This is probably the wrong reaction, but the thread title made me laugh.
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot ? If you are wearing it so that it is obstructing your hearing, seriously you need to learn how to put it on correctly.
During my google search to find the above images, I also found an X-ray of guy that doesn’t wear a helmet. 
You also might find this account interesting.
If you still aren’t convinced, you might want to look at this science fair project about the need for a helmet in low speed accidents AKA are you smarter than an 8th grader?
Also if you are getting distracted by your bike helmet, maybe you should consider not going out alone in public. How is a helmet distracting? 
Disturbing ad for wearing helmets Work safe, but graphic. don’t say I didn’t warn you.
I ride a lot, both on and off road, and I wear my helmet every single time (been doing so since high school).
I have taken spills down stairs when I was trying something dumb, had chains jump the derailleur and jam, throwing me off the bike with no warning, had high-speed flats, had collisions/near collisions with people/cars/pets/riders/vegetation, you name it. Stuff happens, sometimes my fault and sometimes not. I’d actually be more concerned about an accident if I was in a big mob of other riders. Helmet has saved me some grief before.
Fer chrissakes, a helmet is $50 worth of foam and plastic. If it saves you just one painful knock on the noggin (and it will) then it’s worth it, let alone a trip to the hospital.
Even if you don’t chalk it up to pregnancy hormones I think you were totally right to push your hubby to put on the brain armor.
And that’s more likely if you’re wearing a helmet.
Hi,
Just wanted to back this post up. I had a similar experience this last spring (2007). My boyfriend is a regular commuting cycler and often rides his bike through the metropolitan area of Salt Lake City. Well, when I got a bicycle in March, I immediately bought a helmet and realized that he hadn’t been wearing one all this time! I asked him about it and he said “Well I wear a helmet when I go on like a bike ride!”
“Well that’s not good enough,” I said, “You are much more likely to get hurt by a car in traffic than when you are riding your bike on a desolate trail.”
He didn’t buy it. I pouted about it for a while, and then decided not to be his mom (he hasn’t committed to love me and a fetus forever, yet). For a while, everytime he would go out the door with his bike I would say “You should wear your helmet…” and he’d reply “yeah yeah” and head out the door (without helmet).
In May I went to the Czech Republic for 5 weeks. When I returned, my boyfriend was obviously excited to see me after my long absence. The next time we went out on our bikes, he brought his helmet. Curious… Then the next time he had it, and the next time, and the next time!!
Sounds like he just needed some time to adjust to the helmet idea (and pretend it was his idea, not mine).
Oh those guys!!!
Fine, I’ll avoid bicycling in Salisbury and Bristol then. They sound like vicious places if a professor can get smacked twice during the course of a study when I’ve only been hit once ever. 
As for a leisurely bike ride and no need for a helmet, the one and only time my husband went over the handlebars of his bicycle was riding through the relatively slow-paced streets of our suburb’s “downtown” area. He landed on his shoulder (doing a tucked-in roll, no less) with enough force to shatter a chunk of bone off the top of his humerus, which put him out of work for weeks, required physical therapy, etc. Landing on an unhelmeted head would have been brutal.
What in the name of all that makes sense! Does you car have airbags? Do you wear a seat belt while driving? Why? They just give you a false impression that you’re safe.
Seriously, not taking safety precautions just because there is some amount of danger with or without them is one of the stupidest things I’ve heard in quite some time. Yes, riding a bike carries some risk. That is why equipment is available to reduce that risk. Short of futuristic sci-fi force fields, nothing will provide completely invincibility while biking. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t eliminate as much risk as is reasonably possible.
Oh, and hospital gowns don’t?
Curiously, this same argument doesn’t prevent people from spending hundreds of dollars on lottery tickets.
I completely agree. The application of progressively more stringent safety standards and equipment designed to mitigate the risk and severity of injury has left us with a dearth of population reducing hazards in daily life, which has resulted in excess population with attendant resource depletion and low utilization in the medical trauma and occupational therapy sectors. Far from promoting the use of safety equipment and practices designed to alleviate injury we should encourage unsafe behavior in the hope of thinning the crowd and keep the hospital industry in work.
You should get yourself a pair of these as well, to further avert any sense of danger or hazard.
I’m still waiting for someone to provide a credible rationale for not wearing a helmet that a five year old can’t punch logical holes through.
Stranger
From your link
It does not say if these distances are with or without helmets. No matter, three feet is plenty of room. I’m fine with that. As a matter of fact, I am fine with any passing distance that is >0.
However if the car/truck/bus passing distance gets = 0 or <0 I want all the protection I can get. That means I wear a helmet.
I still want to know how a helmet obstructs your hearing, and is distracting. :rolleyes:
Funny… my uncle was in a coma for a couple of days after a bike accident that he still cant remember.
I think I can honestly say that I don’t pay attention to what a bicyclist is wearing or not (OK, maybe if he’s got nice buns in spandex…) and I give him or her as wide a berth as I can. Back when 2 wheels were all I had to get around, I hated when cars passed too closely - especially the asses who thought it was fun to lay on the horn just as they got beside me. :rolleyes: But my own casual, unscientific observations are that people around here give bikers plenty of room, regardless of their attire.
Wearing a helmet is asking for trouble and just plain stupid, no matter how one can feebly attempt to justify it.
Of course, same goes for Critical Mass.
I’m pretty sure the people observed in the study were not making conscious choices. At least, I hope not.
Interesting topic. This past Tuesday I attended a fundraising dinner for the Children’s Miracle Network. The child “ambassador” who attended this year had been the victim of a catastropic brain injury when he rode his bike down a steep hill and into a brick mailbox. He suffered a “degloving” injury, where his scalp split and peeled off like a glove, and they had to pick skull fragments out of his brain. No, he was not wearing a helmet. In addition to CMN, he works with Safe Kids to show off the nice Frankenstein scar on his head and encourage other kids to wear helments.
Ha! Let’s see your five year old punch holes though reasoning like this! Go ahead. I dare you.
It really is taking longer than we thought. :rolleyes:
Fair enough, but if you’re interested in a half-intelligent debate and you’re presented with
it’s kinda hard to get it up.
And admittedly, I’m less interested in calling out the OP’s event. Calling Critical Mass a “big bike ride” is like saying President Bush “might’ve made an oopsie.” At least in SF, anyway.
I bow to the opinions of the experts. Please disregard my previous post.
Another vote for helmets. I know too many skulls that they’ve saved not to.
I didn’t have computers when I was a kid. Does that mean I should refuse to use one now? :rolleyes:
What?
They don’t keep your head cool. They’re vented so as to provide as much airflow to the head as possible, but they don’t keep your head cooler than not wearing one.
FWIW, I wear one, but I still think the benefits they provide are way overrated, especially for a slow ride like critical mass.
This doesn’t mean the odds “aren’t that low”.
It means that OF REPORTED INJURIES, 1 in 8 is a brain injury.
That means that even if you injure yourself seriously enough to report it (which is a small fraction of all crashes), you still only have a 1 in 8 chance of it being a brain injury.
They’re not that great. However, there isn’t much downside to them, so I still wear one.
Oh, and I really hope the OP going through those thoughts of “if he loved me and my embryo” is just crazy-pregnancy think. The dude is just thinking, “I don’t want to wear a helmet”.
Besides, whoever heard of borrowing a bike for “critical mass”? CM is for bikers trying to make a statement about their recognition as vehicles.
Also, reflectors and lights for your adult husband on a critical mass ride? Jesus, I’d try to tone down the mother-birding before that kid shows up.