when the guy hauled back for the punch, I’m pretty sure the bicyclist just thought he was falling over. “By golly,” he no doubt thought to himself, “the sheer force of my argument has incapacitated this fellow and knocked him to the ground! What a perfect specimen of humanity I am!”
As I always say, I don’t endorse punching bicyclists. But that doesn’t mean I feel any sympathy, either.
[Philadelphia Inquirer] After 30 years of being largely privately financed, the professional bike race that features the Manayunk Wall was formally taken over by the city, which assumed its financial liabilities.
The cost to taxpayers? So far, $1.029 million – about $600,000 spent for this year’s race and an additional $400,000-plus rolled over to cover the expenses for the June 5, 2016, race.
That commitment is five times the tab to taxpayers in 2014 when the race was in private hands. The previous year, promoters ran it with no taxpayer help.
—
Can I ask a serious question? How the fuck can a bike race possibly cost $600,000? If you handed me $600,000 and told me to plan a bike race while actively trying to spend as much money as possible, I think I MIGHT be able to spend $100 (that’s $20 for bottled water and $80 for Valium). Maybe $10 here or there to buy some caution tape and a finish line ribbon and an extra 50¢ or so to print out numbers for the riders. That’s seriously it. To spend $600,000, I’d have to plan a bike race, then buy myself a Lamborghini and have it shipped to Mars.
Of course, as usual, the bicyclists don’t care at all. As is typical for them, they simply do whatever they want and pass the consequences onto the average citizen. Whether they’re actively blocking traffic, killing war hero combat dogs, running down pedestrians on the sidewalk, or wasting over a million taxpayer dollars, they don’t care about how they make you suffer. They just don’t care at all. And why should they? When their “privately funded” bike race couldn’t carry on any longer, the government stepped in a volunteered to foot the bill. Even when bicyclists completely fail in their useless endeavors, someone is standing by to bail them out.
It’s clear that bicyclists have infiltrated the highest levels of city government in Philadelphia. Frankly, if I lived there, I’d get out while I still can. Because mark my words, if this trend is allowed to continue, it’s only a matter of time before the entire city budget is being funneled straight into the pockets of the bicyclist lobby. Do you want to live in a city where every day is one giant bike race? Where an endless horde of lawless, spandex-clad spokesters terrorize the streets? I know I wouldn’t. If you choose to stay, I respect your bravery. But I can’t be held responsible for what might happen. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
[Fox News] A bomb-sniffing combat dog named Mike survived two tours of duty in Iraq but not the streets of a bucolic little town in Wyoming.
The 9-year-old Belgian Malinois was shot and killed in Powell last Saturday by a bicyclist who said he was attacked, leaving Mike’s devastated owner Matthew Bessler, a retired Army Ranger, wondering how he is going to deal with his combat-related injuries alone.
The bicyclist, 59, told the Park County Sheriff’s Office he was attacked by “German shepherd-looking dog” in an encounter in the road, the Powell Tribune reported. Authorities say somehow the dog got loose from Bessler’s yard. According to the account he gave deputies, he fended off the dog using his bicycle, and then grabbed a revolver from his bicycle-mounted holster, and shot the dog.
Bessler questions the bicyclist’s account, saying the dog was shot in the rear. “He has his story,” he told the Tribune. “I know my dog. I have my story.”
—
Well this is just a sad story. There’s nothing to laugh at here, nothing to make fun of. A bicyclist was riding through town and decided to shoot a war hero bomb sniffing dog in the back.
Listen, I wasn’t there, so I’m not going to pretend to know exactly what happened. Maybe this guy WAS attacked. Maybe all of this is a big misunderstanding. But if you believe for one single second that a 59-year-old man was able to fend off a fucking COMBAT DOG using only his bicycle then YOU are the biggest goddamn sucker on this planet of Earth.
I know bicyclists like to pretend that they’re in the greatest shape of anyone on earth, and that bicycling keeps you fresh and young, and that if only everyone would bicycle everywhere they’d all be in perfect health and live longer, fuller, stronger lives…but I’ll tell you right now that if a military-trained combat dog wants to bite you to death, you might as well lay right down and show it your throat, because you’re getting bitten to death. You’re certainly not fending it off using your bare hands and a fucking ten-speed.
So, sure. Maybe the guy got lucky. But it ain’t a good look when you pull a gun out of your “bicycle-mounted holster” (which, also, what the fuck?) and shoot a dog in the ass. And when it turns out that it’s a dog that has saved countless lives by sniffing out bombs overseas and is currently providing a wounded veteran with a little companionship as he reacclimates to life at home…well, that REALLY ain’t a good look.
[Canberra Times] A cyclist has filmed an “unnerving” encounter with a group of kangaroos on Melbourne’s north-eastern outskirts.
Ben Vezina was riding in Hawkstowe Park near Hurstbridge on Sunday when he came across the mobbing marsupials down a deserted dirt track. In a YouTube scene reminiscent of a horror film, many of the eastern greys stand stock still as Mr Vezina slowly rolls past, eyeballing the camera.
“I feel like … oh my God … instead of a zombie apocalypse, it’s a f—ing kangaroo [apocalypse],” he says, as the camera pans past the animals. Look at them. They’re all just standing there. I mean, should I be going down here?”
A couple of kangaroos hop away but many others stand their ground as Mr Vezina cycles past.
“I’m going to be honest,” he says on camera. “I’m a little terrified.”
—
Couple of different ways to approach this one. First of all, are you allowed to live in Australia and still be afraid of kangaroos? I thought Australians prided themselves on living in the wild outback where the most deadly animals on earth roam free. Aren’t Australians supposed to be made of stronger stuff? You’ve got deadly snakes, poisonous spiders, carnivorous fish, 75 ABV beer, and the thing you’re going to admit to being terrified of on camera is a fucking KANGAROO? I know kangaroos can have a mean right hook, but come on man.
Get your people in line, Australia. Really not a great look for the entire country to have this be the video that goes viral. Steve Irwin is for sure spinning in his grave right now. Seriously, some Aussie better jump into the ocean and punch a shark to death or something pretty goddamn quick or this could be absolutely disastrous. You can’t have people thinking that Australians are just a bunch of pussy bicyclists afraid of a pack of fuzzy kangaroos. You just can’t have that. All those Foster’s commercials will have been for nothing.
Now, we can also look at this from another perspective, which is that of COURSE bicyclists should be afraid of kangaroos. Mother Nature has shown time and time again that each and every one of her wondrous creatures hates bicyclists just as much as humans do. In fact, I should point out that this isn’t even the opening salvo in the kangaroos crusade against bicyclists. That came earlier this year, when the same publication reported a kangaroo righteously defending his territory from an invading bicyclist rollicking through his front yard at 5:30 in the goddamn morning. No wonder kangaroos hate these fuckers. Absolutely no respect for anyone or anything.
Listen, bicyclists. You brought this on yourselves. If you don’t even respect kangaroos enough to let them get a good night’s sleep in their own habitat, you really can’t be too surprised when the kangapocalypse is upon you. The kangaroos left this guy alone because they saw his camera. They wanted to send a message. Whether that message is a warning or a declaration of war…well, that’s up to the bicyclists.
[RealClearPolitics] DONALD TRUMP: How would you like to be Israel right now? They relied on us. They’re a voice of sanity. They’re great people. And we have a deal that is so incompetent, so bad. Think of the deal. We make a deal, our chief negotiator goes into a bicycle race at 73 years old, he falls he breaks his leg. That was the good part of our deal. That was the only thing that happened. No, think about it. I told people last week. I swear to you I will never ever ride a bicycle, at least in a race, but I won’t ride one anyway.
—
This is a real tough one for me. On the one hand, Donald Trump is clearly a lunatic. On the other hand, we at the Anti-Bicyclist lobby haven’t had a candidate we can truly rally around since FDR, and that’s pretty much only because he was physically incapable of riding a bicycle. I mean, let’s take a look at our most recent presidents, shall we?
All the way back to Nixon! And I could go further! But the thought of seeing Grover Cleveland on a penny-farthing bicycle is enough to make me want to puke my guts out.
So you understand my dilemma. While I don’t at all like the thought of endorsing someone as crude and possibly insane as Donald Trump, I also feel like we’ve had an unbroken run of bicyclist presidents running basically back to the day that infernal contraption was invented. Isn’t it about time we did something about that? Isn’t it about time we had a President who will stand up to these pedal jockeys? Isn’t it about time we elected a man who isn’t afraid to grab them by their spandex waistlines, tell them “enough is enough,” and dish out the wedgie of justice?
Listen, I’m not endorsing Donald Trump. But I’m definitely making eyes at him across the room. I have a sneaking suspicion that if you read between the lines in the book of Revelation, Donald Trump is probably mentioned pretty prominently. But apocalypse be damned, he’s one “Donald Trump Dynamites Bike Rack Outside Trump Tower” headline away from me being fully in the tank for him.
PS. Yeah apparently that really is little baby Gerald Ford. Whatever. I’ve always said youth is no excuse and I’m sure as hell not backing down now.
[Metro] Maybe one day cyclists and drivers will get on. Until then, we give you this latest piece of road rage.
An irate cyclist climbed on top of a taxi after he claimed to have been sworn at by the driver. Pictures emerged yesterday showing the man clamber on the bonnet and sit there until police came to take him off. The incident unfolded on the Mall near Buckingham Palace.
Police were quick to intervene. One witness, who asked not to be named, said: ‘I was in my car waiting to cross at the lights when I saw the cyclist cut right in front of the taxi.
‘He jumped off his bike – leaving it directly in the driver’s path – and climbed onto the bonnet.’
—
Well, I can’t fault the bicyclist for this one. How many times have you had a disagreement with someone and settled it by planting your ass on the hood of their car and refusing to move until the police take you away? We’ve all be there. It’s basically Arguing 101 at this point. Get sworn at, stop traffic. It’s only logical.
I mean honestly, what else was he supposed to do? Just move on? Get over it? Extend a finger? Maybe yell back with some harsh words of his own? Fuck no. That’s all loser talk. Real men take DECISIVE action when someone mildly insults them for (I can only assume) riding their bike like a complete asshole. And nothing proves that you’re the big swinging dick in the neighborhood like sitting on a car and refusing to move!
So I give this bicyclist a big A+ not just for what he did, but for where he did it. Right outside of Buckingham Palace? Oh Bikey, you sly dog. I know what you’re up to. And frankly, it’s a good thing the police intervened where they did. What if Kate Middleton had happened to look out a window just then? We ALL know nothing gets the royal panties wetter than a man in spandex causing an uproar on a busy street. No doubt she would have been instantly overcome with lust, and then we’d have had a REAL scandal on our hands.
[KXXV] WACO – A man is in jail after running from authorities following a bicycle traffic stop.
Police say they pulled the man over around 2:15 Tuesday morning in the 2100 block of Dutton Ave. because he was riding his bike on the wrong side of the road. When officers approached the suspect, he took of running.
According to police, the man reached towards his pant leg multiple times before jumping a fence. An officer caught up to the man and used a stun gun fearing for his own safety.
Police found a gun and a small amount of drugs on the suspect. He’s now in the McLennan County jail.
—
At this point I’d be more surprised if I can into a bicyclist and he DIDN’T threaten me with a gun while high on mescaline. I mean, what can you really say about this guy? If you asked me to invent a generic headline for a potential blog, “Gun-Toting Bicyclist Arrested With Drugs” is exactly what I would have come up with. It’s perfect. Almost TOO perfect.
We all know that bicyclists are a roving cabal of lawless sociopaths, but I’d appreciate a little creativity at this point. You can’t just run around with drugs and guns and get arrested. That’s not exciting. That’s just par for the bicyclist course. I mean, at LEAST try to eat the drugs before the police get to you. Throw the gun off a bridge or hide it in a baby’s stroller. SOMETHING. The only thing worse than a lawbreaker is a boring, predictable lawbreaker, and this guy might as well have answered the casting call for Typical Bicyclist #7.
Of course, the real hilarious part of this story is the fact that he hopped off his bike and attempted to flee on foot. That’s the best thing about these bicyclists. When push comes to shove, they can’t even stand by their own convictions. “Bicycles are the only mode of transportation anyone could ever possibly need!” they cry. But the second it starts to drizzle they go running for their cars. The minute they have to cross a little “ocean,” they trade in their spandex for plane tickets. And the minute the cops are hot on their trail, that bike gets tossed on the side of the road like a crumpled up McDonald’s wrapper. Just stand by your principles for me ONE TIME, hypocrites.
[Vice Sports] Irish cyclist Matt Brammeier suffered multiple injuries on Saturday when he lost control of his bike and slammed into a moving car at a hairpin turn called Guardsman Pass in the Tour of Utah. The steep turn is already treacherous, but the addition of team cars whizzing around alongside the cyclists makes this a disaster waiting to happen. Brammeier clearly lost control of his bike, and who knows where he would have wound up if he hadn’t hit the car, but he did hit the car and it was ugly.
—
I know I’m late on this one. I’ve seen this video posted here, there, and all over this land. And I’ve let you down, dear readers. No need to make excuses for me–we all know it’s true. I’ve been busy. I’ve been away. I’ve been lax in my duties. But I think Bender Bending Rodriguez said it best…
I’m back baby! Here to make my triumphant return! And oh, what a return it is. I simply cannot imagine a better “welcome back” gift than this video here. You might look at it and see a simple bicycle wreck, but I see so much more. There’s so much to go into here that I think it bears a full breakdown.
0:20: Our boy absolutely FLIES into the frame going about five times as fast as anyone before him. Slow down for a sharp turn? Not on this guy’s life! Literally, not on his life, as he is probably about to die.
0:20: Less than a second has elapsed, but our valiant hero has finally decided that now is the opportune time to apply the brake. Look at that back tire fly off the ground! Will it be too little, too late? Will he manage to right himself? The suspense is killing me!
0:21: NOPE! DOWN GOES FRAZIER! I’ll be honest, I did feel a little bit bad here. I mean the sound he makes when he smacks into the car…have you ever seen The Return of the Jedi? It reminds me of the sound effect when the Ewok smacks that poor Stormtrooper with a log. Just brutal.
0:23: Dishrag. Just an absolute wet dishrag lying on the road. Not a good look for anyone, let alone a professional bicyclist. It’s good that the car behind him had the presence of mind to stop, but if it were me I might rather they just run me over and put me out of my fucking misery. I mean, is there ever going to be a time in your life when this isn’t what you’re known for? You blew up on Twitter as Bike Guy Who Got His Spine Caved In By A Car. There’s no coming back from that.
0:24: “That guy’s hurt.” Smart take, video guy. Smart take. I think this is secretly the best part of the video. It’s just the PERFECT level of understatement. Beautiful in its own way. I want this man to narrate my life.
0:29: “…nahhh.” The callousness of bicyclists is truly a sight to behold. This guy is the only one I’ll specifically highlight (because he had the misfortune of being first), but it’s worth noting that not a single bicyclist stopped to help this man whose spine was clearly just mashed into jelly. Not only that, I don’t think anyone even really slowed down. But I guess that’s just the bicyclist mantra: hear no, see no, speak no thing that doesn’t directly affect me and my selfish bicyclist life.
0:34: Honest to God, there are eight support vehicles in this frame. EIGHT! I know bicycle races have support vehicles that stay near the riders, but this seems like an outrageous amount of overkill. Have we even seen eight total bicyclists yet? Is this actually a motor vehicle race that the bicyclists are just disrupting? Actually…this is starting to make a lot of sense.
0:37: “Slow down everyone, slow down! Slow down, or who knows what could–”
0:44: I gotta give this guy credit though. He knows what he did. He knows he fucked up. That’s the resigned look of a man who knows that he has made his bed, and now he must lie in it.
0:49: Seriously, I can’t get enough of this guy. I wish I could bottle that despair and put it in my coffee every morning. The best part is that nobody even cares about him because that other guy is still lying dead on the ground. It’s like when your girlfriend dumps you, and you go to your friend for sympathy only to find out that their grandma just died. Nobody cares about you or your problems anymore, bike guy. You just got tragedy trumped.
Well, there you have it. A blow-by-blow breakdown of the greatest video to hit the internet in quite some time. You might remember the bus video. Or the slap fight video. But I feel pretty confident when I say that this one beats them both. Whether it’s the initial impact, the quiet, understated genius of the videographer, or the two-birds-with-one-stone glory that is the second accident, this is a thrill-a-minute blockbuster as far as I’m concerned. I’ve watched it about 95 times in the last week or so and I’m not sure I’ll ever get sick of it.
I HATE BICYCLISTS 