Zombie cyclists

Just a quick note to say the head phones you get with iPods are shit and therefore you can use them safe in the knowledge that you'll be able to still hear outside noise, buses, trucks, cars etc and the music will be a faint hissing beside it

My own sense of ennui allowed me to avoid a nasty pothole this morning.

How can you tell which people need to be listening to music and which just like it?

I imagine it's like telling the difference between a social drinker and an alcoholic.

Bugger, I guess i'm guilty with my hidden stash of ipods then.

It was suggested to me as part of my cycle training that I start cycling with an iPod on, to encourage me to observe more with my eyes and less with my ears.

Sounds can reflect off walls so hearing something from your right hand side may not actually mean that a car is approaching from that side at all. Your eyes give a much more accurate indication of what is going on.

With the iPod on i tend to turn my head either every 4 or 8 beats, so am observing a lot more than I used to. As such being an iPod Zombie has improved my cycling.

With your record of violence it might be an idea if you listed to something more calming whilst on your bike.........

Bugger, I guess i'm guilty with my hidden stash of ipods then.
a mini TV in a paper bag is a dead give away

With the iPod on i tend to turn my head either every 4 or 8 beats, so am observing a lot more than I used to.

that's no good if the driver is listening to something in 5/4 and hits you when you are not looking

It was suggested to me as part of my cycle training that I start cycling with an iPod on, to encourage me to observe more with my eyes and less with my ears.

I have to agree, in fact I would go much further and say - for me at least - that I find cycling without music/iPod fairly disorienting, I realise that is going to sound faintly ridiculous to some people but I find that cycling without music makes me feel kind of 'clumsy' a little like being in a daydream, - I feel so much more alert with music playing.

It's a little like if you have spent years cycling clipless - and then have to ride without being clipped in, it's feels weird, difficult to get up to speed and so on . . . for me cycling without headphones feels similarly disorienting.

With your record of violence it might be an idea if you listed to something more calming whilst on your bike.........

Maybe a recording of the last parole hearing.

I don't think its got anything to do with ipods or music. I'm sure some listeners cycle perfectly well with great awareness. It's just that a lot of people on the road are fucking thick and cycle in a little bubble with their heads up their arses. Fact*.

*No reflection on or disprespect meant to anyone who has been hurt or killed or anything.

How about listening to audio books?

Probably put you to sleep.

Doesnt it also depend on the type of earphones you use?
I know that you can get cheap/expensive total block out (passive)/noise cancellation (active)/expensive external noise (opposite to the block out ones)

I may probably be wrong but if you have cheap ones or the ones that let ambiant noise in, you can still hear the noises around you. Blocking out sound may end up cacooning you in your own world.

For those that use iPods, wouldnt you say on average you guys are experienced cyclists. I think this is more aimed at the 'amateur' who should not be distracted by music?

I have lots of noise in my head that I can't block out.

...cchhhaaainnnsss...

Look, kids, I'm going to keep doing this joke until someone laughs, so get it out of the way now is my advice. This'll get even unfunnier after the 150th repetition.

Look, kids, I'm going to keep doing this joke until someone laughs, so get it out of the way now is my advice. This'll get even unfunnier after the 150th repetition.

I would laugh if i knew what youre refering to Bleak...

Instead of zombies saying "Braaaiiiiinnsssss", zombie cyclists say "Chaaaiiiiinnsssss".

Right?

I need music when i'm dancing, but not cycling. You lot are weird.

Instead of zombies saying "Braaaiiiiinnsssss", zombie cyclists say "Chaaaiiiiinnsssss".

Right?

AH!!! DOH!!! Bleak, that is funny. thanks Mccarthy!

It was suggested to me as part of my cycle training that I start cycling with an iPod on, to encourage me to observe more with my eyes and less with my ears.

Sounds can reflect off walls so hearing something from your right hand side may not actually mean that a car is approaching from that side at all. Your eyes give a much more accurate indication of what is going on.

With the iPod on i tend to turn my head either every 4 or 8 beats, so am observing a lot more than I used to. As such being an iPod Zombie has improved my cycling.

I have to disagree.

I can hear an incredible amount of what is going on behind me

• Car Acceleration, Braking.
  
• Whether it is a twat in a car
  
• The Size of the vehicle (big diesel engines in anything over the size of a transit van)
  
• On a road a know well (i.e. ridden down a couple of hundred times), I can hear in the wet what part of the road it is driving over since I have a good mental picture of the road in my head.
  
  

Obviously I still look around and behind ... but these the clues above IMO help alot.

its not that i am blocking out the sounds around me, but I am using my eyes more

I have to disagree.

I can hear an incredible amount of what is going on behind me

[]Car Acceleration, Braking.
[]Whether it is a twat in a car
[]The Size of the vehicle (big diesel engines in anything over the size of a transit van)
[]On a road a know well (i.e. ridden down a couple of hundred times), I can hear in the wet what part of the road it is driving over since I have a good mental picture of the road in my head.

Obviously I still look around and behind ... but these the clues above IMO help alot.

lol

I need music when i'm dancing, but not cycling. You lot are weird.

I think you'll find it's RPM's job to tell us who the weird people are; as far as I can work out it varies a bit from day to day but is basically everyone except RPM.

its not that i am blocking out the sounds around me, but I am using my eyes more

liar

I need music when i'm dancing, but not cycling. You lot are weird.

I like to dance naked, sometime 'they' try and leave, but I stop them, I can always stop them, always, sometimes they get a window open, but I just dance over to them and stop them, always, they never get out, none of them, none.