journal features

my bike has brakes again

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

Toronto, 2013.04.18

I've paid someone to reinstall the rear brake on my bike. The pads were shot (after three months of service on the front wheel, they were rotated last year to the back) and the cable kept disengaging from the brake handle, so I simply removed the whole thing last October. But it slowly started to feel maybe a tad unsafe so I chickened out and took the thing to MEC across the street from my office.

rand()m quote

Naturally the common people don't want war: Neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.

—Hermann Goering