2010-03-26 Fri - Critical Mass - The rolling LFGSS birthday party

Oh, Andy... :O

Ha.

My first CM ride - been meaning to do one for years. The confrontations with motorists were regrettable, but many drivers seemed fairly friendly and receptive when riders spoke to them about CM. It is only right that we engage in such rides to raise the profile of cycling and assert our rights to be able cycle safely.

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http://crapwalthamforest.blogspot.com/2010/03/critical-mass-from-waterloo-to-hackney.html

http://www.criticalmasslondon.org.uk/text/report26-03-2010.html

The party at the pub was good, and its always nice to meet up with other forum membes.

Its funny how friendly and welcoming everyone is in real life. Oh and CM is a group of people as any group it may attract a group of trouble makers.

http://crapwalthamforest.blogspot.com/2010/03/critical-mass-from-waterloo-to-hackney.html

http://www.criticalmasslondon.org.uk/text/report26-03-2010.html

oliver, you know those yellow signs which say "fatality here on this date"? is there any way to find out what actually happened? just that, i see a few on my commute, (at the junction of hawley road and kentish town road, and oakley sq and eversholt st from memory) and am curious to know whats happened.

gotta say that there were plenty dicks stirring it up this time,

on the first blog there Olivers post ^^, Ma3k is seen talking to the drivers, HE cooled that shit down, when it didnt need to flare up so badly, but dicks leap on to anything that looks confrontational with the cameras, making it worse.
Good example Ma3k, wish more people had the balls to actually speak to drivers.

+1 on the comments that say it is down to the one on one interaction between road users, again, when you explain that its 5 minutes for a ride to go past, civilly, people in vehicles are surprisingly alright.

but then I would say this being a blatant peacenik.

Hi hi, nice to meet a bunch of you at the pub. Don't remember any names though. Might try to make it to Southey drinks tomorrow.

There were some awsome bikes at the pub :)

Hey guys!!!

Rocking event! LFGSS birthday was an awesome success in my eyes! CM was poo tho. I thought i was going to miss the windmill but seriously glad i didnt. I have the photos but not sure the best way to present them for your eyes? (plus im shit with the camera)...
Cliveo, pleasure meeting you!
Betty, welcome to the fold. Youll fit in fine here!
It was really good hanging out with so many people at one time. To difficult to speak to everyone.
Dovv, your rat costume was brilliant as was Geralds. The pirate flag belong to the one and only Mr Mental.
The ride home was really good! Guys, the after pub was a good idea and thanks to betty for finding it.

oliver, you know those yellow signs which say "fatality here on this date"? is there any way to find out what actually happened? just that, i see a few on my commute, (at the junction of hawley road and kentish town road, and oakley sq and eversholt st from memory) and am curious to know whats happened.

Follow the local press--if I lived where you live, I'd read Ham&HIgh, the Camden New Journal, and probably others that I don't know about. It's usually fairly easy to Google these days what happened by using the location name and the date. If it's a cyclist fatality, Camden Cycling Campaign will know about it soon enough, so it's worth joining their e-list.

http://www.camdencyclists.org.uk/

Most fatalities in London are pedestrian fatalities.

sorry i never really spoke to anyone on the ride - arrived late and left early. plus i forgot my pirate stuff :(

But on the points about "troublemakers" and "anarchists" - what a crock of shite. who said they were anarchists? Or was this just a typical knee-jerk assumption? I'm going to nail my colours to the mast a bit and say that i know a LOT of real anarchists and other assorted radicals. Frankly, the people who were shouting at drivers don't know shit about radical politics if they think that this will bring about revolution and whatnot. And the people on the forum assuming that these people were somehow radicals are equally talking shite. In fact, the anarchos who i know would actually be very pissed off to know that people had been lobbing abuse at strangers just because they happen to be driving cars. It's just painfully bad politics. As any anarchist worth their salt will know, forging positive social relationships between different people on uncommon ground is the only way to build any form of emancipatory politics.

Anyone who thinks that argy-bargy for its own sake is what radical politics looks like is clearly talking out their arse.

'Anarchists' was just a loose term to describe the tits on the ride that saw fit to rile drivers simply for the sake of it

oliver, you know those yellow signs which say "fatality here on this date"? is there any way to find out what actually happened? just that, i see a few on my commute, (at the junction of hawley road and kentish town road, and oakley sq and eversholt st from memory) and am curious to know whats happened.

The junction of Hawley Road and Kentish town Road was an accident involving a pedestrian being hit by a car around 6.30am. As i saw the car and police on my way to work. No cyclists involved. But looks like the poor women didn't survive. RIP

'Anarchists' was just a loose term to describe the tits on the ride that saw fit to rile drivers simply for the sake of it

^ Hoops...

Some of it was a bit wanky, some of it was good fun.

Good run to the pub after, good to catch up with a few people I hadn't seen in a while, and meet some new ones, could have been a less wet ride home.

And hello to whoever it is with the Superted-moustache bridge I was following round the first roundabout. Nice.

Bike radar is that way>>>>>>, you bunch of spazzes

a big +1 to what ftony said, and what m./f said about just talking to the drivers... it helps.

I spoke to a geezer in a porsche waiting pateiently with no corkers in front of him, just after the Druid St 'pause'. I rolled over and just said 'hi, there's quite a few of us, sorry you're best off just waiting til we all pass and not trying to push trhough us, we've just been commemorating someone's death at that junction over there' and he was totally flipping cool, 'yeah no worries man'.

Conversations for the win. The Seven foot tall guy that murtle mentioned wanted to smash my face in as he was convinced that I kicked his car. There were plenty of people around his car (he was trying to push through the mass, DK and someone and I attempted to cork him up) so I don;t know why he was so convinced I in particular was kicking his nearside wing. FFS I drive a car, I know how much they cost to get fixed, and just to run the damn things. I wouldn't do shit like that. But did he want to talk about it? Nah, he wanted to threaten me.

Sometimes I think fridays are a bit mental.

Bike radar is that way>>>>>>, you bunch of spazzes

:D

Skully - If I knew who it was I'd out them for it (I don't ) but I saw with my own eyes some bell-end purposely hit that Mini with his front wheel.

Good to meet some more of you on Friday at the pub, even if i wasn't drinking :-( CM was funny but fairly wank imo, good ride to the pub thought when we decided to sack it off! Who were the three RLJers that got caught by the sneaky copper on a motorbike again?

Ride home with Peter and Katherine (i think!?!) was a good blast though, made a nice change to the 2mph CM...

Skully - If I knew who it was I'd out them for it (I don't ) but I saw with my own eyes some bell-end purposely hit that Mini with his front wheel.

Hm ... are you sure it was a Mini and not some kind of supercar? :)

sorry i never really spoke to anyone on the ride - arrived late and left early. plus i forgot my pirate stuff :(

But on the points about "troublemakers" and "anarchists" - what a crock of shite. who said they were anarchists? Or was this just a typical knee-jerk assumption? I'm going to nail my colours to the mast a bit and say that i know a LOT of real anarchists and other assorted radicals. Frankly, the people who were shouting at drivers don't know shit about radical politics if they think that this will bring about revolution and whatnot. And the people on the forum assuming that these people were somehow radicals are equally talking shite. In fact, the anarchos who i know would actually be very pissed off to know that people had been lobbing abuse at strangers just because they happen to be driving cars. It's just painfully bad politics. As any anarchist worth their salt will know, forging positive social relationships between different people on uncommon ground is the only way to build any form of emancipatory politics.

Anyone who thinks that argy-bargy for its own sake is what radical politics looks like is clearly talking out their arse.

Very true. A lot of those who stir up this petty 'trouble' are people who feel very disempowered and don't know a better way of letting off steam. They're obviously going about it in the wrong way, but fortunately there aren't very many of them, and as Skully said, there is also the occasional driver who loses it.

That was Andy (PGM) and Izgard, the rest of us were behind giggling, he didn't fine them though - nice sneaky copper!

Good to meet some more of you on Friday at the pub, even if i wasn't drinking :-( CM was funny but fairly wank imo, good ride to the pub thought when we decided to sack it off! Who were the three RLJers that got caught by the sneaky copper on a motorbike again?

Ride home with Peter and Katherine (i think!?!) was a good blast though, made a nice change to the 2mph CM...

Thought the ride was a right mixed bag tbh,although on the whole I had a good time. The best part is always the ride home after a few beers lol. Anybody see the brawl with the cyclist and driver on the bridge ? What was that all about ?