Eyesight at night

[Graeme]

I can laugh at you old blokes. I'm but 61 and I'm told I don't look a day over 60.

[balibeemer]

Old age is mother natures way of letting you know that you have a 'use by date'

[Rob Valdez 79 R65]

As we approach Winter here in the northern hemisphere, I am reminded how harsh the afternoon sun can be, low on the horizon as it is, as well.

[Ed Miller]

As we approach Winter here in the northern hemisphere, I am reminded how harsh the afternoon sun can be, low on the horizon as it is, as well.

At least I don't have that to worry about.

I wish I did.

[Altritter]

As we approach Winter here in the northern hemisphere, I am reminded how harsh the afternoon sun can be, low on the horizon as it is, as well.
Post

Right! Winter sun's a killer in my neighborhood, both morning and afternoon, because the high-density road that we must use runs exactly along its trajectory. I make a point of not riding at certain times in winter because I'm certain that drivers behind me cannot not see the bike or me, much less my brake light.

Also, consider the strobe effect (upon both cage driver and cyclist) of mid-afternoon winter sunlight from the side through leafless deciduous trees. A hypnotist could not devise a more effective strobe-induced trance! Spouse and I encountered this in December 1994 while traveling west on a straight but washboard-rolling road cut through a deciduous forest (10 miles' worth). I was driving, and the strobe effect nearly put me to sleep. Sadly, my spouse's mother, driving solo about 15 minutes in front of us, ran off the road and was killed. (Spouse and I had detoured about 5 miles before the accident scene to make a side trip, so we were unaware until late that night.) The cause of the accident was never determined, but we surmised that it likely was either (1) hypnosis from the strobe effect of sunlight through the trees (though she had stopped for coffee not long beforehand), or (2) acute physical distress. (There was some reason to suspect a ruptured aneurysm, but there was no legal requirement for autopsy under those conditions, and we felt no useful purpose would be served by requesting one.)

[trips]

I've already had cataract surgery on both eyes before I was 50, one came back and had to be lasered, the other one is coming back now and will need the same. Only 53, but really worried about my eyes. Due to this, and deer, I rarely ride at night, sometimes back from my club, but it's only 8 miles from home.

[Vegasrandall]

...Back in the 70's stock headlamps could be pretty awful and I remember fitting a Cibie conversion to my 75 Triumph in order to improve things.

Ah, youth... I remember it but only in bits and pieces. I'll be 64 this Thursday. That sucks. [smiley=nopity.gif]

that reminds me of why the brits drink warm beer?
they have lucas beer chillers.(old groaner from a brit machine owner)

My 1953 Triumph 500, sparked and lit by Lord Lucas, needed curb feelers to get me home many dark nights. Could have been my beer goggles. I forget. That's an advantage of aging...

The older I get, the faster I was. [smiley=2vrolijk_08.gif]

Monte

[Altritter]

My 1953 Triumph 500, sparked and lit by Lord Lucas, needed curb feelers to get me home many dark nights. Could have been my beer goggles. I forget. That's an advantage of aging...
 

That's an image that I haven't forgotten, both with and without beer goggles — though I will say that I never had the huevos to ride a bike after a night in the tavern. (I still have zero tolerance for alcohol when I'm on my bike, though I'll consume moderately if I'm driving a cage.)

Your "curb feelers" remind me of two situations, both occurring when I was in the Army and stationed in South-Central Ohio farmland. I didn't own a bike then, but I did have a restored '54 Chevrolet that I cherished. I lived about 4 miles outside a town too small to have reliable taxi service, so the alternative to driving was walking home, then walking back to town the next morning to retrieve my car in time to drive to the missile site, 5 miles from town in a different direction. One evening I had considerably too much beer, to the point that my vision was seriously impaired. I managed to get home by dropping my two curb-side wheels onto the gravel shoulder of the road (paved rural road with no curb), steering the inner sidewalls of the tires into the raised edge of the pavement, and driving very slowly.

That lesson was valuable to me a few months later. I had a date (remember that ritual?) in another town, about 20 miles away. I had nothing to drink that night (she didn't drink), but I became extremely sleepy on the way home. When my curb-side wheels dropped off the pavement, I didn't react. But then I felt my inside wheels drop onto the shoulder, and the adrenalin rushed! The first thing I saw was a curve-warning sign on a steel post, too close to avoid by swerving back onto the road. So I went to the outside, missed the sign, and got back on the road by swerving again to the left of a concrete culvert abutment. (I think one of my curb-side tires might have grazed the low edge of the abutment.) It took me a while to fall asleep when I reached my apartment.  

One of my colleagues tells the story of having so much alcohol that he suffered double vision. (Coincidentally, this also occurred in Ohio.) He solved the problem by removing his necktie, tying it around his head to make a patch over one eye, and driving home.