Rudi "Cooler Weather = Better" Riet

@randomduck.bsky.social

867 Followers 929 Following

Transpo analyst. Political activist. Cycling advocate. President of Potomac Pedalers. Alpine ski racing coach. All views my own. Mastodon: @randomduck@thepit.social (not there too often) #bikeDC #ClimateChaos #AlpineSkiing #RoadCycling #GravelCycling

Fireworks
Spotted lanternfly nymphs and adults on a tree trunk.
“Zohran Mamdani, the rare Democrat who seems fluent in sports, has made a point of showing off his extensive knowledge of the English Premier League and has made his fandom of the Knicks and Mets apparent. After the Knicks swept the Cleveland Cavaliers in the NBA playoffs, Mamdani went on X to troll the Ohio Republican candidate for governor Vivek Ramaswamy. Compare these examples with the way in which the 2024 Kamala Harris campaign tried to channel some of sports talk’s power after selecting Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, a former high-school-football coach, as Harris’s running mate. “Coach Walz,” as Harris called him at the event announcing his candidacy, seemed more content to let people write about his sports identity than to demonstrate it. On October 27, the nation found out why. After Walz joined Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on a Twitch livestream to play Madden, the über-popular football video game, his campaign’s X account posted that “@AOC can run a mean pick 6.” A pick-six (when an interception is returned for a touchdown) is an outcome, not a play. The gaffe was probably the fault of a social-media staffer, not Walz himself. Even so, it went ” Excerpt From “Democrats Must Learn to Talk Sports” Nathaniel Frum The Atlantic https://apple.news/AWE-JED67QCWc4CZTmqVTmg This material may be protected by copyright.
“As Democratic politicians scramble to seem in touch and ensure that their faces appear on our phones as much as possible, they are neglecting the free real estate offered by sports talk. A popular meme mocks men for being content to sit and name obscure athletes to one another for hours. It’s popular because it isn’t far from the truth. The politically disengaged male voters whom Democrats are so desperate to reach aren’t at bars arguing about Medicare funding. They are arguing about a roughing-the-passer penalty. Bettors on Polymarket give Stephen A. Smith higher odds of winning the 2028 Democratic presidential primary than Cory Booker, Raphael Warnock, and Ruben Gallego. Nothing gets attention like sports takes.” Excerpt From “Democrats Must Learn to Talk Sports” Nathaniel Frum The Atlantic https://apple.news/AWE-JED67QCWc4CZTmqVTmg This material may be protected by copyright.
The SCANDALAMITY is real, and Rachel Dratsch is the perfect delivery mechanism.
Triumphal arch with a "Spirit Halloween" sign and a golden skeleton statue on its top - as one does.
Amtrak Airo train information.
A crowd of people on bicycles gathered along the 15th Street protected bike lane in front of the Washington Monument and blooming cherry trees.
Just an insecure clown celebrating the demise of someone who actually called out his criminal ways.
A photo of a white bike helmet in a meeting of international transportation experts and municipal leaders. NORMALIZE THE BICYCLE!
A Metrobus snarls traffic in DC
A screenshot of Merriam-Webster's "2026 Word of the Year" GIF with the word "picturesque"
"This was not a holiday address from the leader of a great democracy to its citizens. This was a desperate, enraged tinpot, yelling into a microphone while cornered in his palace redoubt. The president has been unraveling for weeks, and his speech tonight, like Trump himself, was unworthy of America and its people.”
Three Lime bikes with worn out rear tires - unsafe to ride! They are parked outside of the ER entrance at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, DC, on Tuesday, December 2, 2025.
A street with gingko trees in full fall color.
Selfie with Steve in front of the slide at MLK Library!
The cover art of the Indigo Girls' self-titled 1989 album.
The album cover art of Paul McCartney's 1989 album, "Flowers in the Dirt"
Screenshot showing 0 degrees Celsius/32 degrees Fahrenheit in the District of Columbia just after midnight on Tuesday, November 11, 2025.
Crowd at No Kings rally in DC
A fascist buffoon admits the obvious
We are here! Follow the arrows!
"This episode illustrates the dangerous logic of abdication: the belief that, faced with a rising threat to democracy, surrender is strategy, cooperating with an autocrat is survival, and sparing oneself or one’s party from immediate punishment is worth opening the door to long-term authoritarian rule."
Riding a bicycle through the glorious hellscape that is Rock Creek Park
Ilyushin IL-96 wide body aircraft parked at GVA
Munich
Draft beer is goooood
Bike parked in front of American Ice Company on V Street NW
Beer taps!!!!!!
Map from PurpleAir.com showing current air quality in the greater DC area. Air quality is in the 147-170 range - seriously unhealthy! Contributing factors: wildfire smoke from New Jersey, as well as all the bombast from the U.S. Army 250th and 45/47's military fetishism and fireworks for his 79th birthday.
Text reading: "Both New Karoo and Karoo 2: We fixed an issue where downloaded regions for a route from DC to Maryland did not include DC."
Screen grab from Loony Tunes cartoon, showing the paw/hand of Wile E. Coyote holding his business card, which reads: "Wile E. Coyote - Genius - Have Brain - Will Travel."
Screen capture from Facebook advertising Meta’s AI app: “The Meta AI app is here. Download now to start talking to your own person…” No, thanks!
"You are not an ATM" as the subject line of a fundraising email from AOC
Photo of where Capital Bikeshare station used to be
A Kelly green bumper sticker with white text reading "Mayor Muriel Bowser Presents the Tough on DC Crime Presidential Order" with the hashtag #KissTheRing and the DC flag.
Kelly green bumper sticker image reading "Mayor Muriel Bowser presents #ZeroVision DC" with the tagline "Where is my #FairShot?" and a white-on-green image of the flag of the District of Columbia. This sticker says it all, really: Mayor Bowser has ZERO vision for the future of DC.
A Tweet from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in response to a non-answer from the Anti Defamation League regarding Elon Musk's Nazi salute during a Trump inaugural rally: "Just to be clear, you are defending a Heil Hitler salute that was performed and repeated for emphasis and clarity. "People can officially stop listening to you as any sort of reputable source of information now. You work for them. Thank you for making that crystal clear to all."
Close-up of a road bike handlebar sporting Arundel Art Gecko bar tape that fades from lime green to black as it moves closer to the center of the handlebar.
An image of Doppler weather radar showing a strong storm front moving toward Washington, DC.
A map showing a better way to access this week's (Nov 11-15) detour on the Washington & Old Dominion Trail in the Dunn Loring area.
Nationals Park after a baseball game, nighttime.
Tortoise colored kitten, named Ember
A virtual certificate with text "Celebrating 10M users on Bluesky, #598,178, Rudi "Cooler Weather = Better" Riet ‪@randomduck.bsky.social‬, joined on Aug 17, 2023"
A poster advertising a political fundraiser for U.S. Senate candidate Caroline Gleich from the state of Utah.