Thinking about entitled hipsters on bikes, I remembered a harrowing experience hub and I had in SF. Some years ago, before we had kids, we were heading out to wine country for a weekend away and made the mistake of routing through SF on a Friday evening after work. Driving in SF is terrible in the best conditions, the city has unique topography and a mishmash of one-lane streets, no-left-turn streets, trolley lanes, center line bus stops, and more, and this is disregarding the two-legged element.

On this evening, it was past dark, it was only a few nights before Halloween, and it was CRITICAL MASS. Critical Mass is a periodic demonstration performed by the bicycling community, to promote cycling and disrupt drivers. This being Sodom on the Bay, it includes bicyclists towing beer kegs, participants smoking cannabis while they ride, and others in various stages of undress or lewd costumes. The bicyclists make their way randomly through the city and completely overtake the streets. As we inched our way through, trying to get to the Bay Bridge, we had cyclists leaning up on every surface of the car, banging on the fenders, shouting and making rude gestures. We had a portly African American police officer chide us for being in the trolley lane, though he saw the desperation on our faces and showed us mercy, turning the other way long enough for us to get across the intersection and onto the bridge ramp. I have lived nearly all my life within an hour's drive from San Francisco and loathe going there. I only enter the city if necessary to obtain a visa from a foreign consulate, if absolutely necessary for business, or if forced to go to tourist attractions on behalf of out of town guests. One item on my list is to attend a live performance of Handel's Messiah, which might necessitate a trip to the city, but I will definitely not go for dining or theater, no chance. Baseball is permissible, since the park is near the south eastern corner of the city, and the train serves the park and runs near our home.

James, does Baltimore have Critical Mass?

Lynn, one thing that is good about a city of feral criminals, whose idea of fitness is eating Pop Tarts, is that they have no patience for such hipster debauchery as you describe. Dozens of those bicycling faɡɡots would have ended up in the gutter and our local Reparations Recovery Teams would make good use of the donated bikes.