Author Archives: Rich Freggiaro

Unless you get all your news from NPR and PBS, you have undoubtably seen videos of citizens (and non-citizens) behaving badly. Gangs organize smash and grab raids of high end retailers, or liquor stores. In California shoplifting goods valued at less than $950 is a misdemeanor, and our DA’s don’t prosecute misdemeanors, unless the deedContinue reading “Mikado See, Mikado Do”

A friend sent me a link to a YouTube video that he suspected might interest me. He was right. It’s only 6 minutes long. I watched it twice, the second time taking notes for this blog. Here’s the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpCkJs6DKCw The video is by Dr. Peter Attia, and his premise is that a person’s VO2Continue reading “VO2 isn’t Voodoo…”

Climate change is quite real. 10,000 years ago the most recent ice age was ending, and glaciers extended down into the Smokey Mountains between Tennessee and North Carolina. Those glaciers are gone, so it is pretty hard to argue that the climate didn’t get warmer over that time. On the other hand, how serious climateContinue reading “Indulge Me”

…to be married to Stoker for 41 years as of today. Happy Anniversary Diane! Regarding ‘privilege’, Johns Hopkins Hospital chief diversity officer Sherita Golden wrote the following in her DEI newsletter: “Privilege is an unearned benefit given to people who are in a specific social group. Privilege operates on personal, interpersonal, cultural and institutional levels,Continue reading “It Has Been a Privilege…”

I stole the blog title from the 1898 horror novella by Henry James. I never read it, but I did have to read and take a final exam on the same author’s novel Daisy Miller. Not exactly a page turner…And later it was used as the story for a 20th-century English chamber opera composed byContinue reading “The Turn of the Screw”

There are lots of serious and dangerous events going on in the world and here in the United States. Too dangerous and serious for the Rich Freggiaro Cycling Blog. We try to keep things light-hearted here. Recently I came across a few items that are quite different, but related; call them Variations on a Theme…Continue reading “Weighty Matters”

Not in Boston…you may not know about this if you get all your news from NPR. Michelle Wu (Mayor of Boston) drew criticism Wednesday after her aide sent a holiday party invite to all members of the Boston City Council for an “Electeds of Color Holiday Party,” even though seven of the officials are White.Continue reading “And May All Your Christmases Be White”

I learned a lot about paradoxes in college. “The Paradox of Value” asks the question why is water, which is essential for life, so much less expensive than diamond rings, which are not. Zeno’s Paradox takes many forms; balls that can never hit walls or tortoises that can never cross finish lines. My favorite versionContinue reading “‘Tis a Puzzlement”

On Saturday a group of my cycling friends decided to stay flat and local with a 50+ mile loop from Lodi to Thornton and Galt. The weather was perfect, cool but not frigid, and sunny with almost no wind. Everyone was relaxed and enjoying the day and the company instead of hammering up some hillsContinue reading “Share the Road…Not Everyone Concurs”

Way back in December 2014 I woke up one morning with a very strange tingling sensation in my chest and I felt a little light headed. I took my blood pressure with our home monitor and discovered my pulse was over 100 beats per minute (bpm). That is about double what my normal resting pulseContinue reading “A Fib…No Lie!”