I spent Saturday morning and much of the afternoon chanting, "Rain, rain, go away!" in all sincerity. It took its sweet time to do so, but finally obliged around 4pm, and my legs wanted hills, so I took the Surly Trucker DeLuxe and rode East, through the familiar flats and hills of Arlington, Medford, Malden, Melrose, and Stoneham.
I was a little wary of the wet roads, but the low-profile file tread and big contact patch on the Rat Trap Pass tires gripped nicely. The wind was another matter: I was in the teeth of it for much of the ride, but made way adequately, and on those occasions when it presented as a tailwind, it was delightful. There wasn't much traffic just then, so the urban tactical riding component of the route was a little tame (that's ok), and the hills were the thing. Climbing a long hill into a strong headwind made up for the lack of traffic at times. Fast descents with a tailwind made up for that (Wheee!). Descents with a headwind were a little funky, had to keep up with all that vector arithmetic. In any event, I got my money's worth out of this ride, and any rainy-day blues I had been suffering earlier were rolled away by the end of it.
rod.