musings on precipitation

For now the second day in a row, I drove to work. Yesterday, I had a marginal excuse--I had a case of light bulbs to take to my office, and they don't fit on my bicycle as currently configured.

Today's excuse was thinner--I'm just not interested in riding 13 miles in the rain on my way to work today. Over time, I will get the right gear to make such a ride less uncomfortable, but rainy cool weather has never been a favorite of mine, and riding in it really sucks when I then have to be presentable at my office.

One problem for me in this is that I had been on something of a roll lately--over a three-week period, I rode ten times in thirteen work days (I took two vacation days one of those weeks). I had ridden over 200 miles since I had last fueled my truck a couple weeks ago.

On the other hand, my rainy-day bike is closer to reality. I bought an old Raleigh 3-speed a few months ago, and have been modernizing a few things here, cleaning and tuning a few things there, in order to have a bike that would fit on the TARC bike racks. The tires I'd been able to get locally aren't the greatest, though, so I ordered a set of Schwalbe Marathon Plus tires for it, and they arrived Monday. I've ordered a set of modern aluminum rims to replace the battered, partly rusted steel rims that came on the bike, and they should be in later this week. I get to build a new set of wheels soon, which is a restful pastime for me--kind of a zen thing, to be honest about it. I need to create a couple bits of hardware to allow me to attach panniers to it, and it will be ready to go!

It's a cool bike--a then top-of-the-line commuter from Raleigh, built in 1974. It has the aforementioned 3-speed hub, but also has some neat details, like a built into-the-hub dynamo that powers a headlight and taillight (the system is not operating at the moment, perhaps due to burned-out bulbs which are hard to find), fenders, a rear rack, a Brooks saddle and a locking fork, which I will take to a locksmith and see whether it can be made functional again.

I'll fit that into my copious free time, along with traditional fall chores like clearing leaves from the gutters of the house and raking the leaves from my neighbor's Maple tree to the front of the property so that the works department folks will haul them away.