Uneventful commute today, except for the brutal heat. Our area's typically oppressive humidity
pushed the heat index close to 100°F today. I replaced the old Weinmann center-pull brake pads
on my old Moto GT with some Kool Stop pads yesterday, and this was my first commute with them.
It was good to feel safe again

WTF? Have not commuted in about 2 weeks. Today was hard, I was very tired, winded, yet when I got to work, I realize it was one of my fastest rides! WOW.

Wonderful ride in this morning, like fall. Cool temps in the 70's and breezy. It's also quite a bit darker than just a month ago. I felt good this morning and passed several other riders, however, I made a couple of bad choices on the road in DC. One I got caught between cars on the double yellow line trying to cross 15th street, the second; I cut off a truck that was pulling into our parking garage-bad move. I don't know what I was thinking, but fortunately nothing was that close and I'm here to talk about it. Usually I'm more conservative. I've also concluded that my rear hub has finally kicked the bucket. It's an XT with a lot of miles. It loosens whenever I remove the wheel and now makes a grinding noise. I think I'll replace it with something better as opposed to having it rebuilt. May be a wet ride home for us DC commuters today...

*Unbelievable!!! After crashing on Sunday, The ride in today was Great! I put on New tires on about a week ago... Conti Town & Country... well the Conti Rep was right, I gained about 3 mph on my ride in today... Then of course I was making those legs work harder since I was so jazzed up~!

Ride Safe

Yesterday: Fast ride. I ended up having an easy weekend just hanging at home and doing a few odd jobs, and the 2 days off the bike seemed to give me a lot of energy.

Today: Took it easy this morning. Didn't want to get out of bed, and I think I'll do a longer ride this afternoon on the way home.

What did Greg Lemond say? "It never gets easier. You just go faster."

My ride was very pleasant other than my annoyance at the driver who ran the red light at Vallejo and Land Park. She appeared quite elderly and her car had disabled person plates. She cruised right through the red at 30-35 mph and only after she got 100 yds or so past the intersection I saw her brake lights go on. Well, don't bother now!

Anyway, the rest of the ride was easy and slow. I fell behind a guy on a cyclocross bike who seemed to be going to the Capitol area too. Lost him at a stoplight that I didn't want to sprint for.

Still overcast and foggy this morning. It was nice though, the air was moist and crisp. Had my fastest ride to work yet. As I continue to get comfortable with the roads I should be able to get it down to 30 min. or so. It's a little hard to get out of bed but once I'm on the road I'm lovin' it!

Bennington Battle Day. No work, so I battled through a 28 mile ride through the lovely burgs of Shelburne, Hinesburg, and St. George. I saw a beautiful red-tailed hawk trying to be inconspicuous, while sitting still on a branch scanning a field for breakfast. Some pretty stiff southwestern breezes = not a very fast ride.

Bennington Battle Day? WOW, maybe they will come up with something like that for us people across the lake.

Mexico has Cinco de Mayo; Vermont has Bennington Battle Day.

Funny commute today. One car didn't see me, and pulled out from a side street in front of me,
but I was ready for it. A few minutes later, a motorist stopped in the middle of the street where
there was no stop sign, because I was waiting to take a left across his path. I usually wave these
people on, but there were cars backing up behind me, so I went. Then, after that, another driver
decided to change direction in the middle of an intersection, as I was following behind. She would
have right-hooked me, had I been further ahead.

This evening, I picked up our weekly crop and flower share, so I put the old rack on my bike this a.m.
I strapped the ½ bushel box to the rack, and tied up the flowers in a plastic bag and secured them
through the drops of my handlebars. First time I had done this, and it worked pretty well. My old touring
bike is turning out to be a great utility cycle. All I need now is a trailer.

A wet ride to work. First time in months since there was rain on a ride. Did not really rain on me but fell off trees, splashed off road. Used rear blinker light and most drivers gave me more room and respect.

You guys can celebrate if you want. The battle was, arguably, fought in New York State.

I did have to work, and my commutes were fine.

I made a karma deposit on my ride home. There's a section of trail that can be a little crowded (between the Burlington waterfront and North Beach), and today it was getting a lot of use. I hammered up the brief hill heading north and then waited it out behind a couple of kids riding with fishing poles. Kind of reminded me of when I was a kid.

Then I noticed one of their kickstands was down. (It was the kind that mounts to the rear axle...) When it was clear ahead, I bolted up next to him and said, "Hey watch that kickstand!" He looked down and said, "Thanks!" I watched in my mirror as he stopped to put it up. Might've been ugly if he'd taken a left corner.

Happy Bennington Battle Day!!

My company's moving out of town...they may want me to move with them...So when I was riding through the 'hood I kept wondering could this be the last time I may ride through this part of town...forever.

I wondered what it was gonna be like riding though some multi-laned lilly-white corporate burb. No chuckholes..no fear of getting jumped..no pricks in a beat up buicks trying to knock me into the curb on a busy 3 laner...

My commutes were great. I was late leaving for work this morning but the weather was cooler though still humid. One leg of my commute is on a busy four lane road. The drivers speed and can be obnoxious. But I've ridden enough so that I'm seeing some of the same people repeatedly. And they seem to be getting used to me.

The weather this evening for the trip home was glorious. It rained during the day and the evening air was cool and clear. I can't believe it took me so long to stop obsessing about every little detail and just get on the bike and ride to work.

Nice ride today, and not so hot. Some wind out of the northwest, starting to feel a little like fall? Too many dead skunks on the roads. (edited)

I've been smelling skunks almost every day lately. Haven't seen any though.

A co-worker/friend of mine met me at my house at 7AM and we rode together. Nice ride. Cool, with a light tail wind.

The commute sucked today! Apparently there was some kind of accident on or near the GWB (George Washington Bridge) which caused a ton of traffic to divert itself onto Riverside Drive. My normally tranquil commute turned into a vicious struggle with a55hat drivers who didn't realize that the city speed limit is 30mph and that perhaps they were the ones who didn't belong on that road (seeing as I'm there every day and they, well...).

Anyhow, I was so infuriated by one guy honking and buzzing (yes in an SUV, like you had to ask) that as I was distractedly filtering (traffic stopped at light) past his Rolling Cage of Death(TM) spewing obscenities which I would never use in front of people my bar end caught a mirror (wish it was his haha) and caused a 2mph crash. Bleah. I need to take my own advice and not let this cr@p bother me and STFU. I really lost my patience after like 10 honking buzzers, though. Minor road rash and a nice bump on the knee; nothing I haven't had in all my other 2mph crashes.

Unlike probably 99% of people at work I know where the first aid kit is so it's all well and good now (I used a spare network cable to tie a bag of ice to my knee too ).

At least the weather was excellent, or at least the temp. Around 70deg F.

I came in late to work today, and as a result saw about a hundred times as many cars as I normally do. Seriously, they were backed up in stop-and-go traffic almost all the way to my house. Instead of them passing me, I was zooming past them. (Uh, safely, of course. I wasn't going all that fast, but they were stopped, so I was making some serious time.)

All in all, a beautiful ride in. Until a few blocks from the very end, where I had to hard-brake and swerve to avoid a rollerblader blading the wrong way down the middle of a one-way street. We both tried to go to my right, which didn't work, so he stepped up on the sidewalk, while I hammered on the front brake and ran into the curb. My rear wheel was lifted a foot or so up in the air, but my feet were on the ground at that point, so I wasn't going to go over the handlebars. Crazy rollerbladers. Aw, heck, even after that it was a beautiful ride in. Just a little humbling, getting passed by all the people behind me at the previous red light.

Good Commute this am. Nice and fast. Last night on the way home it was a 30K headwind and this morning it was a nice tailwind. Cloudy and 13C made it a pretty comfortable ride. Regina is hosting the Canada Games right now and my route is just a buzz of activity from dawn to dusk. It is nice to see all the people out however I am looking forward to November and December when everybody starts their hiebernation again. Then I can really kick it up a notch.

So sorry you got hurt! Sounds like a really frustrating ride. I rarely have to deal with traffic as my commute is all rural and residential. You must have felt so violated to see all of those cars on YOUR road! At least, I would have!

Wet, wet, wet going home yesterday. I stayed an extra half an hour at the office waiting for the lightning to move away a little bit (it was too close for comfort), but the rain was still coming down reasonably hard the whole way home. I still rode the long way home - once the shoes are wet, they're wet... may as well enjoy it!

Cool this morning - wore the arm warmers for the first 8 miles. A bit slow this morning too. No biggie - who wants to get to work early?

Hey, good to see that "how was the commute today" is still going. I've had little time to post recently, but promise that I'm still biking to work

Good weather today, so the 105 special got a rare weekday outing. This made for a great ride which simply ended too soon...

Cheers,

Ed

So true. As soon as the lights would go green the cars would turn the street into a highway going 40-50mph (30mph limit -- it's a city street). Invading Vandals and Visigoths I tell you. They're like summer vacation, no class.

It's funny that in the morning it is "my" road in a lot of ways. Sure there are cars, but nothing like today. The afternoon / evening is another story. If I get out a bit early (which would probably still be late for most people ) that street is pretty busy, so in some sense, only one side of it is "my" road.

Dropped the car at the shop and road the Allez home. Stopped for a newspaper, at the bank and at the post office on the way back. From the redlight by the court house, yes this town has a redlight, actually it has two, it's about four miles of non-stop highway to the next stop sign and a little less than another mile to my house. The road that actually runs to my house is sand and when we ride on it the Allez takes a perverse delight throwing me down and making me roll in it. Today we made it all the way to turning in to the driveway before this silly bike got the better of me and slammed me into the sand.

Towel off, clean up the bike, change clothes, followed by a little fiddling around the house and I'm loading the trailer to go fishing. Just for grins, borrowed the wifes bike today, Cannondale Comfort with a top tube length too short for me. Normally I take my Townie3 for this run. The Allez doesn't go because of a 7+ mile commute the first 2+ miles are paved. The other 5 are all sand road, mostly through the woods of the St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge. Do not stop on this road, for anything. This is classic Florida swamp and hardwood and palm hummocks. If you're on a bike and stop on this road at this time of year the deer flies will catch up and cover you. Repellent does very little to keep them at bay because they're very aggressive little biting buggers and you'll just sweat it all off anyway. Left the house at noon, fishing at one. Sand roads, on an upright bike, towing a trailer are s-l-o-w.

Got back on the bike to come home about five. Watched the butterflies jumping off the road as I road by. BIIIG grasshoppers in the road today. What we used to call Georgia Thumpers. Didn't see any rattlesnakes on the road on the way back this time, but did see a wild turkey two days ago.