Nice ride in; clear, cool enough to wear the rain jacket as an outer insulating layer, and of course the 10-15 mph N wind (tailwind coming to work!) that comes after the cold front is past. It's only been two miserable days of rain, but I'd almost forgotten what that bright thing in the sky was like!


Inadvertent experiment today with interesting results. I picked up an activity tracker just after Christmas, largely for accountability on days like the last two, rainy ones. Took it off for the ride in, and somehow the bumps on the bike path, the last mile to work, added up to 2,000 steps!

Lucky I have a choice, too. I did not ride this morning, and I probably won't tonight. I took the subway. Man, what a crush it is at the station near work!

To make up slightly for my lack of exercise, I walked up the stairs to my office.

So, because I learn lessons the hard way, the universe let me know that I need to regularly check each bolt on my bike.

As I was riding to work this morning, I noticed a strange sensation--like my reach was changing, a floaty and weird feeling. That's because the handlebars on my hybrid were starting to spin! I was able to stop without wrecking, although it wasn't easy. I am glad I carry a multi-tool!

I definitely lost some commuter street cred points. Can't believe I didn't wreck! And I know I need to replace my brake pads, they're a little sad.

Sounds like another case of SMIDGAF. :(

I actually should take the stairs more often in my building. I'm on the 10th floor and the doors should still be open on the lobby and 10 at least.

Rode home last night around 8pm, and while the rain wasn't too heavy yet, the wind was already pretty nasty. Coming over the 59th street bridge was interesting and fun.

No way I was riding in this morning. Just not worth the hassle when I can't ride home after work due to a commitment. And the wind is even worse today... there must be thousands of broken umbrellas strewn about the city.

100% agree. They don't seem to have the first clue about what is really going on with tires, traction, the working of an engine... It's like an extension of a playstation to them: this button/pedal makes it go forward, this one slows it down. Turn big round thing to go left or right...

I've noticed that if I ride a hill several times it gets easy. But I'm not sure climbing 8 or 10 flights of stairs will ever get easy. But I can do it handily, and my breathing rate returns to normal after about a minute, so I'm in good enough shape.

He would have cared when his pickup connected with my Civic. (Though I am glad it didn’t)

If that's how it works 99,90% of the time, can you blame them? A modern car is not informing the driver about the physics of mass in motion.

Hey, there's an idea. Should it be a momentum meter or a kinetic energy meter?

Should be a good week for commuting, a 4-day work week for me with no precipitation in the forecast except for a little on Wednesday night.

Bike shopping progress... the Marin dealer isn't stocking the Pine Mountains, because they are still trying to sell a few MY2016 XXL bikes, but they could order one; and the Trek dealer is backordered on the Roscoes.

I would write Österriech with A and employ AUS for Australia. I agree that more rural peoples are more mechanically inclined.

I find Dutch really interesting as I speak Swedish, German and English.

A lot of mixing of the languages.

Ik eet / I eat / Ich esse being an interesting one.

even Ik / Ich / I / Jag being interesting in the inverse manner.

Then there's the Aardappel / Kartoffel / Potato / Potatis debacle. I'm assuming Aardappel (is earth apple ... Erdapfel?)

Yes, just a translation from the French pomme de terre, where the potato came from after it crossed the Atlantic. A lot of words just follow the object, skill, product, invention or idea and maybe changed but keep roughly the same meaning. There's a lot of modern loan words from English, but also the other way around, especially related to see trade.

One of the reasons I don't experience it like that is because there are a lot of loan words from English and French, but the relationship with German is entirely different, German is branch from the same tree, while French and English words are more like organisms that hopped from tree to tree. This is probably why there are a lot more mutual false friends with German than with English and French. The only loan word from Swedish I can think of is ombudsman, wrongly changed to ombudsvrouw (ombudswoman) in case a female holds this position. I can read a Swedish newspaper and get quite an impression of what's it about, so it's remarkable alike, about as alike as German it seems to me, despite it beeing an older branch further away.

So the nature of the connection is very different per connected language. English and French don't feel connected at all to me, German does. But don't underestimate the difference, becoming really fluent on a high level is quite easy coming from German to Dutch or the other way around, but that's only after a hard struggle to get the basics right.

Going to be a windy one today. Got the broken spoke fixed this weekend. Went ahead and ordered a new wheel with 12 gauge spokes. The Trek's going to get a bunch of new parts this year!

Is "vrouw" in Dutch the same as "frau" in German?

I guess that I can understand a fair bit of Dutch when it's spoken, but I've never learned it phonetically. "Vrije" is "Frei" or "free" essentially? So maybe the Vr makes the f? Also that IJ digraph is pretty cool.

IJ digraph

Back on the bike after driving most of last week. And consequently I left my work badge in the car and had to go get the dummy "Forgot my badge" badge.

I haven't mentioned it here, but my wife is currently suffering some sort of "post-viral syndrome" and is mostly unable to walk. It's a neurological thing and although she has reflexes and muscle control, she can barely shuffle about and only for short distances. The doctor said things should turn around, but it could take weeks before she is back to normal.

And she can't drive either. The biggest challenge that poses is getting kids to activities which start anywhere from 3:30pm to 6pm. We have some friends helping, but I will be driving to work some to make it home in time to pick a child up and take them. If things work out, I can ride 3 days a week.

It was low 30s when I started at 6:10am this morning and my face got a bit cold. I went to the gym for about 40 minutes on the way to work.

A lot of debris on the sides of the roads this morning, some of it hard to see in the dark! And there was a tree that had down over the towpath by the canal, I had to lift my bike over it. I'm hoping the nasty vine on it wasn't poison ivy; kinda hard to tell in the dark, before there are any leaves on anything! My dynamo light has a 'standlight' so it puts out a bit of light even when the wheel isn't turning, but I would have liked more.

Yes, but not to adress someone, than it's mevrouw, like madame, my lady. 'Frau Dr. Merkel' would become 'hey Angela' anyway, German and Germans are much more formal.

[quoteI guess that I can understand a fair bit of Dutch when it's spoken, but I've never learned it phonetically. "Vrije" is "Frei" or "free" essentially? So maybe the Vr makes the f? Also that IJ digraph is pretty cool.[/QUOTE]
It's often difficult for visitors because they don't realise it's only one vowel, just like 'ei', 'ui', 'ie', 'ou' and 'oe', which makes road signs and things like that unnecessarily unreadable. It's most simular to the Y like in why, and it alsof functions as a 'j' and the end of a syllable sometimes. Older generations of Dutch English speakers often tend to pronounce the English Y, and I, as in why and vibe as the Dutch ij or ei, but both are very different from the German ei, which is close to the English Y/I. I don't believe there's any even remotely related language that knows the 'ij' or the 'ui' sound.

In lots of cases the Germans use the F the Dutch use the V, but not always and it could also be the other way around. The V can also replace the German B, like in geben and leben. Come to think of it, the Dutch seem quite fond of the V, if they pronounce a word starting with an F but want emphasis on it, the F often becomes a V. This is not correct, but most people speak Dutch very sloppy, unlike the Germans speaking German. In general most Dutch are very indifferent to speaking it correctly, but quite enthousiast in beeing creative with it's expressive power and subtle changes of meaning/message with intonation.

The warm front the first part of last week brought out the early-blooming magnolias; the chill this weekend knocked the blossoms all down. They made splashes of color, pale pools of pink-ish purple petals on the bare ground. As if to make up for that, the redbuds are coming out and there's a few dogwoods blooming, about a month ahead of Easter.


That was the nice part of this morning's ride. On the other hand, it started to rain as I left the house, a cold rain, knocking the temperature down 9 degrees on a 10 mile ride. The clouds kept the air warm overnight, until the rain hit. If I could order weather a la carte, I'd have taken clear skies, cooler temps, and why couldn't the rain hold off until I got to work??

I shipped a bike frame out today in a big box. I put my stuff in my backpack, carried the big box in one hand and a big bag of shirts in the other hand. I dropped the shirts off at the cleaner and quickly grabbed a taxi to the Fedex place. I asked myself if I should take the subway or Citi Bike to work. I tried Citi Bike, though it's a big distance to ride on such a heavy tank of a bike. I rode west (out of the way) to the river and faced fierce headwinds. It's cold, and there was a guy on the path on roller blades going the other way wearing no shirt. The headwinds made it clear it was going to be too much of a struggle, and I probably would have been charged overage for the time on the bike, so I rode back towards the center of the island and caught the subway. After 3.2 miles on the bike, I was 1.4 miles from where I started. Well, I got some time on a bike, so that's OK. And I got to work early since I left home super early.

32F and windy this morning - new tires so looking forward to an end to the flats... for awhile

39F, gray

Spent the weekend completely rebuilding my hybrid, which was in dire need of attention. Disassembled pretty much every piece and cleaned, lubed and adjusted it, or replaced it altogether. New bottom bracket, crankset, derailleur pulleys, brake pads, seat, handlebars, grips, brake levers, and all cables. Even straightened the derailleur hanger and trued up the wheels. Got it all tweaked out and ready to go.

This morning was rain turning to sleet turning to snow. So I couldn't take my freshly rebuilt bike, and had to take the old winter beater with the studded tires.

Rode my bike to my cardiology appointment. I had a stress test scheduled where they run you on a treadmill increasing the speed and incline until you can't go any further. I asked the technician how long people usually last. He said 6 minutes was typical, but sometimes 10. Once he had a guy last 15 minutes. He shouldn't have said that as I took it as a challenge. Was pretty easy until about the 10 minute mark. Around minute 13 it was getting tough. I managed to keep going until the timer hit the 15 minute mark when I finally cried uncle. Had to demonstrate the cardio fitness of us bicycle commuters.

After my appointment I rode to work. Snow is coming down pretty good now. People are bailing out and heading home right and left. We'll see if the snow keeps falling. If it doesn't look like it's going to stop any time soon I may just head home early before the snow gets too deep and work from home so I don't have spend an hour and a half riding home at 6 pm.

The wind really has been insane the past few days, especially when channeled between certain buildings.

Exactly. And that's a scary thing (to me at least). All the giant SUV's that are so popular in the US have had their cockpits redesigned and resized to make them feel more car like, and more comfortable for smaller drivers. Read: women who love to drive those useless beasts, and while they can talk trash about guys in sports cars need to compensate for something, nobody every says anything about them...

I agree and they're beginning to creep into the Medieval streets over here.

A good MTB ride in today. Lovely weather a couple of days past the rain, trying to avoid the puddles in the low spots.

Tomorrow will be a daycare ride. Traffic promises to be snarled. A water main broke closing Folsom road, Hazel construction is in high gear, and on Greenback between them a guard rail is being repaired. These are artery roads with major bridges across the American river and Lake Natoma. I am not sure yet whether I’ll be breezing past cars, or threading through barricades thanks to “share the road” signs.