I hope it's just a little metoprolol and not something vital.

I usually notice quickly when I set out on my bike and have not taken my camzyos. If I am driving, I might still forget. When I forget, and I have one handy, I try to remember to eat one at lunch time. Then it's still effective by the next morning, and I make the same mistake again. If I've still forgotten by evening, it feels wasteful to take if it's only eleven hours til the next one and seven of them are sleeping. So I'll tough it out til bedtime and put it off until the next day. I have enough of a backlog now, and I do this often enough, I should carry some in my laptop bag.

It was just my blood pressure meds: metoprolol and amlodipine. Not as critical as my warfarin for my mechanical heart valve, but not something I should be skipping on a regular basis either.

Consecutive bicycle work commute number 2041:

By the time I was going to ride home from work yesterday the temp was down to -10°F and falling. Past the double-digit threshold my wife has declared, at which point I need to take the bus for part of the commute. However, I was going to have a tailwind. I decided to ride the whole way and ask for forgiveness later. It actually felt a lot warmer than the morning's commute where I was fighting the wind. Much to my surprise, my wife didn't say anything about me riding the whole way.

Overnight the temp hit -15°F, but by the time I got up it had warmed to -12°F. Once again I was "supposed" to take the bus. However the wind was only 7 mph, and was going to be a cross wind. I decided that the previous night's ride home made me confident I could easily handle just two more degrees colder. Also, my wife was still in bed when I left the house, and wouldn't know my plans until it was all said and done. So I rode the whole way to work.

The ride really wasn't bad. My goggles icing up were a bit of a problem, but I've resolved that to be an unsolvable issue when the temp is negative. Also one of the plastic clips on my Ortlieb bag must not have liked the double-digits-below-zero temps, and snapped when I tried to open it at the office. So I need to order a replacement clip.

Rode today. Someone drove across the foot bridge. This is not unusual- it’s a park and they drive in emergency or maintenance vehicles. But it was still funny to see the tracks in the bridge frost.

It's 17ºF and slightly windy, and I do not have the clothes to handle those conditions. @smaug1 recommended that I buy some massive Wisconsinite mittens. They arrived in the mail today. Maybe they will help.

This is colder than normal for this area. We had a small snowfall recently, and it is now a layer of ice on the ground, and that's another reason not to ride in this brutal city.

A balmy 16 degrees (C) this afternoon. Didn't even need my full finger gloves. Days are getting longer, too, and it's no longer dark until I'm fairly close to home now, which is nice.

Got three weeks of holiday coming up for Chinese New Year as of this weekend, so I'll be off of commuting (but certainly not riding!) until mid February.

Rode today. Cold, for here. Around freezing at dawn. There was frost early. By my ride around 8:30 it was still frosty in the shade but gone anywhere the sunshine touched

Too many mornings below my cold weather threshold of 5° F.So I am using my wife's recumbent exercise bike and voice typing this as I pedal for 35 minutes to match my commute time.So far the pace and the distance displayed on the fake bike seemed to match my actual pace and distanceBut of course no hills but no coasting either.The weather here in Colorado Springs is a little colder than usual this winter So I may have to resort to this a little more often.

I was wondering how to fit the time into my morning routine since I still have to spend time driving to work and then I realized I could do my morning reading on the laptop sitting next to me hands-free while I'm peddling which is what I am doing right now.



it's been 10 years since I haven't had studied snow tires and I used to do our treadmill in the winters. Back then I would have the TV on but inevitably I would get bored, stop and get off.But if I can pedal and do my morning reading on the internet This might work out for the few daysIt's below my cold weather threshold.

seriously, I am still peddling as I type and post this.

Rode today. Not as cold

Crashed last night. My headlight battery gave out on the way back from pub quiz. My new .sig file notwithstanding, the moon was not out. I was using bike trails to avoid cars but it was pitch black. I rode right into the last bollard where the last bike lane dumps into my well-lit neighborhood. Ass over teakettle but little damage. Walked the bike to the first street light and straightened out the steering. Pretty good bruise and maybe sprain to left pinky knuckle, which might have been the point of impact, as I'm having trouble finding any other damage to the bike at all and all my other aches and pains are secondary. My head didn't hit the ground but did touch down and scrape. Helmet lost its peak, which I did not realize til I got home, and did not see it at the crash site this morning. But if I did, it's broken anyhow, the little peg that holds it on is still in the grommet

Headlight is now charging.

Hoping your injuries stay minor.

Darth Lefty, I'm very sorry that happened! You'll replace your helmet, right? I hear that's what we should do because they're designed for only one crash.

Probably not, because it's only scuffed, and I'm a hypocrite

If you don't buy yourself a helmet, I'll start a gofundme, and we will buy one for you.

What I really needed last night was a helmet for my pinky knuckle. I remember I also hurt my hand on my last good surprise crash a few years ago. I considered then if I ought to be wearing moto gloves with armor, but dismissed it as silly. Of course that wasn't really the problem

drove instead of riding Wednesday, did not want to deal with black ice. More scheduled for next week, might have time to put studded tires on this wknd. I did ride today, 38F and fog. Just got missed by a 17' truck that drove up to and right through a stop sign as I was going past in the bike lane. Heard his whole load slam forward as he braked...

Well, this one feels really great, even though it's a regular commute to work, something I have done who knows how many times before.

On 13.10.2024. I walked down a set of stairs in a residential building when light went out, I thought I had reached the bottom of the stairs and stepped forward... there were two or three more so I stepped into nothing. Fell forward and in the process rolled my right ankle in all possible ways and directions. They say there is a standard ankle sprain and high ankle sprain, with the latter requiring longer to heal. I had both, and possibly invented another two or three more in the process.... Walked with a hiking stick for almost three months (had to, couldn't rest or have any kind of cast) and I am still walking with a limp.
But it felt like the time has come, so I woke up this morning and cycled to work. Ankle will take time to heal completely (it hurts a little now, but in a good way if that exists), but the joy, oh the joy...

Go, man, go!

Rode today. Cold again. Weather coming in on the weekend into next week

Consecutive bicycle work commute number 2045:

At 8 AM this morning I had a dental appointment to get a crown to address a cracked tooth. This was the first crown I've ever needed in 55 years of life, and I was a bit nervous about the procedure. I was also a little apprehensive for the commute, as it was going to be at a different office than my usual dentist, and that office is not in a very bike-friendly area which I would be traveling through at rush hour. I came up with a route that was the best I could make of a bad situation, which involved a bit of back-tracking.

The temp when I left the house was 19°F with a strong headwind. However, there was no ice or snow on the ground so I used this as an opportunity to take the road bike. That made fighting the wind a bit easier. My thighs were pretty chilly when I arrived at the dentist from that wind.

I pulled out of my driveway and my headlight went flying off the mount. This mount has been getting looser and looser as of late. When the light hit the ground it went dim. After that it wouldn't get very bright, and kept shutting itself off after a minute of use. I fought with it most of the way to the dentist's office, until about a half mile away when I remembered that I had a backup light on my helmet. I ordered a replacement light and I'll have to use my backup until the shipment arrives.

Getting the crown wasn't all that pleasant. I've never had a lot of luck with novocaine completely numbing my teeth. Mostly I laid there trying to keep myself calm through the pain of the drilling. I like to think of myself as a pretty tough guy, then something as simple as a dental procedure shows me how much of a wimp I really am. They were able to save a good portion of my original tooth, so the final bill was less than they estimated. Also, they let me go watch the milling machine as it made my crown, and that was pretty cool to see.

Afterwards the ride from the dentist office to my company office didn't have much in the way of routes that didn't involve very busy streets. I took a couple of back streets where I could, but a lot of it was on a major artery. I had a driver of a courier van rev up their engine and then intentionally close-pass me. Jerk.

Once the novocaine wore off my tooth started to throb. I'm hoping it's just complaining a little and will calm as the nerves settle down.

Took the studded winter bike. 12F with packed snow on side streets for the first half of the commute. As I approached downtown I took a bike path I usually don't take, but I saw it had been plowed. It leads to Pikes Peak east of downtown where they put in three blocks of separated bike lanes. Those were not plowed but the streets were clear. America the Beautiful Park and the Midland Trail were also plowed...in fact I saw the mini-plows plowing part of another trail. ~20F when I rolled up to work.

It had snowed all day Saturday so I did the stationary recumbent in the basement. I forgot my main laptop's screen comes off to work as a tablet (Microsoft Surface Pro). It just fits on the trough below the screen of the stationary bike. I watched dash cam videos Saturday. Sunday I watched those incredible descent videos on the SAFA Brian Youtube channel. Those got my cadence up quite a bit.

But being on the bike outside in the cold and on the snow felt liberating.

And now, I leave for the ride home. It's back down to 33F from today's high of 43F.

Studded tires...do your thing!

Rode today.

On the return leg there was a dude being picked up by the cops. One dude, four cop cars and a motorcycle

That reminds me of a joke:

I was riding home the other day when I saw a guy getting beat up for four other dudes. I decided I couldn't just ignore the situation, so I jumped in to help.
He didn't stand a chance against five of us.

Rode today. It's one week since finding the bollard in the dark. Hand still hurts, but that was really it.

Last night, I rode to rehearsal and back. It was about 35º and somewhat windy. I wore my new mittens for the first time. And for the first time, my hands were not cold. The mittens are comically enormous, but I guess that's what it takes. Thank you Smaug1 for recommending them. It takes a Wisconsinite to know good mittens.

Finally got to ride to work yesterday, temps were around 7*C both morning and evening so I could ride in my summer road gear with added sleeves and light full finger gloves. Favorable winds and the need to get to work faster (I forgot my keycard and getting a temporary one takes time) got me a commute PR I had to take it easy on the way back but at least it's 85km added to monthly total, which is lacking compared to last year.