My Evening Commute

[Judd]

@LeprosyStudyGroup 149601 wrote:

So as I was crossing the 14th street bridge tonight I gave a habitual courtesy ding of my bell as I passed… a 50 gal. trash bag full of sticks.

Still there when I was on my way home. I thought about stopping to remove it but it was pretty far down the bridge to drag. In hindsight, I guess I could have pushed all of the sticks into the river and taken the bag with me. If it’s still there in the morning on my way in, I’ll take care of it.

[dkel]

@cvcalhoun 149607 wrote:

I have been riding the CCT home every day, often after dark. And it appears that the deer are getting used to me. They used to run away when I appeared. Now, they just stand at the edge of the trail and stare at me. I’m drawing the line, though, if one of them tries to hitch a ride on the back of my bike!

Don’t be naive. They are after blood.

[KLizotte]

@cvcalhoun 149607 wrote:

I have been riding the CCT home every day, often after dark. And it appears that the deer are getting used to me. They used to run away when I appeared. Now, they just stand at the edge of the trail and stare at me. I’m drawing the line, though, if one of them tries to hitch a ride on the back of my bike!

Better to think like Santa Claus and lasso one of them! Think of the speed you could get going up the CCT! Plus you may get lucky and snag one with its own light!

[americancyclo]

@americancyclo 148441 wrote:

Saw a woman on a fat tire ebike coming off the 14th St bridge to the MVT. Maybe a Motan folding fat ebike? hard to tell, but the battery was lined up with the seat tube, which seemed unusual.

It may have been a RadMini Electric Folding Fat Bike.
http://www.radpowerbikes.com/products/radmini-electric-folding-fat-bike?variant=17586850561

[dplasters]

Looks lovely out there. Times up, lets do this.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]12907[/ATTACH]

[notinthe18]

My ride home turned out to be a very pleasant ride in the rain, but I had two (!!!) close calls within about 60 seconds right at the beginning of my ride. The first was a lady who apparently believed (wrongly) that I had not pulled forward enough to let her go right on red (which she wasn’t going to be able to do anyway) and decided to give me a hornful and then a earful. Then a guy in a white sedan decided to swerve around me with almost no room at high speed going south on 21st St. I was fairly shaken but realized he didn’t even have his lights on. Hopefully he, you know, put those on and got home without further incident.

I’ve come to prepare for all sorts of crappy behavior while still hoping for the best from folks; just sort of didn’t think a well lit biker who was completely behaving himself while in very cold rain was going to be a popular target. :rolleyes:

[KWL]

I love riding in the rain. The GW Parkway was packed and slow while the Mt Vernon Trail was sparsely populated. #schadenfreude. And it provides an excuse for me to spend some personal time cleaning up my bike and sipping bourbon.
https://youtu.be/Wn7a-L0KVe8

[huskerdont]

Yup, that was wet and messy. True to form, I was dressed for the morning commute, which was dry, even though I knew it was going to be wet and cold in the afternoon. So I had the very old softshell that is no longer waterproof but has vents, and I didn’t have shoe covers. My shoes filled with water, and the water soaked in the back of my jacket and along the sleeves. Parts of the hands and feet were white and bloodless by the time I was home. And yet it still beat driving.

So I lubed the single speed up a bit when done and discovered that the brake mechanism was no longer centered and I was getting a slight brake rub. That explains why the bike felt slower to me the whole day. What a maroon.

[OneEighth]

Shoe covers wouldn’t have helped me. The water covering the W&OD undepass at Wilson was above my bottom bracket.
That was fun.
And cold.

[dkel]

I really enjoyed not having to lube my belt drive when I got home last night. (I’ll totally understand if you want to ELITE this post! )

[Sunyata]

@dkel 150023 wrote:

I really enjoyed not having to lube my belt drive when I got home last night. (I’ll totally understand if you want to ELITE this post! )

Samesies!

But, my rain pants leaked… I guess I need a new pair.

[Steve O]

@Sunyata 150088 wrote:

Samesies!

But, my rain pants leaked… I guess I need a new pair.

Before you buy a new pair take the pair you have and put them in a hot clothes dryer. That rejuvenates mine. Works on my rain jacket, too.

[huskerdont]

If there’s an actual hole you can seal it with this stuff called Aquaseal, which I’ve used on my dry suit for boating. It does wonders.

http://www.nrs.com/product/2291/aquaseal-urethane-repair-adhesive

[Sunyata]

@Steve O 150093 wrote:

Before you buy a new pair take the pair you have and put them in a hot clothes dryer. That rejuvenates mine. Works on my rain jacket, too.

That would work if it was the DWR that was leaking… Unfortunately, the taped seams are no longer taped on the inside seams. They were cheap and lasted a year, so I guess that is about right.

I have an Endura rain jacket that works lovely, even after two years. I think I will go that route for new pants and hope they work out as well as the jacket has.

[cvcalhoun]

My evening commute last night got complicated after building management stole my clothes!

They sent around an e-mail mid-afternoon, saying that they were cleaning the lockers, and that everyone had to have their clothes out and the locks removed from lockers by 6:00. So I come down a few minutes before 6:00 to find that the lock has ALREADY been cut, and the clothes removed. I learn later that the engineer, who is the one who cuts locks off, leaves work at 5:30, so they’d known from the very beginning this was going to happen at 5:30 rather than 6.

So I try to figure out where my clothes are. They tell me the clothes are now locked in the management office, but that they are perfectly safe, and I can get them back Monday. Yeah, not so much. First off, I am not biking 12.5 miles home in a skirt suit with a relatively tight skirt. Second, it’s freezing, and my warm jacket was among the clothes they took.

After many calls, I finally get someone with a key to let me in. And he lectures me that gym lockers are supposed to be used only while in the gym. Because apparently, after biking in and showering, I’m supposed to take my smelly gym clothes back to the office. (No, there is no shortage of lockers–this is just a matter of principle for building management.) I could do this, since I have a little closet in my office. But I have no idea how they think secretaries, who have neither closets nor offices, are supposed to manage.

I’m not going to battle this one, since we’re moving in two months. But I’m just appalled that a) they would have such a rule, and b) they would enforce it by randomly removing people’s clothes with no warning.

[Author]

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