That’s a good start. I had a dog walk right across the bike path in front of me the other day, and I had to jam on my brakes. The owners didn’t seem to notice or care. I’ve also seen a dog on one side of the path, the owner on the other, and a leash in between.
If you’d been in a car, you could have run over them (bad joke, I know). The only potential trouble I’ve had with dogs in the city was also late at night. I saw them waiting in the road ahead of me so I stopped and turned around. I didn’t know for sure that they had evil intentions but I wasn’t going to find out. Now that we have bylaws that require dogs to be on leashes in public, I haven’t had an encounter with them for years.
I did have a friendly little mutt follow me once and wouldn’t leave. Doubling back to where he’d joined me didn’t work, so I had to let him come home with me and leave him outside. He eventually left on his own.
My dad rides his bike a lot. He tells me really horrible things about his attempts to deter curious dogs. I blame the clueless owners. I’m also not making any comments about the bikers – you (we) gotta do what you gotta do. If you have to pepper spray a dog to keep its nose out of your spokes, I’m not going to blame you – I’m going to blame the dog’s clueless owner.
That said, every time I see a bicyclist, I picture in my head what that rider would do to my dog if the rider was my dad. So I keep my dog – and her leash – the fuck out of cyclists’ way. Which means, sometimes it’s a good thing my dad is such an asshole because it’s forcing me to teach my dog manners. 
Well, we can’t let the thread languish over the weekend (when all the real bikers will be out in the analog world), on a negative note like Downer Dad ‘n’ Dog Dangers.
I started to bike to work every day, and I notice so many things I didn’t at 40mph: back streets with fun little houses, lawn sculptures, weird hippie gardens (and the wild people who are tending them at 6 am).
And I notice that I’m in a much better mood when I arrive at work, having NOT had my blood boiling by sitting behind slow, clueless drivers. Now I cruise past them on the bike path.
Stuff you notice when you ride a bike.
How arthritic my wrists are getting.
How many tiny little bugs seem suicidal. Why do they want to die in my nose? Or my mouth? Blergh.
Also, how crazy people drive in parking lots. Slow. Down. (No doubt this is also because I’m a mother with young children. But really, SLOW DOWN, people.)
Preach it. Once upon a time I did without a car for over 5 years. In Los Angeles no less. Won’t bother sharing any of my scary tales, but will describe the biggest idiot bike rider I ever saw. On a bike, “walking” his dog and on the cell phone all at the same time.
People driving on the wrong side of the side of the road - it’s like the two metres of space they have to get around me isn’t enough, and they’re willing to cross the centre line for that extra metre. I’ve had people cross over no-passing lines whilst there’s oncoming vehicles. (Even seen it when I’m not actually on the road, just waiting in the driveway for a break in traffic.)
Meanwhile I’m dicing with death by riding a hair’s breath from the edge of the road to give them as much room as possible.
One day it will all end in tears, and guess who they’ll blame.
I do tend to scoot over when passing a bicycle a little more than most people (although I do stay on my own side of the road), trying to give the bicycle more room for THEIR safety. My depth perception is not good, and I tend to think I’m closer to another person/vehicle than I am, so I want to give others (especially someone who could wipe out and be on the road surface with no shelter from other traffic) some extra space.