Make sure you lock your bike any time you leave it unattended. It's definitely inconvenient, but sometimes you've just got to suck it up. Lock the frame for sure, and one or more wheels as well, if possible. Lock it to something that can't be easily disassembled. None of these things will prevent a thief from cutting your lock off with an angle grinder, but he or she would likely go for an easier target unless yours is a real prize. Therefore, if you have an expensive bike, try to avoid parking it outside overnight if at all possible. You can get a cheap beater bike to store in a more easily-accessible location and keep your nice bike somewhere more secure.

Recording distinguishing information on your bike will make recovering your bike much more likely in the unfortunate event that it is stolen. Once again, there's no magic bullet here, but there are things you can do to increase your chances. The City of Champaign will register your bike for 50 cents at any local fire station. They'll record the serial number of the bike and keep it on record if your bike is recovered. The U of I has a similar program which is optional for students and others associated with the University.

If you've registered your bike and it's stolen, it can be registered in a national stolen-bike directory. That way, if your bike is stolen and transported out of the area, it can still turn up. Even if you didn't register your bike and don't have the serial number, you should still report the theft if your bike is stolen.

Check out these links that were referenced in researching this article:

http://www.ebbc.org/?q=theft_prevention
http://bicycleuniverse.info/eqp/theft.html
http://www.chicagobikes.org/theftprevention.html

Thanks also to Fred Davidson and Christopher Hawk for their contributions to this column.

Once a potential contractor is approved for a loan, then they can purchase a vehicle. FedEx can help point the contractor in the right direction, but they can’t participate in the purchase or in the negotiation of the purchase. Once the contractor has acquired a vehicle, the company will give the contractor FedEx decals that must be strategically placed on the vehicle. The contractor must pay someone to install them. After the truck is decorated, a safety inspection is performed. If the inspection goes well, the vehicle will be cleared to start operating as a package delivery vehicle, but only after the contractor has also been able to get a commercial driver’s license.

Ed. note: The concluding entry of this three-part series will appear next Tuesday.

However, a lot of negative things often occur in the life of a contractor. Sometimes, a package gets damaged, and a claim is made by the customer. The claim is made against the contractor who delivered the package, and if the investigation proves that the damage was a result of negligence on the part of the contractor, then the contractor has to pay the claim. If it was damaged before it got to the contractor, then the company will pick up the tab.

I used to work for FedEx Ground, and I remember an issue came up when a customer complained that a contractor backed over part of her yard, tearing up some of the grass just off of her driveway. The contractor couldn’t dispute this, so he had to pay the lady’s landscaping bill.

One of the hardest realities of a contractor’s life is the lack of time available for a personal life. Most contractors don’t take vacations, and most work from six in the morning to five or six at night. In order to take a vacation, the contractor can either choose to pay the company to run their route in their absence, or the contractor can find their own driver to run the route. It costs way more for a contractor to pay FedEx to run their route, and all of the profits go to the company. If a contractor can find a reliable driver, they can pay their employee a wage (often $100 per day) to run the route. The good thing about this option is that the contractor can still collect a settlement check.

The term “settlement check” is used to make sure the IRS is aware that contractors aren’t employees. Contractors are paid a settlement for each package delivered and for each package picked up. Yearly settlements can exceed $100,000, but if you look at the truck payment, the cost of insurance (both vehicle and health), fuel costs, vehicle maintenance costs and taxes, the contractor’s net income is more likely to be between $30,000 and $50,000. Not too great, huh? Contractors don’t really start making a lot of money until they are multiple-route and multiple-vehicle owners, but that involves even more work.

I knew a contractor who owned six routes. He never delivered a package; instead, he employed six drivers to run his routes and he managed the business. He actually did quite well for himself, but he was constantly working. Sometimes he would have to train a new driver, other times he would have to meet with the managers to discuss his employee’s behavior and sometimes he would have to work on repairing his vehicles.

Some people want to own as many routes as possible, while others just like having one route. I once did a ride-along with a Home Delivery contractor who just liked having his one route. He drove a large cargo van and constantly had it full of packages. We started at 6:30 a.m. and got finished at 5 p.m. Most of the packages we delivered were small boxes and envelopes. We must have stopped over 120 times that day, and each one was different. Some customers were friendly, but some had large, angry dogs, others weren’t home and others would not come down to unlock the security gate, so we couldn’t deliver their packages. I asked him if he ever got hit on and he started laughing. He told me of several occasions when naked women opened the door for him and blatantly flirted with him. He was laughing when he said to me, “Look at me. I’m going bald, I’m overweight and not too attractive. Who would think that I could be somebody’s fantasy, but I am.” He said that he has always remained faithful to his wife, but he still likes knowing that he is a sex symbol to someone.

As I construct these articles, I now realize that I could write a book about this subject, but there isn’t time for that. There is so much that I could go into, but I only have one article left and I haven’t even touched on the subject that FedEx Ground hates to think about: unionization of their contractors. This is a very important topic, so stay tuned to learn why FedEx Ground hates unions.

And while many of the country’s cross-dressers may take a different, more literal approach to attraction, I’m speaking more metaphorically about their tourist economy. Thailand is the world’s largest exporter of rice, host to more than 115 different newspapers, and a land devoted to their noble king and humble Buddha. There are virtually no traces of the Western world, yet they so heavily rely on tourism to help them survive day-to-day. For one month, I backpacked with my friend, Charlie, through the jungles, across the beaches, and in the most touristy and non-touristy parts of Thailand. They can’t afford a sock, yet they make sure to keep one stuffed in their pants to impress tourists. And as a visibly noticeable tourist, experiencing the backwardness of their society helped to bring issues of our Western world to the forefront.

But many of these ladyboys are found primarily in touristy areas. In Bangkok, there’s a strip heavily influenced by “falongs” (“foreigners”). It’s called Khao San Road., and it was there that Charlie and I met our first ladyboy. He/she walked up to us and told us how much more beautiful she was than any of the other women of Bangkok. We weren’t interested in any service she repeatedly offered. Rather, we were interested in the cross-dressing phenomenon that had made Thailand so infamous. We asked “Sarah” (or as she insisted on pronouncing it, “Sa-raaaaaah”) how many men she had been with, and of that number, how many knew she was a ladyboy. Sa-raaaaah said she had been with over 1000 men (many of whom were tourists), and of that number, just under 400 didn’t know she was a ladyboy (I can’t believe she kept count). She also openly admitted to having AIDS (which is a major epidemic among Thai prostitutes), and that a night with Sa-raaaaah was like nothing anybody had ever experienced.

Wow. It was almost too much information for my sheltered, suburban, college mind to take in at once.

Now my purpose isn’t to shed a bad or frightening light on Thailand, because it’s one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. I’ve seen some of the most amazing imagery, met some of the happiest and nicest people, and truly felt honored to have been a part of their culture. I tell you about Sa-raaaah and the ladyboys as a point of comparison. That’s how we learn – we compare our lives to the lives of others. And what I learned was that I feel as bad for many American people as I did for Sa-raaaah.

There was something refreshing about that sock.

Jeff Hunt zigzagged through a pick-up game on the basketball court with 15 pizza boxes in his arms. The Douglass Community Center on Champaign’s northwest side usually closes at 7 p.m., but on a Friday night this spring, Hunt and several volunteers served pizza and Gatorade to more than 60 young people until almost midnight.

Hunt is a Christian and a youth mentor. He runs Mission 180, a faith-based non-profit that works with “at-risk” young people ages ten to seventeen. The Friday night basketball games offer a fun, safe environment for the young people. None of the Mission 180 volunteers talked about Christianity with the young people on the night I visited, but Christianity drives Hunt’s work.

Rap and hip-hop music boomed from the stereo system in the Douglass Center’s gym. The four rows of bleachers along one side of the gym were filled with players waiting their turn and with the players’ girlfriends and friends who had come to watch the action.

Hunt circled the gym, greeting the young people individually and applauding good plays. Chaos swirled around him. Whistles blew. Sneakers screeched. The electronic scoreboard blared its game-ending signal. Hunt, 32, is tall and muscular, with a shaved head and trimmed brown beard. He wore sneakers, jeans and a brown T-shirt with a yellow school bus on the front, bearing the words “Old School”.

“He’s real cool,” Teven White, 17, tells me. “He’s real straight forward and he’s got lots of patience.”
At midcourt, Hunt playfully shadow-boxed with one teenager for several minutes.

“We have two rules,” Hunt explained. “You can’t say the f-word or the n-word, and you have to respect everybody.”

The teenagers remained respectful all night but used both banned words in Hunt’s absence. In Hunt’s presence, one boy used the “n-word” and quickly corrected himself.

Hunt, like four of the five volunteers working with him that particular night, is white. Nearly every young person in the gym was black.

“The kids ask, ‘Why are you doing this? Why are you this way? You’re white, I’m black.’” Hunt said. “’I say, Ok, you can see. Let’s get beyond that.’”

Even when he stopped briefly to talk to me, Hunt stayed close to the action. He sat in the front row of bleachers underneath the basket. As he talked, players crashed into him and wrestled for a loose ball that bobbled in the air in front of his face. Hunt ducked his head to the side and kept talking.

“I don’t know if people would disagree with this or not,” Hunt told me, “but I let them know, ‘I know you guys are smoking the weed and doing all those other things. But what I’m most concerned about is you having a relationship with God. Because once that happens and you’re serious about it, all that other stuff is going to go away. I promise.’”

Hunt had a very different experience growing up. He was raised in tiny Lawrenceville, Ill. where his father was a minister. Hunt attended Lincoln Christian College in central Illinois where he met his wife.

After working as a youth pastor for several years, Hunt and his family moved to Champaign in 2002. He took a job with the East Central Illinois Youth for Christ. Hunt said he began to notice what he called a gap in Champaign County’s services for at-risk youth. Through Youth for Christ, he began spending time at the county’s Juvenile Detention Facility (JDC) once a week. To Hunt, that amount of time felt insufficient. “I just felt like we needed to do more,” he said.

Hunt designed Mission 180 to provide more intensive, individual mentoring. He has no office and works from home. Hunt spends most of his days shuttling between appointments at various social service centers. Since founding Mission 180 in 2005, Hunt has developed partnerships with the Champaign County State’s Attorney’s office, the juvenile probation office, the Mental Health Center of Champaign County, the Champaign public schools and the Champaign Park District.

Mission 180 has little philosophical structure other than the emphasis on relationships and faith. The young people at the Friday night basketball program told me that Hunt rarely discussed Christianity, but they knew he was religious.

“We let it come up in questions,” Hunt said. “We don’t want to force anything on the kids. We let it be a lifestyle example.”

Hunt runs an activity period at the county’s Juvenile Detention Facility in Urbana. I went with him one afternoon this spring but was not permitted to take notes. Hunt walked casually through the facility, “buzzing” the appropriate buttons to enter secured areas and making small talk with the staff. He carried store-bought frosted cookies in a plastic bag.

In the facility’s small gym, a group of ten young men and two young women lined up against a wall, waiting for Hunt. They wore navy blue jumpsuits and slip-on shoes. Hunt walked down the line exchanging handshakes and greetings with each young person. They played several rounds of basketball and volleyball with Hunt.

After the games he led them through a group exercise about second chances. The young people stood in a single file line and Hunt asked them a series of questions. They stepped to the left or the right depending on their answers.

First, Hunt asked the group whether they felt they deserved second chances. Each of them responded yes. But half of the group said no when Hunt asked whether they would deserve second chances if they continued to make mistakes. One young man suggested that his family would eventually stop trusting him. Then the discussion shifted to the consequences of repeated mistakes.

Hunt finished the session by reading from pledge cards the group had filled out the previous week. The young people had written down a part of their behavior they promised to improve during the week. Hunt asked each of them if they had succeeded. Then he awarded a certificate to the young man who the group had voted the best behaved during the previous week’s discussion.

“I tell you this every week,” Hunt said as he passed out new pledge cards, “but I love you and God loves you.”

People often question Hunt’s work, especially his emphasis on juvenile offenders. “Not everybody understands why they spend time with them,” he says. “We still get people who say, ‘Well, they don’t deserve the kinds of things you’re doing with them. Why are you doing this? They’re criminals.’”

Hunt answers such questions by citing the example of Jesus Christ from scripture.

“I’m like, ‘Well, the guy that I’m modeling my life after, that’s who he hung out with,’” Hunt said.

Skepticism about Mission 180 comes more often from Christians than the secular community, he continued. “People that we work with or have partnerships with, the majority of them are not Christians, or are very nominal,” Hunt said. “They welcome what we’re doing with open arms.”

According to Mission 180’s agreement with the Champaign Park District, Hunt and the volunteers must drive home the participants after the Friday night basketball program. Hunt and five teenage boys walked out of the Douglass Center a few minutes before midnight.

As the group walked toward Hunt’s minivan, one young man boasted of his ability to sneak into clubs restricted to people over 21 years old.

“You couldn’t pass for 13,” Hunt laughs. The young man responded with a crass remark. “That’s real mature,” Hunt adds, rolling his eyes.

Rap music blasted from the stereo in Hunt’s van. The drive toward the teenagers’ homes in east Urbana was loud and laughter-filled. Hunt told one of the young men how to pop a pimple before his trip to the movies the next night. He was nearly finished with another long night in his mission to build relationships.

“The things we do may seem isolated,” Hunt said, “but to me they’re not.”

Ed. Note: This is the first installment of a three-part series which will run the next three Tuesdays.

On your door is a slender, white and green door tag. You remove it and read that a delivery attempt has been made and that it will be made again tomorrow. You go inside and throw away the tag, expecting that the package will finally make its way home the next day, but you are wrong, because you forgot to sign the package release line and you forgot to leave it on your door.

When you get home the next day, that same damn tag is there. You break down crying and throw the tag away again, because it read that the delivery would be attempted one last time.

On the third day you come home to find that tag again. This time you tear off all of your clothes and run around the neighborhood screaming, “Why? Why? Why?” You then gather your wits and call the company’s international number. After about twenty minutes you finally get to speak with someone local, who tells you that you can come and pick it up, so you drive out to the facility, sign some papers and finally leave with your beloved 80-gig iPod.

This can be a hellish experience to online shoppers, but does anyone know why this happens? The delivery of your package is more complicated that just carrying an item from a warehouse to your home. For FedEx Ground drivers, each delivery could be the difference between success and failure.

You see, FedEx Ground doesn’t employ drivers. Instead, they contract individual routes out to ordinary men and women who take over an area or territory. This might be a hard concept to grasp for the average consumer, but it’s the truth. FedEx Ground “Delivery Drivers” are entrepreneurs and risk-takers. Why would FedEx model their business this way?

Well, the men and women who built FedEx figured that a contractor-based model would be the best possible customer service solution. They predicted that if independent businessmen and women had a greater stake in the company, then they would be driven to bring the best customer service experience to the industry, thus growing the individual enterprise and the corporation’s economic stronghold as well.

So, how do you become a contractor?

Well, first you have to meet with a Pickup and Delivery manager. They will have you sit down and fill out an application. Then they will run your Motor Vehicle Record (MVR) and do a background check. If that comes back clean, you will then have a meeting with them to discuss the contract and the business model. You will have to give them your own business model, explaining to them how you plan to run your route and what your contingency plan will be if you are sick, injured or dead. Sounds like fun, huh?

At first it might sound like fun. The manager has convinced you that you will be making money hand over fist. He tells you that you’ll soon own multiple routes and you’ll have a fleet of drivers, that those drivers will be bringing you income, like a whore to a pimp. You leave the meeting with the suggestion that you go talk to a bank to get approved for a loan. You plan to leave out the pandering part, though.

How much money will you need? Well, just like buying a lot on which to build a house, routes are priced depending on a number of factors: size, density and potential being the most important. Prices can range from $10,000 to $100,000, depending on who’s selling it. If it is a contractor who is looking to get out of the game, the price might be considerably higher than if the company is selling a new route. Or, it could be the other way around, if the company believes that the route will explode with business.

On top of the cost of the route, you’ll need a truck. Diesel trucks can cost anywhere from $45,000 to $75,000 new. Buying a used truck is discouraged, because chances are you’ll spend more time fixing it and you will also have to eat the cost of using rental trucks, too.

So there you are, ready to make a dive into debt, ready to go the bank to beg for a loan, and possibly ready to sign your life away. This could prove to be the best move of your life, or it could possibly end up in a divorce, with a shotgun, a bottle of whiskey and a dead dog. Toby Keith might even end up singing about you.

To be continued . . .

It’s time for apple pie.

Curtis Orchard opened up shop for the season last week, and that can only mean one thing: apples. Well, actually it means a few things: Apricots, blueberries, Rehaven peaches, watermelon, sweet corn, tomatoes, yellow squash and zucchini.

Curtis Orchard, near the brand-new I-57 Curtis Road interchange — grows 5000 apple trees and 20 acres of pumpkins on their 80-acre farm just west of Windsor Road.

Curtis Orchard is located at 3902 S. Duncan Rd. The hours of operation are Mon.-Sat. 9 a.m.-6 p.m. and Sun. 11 a.m.-6 p.m. The farm closes for the season in mid-December.

I sat down with Larson and his general manager, Luke Henry, to ask them about the newest addition to downtown Urbana’s nightlife. Larson’s idea was to create a contemporary atmosphere that would be accessible for business lunches, casual dinners and raucous sing-a-longs late into the night. They also desired to create a diverse atmosphere that would be accessible to all age groups. “We would like to have a dinner atmosphere similar to Biaggi’s, but not out of reach as far as prices go,” Larson stated. Henry added that most mixed drinks and drafts are only $3, so that no one feels that 88 Broadway isn’t affordable.

I haven’t had the opportunity of dining at 88 Broadway yet, but I have been able to have some drinks and watch the dueling piano players on two separate occasions. My first visit was opening weekend and the place was packed. I arrived at about 8:30 and it was kind of quiet. The performers were just slightly audible to me. I made the comment to my friend, “Man, this better pick up. I want to hear some loud Elton John and some cussing soon, or I’m out.” Well, after four more drinks, the lights dimmed and my wish came true. Numerous audience members were berated in front of an increasingly drunken crowd. Girls were up dancing, shots were being taken and my friends were all singing in high pitched voices to songs from the Grease soundtrack.

The highlight of the night came when a 21-year-old birthday boy was called down to stand by the pianos. After calling his name, I saw him run down the ramp from the bar towards the stage. I don’t even think he was drunk, but he somehow managed to fall face first into a table below. After a few seconds he popped back up, threw his arms up in the air and made his way to the stage. He had already embarrassed himself enough, but still the guys on the pianos managed to make matters worse by singing a song about his little weenie. He’ll never forget that night, I’m sure.

My second visit was a little less eventful. I went there last Saturday night with my same friends, and we all left there feeling a little disappointed. We attributed our disappointment to the pianists and their crowd interaction. There were three new players that night, each of them being less enthusiastic and less interactive with the crowd than the opening weekend’s musicians. It seemed like the guys we saw the second weekend were more interested in playing the songs to show off their skills and less interested in getting the audience singing along. It was still a fairly good time, but just not as climactic as it was on my first visit.

In order for 88 Broadway to make a name for itself, like the Big Bang of St. Louis, they are going to need a talented cast with tons of energy (shows can be seen Wednesday through Saturday starting at 9:30 p.m.). Right now they are trying out numerous local players each week until they find who they’re looking for. What they want are people who are enthusiastic, energetic, diverse, spontaneous and talented. If you or anyone else is interested in auditioning, all you have to do is get in touch with Luke Henry by emailing him at luke@88broadwaybar.com. People who have stage fright need not apply.

I think that 88 Broadway has a lot of promise for downtown Urbana and I encourage anyone who likes to sing out loud in their car or shower to stop by and see a performance sometime. I didn’t think that I would be singing along, but once I heard the teasing of Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’, I had to sing. I felt like I was in the Drunken Clam with Quagmire, Joe, Peter, Cleveland and the rest of Quohog, but no, I was just drunk in Urbana, making an ass of myself. I wasn’t the only one though.

It's going to be pretty tough to get an accurate picture of what really went down from those stories. After spending a few days in Seattle, though, I can see where commuting tension would be high. There's a ton of traffic of both the car and bike variety, and even a lot of the arterial roads are narrow and curvy.

Here in comparatively pastoral C-U, Critical Mass is, in my experience, a celebration of bike culture and a brief opportunity to force motorists to acknowledge our presence by taking up a lane of traffic. I'm sure that it pisses drivers off here, too, but I've never seen anything beyond a honk and a bird. Violent interactions with motorists seem out of our reach at this point, but who knows.