Two Wheels, Nine Lives

I stopped. I looked both ways. I saw a car pulling up to the stop sign on my right. Having waited my turn at the four-way, I started across the intersection. That's when I noticed that the car at the stop sign was starting to ease ahead. If I didn't stop, honk, or wave, I might soon be beneath its wheels. I have no horn, and as I started to swerve as I yelled. I yelled, "Hey!" That's my standard yell when I'm about to be crushed by a motor vehicle. That's when the driver looked up, took his hands off the wheel and gave me a very sheepish, "my bad" shrug of the shoulders. Happily, this coincided with him stepping on the brakes, and a collision was averted. My bike and I had avoided yet another nearly near death experience.
It wasn't a new thing, almost getting run over in my bike. I live and ride in Oakland, after all. It's not a city that will be described as "bicycle friendly." By contrast, we don't feel the need to get all aggro on motorists like they do in San Francisco. There is a mob-bike-ride the last Friday of every month, sponsored by Critical Mass, in downtown San Francisco. The idea is that a large enough group of riders will intimidate and oppress the cars and trucks and other things that go. Confrontation is the name of the game there. Not a lot of "aw shucks" gestures on those streets. Gestures of another sort are quite common.
And so, back on the mean streets of Oakland, I ride with my eyes open and my head on a swivel. When I have a near-miss with a car I tend not to get too worked up when I'm all on my own. Antagonizing somebody with a three thousand pound weight advantage isn't a great plan, and so I keep to the right and obey the traffic laws. I wait until I am through the intersection before I shake my head and mumble curses under my breath. It's safer that way.