wphamilton

Looks like I'm commuting again, in an odd twist to the same place! Unless there's snafu in the paperwork and red tape I'll be a consultant for the parent company of the one I just left!

Only half as much commuting though, since I can work remote half of the time.

Darth Lefty 

Wm got poached!

wphamilton

It's a cliche, engineer quits fired or run off, comes back as a consultant in a more respectable role, but to my over-active sense of humor it's really funny. We've got some paperwork/budget hurdles to get over before I can call it a done deal though. Next best has a 20-mile commute into downtown Atlanta

Darth Lefty 

Oh I get it. When my employer announced their move to HSV a couple years ago, one of our customers opened a new location here in CA about five miles away, for the express purpose of retaining the team that was working their programs... and keeping them away from the competition.

madpogue 

Where I work, we administer/support a LOT of vendored apps, and we see poaching, in both directions ALL the time. You see some guy working for the vendor active on their forums, and six months later, you see him again, only with the logo of some customer on his profile. Or a third-party consulting firm. Then you see it vice-versa, the vendor has poached a power-user from a customer. The better players are "adults" about the whole thing, and see it as a part of the business.

mgw4jc

wphamilton - hope it works out to your benefit. And glad you can still bike commute some!

A chilly morning here at about 33F. I was expecting a bit warmer and thus slightly under dressed. But I survived. Blue skies and clear will make for a warmer afternoon commute home. Bike is in need of a cleaning again.

Tundra_Man 

I work for a software engineering consulting firm. Because we do so much work at client locations away from our home office, poaching is a big issue for us. Our contracts with clients have very explicit clauses that they are not allowed to poach our employees. Attempts are still made occasionally, but usually a call/letter from our lawyer reminding the client of the financial consequences to which they agreed when they signed the original contract squashes the attempt quickly.

Consecutive bicycle work commute number 882:

16F this morning, with a light cross wind. Not bad overall. The humidity was in the 90% range which meant my goggles were about fogged over by the time I made it the 8 miles to our company office. Still tons of rutted ice on the MUP and road. At this rate we probably won't see that go away until probably some time in March. I took the fat bike and it really smoothed out the rough areas.

pdlamb

After all the warmth and rain this month (except for last week's frigid temperatures), perhaps we're back to average temps -- 30 to 50F? Without the cloud cover, the temperature can swing a bit more. Downside is only that I brought my warm cycling clothes home in the second pannier last night that would ordinarily be left at work -- such a first world problem.

Came out of the house this morning and, though it's too late for the holidays, started my own lyrics:
Frosted car windshields, that I don't have to scrape!
Every pedal stroke warms me up.
Great commuting, may your ride to work be smooth!
Get my exercise, out to work and back,
And at work I've got
The best parking space.

RidingMatthew

I think every ride last week was below freezing the morning rides were well below freezing and the evening rides were right under.

Yesterday it rained throughout the day but not in the morning on the commute or the ride home glad the weather person was more right than wrong this time.
Rode today and it was nice.

esmith2039

Absolutely perfect! 1/2 to 1 inch of snow and the studded tires just ate it up.. nice smooth ride! The snow did sting the eyes a bit but I survived.

mgw4jc

Temp right at freezing again this morning. Not sure why the Dollar General store has to run a sprinkler in the winter that partially sprays the road creating a nice spot of ice. At least it's not so huge I can't go around.

pdlamb

If they think the water costs less than a service call to turn the water off, wait until a good freeze cracks the pipes. And heads.

Just enough water falling out of the sky this morning to get me on my (previously cleaned) rain bike. Tantalizing watching the blue patches of sky coming closer from the west -- while rain's falling on me. Now that I'm at work, it's probably done for the day.

noglider 

Hi folks! My semester at college started this week, so I'm commuting again. I'm trying new routes. I was taking a 5.7-mile route which included the Greenway, one of NYC's best bike routes. Instead, I'm taking a direct route using streets. A direct route is only 4.3 miles. But it's a bit crazy. Traffic is insane. I have a rearview mirror on my glasses and use it a lot. I'm driving like a motorcyclist, taking any lane, even the middle lane, moving over for no one. This works partly because I'm moving faster than traffic. I'm making an effort to be more careful than before around trucks and buses after learning hearing all the stories of them injuring and killing cyclists.

Yesterday I realized I'm riding in weather I previously considered nasty, but it seems fine to me now. It's cold and windy and damp and grey. But I still enjoy being outside and moving rather than inside and still, breathing bad air.

rhm

Yesterday a pedestrian stepped out from between two cars stopped in traffic while I was riding by on the left. She didn't look either way. I hit the brakes so hard I felt my rear wheel start to skid just before it lifted off the ground... and then I was riding on as if nothing had happened. Whew!

Five minutes later, the same thing happened, but from the other side. Doh!

madpogue 

As long as the sprinkler is running, the water in the pipes won't freeze. And maybe that's why they were running it; they couldn't find the place to shut it off far enough upstream to keep it from freezing, so they just left it running.
I'm seeing this more and more every day, but usu. it's because the ped is looking at her/his phone.

mgw4jc

I don't think they're that smart and it is just on a timer that runs regardless of weather / temperature. I've seen it drain into their parking lot before creating an ice rink. I think it's actually a hose running to a sprinkler head as opposed to an underground pipe system.

TsunamiJobu

1st day back commuting in a decade. 15mi... of rolling hills and headwinds. Felt great... but also hurt a lot. Can’t wait for ride #2.

mgw4jc

An opossum was about to cross the MUP ahead of me but decided not too when he saw / heard me coming. At first I was concerned it may be a much smellier creature and was relieved it was not.

arsprod 

Wow, you picked a helluva time of year to start back - good for you! 32F, no snow, no rain, no wind... close enough to perfect short of being 40 degrees warmer

Darth Lefty 

I went to the hospital this morning for some tests in prep for my implanted defibrillator replacement Monday. Three half-hour waits for 2min procedures, naturally. As it happened this finished up right around the time my 5yo was dropped off at kindergarten. Wife had walked there with the whole crew and the 3yo twins and dogs were playing at the adjacent park, but the 3yo girl twin had become recalcitrant. So at wife's request I picked them up. Twin girl had been crying she wanted to go home, now started crying she wanted to stay at the playground. Wife twisted my arm to go home via Dutch Bros. Girl twin cried the whole way there and back, reaching the point where she was just crying about crying and forgot why. We held back the smoothie because we were sure she'd throw it, I'm not sure she even noticed. All through this, boy twin was just happy as a clam. So when we got home it was 11. Wife parked the kids in front of the TV and I headed out on the bike. and I had a still nearly full mocha frappe' to carry. I slurped it on the way riding one or no handed most of the way, finishing it right as I pulled up.

mgw4jc

Chilly morning at about 31F when I left at 6:15am, but I got too warm by the time I got to the gym. Watched some news and Australian Open tennis while picking things up and putting them down.

Chances of rain later today, but hoping it will be light enough I can ride home at 5.

Tundra_Man 

Consecutive bicycle work commute number 885:

33F this morning, which continues our trend of unseasonably warm weather this winter. This is the 2nd January morning above freezing, which is crazy. Usually we don't even get above freezing in the peak of the day during the winter months. This is the day's high, however, as it should be in the mid to low 20s for my ride home. Which is still pretty warm for us in January so I'm not complaining.

In fact, we've only had about a half dozen or so days below zero this year, and only one day where the high was below zero, which is a pretty low number for us. Compared to last winter where we had around 30 days below zero and 10 where the high was below zero, and I'm living large.

We did get about half inch of fresh powder overnight, which did a pretty good job of camouflaging the icy ruts. Thankfully I didn't have any close calls, but the sudden change in terrain under my wheels did surprise me a few times. Headwind was so light I could barely count it as one.

Got to the client's office and used my badge to get into the building where I park my bike. Then I walked across the parking ramp to the building where I work and the badge reader didn't acknowledge my badge. No response at all, like I wasn't even waving it in front of the sensor. I thought maybe it was just that sensor that was freaking out, so I walked around to all three doors and none of them worked. Apparently my badge decided broke somewhere between the garage and the building. Thankfully a guy inside the building saw me walking around to the different doors and not getting in, so he came to my rescue and let me in.

Darth Lefty 

Some kind of trouble with the light rail this morning. My shortest route is on the artery parallel to the rail and there are four lights with crossings. The first one, where I go across the rails and turn left onto the artery, went fine. The second one was blinking red (stop sign), the third was fine. The fourth is where I turn left off the artery and cross the rail again into work. The gate started blinking and bonging just as I got to it. I looked at the train sitting in its station not moving about a quarter mile up, and rode around the gates. Seven minutes later at my desk a coworker dropped by to tell me he'd seen me do it. He was stuck in the left turn lane in his car, and a few minutes later he'd run it too, because the train still hadn't moved.

madpogue 

^^^^^ Our major central MUP was acquired as an old rail line, and runs parallel to some tracks that are still in operation. The gates and signals are more reliable than in the past, but there's still the occasional false trip just like that ^^^^^ . Cars often have to turn around and cross at other blocks. Fortunately the sight lines are good, and on a bike, or as a pedestrian, you can VERY thoroughly assess the sitch and cross with great care.

I wonder if temperature is a factor, as those false trips seem to happen more often in winter.

Tundra_Man , those cards / readers work by proximity, not movement of the card. I had the habit of wanting to wave the card, increasingly furiously, when the gizme didn't read it. Evidenty a rather common reaction; they guy who manages our system saw me doing it one time, and suggested I just put the card close to it, and just hold it there for an extra second or two. Bink!

Edit - end of the week, and this has to win the award for the most UNeventful winter commute week ever. Totally routine all five days. Appropriate, I guess, on the heels of Ground Hog Day... The only "variable" was today. So far this week, on the ride home, aprx. 18:00 CT, on an otherwise pitch dark and deserted frozen Lake Monona, there's been ONE guy out there, about 100 feet out, with a forehead light and a fishing line, peering through the hole. Today was the only day he wasn't there :shrug: .

mgw4jc

Looks like a warm week with the lows not even below 50F each morning. There was a nice sunrise this morning.


Pause on the ride to take a sunrise pic.