A Winter Tradition

We had a great swim.  The final still shows west-bound traffic on highway 50.  A whole lot of  people came to see us swim.  One hour to get to the beach, five hours to get back to camp!

The next 24 hours

  I am currently at my in-laws with my son.  soon, I will drive into Busan and pick up Kwandongwife and drive to sokcho (the little guy is staying with the in-laws).  I will crash until my wife wakes me up.  We will bax all our belongings and the movign truck will arrive in the afternoon.  We will load it up, then I will drive to Jinyoung (near Busan) to stay the night with (other) in-laws (not entirely sure why).  Sunday morning (OK, we have moved beyond 24 hours by now), we will drive into Busan and mee the moving truck and begin settling into our new home.

24 hours, about half of that driving - oh, boy!

I can't decide if I will make a clean break with this blog and move to a new one -already chosen and with a few posts on it- or if I will continue to follow Gangwon-related news story and post them here.  This blog hasn't been very active in February, yet it will not become any more active.

I will miss Gangwon and am sorry that my current schedule doesn't allow for much in the way of face-to-face goodbyes.  I am certain to visit it when I have the chance in the summer though.

Someone comes to town, someone leaves town.

Doctorow wrote a cool and weird story with that title, but my story deals more with how someone came and left.

My brother-in-law drove here on Saturday evening and took the bus home on Sunday afternoon.

He left us with...

A Mercedes! Alright, a Mercedes licensed engine, in a Korando (and that is now three times that I have tried to spell the vehicle name and written Korean instead).
The truck is not new but seriously 'like new'. My B-I-L took excellent care of his truck and actually took a lot of time into explaining how to care for it. He learned basic mechanics on the farm and was a driver for a general during his military service so he has the right background.

You might wonder how or why he would decide to sell or give us his car. Well, he is getting a new one for himself and we helped finance him eight years ago when he bought this one.

I am excited to own a car again. Previously, I had bought a car, a Honda Civic and two weeks later, my girlfriend came to Canada. Three weeks after that, I proposed and began planning how I would move back to Korea. Nine months later, I sold that car.

I have ten months of car ownership experience and, as with most North Americans, several years of driving experience. I briefly worked for an ambulance service and so qualified for my small bus license and considered myself, again briefly, to be a pretty good driver.

Honestly, though, I am not. I might have been a fair driver (maybe) but I foresee taking the car to an empty parking lot and practicing a lot of parallel parking and reversing and such to make up for several years of being a passenger.

My son is eager to practice, too.
I won't be properly insured or registered until Wednesday, so I have a few days before my life is transformed.

Consistent readers of this blog will know that I am at least somewhat anti-private car and greatly interested in how public transportation works (or doesn't) and what alternative forms of transportation can do. I don't like the way cities and people have adjusted to make things more convenient - for cars - to the inconvenience of people.

On Wednesday, that paragraph will read as:

Consistent readers of this blog will know that I was at least somewhat anti-private car and greatly interested in how public transportation works (or doesn't) and what alternative forms of transportation can do. I didn't like the way cities and people have adjusted to make things more convenient - for cars - to the inconvenience of people.

Just kidding. I don't expect to entirely give up cycling or public transportation. Still, I will enjoy and take advantage of the increased freedom a car gives. I need to set some rules for myself, preferably before I do start driving, regarding how much I will drive and what situations legitimately give me a good excuse to drive to work rather than take the free bus.

Still, this blog will return to featuring more travel entries - even though they will be local, limited to the distance that the little guy feels comfortable with.

I like the look of this

I first noticed the Gyopo Wife mentioning a 'car-free day' in Seoul and now the Joongang Ilbo has photos. As it is currently so early in the morning, I think I am reading yesterday's news and today's on the same page: I can see the announcement and a photo (below) of the result next to each other.

The recent 'green party' in Sokcho also included a long section of street closed to automobiles but cars that did travel through town had to take a somewhat torturous detour. It may have been well-advertised but I didn't see much before the day itself.

Anyway, these events where people can walk on the road always seem so much fun. I don't know if it is the usually forbidden pleasure of dallying where once you had to scurry but I do know I like to walk up and down the middle of the street.

They are so much fun, in fact, and are intended to benefit the environment, so I don't know why they are not more frequent. Perhaps various cities should start 5-day markets, closing the street every fifth day, or make the event once a month. Its not like a joke -if once a year is good, many times a year should also be good.

I'm starting to get carried away - how about opening the roads to automobiles once every five days? This would be a good time for stores to be restocked and ready for the next four days without daytime deliveries.

Bikes on subways

Seoul will soon allow bikes on the subway outside of peak of peak hours. In addition, bike storage will be available at some stations.

I like the ideas and hope it catches on.

Bike News

The Joongang has quite a series of articles and letters about cycling and bike safety this year. Considering the snow today, I am encouraged to read that someone is thinking about warm weather activities.

It is hard to make a set of guidelines for safe cycling as people ride for so many different reasons. Children under, I don't know, 16 or so are in one group, adult commuters in another and maybe farmers and bike couriers (do they exist in Korea?) in one or two other groups.

I want my son to ride on the sidewalk and he is no threat to pedestrians at the speeds he travels (or, typically, the speeds I push him at). The way the bike path curves and bends on a straight stretch of sidewalk is not the problem for him it is for me. He doesn't mind sharing the sidewalk with other users at different speeds, nor stopping at each intersection.

I do. If I plan to ride to Yangyang or even Gangneung (20 and 55km, respectively), I don't want to be dodging pedestrians all the way and stopping at every intersection. I am completely willing to stop at traffic lights and even feel annoyed when drivers try to wave me through.

A traffic cop, he looked like a young conscript, tried to wave me onto the sidewalk and I ignored him (I do feel a little guilty about that, but only a little). In Canada, I was taught that adults cyclists should not be on the sidewalks. I try not to let my Canadian bias' take over here, but it just makes sense to me. If a commuter is going to travel even a few kilometres, he can't be stopping at every single intersection along the way, or there is no value to using a bike.

From the March 13th article:

To encourage more people to ride bicycles, we need more than just bicycle lanes. We need parking spaces, rental stations, repair stations and public shower booths.

Insurance programs for bicycle riders must be developed as well and drivers must learn to be careful about riders’ safety.

The schools must offer better safety education. In 2007, 22 percent of the 8,724 reported casualties in bicycle accidents were children.

It is a dangerous idea to start encouraging children to cycle to school when Korea still lacks the appropriate infrastructure and commitment to road safety needed to ensure that fewer youth get hurt on our roads.

I like the ideas suggested in the first paragraph. I would like to see almost a sort of locker for my bike - I have never had a wheel or seat stolen but the horror stories of such events are in my mind whenever I lock up. I don't know about repair stations but at least high-pressure air. The shower sounds like a great idea: maybe coin operated?

I will discuss the insurance idea a little later.

Letters to the editor agreeing with the importance of this article were printed on March 23rd and 24th. Both letters are fine but don't cover much new ground. The first letter does talk about the benefits of clean air, but I wonder. With the good weather these days, I have wanted to go cycling but have held back for fear of Yellow Dust, which is mostly a natural phenomenon and will not disappear even with electric vehicles or the like.

On March 28, an article about Insurance for cyclists was printed. In general, I think it is a good idea if handled properly (read, "the exact way I want") but could turn into a nightmare of red tape. If cycling insurance takes off, I can foresee a time when it becomes mandatory; a required tax with the purchase of a bike. Further, one would need proof of insurance, which means carrying a licence or papers of some sort. I want to be on the road a lot and could see the need for insurance, but many other probably just ride their bikes from their apartments to Expo Park, with only a short period of high traffic risk.

I rode my bike across most of Canada (Woo-hoo- 100th time I've managed to fit that into a post!) and have made a few longish trips in Korea. I've had problems but they've all been mechanical. I am more interested in bike travel education than insurance to make Korean (and Canadian, for that matter) roads safer.


Finally, and ironically as this is the older article, there will be a bike festival in Seoul:

The Seoul Metropolitan Government and the JoongAng Ilbo yesterday signed a memorandum of understanding to jointly hold a large-scale cycling festival for over 10,000 people on April 25.

The eco-friendly event is part of the city government’s push to get more people on bikes as a means of protecting the environment, easing traffic congestion and promoting health.

They also agreed to team up on a public relations drive to encourage biking and promote the C40 Large Cities Climate Summit 2009, which will be held in Seoul.

Korea.net has info on a bike tour and festival on April 25th, although no information from city hall. Indeed the Seoul City Hall website seems to be showing sports events from 2007 or 2008, with no bike or cycling festival listed.

I will keep looking and perhaps I can meet some fellow cyclists in Seoul on April 25th.

Take the train from Seoul to Sokcho

This sign was next to a table of petitions for an express train between Seoul and Sokcho.

I'm too sick right now to comment or even think deeply about the subject, but here goes.

In my six years in the area, I've seen evidence of the old rail line slowly disappear. The old line seemed to go from Gangneung (where I guess it turned inland) into North Korea. There are still many supports for bridges, although the bridges themselves are gone.

If or when the border opens up, I can easily imagine the value of a rail line here and to points north, but right now, not so much.

We already know that nobody wants to fly here (search "airport" on this blog, if you're interested - I'm saving my energy for vomiting).

It would be nice get to and fro in comfort, and especially to have a bathroom available, but it would be strange to have a rail car all to myself, aside from New Year's eve or the like, I guess.
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Oh, the photo was taken with my new Sony DSC T-77. I handy little camera that I bought a few days ago. Thanks for suggestions on what to buy - I am not sure if I followed any or them.

College professor and bicycle commuter killed by bus

I'm late in noting the story. From Korea Beat.

A math professor in Gwangju who had commuted to work by bike since 1987 was struck and killed by a kindergarten bus. The bus driver suffered from kidney failure and the medicine caused drowsiness or exhaustion, causing him to lose control of his bus.

The Joongang Ilbo (Korean) has an article describing him as the cycling professor. Sounds like someone I would like.

new traffic regs- a little clearer now

The Korea Times now has an article about the new traffic laws and it seems a little clearer:

The government, law enforcement agencies and civic groups have waged a campaign to reduce car accidents but have made little progress due to a traffic law clause that exempts drivers with comprehensive auto-insurance policies from criminal charges for car accidents. The Constitutional Court finally ruled Thursday that insured drivers should be criminally liable for accidents which cause ``serious injuries."

There are some "clearly-a-foreign-country" ideas:

But, the ruling will have many side effects due to its suddenness. Drivers might be indicted for inflicting grave injuries that would threaten lives and cripple victims with no chance of recovery, including the loss of eyesight or hearing.

Presumably, this is the goal.

Then comes a real problem with the new regulations:

Not only drivers but also police are confused over how to handle car accidents because of the vague definition of ``serious injuries" the court cited. And, Friday, the Supreme Prosecutors' Office announced a set of guidelines in this regard that are still not clear enough to alleviate the confusion....
[lawmakers will now need to] set a clearer definition of ``serious injuries." They also need to heed concerns that some victims may seek to extend their period of hospitalization as bargaining chips to receive more compensation. Doctors are required to issue fair and credible medical certificates for victims.

The 'serous injury' part of the law was one I missed, but I have a simple solution: Make it "any injury". Speaking as a poor driver myself, if you hit another car or person, you should have to defend your actions.

A change in Korean driving patterns coming

A surprisingly good photo from my window, 3AM, two weeks ago.

Firetruck and car blocking access to hydrant at a friend's apartment complex.

The photos don't direct relate to the post below.

There were two articles in the Donga about a court ruling on criminal prosecution of insured drivers. The first, from the 27th is a news report, while the second, from the 28th, is an Opinion piece.

In the past, a driver in Korea with insurance could not be charged for causing an accident, except under 12 specific criteria (among them, drunk driving, speeding and hit-and-run)."[T]he traffic law served the legislative purpose of preventing the number of convictions from soaring and quickly resolving legal disputes" (2). The constitutional court found

the unconditional immunity for a driver violates the constitutional requirement to minimize encroachment on basic rights. The latest ruling was affected by the fact that most drivers are now covered by general liability insurance and that most drivers who cause accidents do not even appear before the victims, leaving all the damage-related tasks to insurers.(2)

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“Though there are multiple options in punishment such as formal, informal and suspended prosecution depending on the cause of injuries and the severity of the mistake, giving immunity to an insured driver is against the Constitution because this is overprotection of basic rights,” the court said.

“Korea has an extraordinarily higher rate of car accidents than other (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries, and such an immunity case is rare to find. (The immunity rule) tends to make drivers negligent in safe driving or leave what happens after the accident to insurance companies.(1)

I would be interested in what the 12 criteria for permitting criminal charges were.

It seems that drivers were able to walk away from accidents and not be held accountable. I think this is wrong. Ironically, my understanding is that if a car hits a pedestrian, the driver starts off being considered guilty and almost always faces charges. I think this is wrong, too. A drunk stepped onto the highway near Gangneung and my friend missed him. My friend would have been charged had she hit him.

Drivers are either too free of criminal charges or too threatened by them.

I have to admit that my experience with and complaints about Korean automotive culture relate more to low speed driving on back streets and where drivers think they can reasonably park. Still, this decision by the constitutional court seems a step in the right direction for making Korean roads safer.

ADDED Later: Welcome visitors from ROK Drop. There is a new article on the subject in the Korea Times, which I discuss here (honestly, the KT covers it well enough).

Uljin has an airport?

This story is a few months old but it is one I have been following on this blog.

The ill-conceived plan to build the airport was first hatched in the early 1990s. A series of local experts raised their voices in concern, saying there was simply not enough demand for airline services in the area. The Korea Transport Institute even presented a research paper that warned that the airport, once established, would see as few as 50 users per day...

Embarrassed government officials tried to come through with several backup plans, including turning the airport into an aircraft repair center or selling it to the air force. But there was not enough demand for repair services in the area, and the possible sale to the military faced intense opposition from local provincial governments.

“Everyone knew the airport was doomed,” said Lee Yeong-heok, a professor at Korea Aerospace University. “It was a highly anticipated failure choreographed by lawmakers who only cared about their own constituents and a government that did not do enough preliminary research.”

Uljin is in the middle of nowhere. I can't think of any city or population centre within an hour or two of Uljin. I guess nuclear engineers could fly in and out; Korea has a few reactors in the area.

I had to chuckle (in a grim way) at, " the possible sale to the military faced intense opposition from local provincial governments." I would like them to sell the airport to the military and move Gangneung's fighter wing there - I think they buzz our university specifically when I am teaching.

Another local airport in Gangwon Province faces the same fate. Yangyang Airport, built in 1997, is posting ever-bigger deficits as the number of travelers continues to shrink. Back when it started construction on the airport in January 1997, the ministry said it would replace those at Sokcho and Gangneung, two Gangwon Province airports that suffer from chronic delays due to the area’s foggy weather and weak infrastructure. They also insisted that the new airport, which officially opened in 2002, would greatly help in attracting tourists from China and Japan.

But now, all regular flights to and from the airport have been canceled due to the meager number of travelers. Aviation authorities have no clue what to do with the facility, which posted a deficit of 4.9 billion won ($3.8 million) in its first year of operation, a number that has now topped 10 billion won.

“Yangyang Airport was completely inappropriate in terms of its size and investment return,” said one official at the Civil Aviation Safety Authority who declined to be named.

Yangyang airport appears to be in a slightly better position than Uljin - Sokcho and Gangneung both are less than an hour away as are many tourist sites along the coast. As I recall, the airport was built to attract Chinese tourists and it opened right when SARS appeared; not many people were excited about Chinese tourists.

Yangyang Airpot previously on this blog: 2005, 2007

Japanese imports can go faster than domestic vehicles

There is an interesting post at Boing Boing about the mystery driver of an English car in Germany. German speed cameras on the autobahns photograph the licence and the driver's side of the car but not the passenger side. As a result, the driver of the right-hand-drive British car does not show up in photos. S/he is apparently aware of this and has a Muppet in the passenger seat to be photographed.

My understanding of the traffic cameras in Korea is that they only shoot the Driver's (left-hand) side. Drivers of imported Japanese cars would be invisible to the cameras, so they should be able to ignore the cameras and drive any speed they like.

I don't want the roads in Korea to be any more dangerous but I especially wonder about speeding in Germany. I said 'autobahn' above, but I'm not sure they have speed limits. If cars are already going 200km/hr, I wouldn't want anyone abusing whatever laws are in effect.

Kwandongbrian becomes (or recognizes that I always have been) an old crank

This kind of thing always irritates me but especially when I am travelling with the little guy.


If you can't park the car, don't buy a car!

The signs on the windows read "no parking". If I knew how to say, "stay off the frikkin' sidewalk", that's what they'd say.

And kids, stay off my yard! Why, when I was that age, I knew...

War in Seoul

My father, as a member of the Ontario Provincial Police, battled biker gangs in Wasaga Beach during the May 24 Weekend (A Canadian holiday - Queen Victoria's birthday, I think) several years in a row. I was too young to know about it but apparently he would come home bleeding on occasion.

I was intrigued, then, to hear that "Seoul Declares War Against Bikers". Turns out they aren't related. I don't think there are motorcycles gangs of the Hell's Angel sort here. There will soon be a crackdown on motorcyclists - mostly delivery-people - who drive on sidewalks and park illegally.

I am happy to hear about the former and suspicious about the latter. I haven't had much trouble here in Sokcho but occasionally did in Seoul and annoyingly frequently in Masan, with motorcyclists driving on the sidewalk. In Masan, they would even bump into my leg and honk the horn. I learned to not move out of the way of the jerk.

The crackdown on illegal parking is a good idea, but why pick on motorcycles and motorcyclists? Motorcycles don't take up much room; start the parking crackdown on cars. Get the f---ing cars off the sidewalks. Get them off the crosswalks. Then, worry about the parked motorcycles. Heck, do that concurrently, just be sure to include cars.

One commenter on the Korean Times article claims the crackdown will not work because police will not be able to catch fast moving motorcycles. I agree that the crackdown will not work - or will work for only a short time, but not for the reason the commenter gave. We aren't talking about open roads and racing, we're talking about parking (pretty much the opposite of racing) and driving on sidewalks, which is done because the roads are jammed with traffic. If the motorcycles had clear roads to drive quickly on, they wouldn't be on the sidewalk in the first place.

By the way, what's keeping my pizza?
Possibly related.

Crash # 3

Firstly, I'm fine. The car accident happened in an intersection below my window; the third one in a month.

I am not sure how or why these crashes are occurring. They all sound the same and occur in the late evening (this one occurred around 8:40). I am in my apartment and I hear a brief wail of brakes and a solid bump. No one appears badly injured.

I haven't seen the actual impact, only looked out the window a few seconds afterwards. I am unable to figure out what happened. Clearly, one car has broadsided another but was the T-boned car crossing the intersection from the side street or did the driver attempt a wide U-turn across four lanes?

What I can comment on with some authority is the unprofessional-ness of most people afterwards. There are no hazard light flashing on any vehicle although the tow-trucks all have their roof lights on and turning. Happily, there have been no fights or loud arguments, just people working to solve the problem - although in the last two cases, the person stepping out of the, uh, broadsiding car has been on the phone. I hope they have just called for assistance.

Have a look; the two pics are the same image, the second one labelled and a little smaller.


The police drive everywhere with their roof-lights on but turn them off at the scene of an accident?

There are three tow-trucks and a car carrier (I don't know what to call it - the car is driven onto the bed of the truck) in the pic and all have their lights on. However, at the bottom-left of the photo is a tow truck blocking the side street. Only the carrier was used and in leaving, one tow truck ran a redlight with a little toot of its siren.

Accident vehicle #2 is black and has its lights turned off. Even if it has suffered a complete electrical failure (it hasn't; it drove off when the police were through), someone should use a flare or fluorescent marker or something.

Eco-friendly driving – probably an oxymoron

Sarah Stefanson writes for driversense.com and an article of hers was featured on the homepage for Yahoo Canada on September 1. As it was about driving and the environment, I gave it a read (I click on about one in fifty of the featured articles, I guess).

She does give some good tips for conserving gas while driving but I really see no honest effort to be eco-friendly.

She seems to be missing an important point about how vehicle-use consumes energy, looking at the problem in the most simplistic and car-friendly way possible. That point is, the energy it takes to drive any car anywhere is more than matched by the energy needed to produce that car and probably not far off the energy needed to make and maintain the roads and infrastructure necessary for driving.

One suggestion is too keep the trunk clear and not carry too much extra weight. She should follow that thought through and consider the absurdity of using a one tonne vehicle to transport a ninety kilo person (that’s me, by the way, not her).

When I return to Canada, I will likely have to buy a car. Things are pretty spread out there, unlike my situation in Korea.

To be honest, I will likely even drive frivolously on occasion, so maybe a few of her suggestions have merit. However, her attitude is more irritating than than her supposed eco-friendliness.

“I love my car. I love it on days when I drive past pedestrians walking through rain, sleet and snow. I love it because it lets me sleep in an extra half hour every morning since I don't have to catch a bus.”

What a jerk. Those poor bastards, doing their part to protect the environment or too poor to own a car; I love driving past them and laughing.

Take back the …sidewalks?

Below is an article that I wrote for my university's English magazine but was unable to submit. I think I can submit it next semester but I can also publish it here. This is a photo-heavy post; please click to enlarge photos.

Streets are more than utility spaces, good only for transportation and storage. They are community spaces where people should be comfortable interacting.

The subject area is too big to be covered here in detail so I will leave out how street design can affect crime rates and various international attempts to improve the sense of community in city streets and try to focus on engineering and how sidewalks specifically should be more than an afterthought when the ‘real work’ – streets and spaces for automobiles – is completed.

I am mostly going to be describing obstructions to foot traffic, so let me start with a counter-example: something that slows pedestrians but that I approve of. The point of the following picture is to show that my criteria are admittedly subjective and contradictory.

Street markets are a sign of life, of the sidewalk being actively used in positive ways. On occasion, I have had to struggle to push my stroller down the street but I do not begrudge the vegetable sellers their space.

In the city of Sokcho, the sidewalks are generously sized, but all too often, obstructions like this are to be seen:

Here, we have a transformer and a light standard squeezing the street’s width. Can a stroller fit? Maybe.

Would drivers accept this on the road, not stopping their passage but slowing them down and forcing careful maneuvering? Almost definitely not.

So, why are pedestrians expected to? Not everyone is a driver, but everyone is a pedestrian. Everyone has to walk at least a little.

Here are some more light standards and communication poles:

These are two shots of the same site. Wow, three poles, all exactly in the middle of the sidewalk. People can get used to anything, but this just has to be considered annoying.

Or, perhaps it should be considered bad planning. What city planner okayed these obstructions? Next are a few photos of bad planning in Gangneung.

Which one is the crosswalk? The lines on the left appear to be for a speed-bump, while those on the right look correct for a crosswalk. But the left side has an inclined curb. Who planned this? By the way, the other side of the street has no inclined curb, for either set of lines. You could roll your wheelchair off the sidewalk, cross the street, but then have to ask for help to mount the curb on the other side.

Inset crosswalks are another sign of pedestrian’s needs being second class. Below are two photos taken in Sokcho: we are looking across an intersection but where is the crosswalk? See the illegally parked white van on the left side of the picture? That’s where the crosswalk is.

Although the crosswalk is dangerously hidden from view by cars parked on both sides of the road on both sides of the crosswalk, I am more concerned about the value, or lack, given to speed and direct travel for pedestrians. To cross this street, pedestrians are expected to go far out of their way.

Let’s have a look at the five way intersection below Gangeung’s city hall.

First, note that there is no way to cross the major road, but pedestrians can only walk alongside it. There was a crosswalk on the right side but it has been removed – the inclined curb remains, although it is unnoticeable in this photo.

The crosswalk at the bottom left is a good example of how planning for foot traffic is an afterthought. The street at the bottom left is the exit from the highway and so is one-way. There is only a brief period when those cars can enter the intersection but a longer period for vehicles to leave City Hall, then vehicles to cross in one, then both directions in front of City Hall. Only for a small portion of that time can pedestrians legally cross the highway exit lanes, even though it is safe to do so for the entire time.

In Canada, people typically live in single family houses and are spread out. For good financial reasons, public transit is uncommon and infrequent. I could not imagine living without a car in most places. I lived in a town of 15,000 people: there were two pharmacies and almost everybody had to drive to visit them. We actually drove to the closest convenience store (about 4-5 km).

Koreans typically live in apartments and so are more densely packed. Personally, I would like more open space but I do like being able to walk to most of the stores and services I need.

Let me finish with a request or a charge to Kwandong’s civil engineering students. Please, care about the pedestrian. Again, everyone is a pedestrian at some point so they should be considered first, not second, in designing streets. Make us comfortable and happy walkers.

A letter to pedestrians

If you want to use the sidewalk,...


...You can just go f--k yourself because I am so important that I don't have time to park my company vehicle in a parking space.

Signed,
Telecom Guy

Oh, and seconded by busy van-drivin' guy...



...and Truck Drivin' guy, because...
...I need room in front of my truck for, uh, something, or maybe I was in a hurry and didn't have time to think about others - hey, just like always!

PSA for winter pedestrians

Today, I learned, entirely by chance, how to warm my feet up if they feel cold.

I have a pair of sort of half-boots. Not at all suitable for hiking, they are a little warmer than shoes and keep snow out better than shoes as well. My boots are a few years old and it doesn't take long for my socks to get wet these days. If I stop for a few minutes and no longer keep my feet heated by walking action, they feel cold pretty quickly.

Now, I have learned that when my feet feel cold, I should simply not look where I am walking for a few steps. Almost certainly, there will be a broken half-tile or curb hidden by snow for me to half step onto...

My gosh, one's foot immediately feels warm, almost hot, after flexing it over until one is nearly standing on ankle bones!

It took a few minutes to walk normally after the incident, but that foot felt warm all the way home after that.

Good boots might be a better idea, all things considered.

The pettiness of Kwandongbrian

I've written before about how annoyed I get when people park in the 'no-parking' zone. It's a small thing but it bothers me. The four signs are normally in a row along the curb but I dragged them around the Korando.
The good news is, I restrained myself from tying them to the front and back bumpers. That may be my next trick.