Pet Peeve #43: JB Robinson

Ah yes, it's the holidays again, which means the J.B. Robinson jeweler ads are out in full force.  The same ones they've had for years...the video looks older and fuzzier than the TV rerun of The Hunt for Red October that I'm currently watching.  For the record, no she didn't find his secret hiding place, yes he was still able to surprise her after all these years, and amazingly enough, he still was never worried about the earrings/bracelet/necklace/whatever.

At least the one where the guy puts the necklace on his wife while she's sleeping and then pretends to be asleep when she wakes up is sweet and endearing.  Much more romantic than the Rick Santorum lookalike and that horribly awkward hug the couple gives each other at the end.  And the song in the other one is way better.

Pet Peeve #83: Sidewalk Hogs

The first thing I have to do is make a confession. I bike on the sidewalk sometimes. Yep, I'm one of those jerks that gives bicycle commuters a bad name. If I'm in an area where drivers are used to seeing bikes, there's plenty of space, or the sidewalks have lots of pedestrians, I stick to the road. But on narrow, busy, non-bike-friendly roads, I hit the sidewalk. For example, Penn Ave. between Braddock and Fifth--I drove that stretch every day for two years, and can personally attest that drivers are too concerned with stirring their coffee and beating the red lights to get to work, they aren't looking out for bikers.

That admission made, my pet peeve is something I don't have a right to. Too bad, it irritates me anyhow. When a pedestrian sees a bike coming down the sidewalk, why do they simultaneously gawk in fear that I'm going to mow them down, yet also refuse to make a decent amount of space?

On my ride to work down that stretch of Penn, there's one bus stop in particular that drives me insane. There's a telephone pole and mailbox side by side. Most times that a pedestrian is waiting there, they stand immediately opposite the mailbox, leaving maybe a third of the sidewalk open. Let me show you: (MD, you know you've been waiting for a diagram.)



They shrink back against the shrubs in clear recognition of the tight squeeze, yet they don't make any move to relieve the congestion. I know that as a biker on the sidewalk I have no claim to anything, so I'm not complaining from that aspect. But the stupidity irritates me. Out of a sheer desire for their own self-preservation, wouldn't it make sense to stand somewhere different? Say, next to the mailbox, or a few feet down from the mailbox rather than immediately across from it. Are they that dumb? Wait, don't answer that.