I guess it was a holiday yesterday, that explains why I was so all alone. Snow on the Flatirons this morning but only a little bit of drizzle on the ride in. Rode the yellow duck bike in again so it was a slow ride in. Saw a fixed-gear rider with full fenders (Bianchi Pista? or San Jose?) - cool.

Had to stop by my LBS, so that added 8.5 miles for a total of 27 miles for the day. Nice ride, a little nippy with some breeze. I need a rain/wind breaker and rain pants... Went to my LBS because I had noticed wooble on my back wheel... up and down. Turns out the reflectors attached to the wheels cause this! I took both of them out (I wear enough reflective material to be mistaken for a UFO... :D )

I felt like I could go just about anywhere in town on my bike... I felt strong... that is a powerful feeling. People at work are starting to ask questions about my bike commuting. At least one has expressed interest in starting himself. Last week I saw another employee leave the building on his bike (had never seen him before). And the building's facilities manager told me that management has decided to buy a bike rack which will be coming within the next couple of weeks. yay!

GreenAnvil

Yeesh... today was okay. Temperature was good but due to cloud cover the sky was pretty dull :(

Hoping for better coming soon :)

To all Phoenix, AZ area commuters out there: Ain't this time of year the best or what? :D This is why we live here, this is why we endure those long brutal summers. So when things finally cool off we can go outdoors and ride and hike and play golf and play softball and frickin' play until we can't help getting that silly Joker grin.

Looked out the window at 8:00 this morning and the sun was shining low, illuminatiing any and everything that strange autumn gold. Temps were absolutely ideal, in the 70's, little to no wind. :p

I've been laboring in the commute to work lately so I cut the weight of the item with the most mass, my Kryptonite New York U-lock. I left the shackle at work and carried the D-bar along with my lunch and clothes in my backpack. And wow, it almost felt like I wasn't carrying anything.

Tonight on the way home I changed my route. Instead of going around the AZ 101 staging area just west of 79th Ave and Union Hills, I in my perhaps unwise, foolish, newbie wisdom went straight for that 101 junction. The traffic was tight, lots of cars but not going at high speed. Made it through with no horns or pleasantries. Probably will do it again, the traffic flow and pattern is much less complicated and slower going in this direction, westbound, as opposed to eastbound.

Wow, a month ago was terrified of doing this. So far I'm having a ball (knocking on wood).

Not bad. Evil headwind, but I plowed through it. 50F. 5 miles of MUP, and I only saw 1 pedestrian and 2 cyclists. All 3 are "trail regulars."

Had one brain-dead cager incident. I guess my 13W halogen and high-viz neon green jacket just weren't quite enough to be seen through tinted SUV windows (because what's an SUV without tinted windows?). The driver backed out of a driveway right in front of me. Idyllic residential street with no other traffic around. I had plenty of warning because of the vehicle's back-up lights and the fact that it didn't seem to be slowing as it rolled toward the street. I didn't skip a beat. I just smoothly steered left around it. The driver decided to brake at that point, but I was already around it. :rolleyes:

In hindsight, I should have gone up on their lawn and skidded to a stop. :D

Yesterday, a young woman was trying to take off her jacket as she was riding. :eek: She was all over the place. I stayed behind her for a while, expecting her to crash at any minute. She finally gave up with one sleeve off, and then noticed me back there. She apologized and I said, "No problem. Don't crash!" She laughed and said she was trying to take off her jacket. I just said, "Yep...", and dropped her.

No commute today as my wife woke up right around 4:30a and refused to let me ride under a mild thunderstorm... She drove me to work.

GreenAnvil

Tried out my silk baselayer today - just under an alert shirt nothing more. Wanted to see how it breathed and all. Perhaps it was a little too warm for this test. Silk is warmer than my polyester base layers. And it wicks quite well - which is a darn good thing but it was too warm for this test to today. Did I mention that silk is warm? :o

OTOH - wind goes right through it so when using my silks I will need a wind barrier ...

Lots of rain and some lighting today made me turn today into 'errand day'. Had to drive in, so no biking.
Sniffle....I miss my bike already.

Woke up at 3:15 (1 hr early). Headed into work and had a lovely cool ride.
Was a bit windy up north but all was well when the wind turned warm. My goodness, there is even less traffic that early in the morning.

Awesome ride in this morning. Got to see a red tailed hawk up close and personal too. About 5 miles into my commute something moving caught my eye. It wasn't the normal movement of cars, trucks, or ground based animals No sirree. This was above my head and moving towards me :eek: It was a small red tail with a wingspan of maybe 3 feet. I could see each tail feather since he was so close.

Luckily he went right on by. I don't know if he was just crossing over to the woods or if he was checking out the new animal moving at about 20 mph ;) Anway...cool experience.

Walked out to the garage to grab the bike, and I found the rear tire flat :(. Added 10 minutes to the commute :). I was passed by another rider on the way up the middle hill, and it gave me the incentive to get moving faster. I stayed with him the entire way.

I am really liking the L&M ARC HID light I picked up last week. It really makes a difference. Cars definitely see me now.

The commute today was not what I expected -- but it was nice. I did the Melton's ride last night and got home too late to do my house-husband chores so did them this morning. I planned on driving :o but I guess I was supposed to ride. I got in the car, turned the key, and only heard a single "click" and then silence. Dead battery.
Went inside, changed into my riding gear, packed my panniers, and left the house much later than usual.

Nature encounters can be so cool - you've surely seen the many deer that hang out along the Greenway. Sort of scary when they are right by the trail and suddenly decide to flee when you are say 15-20 feet away. :eek:

Once in college, I encountered a bird of prey of some sort. He was perched on a limb 10 feet or so ahead of me. Right at eye level and about a foot off the path. We had a staring contest for a bit. I decided he was ok with me so I starting walking towards him to get class. He spread his wings out to the full 30-foot wingspan (so it seemed) and sort of squawked. I skipped class.

Overslept and drove in. Whatan eyeopener!
##########################################
Leaving home 42F
half way in to 38F!!
arrive @ work 35F

Gaaaa no wonder I've been freezing after "warming up"...a 7degree difference!!!!!!!!!!

Had some fun last night and this morning dodging cars. On my way home last night some woman in a small sedan pulled out in front of me to turn left and I missed her by a couple of feet. I yelled at her but she kept going which was probably a good thing since I most likely would have hit her if she stopped. This morning I had some guy in a sedan pass me in a downtown 25mph zone while I was going around 23-24mph. I was taking up the whole lane and the guy buzzed by me on the left way over the double yellow. Didn't get his license plate and tried to track him down at the next light but didn't see him. Then I had a truck try to pull out in front of me near a gas station and I had to really yell for him to stop and let me by. I don't think he had any intention of letting me go by since he looked very mad when I passed by making him wait. One of these days some idiot will pull out too close and I will hit them, it's only a matter of time. Other than that the rides have been great :p

It's been really nice weather lately. Mid to high 50's when I leave my house, and mid to low 60's by the time I get to work. Today was really fun. No honking semi's, no close calls at all. Minor tail wind the whole way in. It's about a 23 mile ride one way, which is just enough to make me feel like I've ridden.

I've been off my bike for awhile, and really thought I would have slid further back than I have. My cardio is still there, because I have been jogging, but my legs initially just weren't up to snuff. That's changing really, really fast, almost daily even, so I'll probably be back where I was in a month or so.

The bad was roadkill... normally it's no big deal, but something about a cat or a dog that just bums me out. House cat, dead, mile 16. Bummer.

ActionJeans, I just noticed your latest post.
What part of Atlanta do you live in?

Perfect morning: 52F, calm, and bright blue skies. For the first time in forever, all my bikes were in working order and ready to roll. I chose the Novara, because I spent a few minutes last night putting her back in roadie form by taking off the aerobars and swapping back the straight seat post. Man, that baby is fast and light.

Adventures in trackstanding: I was waiting at a light and had a good trackstand going when I hear the buzzy mumble of a too-loud iPod come up from behind. Twenty-something hipster on an older Cannondale wearing tastefully torn Carhart workpants, Chuck Taylors, no helmet to mess his perfectly tousled bed-head, and the aforementioned iPod. He rolls in front of me and stands as if to trackstand but it's not holding and he goes into a lazy circle in front the line of cars. I usually keep an eye on the pedestrian light to get the timing of the green and realize it's almost ready to turn. Just as Hipstserboy's in the middle of the lane and facing backwards, the light goes green. I take off and as I'm clearing the intersection I hear cacophony of car horns.

Way to go, kid.

Did my first cheat commute today. (drove partway, parked, unoaded) Downer-I only ended up going about 3/4 of a mile. Upper-it took about 4 minutes so Maybe I should re-evaluate my parking place in the morning.

Live in Marietta, on Roswell Rd. Commute to downtown Atlanta via Atlanta Rd. (go figure :)

I'm impressed. I live off Timber Ridge and Roswell Rd. (HWY 120). Almost in Roswell. I go north to Alpharetta.

Hey Rose, just so you know, it seems to me that my lights, reflective sidewall tires, and reflective strips here and there, seem to have a much greater effect on motorist during the evening, than in the middle of the day. I get close calls probably once a week on the way in (sometimes many more, school buses really need to realize that a side mirror missing my face by 3 inches at 20 mph can be very disconcerting), but at night, on the way home (I get off at 9:00pm, so no chance of me EVER riding home in the light), I have people giving me wide births, and usually very few close calls, simply because I am glowing.

Key thing to remember is motion. You know how on jogging shoes, they have that little reflective emblem on the shoes? You'd think it wouldn't do anything, that a splotch of reflecto stuff that small would make little to no difference. But it registers instantly in most motorists’ minds as being the motion of someone running, so they tie that to a person, and hence drive accordingly.

Same thing with a bike. My bike shoes all have little glowy things on the rear of them, and as mentioned, my tires have reflective sidewalls. Add a blinking rear light, and the thing that will pop into most people’s heads, rather than being "what in the heck is that glowing thing floating down the road" becomes "oh, that's a guy on a bicycle". How they react from there is, well, let's say it can vary greatly, but usually it's the correct response.

So if you need to convince yourself, or you're husband, just remember that lights are always much brighter at night.

Nice morning. Foggy then burning off to sun. I picked up a thumbtack at one point, but it seemed to be filling its hole well so I went ahead and tacked (so to speak) another 6 miles onto my commute (3 miles past office). Pulled the tack when I got in, psssssssssst will fix the flat later.

Congratulations. :beer:

How far did you drive?

That sounds scary. Stay safe.

Many cycling shoes don't have enough reflective material so I add a piece of reflective tape to the back of all my commuting shoes.

Beautiful ride this morning, once I got rolling. Was starting late anyway, and realized as I was ready to go that my headlight was dead. It's a 2 bulb Cygolite, with one bulb already down - guess the other one died too. Had to take a few minutes to move my backup light off my mountain bike. Then realized I had a loose spoke (regular occurrence - have an apointment for the front to be relaced tomorrow) that needed tightening lest it cause ANOTHER flat.

Weather was beautiful this morning, I dressed just right for mid-fifties (remembered socks!) and had a great ride. First ride on my overhauled rear hub and freshly lubed freewheel - SWEET and SMOOTHE! Can't wait for the ride home...

It may not be the bulb, but the switch instead. I had the same Cygolite and the switch is just a plastic slider that makes two metal flanges touch to complete the circuit. One of the flanges can get bent so that no contact gets made. I called Cygolite about it and they suggested taking the thing apart and then bending the contacts gently with a needle-nosed pliers so that they connect more firmly.

Thanks - hadn't thought of that. I'll look at it tonight. Was hoping to tackle the front hub, but it can wait - visibility matters!