Consecutive bicycle work commute number 1764:

Google said there was a 35% chance of rain today. As I was packing last night I wasn't sure what bike to ride and therefore which bag to pack. I much prefer my road bike, but if it was raining I would want to take the hybrid with a rack and fenders. I wound up packing my backpack for the road bike, but left my waterproof Ortlieb pannier bag sitting next to it on the kitchen counter. I figured I'd make it a game-time decision.

When I got up this morning and looked out the window, everything was dry. I figured I would be taking the road bike as planned. A half an hour later as I was getting ready to leave, it started raining. So I transferred everything into my Ortlieb bag and took the hybrid bike. It rained steady the whole 8 miles to work, and is still raining an hour later as I type this.

The temp was pretty darn warm for a late-October morning in South Dakota: 57° F. My rain resistant jacket is too warm for upper 50s, but the temp was a little too cool to wear just a t-shirt. I wound up wearing a plain cotton sweatshirt over my t-shirt. That's not the most ideal rain gear, but I survived. It got pretty soaking wet by the time I arrived at the office, but temperature wise it felt about perfect. Hopefully it will dry some before I need to ride across town to a client over lunch. If it's not dry, and/or it's still raining, I may reschedule things and stay at our office all day. We'll see.

Because of the unusually warm fall we've been having, the trees are about a month late on changing colors and dropping leaves. They're finally doing both. Usually by November most of the leaves have fallen and I've got the majority of them cleaned up out of my yard. This year I've yet to even start raking.

So, back up a couple days to Tuesday. I didn't post this then but it's an interesting bicycle commuting story: as I was riding across town over lunch, as I often do when I change physical work locations, I made a detour to swing by the pharmacist and pick up a prescription for my son. As I was riding from there to the client, I decided to take a shortcut to avoid having to ride a couple extra blocks due to one-way streets. There is an alley that is only about 40 feet long, and is very narrow. Basically it's just a paved area between two buildings. In order to cut through the block I ride through the parking lot of one of the buildings, take a sharp right turn to pass between the back sides of two buildings, then take another sharp left into the parking lot of the other building.

As I came around the corner to ride through the "alley" I suddenly encountered a guy lying on his back in the middle of the one-lane path. He was motionless, and looked pretty rough. I initially thought he was dead. There was a lady who looked nearly as rough trying to rouse the guy. She was cursing at him and smacking him.

I am ashamed to admit my first reaction was to keep riding and not get involved. I got to the end of the second parking lot when the conviction got too great, so I turned around and went back. I called 911 and reported the situation, then stuck around until the police arrived. By the time the cop got there the guy was kind of sitting up, so I knew he wasn't dead. I explained the situation to the cop and asked if she needed anything else from me. She said she didn't, so I then continued on the ride to the client.

Later I looked up the police call log information and saw that they transported the guy to our city's behavioral health triage center, which happened to be about three blocks away. I'm guessing he was so inebriated (alcohol or some other chemical) that he passed out in the middle of the road. Hopefully the triage center can get him the help he needs.