In my childhood, we called it the gutter. I can see why politically correct Cambridge might avoid that term too closely associated with Victorian, judgmental expressions for the downtrodden--but painting a little bike graphic on a gutter does not make it a bike lane.

I like bike paths, but I'm against bike lanes. Bicycles are vehicles and, according to Massachusetts law, they have the right to use the road. They are required to stay to the right, as are all vehicles, but cyclists are not required to pitch themselves into the ditch every time a car approaches. That ugly little graphic on the side of the road leads car drivers to believe that they have the right of way, and they react with eye-popping rage whenever a cyclist, like me, ventures into the smoothly paved part of Sparks Lane in Cambridge. I urge all Cambridge traffic planners to ride their bicycles through the broken glass, leaves, and uneven pavement on the right side of Sparks Lane. If they find it a demeaning and harrowing experience, they should consider painting over their bike lane symbols. As for me, I don't use bike lanes. I don't want to be hit by an open car door, or edged out by a right-turning car, or run through broken glass. I use the road; I'm not a guttersnipe.

Frank Willison arriving at O'Reilly's Cambridge office.

I tried to use the walk light at the B.U. Bridge because the cars coming out of the Cambridge rotary approach the bridge like rocks flung from David's sling. The sign on the light post says: "Push button and wait for Walk signal." Notice that it doesn't include a third step: Walk. That's because the Walk signal never comes on; the button is a no-op. I felt like Godot. Finally, I hot-footed it across the intersection, offending all the little Hondas with their precious turbo fours accelerating out of the curve. Relax, Honda drivers; show a little Civic responsibility.

An Ibuprofen tablet, preemptively taken with one's morning coffee, greatly minimizes the effects of Screaming Ass-Bone Syndrome (SABS).

Today's commute to work was very encouraging. I cut another 3 minutes off my time (now about 42 minutes, door-to-door). This improvement came, I must admit, because I tried. I stayed in a higher gear than yesterday for most of the trip. I got over onto my largest front sprocket for the longer flat sections of the trip. I pushed it.

Learn more about Bike-to-Work Week, May 15-19, 2000.

I also found myself beginning to employ some proto-Thighmaster biking tricks. For example, rather than gearing down when I had to come to a stop, I left the bike in the higher gear. When I started up again, I stood on the pedals to get more torque and accelerate faster. I tried the trick of balancing on the bike at a red light, not putting my foot on the pavement, but I was less successful there. From a physics perspective, I have the center of gravity characteristics (and the profile) of a golf ball on a tee; so balance can be achieved only temporarily.

I do think that I'm getting close to making the trip As Fast As a Human Being Should Go. There are additional time cutters, but most of the ones available to me are illegal: going the wrong way down a one-way street, going through a red light, using the sidewalk to avoid traffic jams. There is a tendency in this city for cyclists to adopt the devil-may-care attitude for which Boston drivers are noted. I urge such cyclists to note the different configuration of flesh and metal in the two cases: with cars, the metal is around the flesh; with bikes, it's the other way. And the fleshy parts are the ones you want to protect.

I made a mental note for the rest of the week: watch out for the onset of hubris.