jjankie

Wherever you go, there you are. This endeavor seems naïve. Good luck!

bleucheddar

if you're a real person, you seem like my kind of person.. reply to me if you would like. im young and queer myself

McBTC

keep heading north...

greatscott

yeah, I would have to say no to no plan no money, I'm not into panhandling my way.

By the way what do you mean by queer, queer as in odd or queer as in lesbian? I thought the term queer to define lesbian or a *****exual was derogatory?

Maelochs

Have to figure she wouldn't deliberately demean herself. Between what the TV talking heads, the shouters with bullhorns who want to get on TV, the trendy "radical" Twiiter-follower seekers ... I don't even care what the "latest acceptable terminology" might be. I still call black people black. So far no one has objected.

Anyway ... It would be interesting to see how this went. If it was ever even a real thing.

Lots of lessons to learn when you get too far from home to walk back and there is no Uber service, and you can't afford a hotel, and it starts raining real hard, and you can barely push the bike because three spokes broke in the rear wheel, and neither you nor your dog have eaten all day, and you are about 15 miles from the nearest streetlight, let alone building ....

McBTC

and, sleeping outdoors under the exhaust pipes of a motorhome at a roadside pullout or you startle yourself awake looking face-to-face with a ratty-looking skunk looking you in the eye...

yukiinu

I've done 9,000 miles of cross country loaded bike touring. I have read several books by single handed sailboat sailors who sailed thousands of miles in a single trip all alone. And aside from the bicycle/sailboat difference, what they experienced was exactly what I as a long distance bike tourer experienced: Physically (exhausted physical effort, eating whatever is available, maintaining water supply (Death Valley: water sources 50 miles apart, 105 degrees in the shade in May, NOT FLAT constant up and down) lack of sleep, the physical environment that forces you to keep physically functioning until circumstances are safe for you to rest or sleep, and Psychologically: (your thinking goes on a thousand introspective different paths and you must be constantly alert for and prepared to deal with dangerous conditions that come out of nowhere be they weather, vehicles, road surface dangers (crashing waves). If LA refers to Los Angeles and you are an experienced L.A bicyclest than being out on the open highways and riding in the city are equally dangerous, the difference is the type of danger and the speed (65mph big rig trucks coming at you from behind with with air waves that first blow you out from the front of the truck then suck you into the truck. You should read as much as you can about tourers experience on cross country bike blogs, learn about bike repair, take paper road maps(don't put y our life in the hands of cell phone map apps, people have died on phone map roads that went nowhere), read cross country group touring commentaries, and learn from their experiences. If your dog is small it will be easier for you and it, if it runs next to you remember to be aware of wild animals and country dogs (ranch and farm dogs are not like civilized friendly city dogs, they are highly protective, often run free and will attack both you and your dog and at night they will smell you from a couple of miles away and bark all night long at your smell. Every state has different road laws about bicycles, as a rule if there is no reasonabley available road you can ride on interstates and sections of freeways (look for bicycle prohibited road signs). As has been mentioned. The Pacific Coast Bike Route, Seattle to San Diego is the most cheapest and bike friendly in America. A cross country bike trip is a physical, psychological, sociological and cultural journey that is at times terrible and also wonderful. But should be approached with caution, and prepared for with as much knowledge about ALL it's aspects as possible.

bakerjw

I'm still thinking that someone tossed that out there just to see what the reaction would be. On another forum where I am a mod, we get these occasionally and I often check the IP address to see if it is a regular member. Sometimes yes, sometimes it is a potential sting op.

indyfabz

Not for some. LGBTQ is an accepted acronym by many. The Q can stand for "questioning" or "queer."

https://www.plannedparenthood.org/learn/teens/lgbtq

livedarklions

Is this some sort of undercover Park Ranger trick?

Maybe it's Yogi Bear trying to trick bicyclists into bringing pic a nic baskets to Jellystone.

greatscott

I don't understand this calling black people black thing either, they call us white people and no one cringes; what I can't understand is how black people call themselves the N word all the time, I thought it was demeaning and if so why call yourself that? It would be like me calling myself a ****** all the time, it's demeaning, people should use words to lift themselves not words that tear themselves down.

bleucheddar

I actually don't think i know a single black person be offended by being called black. I live in the Prince George County in Maryland, and it's primarily black folk here. They pride themselves on it. Why not I suppose..

rossiny

Okay. I tried to scim the comments to see if this is a real post... is it a real post??? Lol

greatscott

I would think that black people wouldn't mind being called black, we don't mind if we're called white, but I understood that they wanted to be called African American, which is fine but I don't call myself European American. I'm rather confused by all of this stuff, I'm not sure what to call them for fear of being called a racist. I just wish we all got along.

TheRef

McBTC

Phony as a photograph of George Washington.

Maelochs

or .... the OP actually decided to do it and disappeared after about three days ... I'd scan newspaper headlines for phrases like "dog-gnawed carcass" .....

On a very different note … So, when talking about BF posters, you never use the label “BF posters” … you list every single one by name? When talking about people who ride bicycles … when talking about people who drive cars … when talking about Americans, or Latvians, or people from any other country … and when talking about the population of the entire world, you list 7.5 billion people by name?

I had a girlfriend a long time ago who asked an actual American Indian (or is that Native American?) about all this … he answered something like, “You can call me Indian, you can call me Native America, First Nation person, …. You can call me Chief, or even Red Man …. So long as you do it with real respect.”

I figured that made sense.

indyfabz

The fact that you think there is a collective "they" demonstrates that you don't understand.

TheRef

Amen!

McBTC

Arguably, they can argue anything, even everything– they being us... disagree?

Maelochs

This is just ridiculous. Ford cars built between 1960 and 1964---they were made cheaply because ford was loosing money. This is when "Fox or Repair Daily" was coined, I hear. Macnamara, later Secretary of Defense, was hailed as a hero at Ford for cheapening the cars to stop the profit drain. Building cars as good as the Chevrolets of the day was not considered, apparently..

Oh, wait. There is no "they," right?

BF posters sure seem to like to bicker. They often don't seem to think before they type, though .... because there is no "they," right?

I understand that the concept of third person plural pronoun might be a bit complicated for some people. and that some people might not understand that a "group" exists only in concept anyway. If I say, "There is a group of people with the letter 'I' in their names" then I can refer to member sf that group as "they." Black people, white people, educated people, uneducated people, people who like to be offended, people who like to be offensive ... these groups exist conceptually, and as language constructs used in conversation. As such, there are specific grammar rules in place to determine how to address members of these groups, accepting of course that these "groups" are creations of the people on the conversation.

Saying that there is no collective group "black people" is as absurd as saying "There is no collective group of people with the letter 'I' in their names." I understand "political correctness" and all, but if I am not being offensive, then anyone who chooses to be offended is making a choice ... and becomes a member of the group, "People who seek our reasons to show fake outrage." And we all know what They are like ...

indyfabz

Good lord. Not sure if I should laugh, shake my head or what. There is no collective way black people think. So saying "they wanted [sic** to be called African American" demonstrates a belief in a monolithic culture which does not exist. (My mom was fine with being referred to as "black." So are the rest of my black relatives that I interact with frequently enough to know their preferences.) I thought my point was obvious.

But thanks for trying to educated "we folk."

BTW...I haven't decided whether I am happy or sad that I used my 21,000th post for that.

BBTW...****/M

downhillmaster

Maelochs

Oi. Not sure if I should laugh or cry.

This is language, not mathematics. There are no fixed values. Every word means what the speaker and reader think it means... that is the essence of communication. (E.g.. to Michel Jackson, "bad" was really good and made him seem like a seriously bad singer and dancer, which was good. His reliance on powerful drugs to sleep was bad and apparently led to his premature death.)

it is readily understood BY THINKING PEOPLE that trends are not always all-encompassing ... that "members of a group" (said group being merely conceptual to begin with) are not identical, do not lose their identities because they are in the group (which doesn't actually exists anyway) that "members of a group" are still distinct individuals ... but that members of a group can show certain similar behaviors or express related ideas.

For instance ... "Black people don't like to be called the N-word in a clearly offensive and demeaning fashion by white people" is just obviously untrue ... so long there is as any one anywhere who could be called "black" (and I have traveled the world and never actually seen one actually black person ... though I have seen pictures of people covered with raw oil, who appeared to be "black ... ) who like being called the N-word in a demeaning and insulting fashion by a white person.

On a more actual hand, I have known, lived with, worked with, partied with, slept with, eaten with a very large number of people of African descent (but don't anthropologists tell us that we All came out of Africa ... so I am a proud African American like everyone else in America?) and I would never have called any of them by that word in that fashion ... because every on of them which I knew would have found it exceedingly insulting, beyond the normal range of insult most words would offer.

On the other hand, since they were all friends and acquaintances, I never seriously insulted any of them (ooooohhh... he said "them") anyway.

My point is ... FREAKING GENERALITIES. Got it? Nobody is assuming a monolithic Negro-American mindset .... but trends, generalities, can be observed.

At some point, blacks (can we say that word now? Is it PC enough to acknowledge that more recent African immigrants tend to have more melanin in their skin?) decided that they preferred not to be called "negro" and wanted to be called "black." You can deny that, or say that there might have been three or six or 17 who wanted to be called "negro" ... but as a general trend, during the 1960s. African-Americans made it known that they preferred As A Group, Generally, to be called "black."

Look it up.

Face facts.

Does this mean that the thought went through the black hive mind and all people who had been "negroes" suddenly wanted to be called "black"? No. In fact, it was probably a result of various influences on a certain portion of the population---"black" as a reaction to and in opposition to "white," driven by groups such as (possibly) the Black Muslims (who of course were not Islamic) and by people who did not see Rev. M.L. King's tactics to be sufficiently aggressive. I really don't know why ... but it happened in my lifetime, so I Know it happened.

It does not mean that there is a monolithic "black" attitude ... nor does it mean that there is a monolithic "white" attitude, (for instance, there were both abolitionists and supporters of slavery in the U.S. since before its inception as a nation--would it be safe to say there were few black proponents of slavery? Would it be safe to say that African slaves did not want to be slaves? Wait, suppose just one did---then we cannot make that general claim, right? See the absurdity?) or any other ridiculous assumption. It is an actual acceptance of historical occurrences, and it is well understood that it is a generality.

If we were talking about football fans, basketball fans, and chess fans .... we could make general statements and no one would even notice, let alone think we were trying to force a "monolithic mind-set' on the members of these groups (Chess fans end not to be the loud, raucous cheering types---golf fans generally clap very quietly and don't speak above quiet murmurs of approval or disappointment--- OH Noes! I am talking a bout "those people"!!!)

The topic of race is so emotionally loaded it takes real effort to have a purely rational discussion about it.

In any case .... people looking for trouble will always find it, because they will make it. And yes ... I said "they" as though all troublemakers have a monolithic attitude ... and no one much cares.

So far things have gone well here ... but can we PLEASE change the subject? The lock is incoming, unless we get back the the dog-gnawed carcasses of cyclists found beside the Pacific Coast Highway.

Maelochs

Wow it took me about 1300 words to say that.