compliments

wafflycat said:

Went to the weekly weigh-in this evening - by bike as usual - so the usual
acres of reflectives and multitudinous lights on self & bike. At the
meeting, three women came up - all had overtaken me in their cars on the
journey there. Each of them told me how very visible I was whilst cycling
along. Which is nice to know, as that is the desired effect :-)

I thought the desired effect of weight watching was to become less
visible each week ;-)

Tony

Don't you mean trice, or have you really lost possession?

in message <[email hidden]>,

LSMike (') said:

Don't you mean trice, or have you really lost possession?

That's ancient history. Do keep up at the back.

--
[email hidden] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

;; Woz: 'All the best people in life seem to like LINUX.'
;; <URL:http://www.woz.org/woz/cresponses/response03.html>

"wafflycat" <wafflesATv21netDOTcoDOTuk> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Went to the weekly weigh-in this evening - by bike as usual - so the usual
acres of reflectives and multitudinous lights on self & bike. At the
meeting, three women came up - all had overtaken me in their cars on the
journey there. Each of them told me how very visible I was whilst cycling
along. Which is nice to know, as that is the desired effect :-)

Yes, I have no idea what I look like from behind, so when I leave work at
2200 I make sure I ask my colleagues in their cars who pass me on their way
home how visible I was.

--
Simon Mason
Anlaby
East Yorkshire.
53°44'N 0°26'W
http://www.simonmason.karoo.net

wafflycat said:

Went to the weekly weigh-in this evening - by bike as usual - so the usual
acres of reflectives and multitudinous lights on self & bike. At the
meeting, three women came up - all had overtaken me in their cars on the
journey there. Each of them told me how very visible I was whilst cycling
along. Which is nice to know, as that is the desired effect :-)

Don't suppose any of them worked out a correlation between your
increasingly lower weigh-in scores and how you got there to record them?

They /might/ come round to deciding that cycling is not only good for
folk but not intrinsically unsafe with you as a good role model, but I
won't hold my breath until the penny drops... ;-/

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net [email hidden] http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

"Peter Clinch" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Don't suppose any of them worked out a correlation between your
increasingly lower weigh-in scores and how you got there to record them?

Indeed some are working it out. The topic of last night was exercise, so I
had to cycle there really ;-)

Quoted message said:

They /might/ come round to deciding that cycling is not only good for folk
but not intrinsically unsafe with you as a good role model, but I won't
hold my breath until the penny drops... ;-/

There is another cyclist, but she only does about half-a-mile to the class -
but that's better than nothing. Another woman said that as soon as she comes
back from her holiday (which is soon), she'll be cycling to class & back.
During the talk, the leader pointed me out to ask the benefits of exercise -
how I was doing well, etc., etc.. so there is a small glimmer of hope ;-)
Quite a few at class go to the gym or swim. The point I made was that you
have to find a form of exercise you enjoy doing, or you won't stick at it
and for me, I adore cycling.

Cheers, helen s

Quoted message said:

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net [email hidden] http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

Simon Mason said:

Yes, I have no idea what I look like from behind, so when I leave work at
2200 I make sure I ask my colleagues in their cars who pass me on their way
home how visible I was.

You mean "does my bum look big in this"?

regards, Ian SMith
--
|\ /| no .sig
|o o|
|/ \|

wafflycat said:

The point I made was that you have to find a form of exercise you enjoy
doing, or you won't stick at it and for me, I adore cycling.

It's actually not quite so for an exercise that you do anyway, just to
get from A to B. I doubt the drivers particularly relish driving to,
e.g. the shops, but they consistently drive there anyway. A lot of my
fitness comes from just cycling about as a primary means of transport,
and though it is something I actively enjoy, that isn't actually the
/primary/ reason to do it (that's utility cycling, it *is* the primary
reason for recreational cycling though!).

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net [email hidden] http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

"Peter Clinch" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

It's actually not quite so for an exercise that you do anyway, just to get
from A to B. I doubt the drivers particularly relish driving to, e.g. the
shops, but they consistently drive there anyway. A lot of my fitness
comes from just cycling about as a primary means of transport, and though
it is something I actively enjoy, that isn't actually the /primary/ reason
to do it (that's utility cycling, it *is* the primary reason for
recreational cycling though!).

Pete.

Well, in my case, if I didn't enjoy it, I simply wouldn't do it.

Cheers, helen s

On 18/2/05 2:02 pm, in article [email hidden], "Ian

Smith said:

Simon Mason said:

Yes, I have no idea what I look like from behind, so when I leave work at
2200 I make sure I ask my colleagues in their cars who pass me on their way
home how visible I was.

You mean "does my bum look big in this"?

Does my bum look BIG in this? surely... [1]

...d

[1] http://www.bikereader.com/contributors/misc/big.html

"wafflycat" <wafflesATv21netDOTcoDOTuk> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Went to the weekly weigh-in this evening - by bike as usual - so the usual
acres of reflectives and multitudinous lights on self & bike. At the
meeting, three women came up - all had overtaken me in their cars on the
journey there. Each of them told me how very visible I was whilst cycling
along. Which is nice to know, as that is the desired effect :-)

Yes waffles --- but the rate you are getting smaller suggests that you
simply will not be able to carry the quantity of reflective material soon.
Then where will you be. Remember the theory of BIG

T

David Martin said:

On 18/2/05 2:02 pm, in article [email hidden],

Ian Smith said:

On Fri, 18 Feb 2005, Simon Mason <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

Yes, I have no idea what I look like from behind, so when I leave
work at 2200 I make sure I ask my colleagues in their cars who
pass me on their way home how visible I was.

You mean "does my bum look big in this"?

Does my bum look BIG in this? surely... [1]

..d

[1] http://www.bikereader.com/contributors/misc/big.html

Interesting, this theory of BIG.

However, isn't there a thin line between being visible enough to avoid being
hit and being so visible that drivers stare slack jawed at you in
astonishment, thereby losing concentration and hitting someone else
(possibly another cyclist)?

Tony W said:

"wafflycat" <wafflesATv21netDOTcoDOTuk> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Went to the weekly weigh-in this evening - by bike as usual - so the usual
acres of reflectives and multitudinous lights on self & bike. At the
meeting, three women came up - all had overtaken me in their cars on the
journey there. Each of them told me how very visible I was whilst cycling
along. Which is nice to know, as that is the desired effect :-)

Yes waffles --- but the rate you are getting smaller suggests that you
simply will not be able to carry the quantity of reflective material soon.
Then where will you be. Remember the theory of BIG

Ah grasshopper. You no understand BIG. BIG no about physical size. BIG
much BIGger that that..

...d

Epetruk said:

David Martin said:

On 18/2/05 2:02 pm, in article [email hidden],
"Ian Smith" <[email hidden]> wrote:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

On Fri, 18 Feb 2005, Simon Mason <[email hidden]>
wrote:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> Yes, I have no idea what I look like from behind, so when I leave
> work at 2200 I make sure I ask my colleagues in their cars who
> pass me on their way home how visible I was.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

You mean "does my bum look big in this"?

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Does my bum look BIG in this? surely... [1]

..d

[1] http://www.bikereader.com/contributors/misc/big.html

Quoted message said:

Interesting, this theory of BIG.

Quoted message said:

However, isn't there a thin line between being visible enough to avoid being
hit and being so visible that drivers stare slack jawed at you in
astonishment, thereby losing concentration and hitting someone else

I recall the woman a few years ago who cycled up Edinburgh's Leith
walk wearing either nothing but a very tight fitting Lycra body
stocking, or maybe just green paint. She was clearly quite fit; I
never did manage to get close enough to decide conclusively between
the Lycra and the paint hypotheses. But she caused serious disarray in
the traffic on both sides of the road, and when she went round the
very large roundabout near the top of Leith Walk she caused such
derangement of the traffic that for some time after she was gone cars
were still honking at each other trying to get moving again.

It occurred to me at the time that all this visibility stuff based on
fluorescence and reflection is missing a very basic psychological
point. There are two ways of making yourself very visible to car
drivers. One is to look like a policeman, the other is to look like a
naked woman. You wouldn't have to *be* naked, or a woman. A large pair
of joke shop breasts would do the trick. I'm sure anyone who has tried
it will confirm that for getting noticed instead of ignored looking
like a copper or a naked lady beat the pants off looking like a road
hole digger.

It's basic psychology of vision. The SMIDSY problem isn't registering
a large effect on the retina, it's attracting the driver's *conscious*
attention. Below the level of consciousness there are powerful filters
at work deciding what is important enough to alert the bosses in the
conscious attention boardroom of the mind, and what isn't. To counter
the "only a cyclist" filter concept using bright colours and lights
are no use, you have to counter it with another powerful filter
concept with positive psychological attention value.

If we needed bright colours and lights to notice important things we'd
never have been able to become good hunters. The SMIDSY problem isn't
a problem of "uncamouflaging" the cyclist, it's a problem of changing
the *significance* of the cyclist.

For example, when the Netherlands introduced the legal presumption of
driver fault and cyclist innocence in traffic accidents (unless there
was positive evidence to the contrary), car drivers protested
strenuously that it was unfair because so many cyclists crept around
in camouflage and threw themselves in front of cars in a totally
unavoidable fashion, and this new legislation would clearly encourage
them in their evil ways instead of punishing them. Yet oddly enough it
had an immediate and dramatic effect on the rate at which cyclists
were hit by cars, simply because it changed the *significance* of a
cyclist.
--
Chris Malcolm [email hidden] +44 (0)131 651 3445 DoD #205
IPAB, Informatics, JCMB, King's Buildings, Edinburgh, EH9 3JZ, UK
[http://www.dai.ed.ac.uk/homes/cam/]

Tony W said:

Yes waffles --- but the rate you are getting smaller suggests that you
simply will not be able to carry the quantity of reflective material soon.
Then where will you be.

But she'll be a correspondingly smaller target.

On 19/2/05 9:44 am, in article [email hidden], "Chris

Malcolm said:

Epetruk said:

Interesting, this theory of BIG.

Quoted message said:

However, isn't there a thin line between being visible enough to avoid being
hit and being so visible that drivers stare slack jawed at you in
astonishment, thereby losing concentration and hitting someone else

I recall the woman a few years ago who cycled up Edinburgh's Leith
walk wearing either nothing but a very tight fitting Lycra body
stocking,

<snip>

At last, a master in the wisdom of BIG. I bow to your superior
understanding.

...d

On Sat, 19 Feb 2005 09:44:59 +0000 (UTC) someone who may be
[email hidden] (Chris Malcolm) wrote this:-

Quoted message said:

I recall the woman a few years ago who cycled up Edinburgh's Leith
walk wearing either nothing but a very tight fitting Lycra body
stocking, or maybe just green paint.

Why did I miss her:-(

--
David Hansen, Edinburgh | PGP email preferred-key number F566DA0E
I will always explain revoked keys, unless the UK government
prevents me by using the RIP Act 2000.

David Hansen said:

On Sat, 19 Feb 2005 09:44:59 +0000 (UTC) someone who may be
[email hidden] (Chris Malcolm) wrote this:-

Quoted message said:

I recall the woman a few years ago who cycled up Edinburgh's Leith
walk wearing either nothing but a very tight fitting Lycra body
stocking, or maybe just green paint.

Why did I miss her:-(

You did not lead the target?

--
Joe * If I cannot be free I'll be cheap