Great weather...startled a dog sleeping on his driveway. The look on his face when he first woke up was priceless, like "Uh what am I supposed to be doing again? Oh yeah! Barking and chasing you!" It was a half-hearted chase, and then he was all "To hell with you, I'm gong back to sleep." Poor thing.

Thank god the weather is better. A comfortable 70 degrees on the way in this morning.

Thanks... I think I have one of those laying around. May give it a shot. Got tired of the messenger bag yesterday...

No way! Just work a planned rest day in there occasionally and you'll recover just fine, and find yourself getting stronger and wishing for longer commutes... I guess you could call that "not riding so much"...

Wind was back yesterday Ride home was painful and hot, but I made it. And somehow managed to feel good when I started out this morning. Made decent time this morning, tailwind helped me up a couple of small, steep-ish hills that usually kick my butt. The downside is that tailwind will not be a tailwind on the way home tonight

I've had fun with animals the last couple days. Yesterday was amazed to see a half dozen or so wild turkeys in a front yard on my way in. Today I scared a crow as I rode past, and mooed (sp?) at a small herd of longhorns that I haven't seen before. They must have just been moved to that particular field, or I'm simply oblivious to the world around. Both are equally likely...

No ride today. My wife has today and tomorrow off because she's working the weekend; we try to get these days together. Probably a good thing I didn't ride, as my legs were very tired on the ride home yesterday (15 mph headwind didn't help) and a fellow commuter reported that there's acrid smoke in the area because of the wildfires to the east.

Second commute this week. I want to spend time with the family this weekend so I am moving my miles around mainly during the work week. I should only need to ride 31 miles on Sat to hit my 250 weekly mile goal.

Nice windy commute this morning. I had to move my seat post down a tad since it was aggravating my knee injury from 2 weeks ago. I think I was hyper extending my knee a small amount.

My new saddle is here! Woohoo! Sella Italia Flite. My BG Comp from the DOA Langster and my rear never managed to get along.
I am trying to determine why I can ride centuries without any rear discomfort but always at the same spot on my commute home my back starts hurting. Roughly mile 53 for the day.

On the evening commute last night i shredded my front inner tube. The front tire went flat at a very inoportune moment and i had to go about 10m or so until it was safe to change it. I did the old inner tube swap and was on my merry way. When i went to patch the punctured tube, there were no fewer than 5 holes. There were 2 sets of what i'm assuming are pinch flats which probably developed as i rode on it flat. Anyways, i needed 3 patches and now i need a new patch kit. And i should probably replace that tube...

grrrr today was frustrating. 2 days ago I picked up an old Schwinn Suburban to replace the wal-mart bike I'd been riding. I stayed up late last night getting it ready for today. I rode it around last night when I was done making last minute adjustments. This morning I get up get ready pack my bags and head out. I make it two blocks and my rear tire goes flat

Not to big a deal I have a patch kit and pump with me. I find a spot under the tree and start pulling the tire off. Once i get off I realize the PO had put an inner tube that was to large on the bike . I go ahead pull it off find the puncture and patch the tire. I pump it up to make sure it'll hold air then reassembled everything. I re pump the tire and take a moment to chillax. I hop on the bike and the tire is going flat again

I was only two blocks from home so I walked my bike home removed my bags, tools, and pump from the Schwinn and installed them back on the Wal-mart bike. I was pissed off by the whole situation and I pushed it pretty hard . . . . .made it to work in record time. lol. I hate to say it but the wal-mart bike bailed me out today. I'm thinking a may not take it back to the store now and just keep it as a back up.

Looks like the next thing I'll be buying is some puncture resistant tires and some inner tubes that are the right size.

It's been cool and wet all week and the riding has still been pretty nice... the sun has come out today and it looks like we'll be getting some spring time temperatures.

I keep tweaking out the commuter / tourer and and loving the little changes like the new triple, new brakes (Avid Shorty's), and a new stem which is a little shorter and a little taller and has really made for a perfect fit on the bike.

I'll be taking the long commute through the valley as much as possible now and look forward to the nearly 1000 foot climb to get out.

Nice sunny ride, 40F. Much smoother today than yesterday, pumped the rear tire back up from 15psi to 50!

I did my first bike/train commute with my new folding bike today. Everything went pretty smoothly, although going home tonight should be interesting; the trains are always far more crowded then.

More north wind. I'm just losing my mind with this frickin' wind.

Yes, indeed there is, and it stinks. I walked outside at 5am and had to walk around my house to make sure none of the neighbors houses were burning. That toxic smell of house fire scares me.

The ride in was great. I saw 3 bikes today .. woohoo! A record for this week. One guy wasn't too friendly though; I gave him a wave and said g'mornin' and he looked like he thought I was gonna mug him. The air was smelly, but it's a cold day compared to how the week started.

Great ride this morning. A little warm (not compared to Midwest and East Coast, though), but pretty calm and chatted with another friendly cyclist at a stoplight. First time that's happened.

Nicest Morning of the Week here. The breeze was in my face but mild and welcome. I was kinda doggin it for the last mile though...this is my first week where i've ridden all 4 days of the week so far and I think i'm feelin it just a little. Still, I'd love to make tomorrow my first full week with no car.


And man did I ever see a lot of Roadkill today. Nasty stuff too. Like pancake squirrels and birds that weren't quick enough. Worst was this ultra nasty Opossum that was way fresh...he was basically riped in half and you could totally see his severed spinal cord. ew. I'm takign a different route home.

Had the heart monitor on for the first time this morning, clear and warm. Only hit 140 bpm, downhill. Uphill on the way home should be interesting.

Where do you come out that has that much elevation?

Didn't commute by bike today, since I was feeling a bit wrecked this morning. Thought I was getting a little case of influenza. Feeling a lot better now, went to the local hardware store (by bike obviously) to get me a bunch of nuts and bolts for mounting the luggage rack. By now, the luggage rack is mounted, looks a bit weird in my opinion since I'm not used to the bike looking like that
Anyway, tomorrow morning I'll be working on my commuter bike, making sure the cables are in tip top shape again. Will change the cables in a couple of months though...

definitely lots of smoke out there. I was out at 6am with my son mowing our lawn (with my new scythe - ask and I will tell you all about it if you'd like!) and it was think and stinky out there - I thought someone had a house fire or something. Today is the one day per week I go into work late, so I didn't ride in until 1:30, but smoke was still prevalent and getting worse I think. We have a 'Red' ozone air quality alert right now and I think it is well over 151. They are predicting it for the overnight and tomorrow as well. I was fine biking in today, so I guess it will be OK tonight and tomorrow as well - maybe...hopefully

Dang it!
Windy as all heck. Plus, my saddle slipped a couple weeks ago on a century and I adjusted it a tad too high. The end result was my knee hurting like heck. It reappeared again and made this commute very painful. I do think I finally have the height dialed in for my seat post and the new saddle but my knee was so far gone that I won't be able to tell if it works till next week. I am taking the geared road bike tomorrow. Annoyed knee + properly fitted bike + gears + coasting = good.

Windy day today, in Milwaukee. I've been lucky enough to miss the storms on my way in and out...

Nothing of real significance to report, outside of the fact that I'm starting to get into better shape. My 8 Mile commute has been roughly five to seven minutes shorter, on average, every day this week.

didn't get to ride today, which was lame. I spent the whole day thinking "I can't believe I drove my ***king car today." But I keep hearing you have to take a day off every now and again. So there I was... Watching my gas gauge slowly move southward the whole way.

Back on the bike tomorrow morning, for sure. Funny how quickly you can come to despise something you spent 11,000 dollars on. Now if I could just figure out how to put the damn rack on my cannondale. Pretty sure it's impossible, haha...

Fantastic day today.

Nice ride in, and then I had a meeting over at a different office 15km away. Hurrah! The perfect opportunity to put in a perfectly justified 30km on the bike in work hours.

And nice weather too - bit of a headwind, but nice and sunny without being hot. Lovely.

Hey all, I haven't been here in a while but it's cool to see so many new commuters posting! Welcome to the addiction! Hope you enjoy your stay.

I've still been at it but feel like I must be growing bored with my commute. It's far less eventful than riding in Rochester was. So I have been entertaining myself by riding as much of the ride as I can with no hands. I can do about 80% easily, I could do more if I didn't have to stop every once in a while or go up a couple hills.

Another way I have been livening up the commute is breaking out the cruisers on the sunny days. This is what I rode to work today:

loaded with all my regular commuting gadgets. Sticks out like a sore thumb at the bike rack at work:

Almost as bad as the bike I rode last Thursday:


Keep on rollin

It's Friday!!! Great temp out there this this morning. Today makes 15 out of 20 work days I've ridden this month. I'm damn proud of that. As long as I stick to my plan, I'll be a full-time rider next month. The "spare tire" isn't coming off as quickly as I thought it would, but that doesn't bother me anymore; I'm riding and I feel good.

In other news, I saw 5 other bikes today that I haven't seen before. Less carbon waste today ... nice!