A Rare Glimpse of Lord Hobo's Opening Night
Drinking in Boston: Bring on the Belgians
Photo of the Day, November 20, 2009: Red Leaf
David Plouffe on The Audacity to Win
Massachusetts College to Celebrate New York Yankees
As a blog, it's rare that we have to publish a corrections column. Usually, we can sneak back into an entry and edit any error of fact that we may have inadvertently made without making such a big deal about it. But, when an entire post—and its related accusation of smugness—is based on an error, well, we've got to say it. Our bad.
The Lizard Lounge in Cambridge is not hosting a "white trash party."
As much as we enjoy venting our righteous anger, we feel really bad for besmirching the reputation of a place that actually puts on a lot of interesting events from musicians representing a wide range of racial, cultural, and class backgrounds. Lizard Lounge, you're okay in our book.
The confusion was caused when we read an article in the Cambridge Chronicle claiming that the club would be hosting a "white trash party" on July 4th. It turns out that the Lizard Lounge in Dallas is the actual culprit. Good one, mainstream media!
In our flimsy defense, we did check the schedule of the Cambridge Lizard Lounge before posting about the "white trash party." Then, as now, the club has its Independence Day entertainment listed as "TBA," and we made the faulty assumption that the Cambridge Chronicle knew something that wasn't online. That was pretty dumb, and we are very, very sorry.
Fixies
Grandpa Bostonist's post on fixies drew the ire of a lot of readers. Some of you even wrote entire blog posts devoted to debunking our curmedgeonly contributor. It's true that Grandpa Bostonist got the entire class of fixies confused with a certain subset: track bikes that don't have brakes. So, there's that. But the backlash ended up proving one of Grandpa's points: fixie riders are self-righteous!
We were surprised by the number of commenters who assumed that Grandpa Bostonist drives a car on the simple basis that he criticized a narrow group of bikers. Re-read his post. He doesn't mention driving a car a single time, but he does mention walking on the sidewalk and in the crosswalk, where, as we all know, Boston's bikers do not fear to tread. There is nothing in the post that is anti-bike, per se. Just anti-fixie. I guess we've learned what constitutes a sacred cow in the Hub.
On a related note, Boston Biker's blog post about Grandpa Bostonist brings up an interesting point. He notes that bikers, drivers, and pedestrians are all guilty of breaking traffic laws but makes the somewhat dubious point that only bikers catch flak for it. Drivers in Boston are known as "Massholes" for their terrible behavior on the road. What should we call bikers and pedestrians?
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A while back, I made the point that bikers, drivers and pedestrians are all assholes and took flack from the bikers because i said the only difference is that they're self-rightious.... ( http://www.davealpert.com/blog/?p=354 )
I guess it all depends on how you get around...
Thanks for mentioning my article. You can read it here if you missed the link.
As far as what to call the ped/cyclists that are not behaving I think Masshole works well for all user groups...
But if you want to be creative, "suicidal lemmings" works well for pedestrians (seriously people don't you have any fear of death LOOK BOTH WAYS before blindly walking into the street)
And as for cyclists.."hipster d-bags" work for the young tight pants crowd, and for the older neon vest crowd I find "super commuter" to adequately express my disdain.
People who ride bikes in Boston catch a lot of shit on the roads, even when they follow all the rules, and try to be polite. It can be a dangerous town to ride in (although if you follow the law it really isn't). They don't need to be catching crap from "grandpa" as well.
No one is innocent, and no one group is any worse/better than any other, but when you look at how each group is using the roads you have to admit that cycling and walking are far better ways to get around than driving, especially anyplace downtown. It is healthier, better for the earth, more efficient, and trust me, faster.
Now if only we could get everyone (and I do mean cyclists too) to start acting with courtesy and respect...a boy can dream can't he.
oh and I wasn't saying that only cyclists catch flak, but that grandpa's article made it seem as if everyone else was innocent...we all know that there are no innocent parties on the streets of Boston.
O.K. Ive got to draw the line with fixies.Ive never seen such a bunch of lemmings in my life.It blows my mind to see such uniform "individualistic" poseurs as the fixie scene.Not since the preppie handbook have i seen such a trend jumping copycat lamos as fixies.Reocuring "individualistic" consistencies such as:skinny jeans just above the knees shorts, retro cycling caps,beards,emo hitler haircuts, bedhead conveniently sculpted disheveled hair, pictures stuck in the spokes,Aerospoke wheels(front wheel only),Messenger bags,bikes Mostly u-locked more than being ridden at the coffee shop.Vegan(organic),etc.. Not only are these unwritten fashion rules but also very fashion over function like tight jeans shorts( very uncomfortable I imagine).Messenger bags(totally useless since they always ride over your hip over to the side causing constant resituating with theback of your arm shoving it on to your back while trying to negotiate cars.never mind how the fact urban cycling demands brakes and gears to effectively out manouver cars and pedestrians. Hard as a rock yet highly coveted Brooks saddles.Do you idiots know how long it takes to break those in?!They're still uncomfortable when broken in, never mind weighing a ton.Its funny how none of them well the lemming purists dont even use clipless pedals! They talk about a simpleminimalist asthetic but I dont know more of a more synergistic ride than with clipless pedals and shoes.Most diehard lemming fixies use very innefective toeclips. Yet they'll never deny anyone how long they can do a trackstand at the traffic light...LAME. I was a bike messenger in Boston in the mid 80's and they were a bunch of elitist crusty Rob Zombie lookalike losers and now we have the fixie movement. A new generation of kids loose on the street that neither know how to handle such a machine nor know how to ride in coexistence with motorists.This is the fragile truce roadies/ commuters have developed over decades of city riding.Fixie poseurs are pissing off motorists left and right with their cooler than though slalom of idling cars, brakestanding, zig zag braking, trackstand posing, in front of moving cars.Someone has said more than once "hey if it means one less car" or "strength in numbers" yet alienating and promoting road rage with motorists then I say I can do without these pretentious pansy poseurs.