Safety First!

Let me just say this. I am all for safety. It's important that when you do anything that you always make sure it's being done properly. However, there's a limit to the amount of safety precautions that need to be taken. Typically the amount of danger involved dictates the number of safety precautions you need to take. If you're handling radioactive toxic waste, you might wanna take more precautions than if you were cleaning your cat's litter box. On a related note, I don't think there's anything more degrading than cleaning a litter box. We clean up after dogs because the law says we have to, but cats shit into a small plastic box full of litter and then the owner gets to scoop it all out while the cat sits there and laughs. To make matters worse, how does that cat show his appreciation? Clawing you half to death when you try and pet it. Holding a cat in your lap is like holding a ticking time bomb. Eventually it's going to go off and you are going to get very, very hurt. I'm half convinced if cats had opposable thumbs, they would rule the world. Did I just go on about cats for an entire paragraph? Yes...yes I did.

Anyways, the other day I was having coffee and I got to see quite a sight. The guy sitting on the other side of the store got up to leave, let's call him Captain Safety. At this point I realized The Captain had ridden his bike today. I realized this because he had brought it into the store in order to keep it from being stolen. This bike was older than me... no one was going to steal it. He then proceeded to get suited up for some hard core bike riding to work action. He put on a wind breaker and then covered it with a sweat shirt, which i still don't understand. Next up was his helmet. Not only did he put on a helmet, but over the helmet, and the best way I could explain it, was a day glow, highlighter yellow, shower cap thing. The helmet also had one of those tiny rear view mirrors attached to it. Next, Captain Safety put on these huge ass sunglasses and I mean these things were like the one's Bret "The Hitman" Hart used to wear. You know the reflective ones that take up your entire face. For a minute I could thought I heard his intro music playing. I immediately feared having the sharp shooter put on me. Anyways, The captain then proceeded to put on gloves, with no fingers, and then put a rubber band around his right pant leg to keep it from getting stuck in the chain. He was wearing jeans, not nice dress pants. So that's the complete picture. Take a minute to take it all in.

This guy seriously resembled a cross between Lance Armstrong and The Forty Year Old Virgin. None of it made any sense...until later that day. Driving out to Best Buy I was coming up on a biker who was riding in the street. Mentor Ave. gets prettyy busy. So my natural reaction was "Get the hell out of the street jackass!" and then I got closer. I saw something strapped to his bike rack on the back. This "thing"... a twelve pack. As I passed him I realized the sheer stupidity, or maybe awesomeness of the situation. I'm not really sure to be honest. I'm leaning more towards awesome stupidity. This man was riding his bike, down a busy street, in the middle of the afternoon in broad daylight... drinking a beer. He was pedaling under the influence, PUI. When I told my best friend his immediate response was, "Can I adopt that guy as my dad?" There is something seriously wrong with bike riders in Cleveland, Ohio.

So there you have it. In the same day I managed to see the world's safest and unsafest bike riders ever. It was also the first real nice day we've had this year. If that's any indication of how this summer is going to go, I am officially excited.