another 5/5 days commute week (still 100% 1/06). going in there was a sewage backflow from two manhole-sewage covers. all was dry exept there. almost lost it on black ice there. all else was dry.
way home traffic was backed up (no pun intended) to a crawl on sh 47. made lane change easy, and the left only signal went i was able to go (thanks to truck behind me to set sensor) BUT a van from opposing traffic started to go staight towards me. i yelled and pointed to signal (left only) and he stopped. earlier, a lady was merging into traffic lane, i had to yell 'yeo" there as well, with effect.
weekend's here, time for so serious riding now!! have fun!

How many miles you gotta ride to work that off?

I lost track of the number of times I almost got sideswiped or buzzed. Weird cuz it usually doesn't happen. Oh well, got home safe so I'm not complaining. Combined w/ the cab I almost rear-ended this morning and you'd think I'd be mildly annoyed, but I just can't bring myself to care too much.

OK, I think these photos are hilarious and stupid, but just so you guys don't think I'm full of ****:

Nothing new to report, so I got a picture of a section of my favorite leg of the commute. The last 3.5 miles through the St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge. There was an unusually high volume of traffic this morning, I got passed from behind by two cars, and by another going the other way, before I stopped to get this shot. Actually, I had to turn around to get this shot. I don't take good pictures facing the sun.
http://static.flickr.com/18/91931246_7073208f76_b.jpg

Great pictures! The dog story is hilarious. Nice, typical Florida road. Florida cracks me up though- what's with the stingy shoulder?- not like there's not enough room to add one.

Didn't have to go into work today but ended up cycling into Boston anyway to drop off paperwork at two locations. This morning finally took some time to tune up and clean off my bike and degrease and lube the drive train. Discovered I had yet another broken spoke on the rear wheel and with the minimal chainstay clearance with the 1.95 studs the wheel had been rubbing. The tire pressure was down to about 25 psi in each tire. Finished the repairs and headed out and couldn't believe how fast the bike felt. Whipped all over town, came back on the bike path, ran into another cyclist for a little bit- a little more camraderie this time of year so good to see other people out there- he said he'd managed to ride most of the winter. Gorgeous night, clear crisp with no wind. Clicked over the black ice with the studs without incident. We've got a Nor'easter coming our way on Monday night.

Six days of riding and five of those were commutes.
I hope the rest of winter is like this .
Have a good nite .

Thanks, Buzzman. Not sure when it passed, I was living in Okinawa at the time, but I understand that the state passed a law requiring paved shoulders on all new highway construction and repaving projects. :)

Somebody told me what the required minimum width is, but i don't remember what it is off the top of my head. I think it's either 3 or 5'.

Further down this road the trees and bushes have been allowed to encroach on the right-of-way up to the white line.

Those are awesome pics!
20mph winds kicking my butt southbound A1A today Whew! :p
about 68* Surf's WAY up. Beach WebCam

www.floridabicycle.org/rights/takethelane.html

Hooked up a canoe behind the Townie this afternoon. Loaded it up with fishin' stuff and headed on down the road. Beautiful ride. A little cool, bright sunny day, with a headwind coming right off the bay. Took me 50 minutes to cover the 7.5 miles. A wee, little bit over 9 mph. I figure that's not bad, considering:
1. A Townie is by no means considered a fast bike.
2. Pulling a 14 1/2' trailer that's easily over 100 lbs.
3. Over 5 miles of that 7.5 are on sand roads, currently in good condition, but still sand.
4. The headwind.
5. I was the pilot to this rig.

Got there and seriously considered turning around and hitting the river because of the wind, but I was already there. So I launched the canoe, locked the bike to a tree, broke the trailer down and stowed it in the bow of the canoe and shoved off. Got a good upper body workout against the wind to get to a tidal creek I wanted to try. No fish, only one strike. Beat it back out against the wind into the next tidal creek, this one with a better, rocky bottom. Again, no dice. Oh well, days like this are very rare for me and the fish prbably need a break, anyway. Got back to the landing and everything put back together.

By now it's close enough to sunset I know I'm not going make it home before dark, so I take a few minutes to break out the lights and put them on the bike and trailer.

Thought I might see more critters out and about this evening, but all I saw on the ride home was half-dozen buzzards on a road-killed raccoon, one squirrel and a house cat that may, or may not, have been feral. Being in fairly close proximity to a trailer up by the highway.

All in all, a very good ride and good workout. :)

Started to commute again a couple of weeks ago after breaking a rib Oct/Nov time. SO good to be back on the bike, the only trouble is the traffic. Ireland's economy has boomed for 10 years and there's so much extra traffic on the roads. I come along a main national route to work (19km/12ml). Managed to drop my bottle when putting it back in the bottle-cage and it rolled out onto the road a bit.....I was going to leave it but got it back - it was scary !! I'll go back home along quiet back roads in the morning after night shift work tonight, looking forward to that.

didn't commute today but had to post this anyway. Did a nice 32 mile road ride going west of Boston where it gets quieter. 51F for temperature! Saw two big deer on the road and then a gorgeous red fox in a snow covered field out by the Great Meadows Conservation Area- it only takes about 45 minutes to bike out there. It can take me almost that amount of time to commute into town in the morning so pretty amazing what a change in direction will give me.

Today was the last day of duck season, but I haven't seen enough around lately to make it worthwhile so rode the Townie to work. Towing my little utility trailer with a cooler and my pack on it, on a paved road, is so much easier than towing a canoe full of fishing stuff down a sand road.

Sloppy weather, heavy overcast, rainy, windy, not cold, though. High today was 69 low tonight forecast to be 56. Had to buck a bit of a headwind going this morning, but flew the Townie home this afternoon with the wind at my back. :D

Went to work for a few hours this afternoon. Nice ride in even though it was raining. Cold, snowy, and windy on the way home. Couldn't get traction on the big hill and had to walk. :(

BTW. The dogs were barking at me something fierce, but stayed in their yard. The invisible fence must be fixed. :)

easy ride... didn't push it considering that i'm still a little worn out from yesterdays 3 hour track adventure. =)

Those are some really nice looking dogs.

I wonder if they will be nicer to you if you fed them some hot dogs or something ?

I would try that.. I bet they would try to hump your leg every time they see you after you do something nice to them like that... most likely they are beaten by their owner on a daily basis ... so they are kind of mean to strangers...

=)

Foggy, warm It was kinda spooky. Don't like riding in the fog next to cars.

Day 2! Cool - upper 30's when I started riding, but was plenty comfortable after about 10 minutes. Came across a small, scattered pile of flat black (matched the pavement perfectly!) 4" jagged rocks on the shoulder of the busy road I travel - probably fell off some truck over the weekend and was swept / blown to the side. Saw it before I hit it, but not early enough to avoid it altogether. Took a pretty solid blow to the front tire. Fortunately there is no apparent damage and I stayed upright. Sure got my attention! Great sunrise brewing as I ended the ride, but I was a bit too early for the real glory. Once again, I'm wondering why I waited so long to start this...

My friday afternoon commute turned into a 3-bar drunkfest ending sometime after midnight. It was really liberating to be able to hop on my bike and hit another pub where some other friends were without hassle. Usually, I know it's time to call it quits when I get to the last $20 in my pocket, then arrange for a cab ride home. But I felt totally free. It was my first time out on my bike for a night on the town, but it'll probably be my last since the wife is back in town and doesn't bike.

-5C this morn.

Thx for postin' the pics Jack, funny stuff.

Nice fast ride this morning. Watched the sun come up halfway thru the commute (10 miles). Spent yesterday evening swapping out my Nokian studded winter tires for the slicks. It's been unseasonably warm here in SE Michigan. ...time for a snack....c u later

Very mild and sticky ride in this morning. Already in the 50's and humidity is sky high. I was sweating early and regretting that I had pants on. Made it in pretty fast today and should have a nice warm ride home, predicting upper 60s here this afternoon. My goal is to ride at least 150 miles a month and it looks like I will get it this month :)

Great ride in today. Sunshine and 40's. Where is everybody? I saw one man walking his dog. He's a regular. Always like greeting him and he gave me a big smile when I rang my new bell. Fun!

I was a little slow today, but pumped it out on the one big climb I have.

Bleagh. I feel like crap today. Even my breakfast Coke isn't rallying me. Everything felt wrong on the way in. Steering too twitchy, seat too hard, knees hurt in weird places, sun too bright, clouds too... cloudy. I wanna go home!

This morning my bike took me to work, instead of me taking it to work. It sailed up and over the hills. It got impatient with stupid, slow, lumbering cars at stop lights.

I think it was happy that I overhauled its bottom bracket on Sunday for the first time in its 25 years of life. The poor thing was dry as a bone... The cups are all pitted.

click...click...clickclick.....KLANG! going up a hill.

Ouch!

It's much happier now with new bearings and packed with grease...

Two weeks ago I overhauled the pedals too, thinking that's where the noise was coming from. I love using tools! A bike shop mechanic sounds like an idyllic job, but that guy at City Bikes (Connecticut Ave at the Capital Crescent trail) on Sunday was not relaxed. He did have the harried, caffeine-overdose look to go with the manic rave music thumping in the background though.

My dear wife bought me a bike maintenance book for my birthday 2 months ago. Why'd I never think of that? Now I have money to buy real tools like a crankarm extractor, instead of hacking at it with a hammer and screwdriver like I did when I was a broke teenager...

I had a very good ride in this morning. In fact, I went back home after dropping my grandsons off at school, changed my clothes and rode into work. The temps are in the 50s with a forecasted high of 63. I just didn't see myself driving on such a lovely day. I also wanted to bike in today so I could past 300 miles for the month. :D

Ahhhh, pretty ride in this morning. We had a fresh coat of snow covering the land and roads (about an inch) and it was only 25F which made it pretty comfortable riding. I debated on my way it to take an extra loop but came direct instead. Dang, I knew I'd regret it. Well, I'll do an extra loop at lunch and take the long way home. Plus the sun is showing it's face, we haven't seen much of that this winter.