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Pastimes : The New Qualcomm - write what you like thread. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: DWB who wrote (5638)	1/20/2003 1:54:20 PM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 12247

DWB, the Segway banning seems to be popular. It's certainly not restricted to San Francisco. I've walked around San Franciscan, Los Angelean, San Diegan, Noo Yawky and other footpaths around the USA. It's almost a scary experience because so few people walk anywhere. I feel as though the police will arrest me for weird behaviour or being a terrorist threat. There are rivers of huge SUVs thundering by and they look scary. It's a weird world for normal humans who crowd the streets of Bangalore, Oxford Street, Shinjuku and Eketahuna [not that Eketahuna streets are crowded, but the humans feel quite removed from the Los Angeles freeway and free-for-all]. There is certainly plenty of room for Segways to surge along sidewalks. But there will be injuries. I am surprised most people can successfully get from morning to night without major A&E treatment. Many don't and that's while they are safely ensconced inside buildings engineered to exacting standards, buses with well-trained drivers, cars with many safety features on roads which are designed to avoid conflict and in Truman Show living conditions at home. So turn them loose on a Segway and they are going to be splattered all over the place and will run into the back of people's ankles constantly. A&E people will instantly recognize what will be called 'Ten Pin Syndrome' [TPS since the USA loves acronyms]. The bruising on the back lower leg [usually one, though sometimes two], the cracked bones and ripped ligaments as the foot and leg are disassembled, the grazed hands, knees and elbows as the victim topples like a ten pin being bowled, the bumps on the head, concussion and contusions as their head bounces off the pavement. The Segway rider will have different injury patterns. They'll have the concussion and contusion to the head, grazing of their hands as they sprawl and try to avoid a face plant, which they won't always succeed in doing. There will be 'sandpaper face' as their face slides along the concrete footpath or asphalt road. They'll have testicular tenderness as the handlebars hit them in the nether regions as their legs shoot forwards on either side of the handlebars, which will slide until hooking them at the top of the legs and cause them to flip onto their face in the Segway Slapdown. The rider's lower legs will typically be injury free, which will make it obvious who was riding and who was skittled. But mountain climbing, bicycle riding, boat sailing, motorcycle riding, ladder climbing and many other activities are not illegal, yet they cause masses of injuries. So it seems absurd to ban Segways, which would help reduce traffic congestion, air pollution, noise, blah, blah, blah... If people want to risk the Segway Slapdown, that's their business. It's part of the fun of life to carry a few risks. Survival is an exciting thing to do, which is why the rides at Knot's Berry Farm and so on are so popular - the fear of disaster, but without the actual risk. A bit like going to war these days [as an American] - all the fun, with negligible risk. No wonder they are all gung ho. Maybe the Segway would put some life into the average Prozac popping American who would like to feel the wind in their hair, the rain in their face and the gravel in their skin. They'd certainly know they are alive. Mqurice