I think the new Olympic coin is bloomin’ sexist. It represents a sexist Britain. And it stinks.
As a cyclist, we are supposed to think ‘wow, they are actually putting a bike on a coin’, well, yes that is certainly something, but the design is unsuitable for the modern day Olympics, after all, women cyclists were in it too. It fails to represent half the population of cyclists – women.
I will boycott the coin and ask for the shops to give me a different form of change instead.
From roadcc:-
“A teenager’s design featuring a cyclist in a velodrome has been accepted as the new face of an Olympics-inspired 50p coin.
Theo Crutchley-Mack, 16, from Halifax was delighted to learn that his design had been chosen from 5,000 entries by the Royal Mint.
Up to three million of the new coins will be released into circulation later this year.
“Just the thought of my design going throughout England and millions of people seeing my design, that’s just absolutely amazing, I can’t think of much better than that,” Theo told the BBC.
Dave Knight, head of commemorative coins at the Royal Mint, explained why the design had been chosen. “It’s a very good design,” he said, “and it is technically very proficient. He has really captured the essence of speed and cycling in general.”
“Cyclist killed in Tower Bridge Road lorry collision
A male cyclist was killed in a collision with a truck on Tuesday morning at the corner of Tower Bridge Road and Druid Street. Police were called at about 9.30am to reports of a collision between a lorry and a cyclist.
A male cyclist was pronounced dead at the scene.
The driver of the truck, operated by Ron Smith Recycling of Feltham, stopped at the scene.”
This is what they say on their website:
“Ron Smith Recycling Ltd is a well established family run business with 25 years experience in recycling and waste disposal we have our own Licensed Waste Transfer Station using the latest waste separation systems. We are based at Feltham Middlesex which enables us to service most of inner London and the surrounding counties. Not only do we provide waste disposal and recycling services but we also build and manufacture waste separation systems which we have installed in various waste transfer stations throughout London. We aim to recycle 80% of waste produced and are constantly looking at ways of improving as we believe recycling is the way forward to a green cleaner environment.
We have built a good relationship with our customers we know and understand how important reliability and service is to them. We pride ourselves on providing a professional fast efficient service and understanding our customer’s requirements. We have a team of experienced advisors who are committed in helping you solve all your waste disposal needs, whilst being competitive on price. Our entire fleet of vehicles are radio controlled and tracked so we can communicate and see exactly where our vehicles are at all times, enabling us to deliver a first class service.”
Yes, a first class service? And they kill a cyclist in the process.
Their contact details are:
Ron Smith Recycling Ltd
St. Albans Farm
Staines Road
Feltham
Middlesex
TW14 0HH
Email: mail@ronsmithrecycling.co.uk
We are awaiting more info on the others.
I have contacted the Mayor of London for his comments. If he replies, I will report it here for everyone to see.
This is very sad news. RIP to the cyclist. Let’s hope it isn’t the cyclist ‘I know’ on Youtube, who regularly cycles along there.
I will be cycling along this road on Valentines Day and put some flowers up.
I couldn’t believe it this morning but it appears that my workplace will be getting the Guardian every day. Let’s hope so. We normally get the Times and Daily Tory/Hatemail. Unfortunately we still get these.
The Guardian is running some free ’21st century’ language supplements, one being Hindi, and another being Russian. In Toryworld, we usually have the ‘usual French or Italian supplements for Tories, visiting their holiday villa or villas). But in the real world in the UK, we need other languages.
Even suffering and living in Toryland and off and on living in East London, I need Hindi. In Kent, I need it in the workplace. I need to get on with my colleagues who don’t always have English as a first language. Let’s hope that the Guardian will have a Polish supplement too). East London is rife with people with different languages but I have never needed German there.
I met someone in Leytonstone who couldn’t speak much English and he needed directions to Leyton. He was not German, Italian or French. But I could have done with a smattering of Hindi.
We have some Russians over here but the Guardian’s supplement is only coming tomorrow. Really, the Guardian must get their act together. I couldn’t ‘wow’ them and say ‘Goodbye’ as they left. Still another colleague of mine is Russian and the only way I can communicate with her is by waving of hands or using Babelfish online. It would be a lot easier if people would learn some basic English before they come here, but in the real world, that’s not happening.
Just one thing, my boss has snatched the copy, she wants to learn some basic Hindi too.
I was walking on the pavement with my bike, the patch of road I was on was too dangerous to cycle on, even though it is regarded as a 40mph B road.
It had rained earlier but one motorist, failing to notice puddles completely engulfed me in water. A whole bucket of manky cold water went over me. Of course the motorist failed to stop and apologise. A hit and run Splashmonster.
I just wished I could chuck a bucket of water (preferably scalding) over him, or at the very least ’somewhere private’.
Now I have new and fancy Netbook, I have started to use
iplayer.
Because I work shifts I often miss useful and important programmes on road safety and well, interesting programmes in general. When I get home it is normally some rubbish American ‘thriller’ -I mean who watches that cr*p anyway?
Anyway, I watched ‘Inside Out- yesterday and it was going on about how many young people were killing themselves because of their ‘inexperience’.
I was pleased that the police went up to the kids in the programme and warned them that their speeding could kill pedestrians and cyclists. But even the police agreed, that it falls on deaf ears to some teenage yobs.
I was also interested to see on the programme a road safety couple who were speaking to young people. The woman was ‘driven out the way’ by a motorist and she had spinal injuries and was in a wheelchair. Some of the kids found it useful.
Of course there is ‘inexperience’ involved to some extent but if a road sign says 40mph, it does not mean 70mph plus. What has inexperience got to do with that? At least the police did mention ‘bravado’ and that is what we see on the roads all the time and it isn’t just young yobs, it is middle-aged people too and some pensioners in fast cars. Oh and ex BBC Director General’s too – old enough to know better.
The police admitted that their approaches to road safety does not always work and considering the increasing numbers of youths crashing in their teens and dying, I think the driving limit should be raised to 21. And Yorkshire needs to have lower speed limits, the countryside has always been forgotten.
I’ve put the link to the programme in the comments section because I can’t fathom this silly wordpress way of doing it:-)
Thanks to Superblog Crapwalthamforest for uploading the Daily Torymail’s story on the Former BBC Director General who had a massive SMIDSY, so bad that it flipped onto its roof.
Now just how did he lose concentration? Just why on earth was he NOT paying attention? This bloke ought to have a proportional fine like they do in Switzerland.
I also tried to find the story on the BBC but I had no luck although it was splattered all over the Torygraph and even got as far as one of the Devon online newspapers.
Now this is exactly what I mean by ‘The Virtual Revolution’ and the suppression of news by the mainstream sources such as the BBC. How come this is news to other sources, even minor ones, but not the BBC? No wonder there are loads of Facebook Groups slamming the BBC as being biased.
“Former BBC Director General Greg Dyke apologised to a ‘terrified’ family after he crashed into their car with so much force that it flipped on to its roof.
The accident left two small children dangling upside down in the vehicle, which was written off when Dyke’s silver Lexus hit the back of it.
The children’s father, who had been driving the car but was stationary at a traffic light when the accident occurred, then had to be restrained from physically attacking the millionaire television executive.
Mr Dyke later wrote a letter to the family in which he apologised for their ordeal, which happened in broad daylight after he ‘lost concentration’.”
Citizen Action! Write and complain to www.bbc.co.uk/complaints/forms (no doubt it will be a standard BBC response letter saying ‘we can only fit so much in’ and all that mainstream ‘vetted’ codswallop. The BBC hate complaints and of course they are forced to publish big ones. Is it more important that BBC protects ex-BBC employees or to raise awareness of road safety? (I have just written and said that writing about road safety is important, and we need to drivers to be more aware of their bad driving so they can improve).
I look forward to the reply which of course, will be published here on this undoctored blog.
I watched The Virtual Revolution on BBC iplayer (which is a series) and it was about how powerful social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter are and how the internet can ‘bring down countries’ like Estonia.
It was fascinating to see how Governments aren’t always able to control the public by closing down internet sites. For example, in Iran, communication managed to somehow get through via Twitter.
As the mainstream press and internet media carry on dishing out lies and celebrity dross, they have been pushing people away.
Remember how hard it was to get a letter in the Times – you often have to have a job ‘at the top’ to get a letter in and of course, you have to say ‘Right Wing things’ to keep the Editor happy or write about a bleedin’ sparrow in your garden.
From a cyclist’s point of view, we hardly got any press, particularly women. Things have improved although there is still a long way to go. But, we are getting there.
With the internet, oad safety is really taking off, things are changing, many roads are now 20mph. Good ideas are spreading round the internet. Even the lycra brigade are getting involved. We may think that we are ‘one person against the system’, but it is not just us, it is the world. We may not necessarily be ‘in the minority’ after all – the minority ‘could be millions globally’.
Another good things is to discuss what the Council are doing or not doing cycling wise and again, before the internet, you just had a letter in the paper, often ‘edited’. If you were lucky or you wrote a letter to them but nothing happened. Again, that could be a real hurdle. With the internet we can now have more freedom, and minorities and people who don’t tow the ‘party line’, can have a say. And cranks like me too lol.
The internet is a powerful tool to improve cycling and we have seen how many good videos there are of bad driving. People can’t deny it, but of course there are those who say ‘it’s fake’.
Either way, we are in a Virtual Revolution, I am glad to be part of it, even in a small way. We just need to remember that we have a powerful tool and good stuff could happen.
Do you sing whilst cycling? Well, I do providing a) there are no pedestrians b) in the countryside. c) late at night d) when there are no other cyclists about.
It’s great, and you have no one giving you filthy looks too.
This is a video by Thomase1 on Youtube. He wants cyclists to post their best Singing & Cycling videos:-
I got up this morning and watched a BMX programme (hey, that was a shock in itself). It was early in the morning about 0830, not exactly prime time viewing which is typical. (Rather have cr*p and pro-obesity programmes on primetime TV instead).
But of course, the BMX programme had nothing about women BMX’rs. Typical sexist sporting media. That means they must not exist… well, how come you get to see them at the Olympics? Funny that.
Anyway, after watching that programme, I quite fancy having a BMX myself but mainly for mountainbiking, I like the suspension. It looks fun.
Now this is a lady who isn’t afraid of cycling with ramps, she makes ‘em. And she likes MUD!
