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PAGE 6 â€" WATERLOO CHRONICLE, WEDNESDAY, JUNE 26, 1985 Much has been said, as much written this spring about the concern for bicycle safety. The growing number of cyclists on our roads and a corresponding relationship in the number of accidents involving cyclists have prompted police and safety officials to issue warnings to make known the problem and step up attempts to eliminate it. There is no question that the problem centers around several identifiable areas. At the risk of insulting those who take pride in operating bicycles properly, one of the puzzling problems is that many cyclists either are not aware, or do not chose to be aware, that as vehicular traffic, they must obey every rule of the road the same as cars, vans and 18â€"wheelers. Too few do. Another problem lies with the unsafe operation of bicycles. Some people ride bicycles they are not educated or equipped to handle. Others like to pretend they know all about safe bicycle operation, yet fall to pieces and panic at the first potential crisis. But without a doubt, the biggest problem seems to be the inability of cyclists and those driving motor vehicles to coâ€"exist in harmony on our streets and avenues. For whatever reason, one which seems far more prevalent here in North America than in European countries, motorists treat cyclists with contempt, to the point where some show little or no appreciation for the other guy. _ _ Second Class Mail Registration Number 5540 As a result, and this is a classic chicken and egg situation, cyclists are showing a like disdain for motorists, resulting in the brewing of a potentially deadly confrontation. A spinâ€"off sore point arises when cyclists perceive themselves to be on equal footing in those oneâ€"onâ€"one challenges to hog the road. One only has to talk to any local ambulance driver to get the picture of twisted and torn flesh and metal that can re. ult fr a bicycle/motor vehicle collision, even at slow speeds. It .s not overdramatic to insist that motorists keep this thought in mind as well, next time they feel like crowding the son of a gun off the road. All is not lost however. In the past week, the Chronicle has performed an informal survey of cyclists â€" 30 in allâ€"observing them in situations where they are faced with obeying rules of the road. Rules such as stopping at stop signs and red lights, making proper turn signals, making proper turns, and so on. We were not only surprised but also encouraged that the spot survey showed that 23 cyclists of the 30 followed the correct procedure, including two preâ€"teens on a residential side street who not only came to a standing stop at a stop sign, but also half a block later made right turn signals to enter a driveway. On the other hand, one of the most glaring violations occurred when a seemingly experienced cyclist, decked out in full biking regalia, proceeded through a red light at a busy intersection at high speed, after but a cursory glance in both directions. The bottom line of course is that there is a great need, especially as our young ones race out the school doors for the summer, for our community to become ever aware of the need for bicycle safety. And that it is a responsibility that must be equally shared by those in the saddle and those behind the wheel. A responsibility that starts with respect. Cycle patterns published every Wednesday by Fairway Press, a division of Kitchenerâ€"Waterioo Record Ltd., owner‘ ) 225 Fairway Rd. S., Kitchener, Ont. a address correspondence to Waterloo office: ¢ 45 Erb St. E., Waterloo, Ont. N2J 1L7, telephone 886â€"2830 Waterioo Chronicle office is located in the Haney, White Law Office Building (rear entrance, upper floor). Parking at the rear of the building. Open Monday to Friday 9:00 a . m. to 5:00 p.m. Publisher: Paul Winkler Manager: Bill Karges Editor: Rick Campbell established 1854 A newspaper article the other day reminded me of one of the inexorable laws of modern life: Things multiply in inverse proportion to their It is a simple fact, and we‘ve all been through it, that there are certain things in life that multiply like rabbits, and others that invariably disappear forever. No matter how hard you try to get rid of pennies, they just build up, and if you carry your loose change in your pants pocket, as I do, after a week you are listing heavily to the right. You pile your 18 pennies on the top of the dresser and start again, and a week later you have 22 pennies in the same pocket. Another multiplier is the single sock. Start out a new year with 12 pairs of socks. In three months you‘ll have six pairs and six off socks. In six months, you‘ll have 12 single socks. After years of suffering this, I‘ve counterâ€"attacked. I now buy 12 pairs of identical socks, so that after six months, at least I have six pairs of socks. Ladies used to have the same problem, before the invention of pantyâ€"hose. But this discovery hasn‘t lessened their problems. In the old days, if they got a run, they usually had a spare single to match the good one with. But now, if you get a hole in one leg of your pantyâ€"hose, you‘re scuppered. Out they go, the intact one with the bum one. Women also have other multipliers in the singles division: earrings and gloves. How many women in this fair land have seven or eight exquisite single earrings and four or five superb single gloves? It‘s quite fashionable these days for a man to wear a single earring, and a practical chap who lost a glove would wear the other and put his bare hand in his pocket. But women don‘t think that way, and the gloves and earrings proliferâ€" ate in their solitary glory. _ Old keys multiply at a fantastic rate, until cupboard drawers and plastic bowls are overâ€" flowing with them. We have a huge collection of car keys going back to our fifthâ€"last car, every key to the house before we changed the locks, and enough skeleton keys to outfit James Bond on one of his capers. New keys are diminishers. I have lost two sets of keys to my present car, and sometimes search for half an hour to find one of the new sets I had to order. The new keys to the new locks disappeared, and I had to take off the locks and go to the key man for new ones. I wonder where they are, at this moment? The new ones that is. ‘‘That‘s the politicians‘ fault. Staff brought them (improvements) forward, it‘s the politicians that call the shots about the way money is spent."‘ It is written Bill Smiley Syndicated columnist A curse Engineering committee chairman Marjorie Carroll on the reason why Waterloo Region has been lax in fulfilling an agreement with residents neighboring the Waterloo landfill site. â€"SEE PAGE 3 Paper is definitely in the multiplier list, especially if you are a writer and/or teacher. I sit to write this column in a sort of tunnel between two massive piles of paper higher than my head. Makes me feel like an old badger. Bottles, particularly those on which there is no deposit return, pile up about as fast as you can empty them. But prepare to take back your beerâ€"case of empties, and there are always two missing. Where did they go? Is there a guy, or a dame, hiding behind the furnace who sneaks up when you are beddyâ€"byes, drinks two of your beers, then eats the bottles? For the ladies, the wrong shades of lipstick and halfâ€"empty bottles of nail polish multiply, along with saucers for which the cups have disâ€" appeared. Wire coat hangers reproduce like rats. The other day, while attempting to get my coat out of the closet, I knocked down six empty hangers. I carefully fished them up from among the parts of the vacuum cleaner, took another 40 empty hangers off the pole, tied them all together with cord, marched calmly into the basement and hurled them into the woodpile. Two weeks later, I knocked down eight hangers while getting my coat, and sat down and wept tears of fury and frustration. Pencils multiply, but there‘s never one in the house when you are trying to take down a longâ€"distance phone message. Odd buttons multiply until it seems like a button factory. But when you need two the same size and color, forget it. You have six thousand buttons, no two alike. You think you don‘t take many snapshots. Been to the attic lately? There are twelve boxes of them up there, right from your own baby pictures, through your courting days, into your own children ‘at every stage, and about five hundred of the grandchildren. But just try to find that especially good one you wanted to send to Aunt Mabel. Completely vanished. Shoes multiply. My wife had about thirtyâ€"six pairs, most of them out of style, just like that outfit she had to get the shoes to go with. She had to tear my comfortable old shoes out of my hands to put them in the garbage. I go to a halfâ€"price sale, buy three new pairs, and they sit there, stiff and stark, while I go on wearing the old shabby ones. Was it always like this, or is it just a curse of the twentieth century? Make up your own list; two columns, one headed Multipliers, the other Diminishers. It will shake you.