The headline needs explaining, which is the point of this opening paragraph. I have a sandal that was given to me years ago by a woman who died in 2007 (this was the woman who I used to ride my bicycle for 120 miles in a day so I could have lunch with her (and make all the other residents of the nursing home angry at their children)). So I have had this sandal for a very long time that I was using as a lifted slipper so I didn’t get back pains on the days I stayed at home. Well the sole of that sandal has crumbled and now the toe is hanging by a scrap of leather that used to be the insole. This makes the sandal painful to walk in and eventually it will fall completely apart.
So, I will need to replace this sandal with “something else”. The problem is “something else” has to be 17mm thicker on the bottom of the left one than the right one, and I have never seen a slipper that had that as an option. That leaves me with two choices, pay someone else to make me a pair of slippers with the left sole 17mm thicker than the right sole, or make my own pair of slippers. Now the thing is for a pair of shoes I don’t walk very much in the thickness difference doesn’t need to be exactly 17mm, anything from 12 to 20 would work just fine.
Something I have been wearing on the right foot has been a pair of slipper socks (well, half a pair) that was very comfortable at all the normal temperatures for my house. So the idea is to build some slipper socks with the left one having the extra thickness I need to get my pelvis level. The local craft store to the rescue! Slipper socks like the one I was using are nothing more than a thin rubber sole bonded to a knit sock so that the sole is held more or less in place under the foot. I have lots of socks, and also glue that will bond the socks to a rubber sole, but until I saw this one item in the local craft store I didn’t have a sole that I could use and also have significant differences in thickness between the two. The item in question is the decorate a shower shoe refill kit, which consisted of two pairs of white flip flops at a reasonable price and is sold year-round as a gift suggestion. The idea I had is to use both pairs of flip flops without the toe thong-thingy that makes flip flops flip flop when you walk in them, take one pair and glue them together with the wear face out and then glue that to the bottom of the left flip flop and then glue the whole mess to a pair of socks sitting in my sock drawer. Add some straps and velcro strips to the left foot (OK the right one too to make it symmetrical) so I don’t roll the sole over and end up turning an ankle and call it done.
Up first is a wreck that shows nobody is “safe” in the bike lane no matter what non-car mode of transport they are using. 1 injured as car hits wheelchair in Shoreline bike lane The problem is not the cyclists if anyone gets hit in the bike lane, it’s the crappy drivers who seem unable to keep their killing machines away from fragile skin and bones.
More on that El Tour de Tucson wreck. Driver in deadly El Tour crash says it’s all a blur OK as I read it the driver’s blood sugar crashed after the game, and then he did the same. Also Driver ID’d in El Tour de Tucson collision that killed a cyclist.
A CA driver talking on a cell phone could be facing charges in the death of a cyclist. PD: Woman may face charges after hitting, killing bicyclist As this wreck took place in September and this is late November I hope you’ll forgive me for not remembering exactly how this wreck happened…
Update on a more recent wreck in CA. Santa Barbara Woman Jailed in Cyclist Hit-and-Run This was a hit-from-behind wreck that could have been much worse. The weapon vehicle just grazed the cyclist at highway speed rather than the full impact that a few more inches would have brought. Kudos on the LEO for tracking and arresting the driver. Protocols to avoid or to mitigate damages, and get the infrastructure right to prevent.
Moving to the Emerald Isle of Ireland we find a totally clueless driver behind 3 cyclists. Three cyclists struck by car in Co Clare Not one, not two, but all 3 cyclists hit by the same car in the same wreck. Hit-from-behind protocols to avoid or to mitigate damages, and get the stupid blind driver off the roads to prevent… I mean infrastructure, get the infrastructure right to prevent (after they get rid of the stupid, blind, driver).
News from the cycling scientist that brought us the news that drivers pass closer to cyclists when they wear helmets comes another study with a bit more depth to it. University of Bath research shows that cyclists’ outfits do not stop dangerous overtaking Notice that two of the outfits are patterned off of local constabulary bike cops uniforms and that had no effect on the passing distances of drivers.
Infrastructure! news from the UK. RE-Tech launches cyclist detection system for vehicles Additional “eyes” for drivers who can’t see out of their trucks.
More infrastructure news. Britain failing to protect cyclist but should they share the blame for accidents? Well the UK statistics show that even with a police force that has demonstrated a strong anti-cyclist bias their own reporting system determined that motor vehicle operators are at least partly to blame in 93% of all bike wrecks. That says that the cyclists are not the problem, they are already mostly doing whatever it takes to not get hit. The real culprits are bad infrastructure and bad drivers.
A Ghost Bike for a MO cyclist. ‘Ghost bike’ memoralizes killed cyclist Now we know the driver of the weapon vehicle was being chased by her ex, and both are in jail on unrelated charges but not charged in the cyclist’s death because it’s OK to kill a cyclist…
And those were all the bicycle links that gave me fits today.
Billed @€0.02, Opus
Slippers are built but problems are found, and the Feed
Gluing socks to flip flops to make slippers works without further modifications, but making the resulting combination lifted to accommodate my short leg requires additions. To wit while the right side flexes as I walk and stays comfortably in place the left side tries to pull my foot out of the sock because it does not flex much when I walk. So I have to cobble up (shoe making pun!) a strap from the heel to the front of the ankle to keep the slipper from wandering away from my foot. Can I tell you that this is the part of making things that I love? Because it is, I love facing problems and finding solutions to those problems. To be totally honest I was slightly disappointed that the right slipper worked so well right out of the box. I mean what fun is that having the initial design working with no modifications needed? So anyway I think I will need to find some Velcro straps to glue to the left slipper to keep the heel in place, the arch and toe areas are not having any problems with the lift or the lack of flexibility in the lifted sole. And I just went to the mailbox to check if the mail had run and I need to place one strap around the back to keep the slipper from sliding off the front, and a second strap over the front of the ankle to keep from pulling away from the back of the slipper when I flex my foot and lift my heel as I stride. I will have to research where I can get these locally, I might just salvage them from the sandals I was using before their soles crumbled…
Up first is more on the cyclist killed on I35 in OK. Bicyclist struck and killed on Interstate 35 Looking at the Street View of the scene reveals a rest area between mile markers 46 and 45 which could explain where the cyclist started from, with a possible disabled vehicle as the reason why someone would be riding a bicycle on an Interstate highway. Anywho, hit-from-behind protocols to avoid or to mitigate damages, if you ever find yourself having to ride on an Interstate highway. From the street view it does not look like there is a rideable shoulder there either.
Moving to CA a cyclist is hurt in a SWCC wreck. Cyclist seriously injured in collision If the report is accurate then intersection protocols to avoid or to mitigate damages, or hit-from-behind protocols if the cyclist wasn’t really “crossing”, but either way get the infrastructure right to prevent.
Still in CA but a little south is another link to the kid that got hit in Long Beach. Teen cyclist critically injured by hit-and-run driver in Long Beach Same thing as it was yesterday, limited sight lines create a condition that only by severely restricting the speed limit (20 km/hr or 10 MPH for the US) could this be made safe for people not encased in light armored vehicles.
Another cyclist is killed in the most deadliest (grammatical error on purpose to emphasize how deadly it is) state in the US to walk or ride a bike since before I started writing this blog. Deputies looking for suspect involved in fatal hit and run on 21st Avenue Hit-from-behind protocols to avoid or to mitigate damages, and get the infrastructure right to prevent. Keep the crazies away from the cyclists and this won’t happen.
Still in that most deadliest state, another notch in the steering wheel… Bicyclist killed in crash on US Hwy 301 near Florida State Fairgrounds OK slightly confusing here, the cyclist was in the right turn lane when hit while crossing the road? That sounds like there may have been some deliberate action on the part of the driver of the weapon vehicle to “not avoid” the cyclist. Anyway, intersection protocols to avoid and get the freaking infrastructure right to prevent.
Another cyclist is shot, this time outside NYC. Man Killed While Riding Bike Home… I honestly can’t say how to avoid something like this, I can’t even say for sure the cyclist was shot because he was riding a bicycle, it might have been something else entirely.
An update on a cyclist killed in OH. Lost in a tragedy, Route 101 needs a bicycle lane
Mass protest in the UK for better infrastructure. More than 1,000 cyclists stage a mass ‘die-in’ safety protest after six riders are killed in London in the space of just a month
Lifestyle in NM. Park now honors girl killed in 2012
And those were all the links about bicycles that gave me fits.
Billed @€0.02, Opus
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Tagged anti-bike blatherings, blind driver syndrome, blind drivers, cyclist injured, cyclists killed, Dead cyclists, DIY, Don't read the comments, hit from behind, hit-and-run, infrastructure, Jolly Olde, Left cross/right hook, Making the world a better place by DIY, miscellaneous ramblings, red light runner, Single Witness Suicidal Swerve/Single Witness Crossing Cyclist, slipper socks, smart LEO, Something smells, stupid cyclist, stupid drivers, stupid LEO, stupid politicians, updates