Consecutive bicycle work commute number 2241:
It rained yesterday afternoon, and into the evening. I got wet on the way home from work last night. But the rain was supposed to stop during the night and today was predicted to be dry.
When I got up at 5:45 AM, the pavement outside was dry as predicted. I did all my preparation, but as I was getting ready to leave the house I looked outside and it was raining again. That was not what I was expecting.
I had already packed everything to take the road bike. I didn't have the motivation to re-pack so I could take the hybrid with fenders. Plus I had a 22 mile route today, and would prefer to do it on the faster road bike. I decided I was just going to get wet and grimy from the road spray rather than switching bikes.
The temp was 38°F with steady rain falling. This is almost my least favorite weather. I say "almost" because this morning I had a tail wind. Had it been a head wind it definitely would qualify as my least favorite weather.
I only saw two other people riding on the MUP this morning, both riding e-bikes. With the tail wind I was moving along at a decent clip, between 16 and 17 mph. One guy on one of those little 16" fat tire class 3 e-bikes passed me like I was standing still, and looked like he was exerting hardly any effort. He was moving at least 10 mph faster than me.
I guess it's good that people on e-bikes are removing larger vehicles from the road, but as I pedaled along I couldn't help but wonder if all these e-bikes aren't doing much to combat our country's obesity problem? People used to get exercise riding their bike, and now they're pedaling just hard enough to get the assist to kick in (if their bike even requires pedaling for assist.) I have friends whose kids now refuse to ride their traditional bikes and are asking for e-bikes.
At the same time when my thoughts start going down this path I need to check my attitude. Thinking of myself as a superior person for riding unassisted is just as reprehensible, if not more so. Riding my bicycle to work gives me a lot of time to think, but sometimes those thoughts are unhealthy.
About half way to work, two things happened. First, the battery on my headlight went into low battery mode. The button on the Niterider headlights I've been using for the last decade glow red when the battery gets low. My previous Niterider headlight would glow red for quite a while before it reduced illumination. This current headlight reduces illumination almost immediately once the low battery indicator lights.
The second thing that happened was the rain reduced from a steady fall to just a slight drizzle. It was nice to not have the extra moisture coming down on me, and only have the road spray soaking me. By the time I got to work the back of my pants, jacket and backpack were quite soaked and dirty.
Today the theater production I'm involved in moves from our rehearsal space to the theater downtown. That means after work I'm riding from the office directly to the theater, and then not riding home until 10 PM or later. We've got another week and a half of practices nearly every day (Thanksgiving off) until opening night on 11/29. This show is doing 10 performances spread across three weekends, so I'm going to be doing a lot of late-evening riding for the next month.