Plus, they double as earmuffs in the winter (learned that one in Ottawa).

YUP YUP....lol

nice Sennheiser's are the jam.
I have a pair of HD 650's (technically they belong to my work, but I'm the only person who uses them), not noise canceling but amazing sound quality.

at home I have a pair of hd500's... they were going cheap at Future Shop right after christmas.

looking for recomendations for bud or wrap around headphones that would work well on the bike.. and not get shoved around but my helmet too I guess.....

I dunno, I'm hesitant to ride w/ headphones / earbuds on.

I've never tried it, but it seems like anything that would cut down my awareness of what's going on around me would be a "Bad Thing." That being said, if I could find a pair of earbuds that worked well, I might compromise and just stick one in my right ear. It would definitely be nice to have some biking music playing when I'm riding around town.

My thoughts exactly.. I'd probably do it while just riding on a trail, or outside of the city, but definitely not while on an urban street. And I'd probably want to use something fairly "open" as well... the standard ipod headphones would probably work well enough for those purposes for me.

I think I need to bring some music to Bay Bloor Radio and do some comparisons on their headphone wall. I found Sennheisers kind of uncomfortable when I did that once before.. same with the Grados.

Indeed...I've stopped riding with music..... I HAVE to hear what's going on around me.

Better than a video game ;) People always ask me how I can bicycle in Toronto with all the traffic and pedestrians and general craziness of the city; I tell them that it is because of those things that I love it so much. I've been living/bicycling in and around Queen west for 20 years now and I still get a rush when I fly through the traffic to get to work. Gets the blood rushing and you instantly wake up when you get into the traffic. Can't beat it.

Oftentimes though, it can beat you... to a pulp!

Traffic Jammer said heading down Yonge I believe. My personal favourite is heading south on University. I absolutely love how it just opens up like a drag strip. Occasionally I'll head down there at night when the street's deserted, which is also a fun experience. It's just one of those places around town that makes the bull**** near-misses worth it.

Personal most hated area: Queen, between Church and University. People have got my name on a list or something in that neighbourhood. I've been clipped three times there.

I find the the normal bud style let in so much outside noise that you can hear everthing you need to anyway, except maybe the music. When I got the ones that actually go inside your ear canal-(think foam ear plugs with a headphone speaker integrated into them), I was thinking it would be really dangerous to ride in traffic with them. You can't really hear anything but the music-(which flat out rocks BTW). After a bit of getting used to them, I think you can learn to ride safely with them. You just have to keep focused on what is around you.

In fact I actually make a point of wearing my headphones when the streets are really snowy, or icey. In these cases, I need to ride more in the middle of the lane for safety, regardless of what joe motorist behind me thinks about it. I find that with the headphones I am better able to focus on what I need to be doing, rather than letting cars intimidate to the sketchy curbside by tailgating or whatever. It's psychological warfare.

I actually get faster the closer I get to downtown. I dance with the traffic ... not the other cyclists, and no coffee required once at work.

For me the worst is always Queen west between University and Spadina (and onwards towards Bathurst). The combination of narrow road, parking on both sides of the street, streetcar tracks, tons of traffic, constant construction and every guy with a facial piercing and girl with ***** boots running across the street without looking as well as a bevvy of swinging doors makes it really quite treacherous. Its even worse in the rain! Whats better: Getting doored or getting caught in the streetcar tracks and then consumed by the car behind you?

I usually end up going south a couple of blocks to adelaide or richmond depending on the direction I am going, but the cars on those streets can be pretty wild at times too!

Yeah, a little competition gets the blood pumping. I love blasting downtown in rush hour traffic-makes me wish I still worked in the city core.

It always makes me smile to crank it south on Spadina, just before college. That keyhole is really fun.

I hate those tracks and their holes ..... evil on road wheels, simply evil.

I used to wear them when my commute route was primarily on the trail system. Nothing like a little Cro-Mags or Tom Jones to start your day. Now that I ride pretty much Eglinton to Steeles on Leslie, I kind of like to know when a city waste truck or semi is coming up behind me. I can't localize nearly as well with headphones on. That and it looks bad when a cop's yelling at you to stop blowing lights and you have to pull your headphones off to hear him.

Hehehe, growing up downtown I learned the hard way to avoid streetcar tracks when I was 13; I went down hard when I got my front tire stuck when I was passing my friend. Hasn't happened since ;)

The lack of hills here is still a novelty to me... I've become such a wuss since I moved here from Newfoundland. There's no way I could ride a fixie in St. John's.. :P I either wouldn't be able to make it up the hills, or I'd have to take my feet off the pedals going back down. :)

That said I haven't tried to tackle The Hill in Toronto yet.. ie. the one South of St. Clair on Yonge, etc. I have friends that live around Davisville, but they don't ride, so I rarely ride there. Haven't tried yet since I bought my fixie last year.

Stupid drivers exist everywhere however.. I used to get just as much ignorant run-ins in NL as I do here. Especially since cyclists aren't nearly as common on the streets there.

I had an old Italian racing frame from the 70's with a BMX freewheel, as close to a fixie as I wanna get in traffic. All those years riding and they still blow my mind.

Ok, we need to do a tour of Toronto "hills", combined with gratuitous park beer drinking after each one. Northbound bayview south of St. Clair, Southbound Yonge south of York Mills, maybe something north of the beaches. Really, there is nothing in this city very challenging, even fixed, but it would be fun all the same.

All of my beater bikes used to be like that. I still miss some of them. SS road bikes are fun for messing with cars downtown. I had one single speed Italian SLX road frame with a flat bar, and double pivot brakes that was like a sports car. I miss that one.

After the drunken hill climbing ... is there a competition for the longest pedaling hurl?

campy drop outs ..punched BB, drilled campy brake levers Columbus Original tubing with my Mavic Aluminum Aero crank ....*sniff I loved that bike weighed about as much as a box of klennex.... fast

and then after we'd gotta go for a double century.

so after discussing it over with a couple of people at work regarding headphones/music while riding it turns out they are nay-sayers too, but it's interesting to point out that these people ride w/o helmets and probably take more risks while slowly dorking around in traffic than I do.
anyways; one earbud in one ear seems safe enough, but which ear would you using it in? the right ear so you could hear potential danger coming from the left, I'm more concerned with sounds of car tires failing to grip pavement, which I'm sure I could hear above the music as it wouldn't be deafening loud.
Or wear it in the left ear and expect the norm from cars to my left and keep a careful watch on my right. (like a parked car door opening, someone running out into the street, etc...).
it's all in your own control over how much you limit your awareness, turn it down if it's so loud you can't a car right behind you.
I don't have an mp3 player yet and music and riding is something I've been toying with for over a year... not likely to ever happen. But it can be really boring and sometimes I wouldn't mind hearing my fav. song just once to help with the ride into work... kind of like audible adrenalin.. if that makes sense.

lee street dude... in the beaches, just east of Woodbine.. starting at queen ends at gerrard. probably only 5 blocks long.....it'd be like riding straight up out of the Don valley where that pedestrian bridge crosses over between the Bloor/danforth bridge and dundas

damnit.. I just had a post ready to go and closed the window by accident.

anyhoo.. the hill + beer idea sounds like a super idea while I'm sitting on my lazy ass at home. :D Looking forward to it!

I just installed new cleats in my new shooes. woo. Oh, and a couple of you will be happy to know that I took the time to tighten my chain. I was too lazy to bother with it much the last time I had my wheel off (had my bike in my car trunk.. wouldn't fit with both wheels mounted) because I had to get to work.

Oh, and on another note. What kind of chain lube do y'all use? I've been using some ancient Pedro's ATB lube that I had lying around since it got cold, but it's pretty nasty. I have to buy something new soon!