essiemyra

It was a pleasant commute to work today with the temp at 41 degrees. Due to it being a holiday I decided to take a little longer ride in to work this am.

Tundra_Man 

Consecutive bicycle work commute number 1056:

Got up and felt terrible. I moved some leaves on Saturday, and immediately started feeling bad after I finished: sore throat, runny nose, sneezing, coughing, etc. We haven't had any appreciable rain in a couple months, so I'm guessing the dust and dirt I stirred up really did a number on my allergies.

The client's office was closed today for Native American Day, but the company I work for was open. That means I still have to work for the client today. I decided that I would just work from home, seeing as nobody was going to be at the client's location, and even though I doubt I have COVID, with my symptoms the way they were they probably wouldn't appreciate me showing up at our company office either.

So despite the fact that I felt awful (I think mostly because my symptoms prevented me from getting any decent sleep last night) I forced myself to get on the bike and ride to the client's office, then ride back home. I then proceeded to try and log into the client's system only to discover that my computer at their office had somehow gotten turned off over the weekend. There was nobody there I could call to have them start up my computer, so I had no choice but to get back on the bike and ride to the client's office a second time.

Powered up my computer, and decided as long as I was there I would just stay at the office. Pretty weird being the only person in this huge building.

Over the weekend I posted my latest commuting video:

rhm

It wasn't raining when I left the house this morning.
but drizzle started about five minutes out and stopped after a few minutes.
But it started up again, and got heavier. My windbreaker wasn't much use. I was pretty wet by the time I got on the train, and had to keep active to keep from getting too cold on the train. So I couldn't sleep. Bummer. I need that sleep on the train.

Fortunately the rain had stopped before I left work. Overslept my stop and found myself in Trenton, had to take a train back. Waste of a half hour, but otherwise not a big deal, this is only the third time this has happened to me in over 20 years.

Finally got on my bike for a leisurely ride home. That's when things started to get interesting:




That windbreaker just got a whole lot more useful. I zipped it up, tied the arms together, filled it with puffballs, and closed it off with the velcro reflective straps from my ankles. Rode home one handed, a sack of mushrooms over my shoulder.

It's been a pretty good fall for puffballs. I've served them for dinner maybe three or four times in the last month. But this was too much. I gave away two of the medium sized ones before I got home, then my wife gave away another... so I'm left with the biggest (1895 g) and the smallest (265 g).

Darth Lefty 

That's cool. We get blackberries, of course, and California has a species of bay tree that tastes a bit different than what you get in the baking aisle. There are wild grapes but they're all pit. I have not been on the lookout for fungus, though.

essiemyra

A nice commute though the roads were wet from the rain last night. The temp was a mild 48 degrees.

The other afternoon on ,my ride home some body in the passengers side of a maroon ford explorer screamed out the window in my ear. It made me jump. I hate when I react to those types of annoyances.

Tundra_Man 

Consecutive bicycle work commute number 1060:

First snow of the year! No accumulation though, just lots of flakes falling from the sky. In fact, I'm still on my road bike.

Temp was 33 degrees F, which was two degrees warmer than yesterday morning. Fought the wind coming in to work, which is fine by me because I'd rather fight it in the morning and have an easy ride home.

It's going to be 51F when I leave the office tonight, so I packed a sweatshirt and shorts to replace my jacket and pants. Fall and spring I find myself hauling a lot more stuff as you have to pack for the temperature swings.

bargo68 

Unseasonably warm here in the Bay Area. This was Wednesday night's ride home on the Bay Trail in Richmond.

wolfchistian

Since the pandemic started, public transport seemed dangerous for me, and I started commuting by bike, and I really enjoyed it, it is safer for me, and much more healthy

Tundra_Man 

Nice! Welcome aboard.

RidingMatthew

Is it commuting if you leave in the morning and ride the equivalent of round trip back to the house to start work?

Either way it was pretty dark this morning! Misjudged the need to charge lights. Riding almost 2 hours at a time uses more battery.
One headlight was blinking low battery at me most of the morning.

Darth Lefty 

I don't know when I'll be out there again, we had some family medical things happen and right now I'm full time daycare as well as full time work from home. But I scored a clapped out looking DVO Diamond fork that the prior owner assures me is nevertheless working fine for about a tenth of its MSRP, and so I want to share that with my friends even though it's not really relevant here. DVO's are fancy, heavy duty, fully featured and fully serviceable. It will go on my MTB which is sometimes my commuter, and if this works out well it will probably also go on a later full suspension bike

Joe Bikerider

California Bay Laurel
Umbellularia californica

Tundra_Man 

I count that as commuting. My reasoning was it wasn't my choice that they sent us home, so as long as I ride the equivalent mileage or more before I start work then I've "commuted."

Maybe that puts an asterisk by my consecutive commutes streak, but so be it.

RidingMatthew

Tundra_Man thanks that mean I commut d a lot. I haven't marked them on my tracking apps as commutes.

You might need an asterisk 😁🤣

pdlamb

Yeah, sure, you do the ride around a normal commute time, and you get the distance in.

No, no way, you don't walk around the office in your bike clothes (dripping sweat in the summer), and you've got too much leeway in routing.

On the "Yeah, sure" front I got a nice round trip in this morning (as I have been most mornings), and this one went within 3-4 miles of my office. I usually prefer to go the other direction, out into the country for a third to a half of the round trip distance -- it's a lot nicer than suburban riding!

RidingMatthew

Not sure I am following what you are saying. Are these multiple answers to the questions of commuting or not?

I never walked around my office in bike clothes. That would be awkward 🙂

pdlamb

C'mon, it's high season for politicians. Why shouldn't I get to argue out of both sides of my mouth?

My normal commuting routine (when I had one) was to go to my cube, check email, then down to the shower in bike clothes in the morning. Then change in the restroom near the cube farm in the afternoon before walking down to the bike. Most people got used to it.

Tundra_Man 

That's what I often wind up doing, depending on the location where I'm working that day.

Darth Lefty 

Holy cow, the weather in the plains! Bundle up you guys

Tundra_Man 

Consecutive bicycle work commute number 1066:

15F this morning, with a light headwind. This was my first full-on winter commute of the season. Out came the balaclava, goggles and bar mitts.

We got 4" of snow yesterday. This morning the cold weather turned all the tire tracks and footprints into a rutted icy mess, so I got to jump right in to the thick of things. I took the fat bike. The main roads had been plowed, but the side streets and the MUP had not. It was slow going. There was lots of foot traffic in the snow on the MUP yesterday, so all the frozen tracks made it feel like I was riding across a field of boulders. Took me 40 minutes to ride the 4 miles to the client's office, and I was quite sweaty when I arrived.

Only supposed to get up to 23F today, so there won't be any significant melt-off and I'll probably have the same road conditions for the ride home. It's supposed to get back up into the 40s by this weekend, so I'm guessing the street department isn't going to worry about plowing the remaining roads and they'll just wait until it all melts off.

There were some sheets of ice here and there as well. At one point I felt my front wheel momentarily break traction, but I somehow managed to keep the bike upright. That's as rare as a Sasquach sighting. Usually if your front wheel breaks traction you're on the ground before you even realize it happened.

timebomb

Just did my first commute to work in my life and it was great! It was only 2.5 miles but it's a much more fun way to start the day.

essiemyra

Back at it again after a week off and we went to MI to visit my son and his family. I was able to take my dgd out in the trailer and did some riding that way. Anyway, it was a pleasant ride this morning with the temp at 48 f degrees. The roads were wet from last night also on the last mile it started raining. And still I was happy to be back on my bike.

Tundra_Man 

Consecutive bicycle work commute number 1067:

My son started showing covid symptoms yesterday, which means I am now 100% working from home until two weeks passes, or he gets a negative covid test. Right now he's fighting us tooth and nail because he doesn't want the test. He's too big for me to pick him up and force him to go, so until I figure out some way to motivate him to get the test I guess I'm stuck here. He got my wife's stubbornness, and my tenacity, which means I could literally withhold food from him for two weeks until he agrees to go get tested and he won't care. Unless he wants to do something himself, there's no way anyone is going to force him.

So, I got up this morning and did my usual work-from-home "ride to the office and then turn around and ride back home" routine. It was 12F with a 2F windchill. Still tons of icy ruts from the unplowed weekend snow. Welcome to October in South Dakota.

I took the fat bike and rode 9.63 miles total. It took about an hour and 15 minutes, and I was a bit chilly by the time I got back home. My GoPro battery died, and my rear blinkie battery died during the ride. Perhaps it was from the cold? The GoPro is usually good for about an hour and a half, so I can understand losing 15 minutes of run time due to the cold. My rear blinkie, however, was charged yesterday afternoon and usually lasts for about two weeks worth of use, so it's a bit concerning that it died in a little over an hour. Hopefully it's not going bad.

Darth Lefty 

You guys in the plains are suffering a real mood swing by Ma Nature

Tundra_Man 

Consecutive bicycle work commute number 1070:

Back at the client's location today. My son's covid test came back negative, so I'm off quarantine.

27F with a light wind. Still a little ice here and there from last weekend's snow, but not enough that I had to ride a winter bike. Took my hybrid. Added an extra 2.5 miles instead of going directly to work, simply because I need the exercise.

Arrived a the office and discovered my rear blinky had broken in the "on" position. The button seems to have stopped working. So at the moment it's in my coat pocket blinking away as I figured if I left it on the bike I'd have people coming up to me all day saying, "hey, do you know your light is still on?"

Guess I'll have to order a new rear blinky. I noticed last week that it wasn't holding a charge as well as it used to, so I'm guessing it was near end-of-life anyway. At least with daylight saving happening this weekend it shouldn't be dark during my morning commute next week so even without my blinky I won't be in full-ninja mode.