Wet weather again

It wasn't precipitating when I left the house this morning. The forecast was for 30% chance of snow. I was only mildly surprised, then, when I was partway to the main office and it started snowing. I decided that by the time I turned around, went home, changed clothes, and drove to work, it would take too long, and I wasn't doing bad as it was, so I kept riding.

It was just flurries at first, of course, and the temperature felt warm enough that it would only get the streets damp instead of icy. I stopped at the Liberty Street office for my agency to process some paperwork, then got back on the bike for the rest of my trip to my New Albany office. The mild discomfort of riding the Raleigh instead of the Ryan was offset by imagining the thoughts of motorists--"There goes some nutcase on a bicycle! In THIS weather!"

I may have mentioned before that I don't mind riding in snow flurries. The water involved doesn't seem to get me as wet as rain does at the same ambient temperature. Still, my experience this morning was encouraging, as I now have less fear of hypothermia for my commute. I have to remind myself sometimes that with my body mass, it takes a while to have that sharp a drop in core temperature. As long as I don't have a problem that keeps me still for a long time, I should do fine.

I tend to wear thin light layers for riding. One of my reasons for not riding in temperatures below 25F or so is that I don't want to put on that many layers to have a bike ride. I have some thicker layers at home, but am reluctant to use them because I sweat freely in the thin layers I already use, and I don't want to deal with thicker layers saturated with sweat if I can get the thinner layers to evaporate the sweat. It seems that I just need to do some more experimentation so that I can determine how what I have works, and follow the advice of the Nike commercials.

Just do it.

The weather for the next couple days looks better, precipitation-wise. It's supposed to get chilly tonight, making me less excited about riding tomorrow morning, but we'll see. Maybe I can find a pair of gloves at the house that are warmer than what I have been using.