It is nice to see that your son is taking up bike commuting. I always advocate for bike commuting for my kids (33 and 34) when possible. Though neither does it and they both love to ride.

It was a nice uneventful ride to work today with the temp at 35 f degrees.

When I left the house this morning, it was a dry and a little chilly, not cold enough for a hat. By the time I got to the station, it was snowing. Snowing! And it's only four miles.

When I got off the train, it was cold and snowing, a good thick layer of slush on the bike path, splashed on my shoes enough that I have wet feet now.

Ugh, April!

Generally light traffic, especially since the kids are supposed to be back in school. Brisk with a light overcast, calm.


I had my "incident" for the month (or more, I hope!). Old lady looked right through me, me in the bright orange shirt but on a bicycle, took her foot off the brake and started to turn right. I let her know (gently) that wasn't a good idea.


Flowering woody plant report:
Redbuds are past their peak.
Ornamental cherries are near peak.
Some dogwoods are near peak; the one of four surviving from when we bought our house is just thinking about budding out.
Our camellia is still flowering -- best year it's had for a while! Late in the year for it.
Our big azalea, the one out of 30 or more I tried to plant before giving up on them 20 years ago, is in full bloom. It was hit hard by the fall drought a year and a half ago, barely flowered last spring, and then had a few blooms sporadically last fall. It's back on track, and gorgeous this spring, if I do say so myself.

April in South Dakota: 25F with a strong wind. I left the house and made it about a mile down the road when snow started to fall. By the time I arrived at work in was coming down hard and had covered the ground.

We're not supposed to get a whole lot of accumulation, but about 12 miles to the east they're supposed to get quite a bit of snow. That seems pretty close so it wouldn't surprise me if the system shifted and we see a little more than they predicted.

19 degrees (F) at pedal out time this morning, but no breeze, so not too bad. Yay, spring!


It's still dark at 6am when I leave home, but the sun is up by the time I get to work.

We got an April Fool's not-so-funny joke, 3 inches of snow. Fortunately it didn't stick to the roads and with the nascent tree blooming it looked spectacular. I never stop and take pictures but couldn't help it.

Last Saturday I had a sudden urge to hang up the winter bike in the rafters for the season. I resisted the urge and decided to wait a couple more weeks.

Good thing I did. 28F, 15 mph headwind and 3" of snow on the ground so far this morning and falling steady. The snow was wet and heavy, but the good news was it was mainly collecting in the grass and the pavement was mostly just loose slush. There were a few drifts here and there but for the most part it was pretty easy riding.

Came around one downhill corner and felt both wheels break free, but thankfully it was just for a split second and I was able to keep the bike upright. Pucker inducing but ultimately a non-event.

About a mile from work my rear cassette was starting to pack with ice causing the chain to occasionally skip. Once this starts to happen there's really nothing I've found I can do to solve the problem. In the past I've tried to dig the ice out with a stick or some other sharp object, but once it's frozen enough that the chain is skipping it's pretty well solidified. This morning I just dealt with the skipping until I got to the client's office. They have a vehicle loading/service area that's heated and they let me park my bike in a corner so it should thaw out before the ride home.

Only working a half day today, then I'll ride home back through the mess which by that time is predicted to be in the 6-8" range of snowfall. This afternoon I'm taking my teenage son to the DMV to get his driver's license. It's only a learner's permit which means just the written test, so thankfully he won't have to take the driving test in the middle of a snow storm.

Fargo got a fresh 3'' of snow yesterday, and today the roads are a mix of compacted snow/ice. The temp for my commute was 7° F and with the north headwind going at 20 mph, the windchill was -12°. I wasn't setting any speed records for sure. It's only supposed to get windier as the day goes on, but it'll feel like I'm flying for the trip home.

The calendar says April, but no signs of Spring in sight around here.

That's really pretty. I'll bet you really enjoyed the view.

Nice pics [MENTION=322871]arsprod[/MENTION].

Comfortable 51F this morning. Spring break for the schools this week, so noticeably less traffic for my commute. I mostly avoid high traffic areas anyway, but a couple of crossings and sections are obviously different.

It looks like my bike odometer (or at least my Garmin tracking equivalent) just rolled over to 9,000 miles. The bike was new to me in mid-September, 2016, so a bit more than 18 months old. I gave it a decent cleaning yesterday and then rode through a couple of puddles this morning.

Which reminds me, with the tree pollen scattered all over everywhere, after my tire got wet, it developed a bright greenish-yellow stripe down the middle. I'll need to get a pic of that next time.

[QUOTE=mgw4jc;20261374]Which reminds me, with the tree pollen scattered all over everywhere, after my tire got wet, it developed a bright greenish-yellow stripe down the middle. [QUOTE]


Sounds familiar. The ridge to the east looked hazy this morning, but it wasn't the white-ish haze of humidity, it was yellow-green. We need another weather front over here to clear the air. Again!


Last night was a good ride, and it wasn't because of a tailwind. Rain is forecast for this afternoon, but it spit on me heading to the garage to get the bike out. Fortunately it stopped while I was in there. But I felt like I was riding a strange machine this morning; just couldn't seem to get synched with the bike. Hope that clears up before this afternoon.

I beat the rain coming in. I had shifty winds, but they were mostly from behind, so I moved fast. I'm often amused by what people wear on the bike path. One guy wore a T-shirt and no jacket, no hat or helmet. It was 42°F and breezy. OK, whatever.

It's raining hard now, and it's going to keep up. I have to ride to rehearsal this evening and then home later at night. I haven't decided if I'll leave my bike at work or ride in the rain. I could bring my change of clothes to put on at rehearsal if I get soaked.

38F, clammy, seems like it should have been foggy but the cloud ceiling was very high (although very diffuse)

After 3 nights backpacking and then a 4 hr drive yesterday my back was suffering, and then after a night in a bed killing me this morning, but as I stayed upright around the house it got better and I rode. So, continuing to improve today.

Beautiful day, over 80° when work ended so I tried something new, a run-commute home. It was kind of fun, if slow.
Tomorrow morning, or more likely Friday I'll run up in the morning and bring the bike home. I'm not up to running both ways in one day so I'll split bike-run but I hope to do it once or twice a week.

Last night I moved my Mirrcycle Adjustabell from the straight section to under the left hood. It worked fine in the garage when I tested it without wearing gloves, but didn't work this morning on my first pass due to the glove dampening the action. Unknown cyclist guy, I apologize for the stealth pass.

I rotated the lever and tightened the strap up so it worked great after that. The new position might help me go faster because I didn't have to move my hand off the hood to ring it. Set some PRs even though I wasn't feeling very energetic on an overcast and mostly blah day.

Nice run! Did you take the same route as when you ride? I may consider trying this too. The shortest route possible would still be 10+ miles. I bike that way sometimes, but usually take a longer 12-14 mile route.

I waited out some showers this morning and left about 10 minutes later than normal. Still managed 12 miles and a couple of 20mph miles (probably wind assisted).

Winter came back with a vengeance.

5 degrees F this morning with a -7 wind chill. The plows didn't run so the 4.5" of heavy wet snow we got yesterday froze into a horrible rough layer of rutted ice. Really slowed me down. There was one mile where I don't think I went faster than 4-5 mph on that stretch.

Forecast doesn't look like it's going to get much better in the next 10 days. Cold temps will remain with more snow predicted for Friday and again on Sunday. The weather guy said this morning that it looks like the first half of April in our area will be 30 degrees below average.

That being said, it is South Dakota so on my way home yesterday when we had 4" of snow on the ground, 24 degrees F, 25 mph wind and snow still falling, a jogger passed me going the other direction wearing a t-shirt and shorts.

7°F again today, but the clear blue sky, and light tailwind made the ride really pleasant. Still lots of ice/compacted snow, so I had to be mindful in those spots. Overall it was an easy, really nice ride into the office.

Temps will get up to at least 30° today with clear skies. I expect a messy, melty ride home.

Tundra - you are a beast. And that's coming from someone who usually has crappier weather than you. Good for you to keep the streak alive.

Almost the same route, along the Greenway with a shortcut at the end that cuts off a half mile of parking lot.

I could cut off a mile, maybe more, by taking the direct surface street route. Lots of hills. That's next on my agenda. I'm thinking I can claw back a couple of hours a week of workout time by incorporating "long runs" into my commuting schedule.

Thanks!

40F, misting

Light rain or drizzle the last couple days, not very nice. On Monday I found a bunch of cards --a driver's licence among them-- at the side of the road. Judging by their condition they had been there for a few days. I collected them and mailed them to the address on the driver's licence. I've found cards in that same place a couple times.

Another day where the weather forecast was for doom and gloom and lots of rain, another day where there actually isn't very much precipitation. I'm going to ride my commuter home (took it on the bus in the morning, didn't encounter a drop on the way), even though I discovered that my new gloves don't agree with the Ergon grips (seams rub against thumbs) and I'm still hunting for the right adjustments to the grips, levers, and saddle ever since I removed both spacers from the stem.

24°F with nearly no wind (weird). Yesterday morning's commute was extremely icy, so I expected today to be icy as well. Much to my surprise there was hardly any ice. Although it was quite cold yesterday, the sun was out which melted off quite a bit of our snow from Tuesday.

The big news though, is today was consecutive bicycle work commute number 500. The last time I drove to work was 2/10/2016. I figured a nice round number like this deserved a commemorative photo when I reached the office: