Catch up moment

I rode the club ride out of Bluegrass Bicycle on Saturday afternoon--on the Giro 26 Jenn keeps at the store. I then rode the Vienna to Mom's for a visit before heading home. It was good to be wearing sunglasses for over two hours of cycling in one day for a change.

Of course, Monday and Tuesday of this week featured wet weather, so it was back to clear lenses for all cycling. A forecast for today suggested that we would see some sunshine, but I'm not overly optimistic at the moment.

Since the time change happened over the weekend, I was looking forward to not needing my headlight for the trip home. As cloudy as it's been, though, I had to have it on for about half the trip last night, and all the way home Monday evening. Good thing I had it on, too. On my way home Monday, I almost got left-crossed by an inattentive motorist.

I was heading in Westport Road in front of the Kroger near Hurstbourne Parkway, and had reached the light that allows eastbound traffic to turn left into the parking lot that serves Kroger, a Wendy's, and several other businesses. A fellow in a full-size Mercury (same size as the current Ford police cars used by Louisville) started to turn left (he had a green light but not a green arrow--my light was also green), prompting me to do a brake check. My rear wheel fishtailed a bit, which led me to swing my handlebars side to side to manage the skid (MAN those disc brakes work well!). I think my headlight flashing in his face finally got his attention, and he stopped abruptly. I'm sure he heard my voice after that, but I doubt he heard my words. It took a mile or two for me to work the adrenaline out of my system, but I enjoyed knowing that I had that opportunity.

Over the last couple days, I've had entirely too much opportunity to "enjoy" headwinds. Fifteen-to-twenty-knot headwinds each morning have been unpleasant at best. Then, of course, the wind shifts by afternoon so I get a headwind on my way home.

The headwind last night was enough reason to go home via Anchorage instead of Westport Road, as the Anchorage route has a bit more protection from wind. It's also much quieter most of the time than Westport Road, and between the headwind and rain, I wasn't in the mood to mess with the goofballs rushing to the movie theater (or whatever waste of gas they were doing) on Westport. I even used New LaGrange Road from Whipps Mill Road instead of Old LaGrange Road as I typically do, in order to verify my cyclometer calibration against the mile markers I knew I'd see.

The new bike now has something like 243 miles on it. I figured it was time to ride the Vanguard a bit more, so that's the bike I used to get to work this morning, including a stop by Stock Yards Bank on 22. I then rode 22 to Crestwood instead of going back over to Westport Road. I didn't get the benefit of a farm tractor holding traffic off my back, as happened for me last April.

Speaking of last April, my log entry for April 30 also mentioned that I tipped 1400 miles for the YTD that day. I haven't logged my trip to work yet, but I think it will tip me over 1350 miles for 2011--almost six weeks earlier than I reached that milestone last year!

Wet out this morning

...but the new Endura Luminite jacket did its job admirably! Anyone who couldn't see that thing as I pedaled along Westport Road was either blind or looking the other way.

I didn't even get too warm inside it, thanks to the pit-zips.

Of course, the weather forecast depended on which site I checked--the forecast available through the Courier's site had likelihood of rain at 10% before noon, then up to 60% for a couple hours, then drying off again by the time I would be riding home. It was raining when I left the house.

By the time I got to Crestwood, I had been through a couple patches of the rain that felt (and sounded) more like sleet. By good fortune, the ground is warm enough that the roads are not likely to freeze today. You see, I don't have my ice spikes yet.

I wound up not riding on Sunday. I took my sister to collect her new motor home, and got home from that jaunt in the afternoon, a bit late to join the club ride out of St Matthews. That's okay--I still have almost two hundred miles for the last week--and that is better than all but four or five weeks in 2010.

Racking up miles

I broke the 1100-mile mark for 2010 on Monday, the 7th. I broke the 1200-mile mark on Thursday, the 10th. I'm something like fifteen miles shy of breaking the 1300-mile mark, and figure to do so on Sunday, the 13th (unless things keep me from riding).

For weeks, it seemed like the most I could manage was 100-130 a week. Now I'm up to 200 in less than a week--almost, as I type this, and I was tempted to go out for another fifteen miles tonight, just to make it happen!

I may reset the annual mileage goal. At the moment, it's set at 6000. I'm over a hundred miles ahead of YTD track to make it. MyCyclingLog.com gives me information such as "Average daily distance of 15.99 required to meet this goal." It was 16-point-something yesterday. Riding over fifty miles today made a difference! It will be interesting to see how that "Average daily distance to meet goal" number changes over the coming months.

The wind made things a bit challenging on the club ride after work. I was on the Giro, which I hadn't ridden since November. I haven't been on my own Bacchetta since September. My muscles are not used to that riding position, and I was sure feeling them complain about it. Now that daylight savings time is about here, I'll get to ride my Strada to work once in a while and get my legs more accustomed to that more aero position. I'm not ready to rig a light mount for that bike so that I can ride it at night just yet.

I haven't been on that bike for so long for a couple reasons: a) when Jenn and I are doing club rides, we ride the tandem, and b) the last time I rode it, I broke a shifter part as I was downshifting to stop at a four-way-stop-sign controlled intersection--less than a hundred feet from my driveway! I have the parts to fix the shifter, but have been thinking for some years about changing the handlebars on that bike and using bar-end shifters instead of the Ergo levers now on the bike. At the same time, I've opted to install a newer fork (from a Bacchetta Corsa) and eliminate the B-Pivot in the stem for a while, just to see how I like the bike that way. I have the parts I think I need, but haven't been able to make time to do all the work. The new fork is on the bike, but I have yet to rework all the cables, which I will need to do before the bike is again roadworthy. Maybe I'll do that this week. It would be good to get out on that bike some again--it's the fastest bike I've ever owned, and I miss riding it.

Car-Free Happy Hour, March 10th, recap

For some reason, my link to the CFHH poster in a prior link was only working erratically. Maybe it sensed my feelings about karaoke or something.

Aikiko's is a karaoke place. I knew that before attending, and went anyway. I don't much care for karaoke, for a number of reasons I won't bore any of my three followers with here. I went because I could, and to show support for the CFHH concept. I got to see some friends, show off the new bike a bit, and enjoy a couple of bottles of Woodchuck Hard Cider.

On the way home, I stopped by BBC in St. Matthews for a chat with Ron Schneider and others who were at Drinking Liberally, and enjoy a pint of Dark Star Porter.

Yes, I drank a few adult beverages last night. Over the course of five hours, I had four beers and some meal-sized quantity of food. It was NOT enough that I would have gotten up to sing karaoke--I don't think I could drink enough that I would do that, and still be able to stand up without fighting off the effects of alcohol poisoning. Also, the semi-cold air was bracing as I rode home.

Earlier in the day, I ate lunch with my long-time friend Harry. He likes to take me to lunch to celebrate my birthday, and this was the first chance we had gotten to do so. The fish and sweet potato fries at Flanigan's are quite good, by the way.

As I worked my way to Flanigan's, I stopped by Jackie Green's bike shop on Frankfort Avenue to get a new rain jacket. Dave Morse, who now goes by 8Dave, has one of the Endura Luminite rain jackets, and is quite pleased with its effectiveness. I tried working a way to order a single from the distributor for evaluation purposes at the store, but without success. I wound up buying my own from Jackie's Bike Couriers shop. So far, I like it for wet weather. It keeps the rain out of my jersey. It ventilates better than a solid vinyl jacket would, since it has pit-zips. It is bright yellow. I mean yellow as in, "Don't you DARE hit me, you idiot motorist!" yellow.

I'm still fond of my yellow Illuminite reflective wind shell, and will likely keep wearing it most of the time. But if it's going to be a wet-weather ride, I now have another weapon in my arsenal for being less likely to drive a car that day.

On the way home from BBC, I broke the 1200-mile mark for 2011. Not bad for the tenth of March. Just for giggles, I set my 2011 goal at 6000 miles in mycyclinglog. It tells me I'm fifty miles ahead of where I need to be to get to that goal at this point in the year.

I got off work early yesterday, in order that I may do some errands and attend the Mayor's Budget Forum in Middletown. One errand was to pick up the reflective vinyl I ordered for the Vienna. I didn't have the bike with me, so we didn't get to compare the color. When I got home, I found the color to be a bit yellow by comparison. I'll have to take it back by some time and see what can be done about that.

I was on the Vanguard doing that, but got the Vienna out for my next errand--getting a haircut in St Matthews. I typically go to a small, established barber shop near Lexington Road and Frankfort Avenue. The barber who cut my hair yesterday has worked there for nigh on fifty years, apparently, and now works two days a week.

Anyway, I hadn't really been thinking about it, so I wasn't watching the Vienna's odometer. It turned over 100 miles on my way home from my haircut.

With the impending bad storms, we opted to use gas to get to the forum last night. We did carpool, though--Jenn and I met at Mark Luking's house and rode to Middletown with him, then I hauled Jenn's bike home in the truck afterward.

It was good to go to the forum. I have managed to attend two of them--the one at Shawnee Park Golf Course last week being the first. Mayor Fischer commented that many of the comments he has received have been more about priority in spending than about how to save money, so I tailored a comment with that in mind later in the session. A couple of Metro Council members have attended enough of these that they've been noticing the reliable bicycle presence. Hopefully that will work in our favor...

Why I ride, revisited

Last May, I posted on selling utility cycling. I found the post as I was searching for references to the GMAC National Driver Test site.

It was good to read my post about utility cycling, though. It reaffirms my attitude about why I ride, which is mainly that I enjoy riding more than I enjoy driving. That I can multi-task (exercise while commuting, thus eschewing a gym membership for cardio workouts), save gas and wear on the car, reduce my insurance costs, reduce traffic congestion and the like are merely byproducts. I think that in many cases, we as advocates work too hard to sell the byproducts and not enough to sell the core issue: riding instead of driving can be MUCH more enjoyable than driving.

I had to work to wrap my mind around whether to ride to work today, though. It's raining, and is likely to continue to rain all day. I took Jenn to work, as she was a bit late for her bus, and then burned extra gas by going back home to get ready for my own work day. It kind of offsets a lot of my efforts at not burning gas, and there is some aggravation and guilt associated with that. On the other hand, I just wasn't in the mood to deal with the internal grumbling I knew would commence as soon as I got on the bike and pedaled down the road.

Tuesday's ride to work with a long-time friend

I rode the Vanguard to work, after leaving it sit for over a week.

I had ridden the Raleigh to work last Tuesday, thinking I would bring home the new bike that night. I got to bring it home Wednesday evening. I rode it again Thursday and Friday, and drove Saturday. I rode the new bike again on Monday, for some reason--probably still wanting to enjoy some new bike bliss.

Wanting to enjoy my long-time favorite bike, though, I pumped up the tires on the Vanguard this morning. I had been pleasantly surprised at how fast the Vienna feels compared to the Raleigh, and wanted to see how the big purple bike fared on that scale.

I wasn't disappointed. It's still comfortable enough and low enough that the speed compares favorably with the new bike. I've long known that the Vanguard is not a particularly fast bike--I bought my first performance recumbent in 2001 based on it having a perceived ten percent speed improvement over the Vanguard. My current "go-fast" (well, sort-of fast...) bike, my Bacchetta Strada, is probably fifteen percent faster on level ground than the Vanguard with similar perceived effort, and climbs MUCH better.

But the Vanguard remains my most comfortable bike. It can haul stuff--lots of stuff, if need be. It's my most versatile bike in that regard--I don't mind riding it long distances (although I tend to prefer the Strada for club centuries), I can haul stuff with it, and deal with most weather with it.

I'm going to the Mayor's Budget Forum (or whatever the formal title is) in Middletown tonight. I have a bit more to do before I leave the store, so I'd better get back to it.

The Fifties are Nifty!

 Or so I'm told.

Today is another of life's milestones for me--my fiftieth birthday.

I wound up not getting to ride, as I had hoped to do. Sometimes life gets in the way of such things. There were a couple of other birthday celebrants having rides today, and I could perhaps have gone on one or another of them. Instead, we had a small gathering at our house, and I spent much of my morning helping finalize preparations. I made a beer run around one this afternoon, and wound up driving for some stupid reason--probably had to do with the fact that I was already dressed for the gathering (in a kilt, as would be expected) and didn't want to change clothing around to ride in the somewhat chilly day. At least that's the rationalization I'm going to use this time.

I don't mind that I didn't ride today--not much, anyway. On my way home from work tomorrow, I'll break the eleven-hundred mile mark for 2011, and I'm fine with saving breaking the 1100-mile mark >before< my birthday for 2012, just as I've opted to save the "first thousand by the end of February" for next year.

We (Jenn and I) had a nice group of folks over for snacks and dessert. It was an interesting mix, by design. I had friends I've known for many years and friends I've known for a couple years. I had friends I've met through cycling and friends who knew I ride but were not as involved with cycling. It was fun.Both of my stepdaughters helped a great deal with cleaning and food preparation. I appreciate them greatly--they are good people.

It's common for folks to ruminate on this or that at such milestones. If I didn't know what day I was born, this would be just another day. However, birthdays are important in my family, and fifty is a milestone of note in our culture.

That said, I don't seem to have many profound thoughts bouncing around inside my head--only verbose ones. It's good to have family and friends, and to have some of each gather with me to celebrate. Twenty years ago today, my mother and stepfather moved into their current home. I was hoping to develop a dating relationship at the time, and when it didn't happen (and in spite of that I knew it would not have been an especially good idea for it TO happen), I went into a depressive tailspin that was profound enough to last me a while. I came through that--with help--and found something of a new me. I went on to enjoy the next ten years more than I had the prior twenty or more. I realized then--and still firmly believe--that the radio advertisement claiming that such and such station was playing the music from the best years of my life was lying to me. The best years of my life are coming.

One friend who attended commented that she had not ever seen me as happy and content with life as I now seem to be. She credited my marriage with much of that. I'm not sure but what it's one of those "which came first, the chicken or the egg" things, though. Yes, I'm pretty happy with life overall these days. When folks ask how I'm doing, my pat response is, "I'm loving life!" I think that being happy in life is part of why Jenn and I got started as we did. I think being with Jenn has helped me be happier, to be sure. I don't think it's a one-way arrow, though. I think being happy helps me be happier.

In any case, I'm glad to be able to enjoy life. It's a marvelous day in paradise, wherever paradise is, but it's not a bad day here, either.

Mileages

I'm a couple days late talking about my end of February numbers.

I wound up not breaking the thousand mile mark before March, with something like a twenty-mile shortfall. That's okay, I have a goal for next year this way. I probably could have done it, but had other things going over the weekend. Still, I rode over five hundred miles in February, which is probably some sort of personal record. That I already have over a thousand miles for 2011 is certainly a personal record.

I looked at the odometer reading on the truck the other day, and realized that it has over 1200 miles on it for 2011. This is NOT what I wanted to see--more miles on the truck than on bikes. I haven't gone over the log entries that are there (we haven't been very good about recording individual trips) to see how we are using it and why we have more gas miles than bicycle miles.That analysis will have to wait until next week some time. I'll also ask Jenn about her bike miles so far this year and see how she's doing.

She wound up riding all the way to work yesterday morning, despite the wind. She wants to use the bus most of the time to reduce the amount of time she spends working up a sweat on the way to her office. She realized she was going to miss the bus, though, and turned accordingly when she got to Lyndon Lane. She has some shopping she wants to accomplish this evening, so she drove today.

New bike goodness

I've ridden the new bike to work twice now, making for two round trips (including the shake-down run coming home Wednesday evening). I'm finding little adjustments to make in things like handlebar angle, shifter angle, and minor tweaks on the shift systems that are part and parcel of new bike break-in processes.

I didn't give much thought to performance expectations when buying this bike. I figured it would be roughly as fast a the Raleigh, perhaps a bit faster since it has more and closer gearing steps that would make better use of my preferred cadence range. This morning's ride to work involved a stop by the bank to make a deposit. The bank branch closest to my commute is at Hurstbourne Parkway at KY22. It's MUCH faster for me to go directly to Crestwood on 22 from there rather than go back south to my accustomed Westport Road corridor for the later segments of my trip, but KY 22 is not a bike-friendly road. The speed limit is higher than on Westport Road, despite that it's narrower and has shorter sight lines in many places. Once past Chamberlain Lane, it's two-lanes all the way (with a couple of wide spots that have become turn lanes).

I've ridden KY 22 from Hurstbourne or so to Crestwood a few times, and I don't mind it once in a while, but I prefer to avoid it. I rode it this morning, though, as I didn't want to ride all the way back over to Westport Road with that extra mileage and time.

I found that I was going as fast as I do on my Vanguard on 22. The tailwind may have helped more than I thought, of course--the headwind I fought all the way to work yesterday certainly took its toll on my average speed. In general, though, this bike may be a touch faster than the Vanguard over this particular course.

The new bike's saddle feels narrow to me, but that may be primarily a function of being used to the Brooks B-66 sofa on the Raleigh. The handlebar position feels fairly good, if unusual after so many miles on the North Road bars on the Raleigh. The stock grips are pretty decent--they are inexpensive imitations of some of the Ergon grips I can get for this bike in another month or two when the 2011 stuff comes out. Ergon has some similar grips that also add bar-ends, and I may consider them for this bike at some point.

Speaking of Ergon, I'm due to receive my Commuter Team goodies in the next few weeks. I'm pretty excited about it--I'm looking forward to trying their new pedals, grips and gloves on the Raleigh. When the pedals are available, I'll probably get a set for Jenn's new bike, since she is riding to work wearing street shoes to save changing time at the office. I'm also looking forward to the backpack, surprisingly. I've mentioned that I haven't been a backpack person when I'm on a bike, since I've been on recumbents for so long and since I figure that weight in a pack is on the bike AND on me rather than simply on the bike. However, I see some versatility in using a pack that doesn't come as readily when using panniers for all one's carried stuff.

Car-Free Happy Hour, March 10th

It's almost that time of the month again! A week from tonight, it's CAR FREE HAPPY HOUR!

I intend to go, although the focus on Karaoke has me a bit concerned. I don't think I've ever been drunk enough that I would get up in front of a bunch of folks and sing--I don't really like how my voice sounds and don't really want to spend the time (and money) taking voice lessons to fix that. Hearing other folks who have never really practiced staying in tune when they sing do the Karaoke thing is not my favorite, either. However, it's not about my ears so much as it is about socializing with other good folks who like to ride/walk/TARC instead of driving a car.

And a couple of the folks who will be there have already asked that I bring the new bike for them to see.

The New Bike is Home

I rode the new bike home tonight. Its shake-down run doubled as my homeward commute, pulling the Safety 1st trailer onto which I had tied the Raleigh.

I didn't use the workstand this time--just the trailer. I tied the top tube to the crossbar of the trailer's frame, then tied the wheels to the front corners of the trailer much like before. The rear wheel of the Raleigh was to the right instead of to the left this time, so I attached an additional taillight to its handlebar as a marker so overtaking road users could give me enough room.

I'm not sure I want to use the new bike to pull a trailer on a regular basis, unless I upgrade the Burley's hitch to use a quick-release connector. I'm not certain it would work, but Burley still offers a five-pack of axle connectors so that I could put one on each of several bikes in the garage and have that trailer work on each bike with a quick-release pin. This would be an improvement over the current situation, as the Burley trailer will now only work with the Raleigh, due to the shape of the rear triangle near the dropout. Both of the new bikes have disc brake calipers in that area, and the Ryans have a different shape rear end to their frames. Right now the only trailer we can use with a Vanguard is the Safety 1st. I can use the Safety 1st on the Globe bikes, but would prefer to not do that due to the location of the brake line.

As for the new bike, it rides quite well. I found it largely quieter than the Raleigh over bumps, probably because of the way I have the two taillights mounted on the Raleigh. The wheels roll better, to be sure. The Globe is livelier than the Raleigh by a fair measure.

It's going to be a fun bike to own.

Well, DARN Part III

So, it turns out I don't get to blame FedEx, after all. Or maybe I will, anyway.

The Specialized warehouse had some really big computer issues over the weekend, and it took them until late in the day to resolve things enough that they could get bikes out the door and on the truck. FedEx considered it a late pick up, and added an extra day to the transit time as a result.

On the upside, the stuff I ordered from another supplier will be here in time for me to mount it on the bike before I go home tonight.

Well, DARN Part II

I think Specialized needs to contract with a better carrier.

The bike they are sending me (so that I can rob a fork from it to fix my new bike) was supposed to leave their warehouse yesterday. FedEx shows that they picked it up Monday evening a bit after 8:00 PM. It shows as arriving in their sort facility across town a bit shy of 5:00 Tuesday morning--yes, that's more than eight and a half hours. It makes me wonder what the driver was doing joyriding around Columbus all night long and missing morning sort deadline.

It probably is not Specialized's fault that FedEx delayed my gratification. I suppose I could consider it as keeping the bike at the store another day so that the last couple of add-ons I ordered can get here before I ride it home.

On the positive side, though, I've had a chance to look at the Portland Design Works Radbot taillights mentioned earlier. These things are pretty cool, and VERY bright. They are likely bright enough to aggravate a few motorists stuck behind me on two-lane roads. I like that they have a reflector integrated into the cover (right below the LED lens). I also like that they come with a bracket so that one can mount the light to a rack reflector tab (or any other common reflector bracket, which gives even more flexibility in mounting options).

I haven't been this excited over a conventional bike in a long time. It's weird. I'm normally more excited about recumbents than about wedgie bikes.

bike hauling

So, the new bike is still waiting for its replacement fork. That should arrive Tuesday, and I should be able to ride the new bike home Tuesday night.

Since I wrapped up another Tool School session today, I figured on bringing home my repair stands (both of them) and my tools that I took to share so that we would have enough tools for some of the lab sessions. I pulled my Safety First trailer (since it will connect to my Vanguard) to the store in the morning rather than drive my truck.

During the day, Jenn called me, laughing, to report that her front brake on the new bike worked a bit too well. Her new bike has its first bit of road rash--a scrape on the corner of the basket. Sad, but it's over with--it's no longer pristine, so she might as well enjoy using it now!

As I readied for work this morning, I started thinking about whether I could haul my Raleigh home using the trailer. I had an idea that might work, but I was going to have to test it before riding home. It wasn't quite crazy enough to appear on www.thatwillbuffout.com, but it was a bit inventive.

I started by mounting one of my repair stands in the trailer, with its legs spread as far as they would go. I secured them to the back end of the trailer, both to keep the stand down in back and keep the legs spread to support them on the trailer frame. I then tied the stand to the cross bar on the trailer, and put the bike frame in the work stand clamp. I used some of my new inner tube bungee cords (with the IT-clips mentioned in a prior post) to tie the bike's wheels to the front corners of the trailer frame. I turned on every flasher I had, and hit the road.

Since it was dark by the time I left the store, I didn't really get to look at the expressions on folks' faces as they passed me. At one point on my ride home, I was followed by a tow truck for a quarter-mile or more--I can only imagine what the driver was thinking ("Huh! A tow bike!"). 

Aside from a couple of tense moments, it went just fine. One of the tense moments was when I was looking for a place to get off the road, as a police car was going to overtake me very soon. The motorist going the other way at the time had stopped too close to where I was, and I needed to get up the road a bit before I could reach a driveway. The cop passed me with his engine in full song. Since his was the third cruiser to pass me in a couple minutes, I figure that there was something pretty exiting happening. Not really needing any extra excitement, I opted to go my own way rather than see what they were doing--I of course could not have kept up with them had I wanted to follow them.

The other tense moments had more to do with traffic than the load--there is something about a bike being carried by some nut riding another bike that gets overtaking motorists to give said nut a bit more room in general, but some motorists still don't "get it." One passed me with plenty of room, but took a LONG time to get back in the correct lane, earning him a honk from an oncoming motorist. 

Anyway, that it worked as well as it did gives me an idea that might work for getting the new bike home Tuesday evening. I can pull the trailer to the store with the Raleigh, then pull it home carrying the Raleigh with the new bike.

Might as well break in the new bike right, eh?

Well, DARN

After getting some actual revenue-generating work done yesterday, it was time to build a couple of commuter bikes. I toyed around with some of the accessories (the locks, taillights and hooks mentioned in my last post), then started unpacking Jenn's new bike.

Boy, is it purty!

I teased her a bit with some cell-phone pictures as I put stuff together. She arrived shortly after closing time so that she could see it first hand.

One of the things I like about her bike is that the internal gear hub (IGH) is silent. Coupled with the Gates belt drive, it will be a nice quiet bike. Jenn likes that she won't feel it necessary to tie back her pant legs (at least most of the time).

Jenn also likes that this bike is rock-solid stable, unlike her Peugeot had been. That old bike had never been but so stable.

Once I got hers together, I started on my new Vienna. The color was the shade I was expecting--sort of a tan-gray mud color. Most of the bolt-on stuff already on the bike was black. When I added the fenders, bottle cage, disc lock and rack to it, the black accessories turned out looking pretty good.

Then I tried to install the front wheel. Wait a minute--the wheel isn't going into the fork correctly. Drat--the fork end got bent in shipping! Can it be straightened? Probably not--it's a pretty bad bend, but let's try levering it out a bit with this prybar SNAP!

A call to Specialized's warranty department yielded that they had no spare forks, only complete bikes from which to scavenge parts. So, on Monday they will ship me another bike, and I can either pull the fork from it and install it on my bike or build it and repackage the bike with the broken fork. I think it will be easier to swap forks at this point--besides, I got to spend a little time last night installing more of the accessories on the bike I already have on hand. I should get to ride the bike Tuesday. I was hoping to ride it some this weekend, but I have no real desire to have the front wheel come off the fork while I'm riding. I've seen pictures of what happens, and it isn't pretty.

I am going to like this bike, though. It looks good, despite that the color is kind of drab. I'm thinking about going to a sign store and having them print a panel of reflective vinyl roughly the color of the bike, so that I can make some reflective bits for it that will blend in in daylight but show up when struck by headlights at night. Just because I can.

IT-Clips

Here's something to make use of those tubes that you have patched until they can't be used any more: IT Clips!

This unassuming little gizmo (actually two pieces) creates an adjustable-length bungee cord out of old inner tubes. The packaging comes with two metal hooks, so that one can go from complete loop to hooked-end cords in a couple of snaps:

I got a couple pairs of each size (road and mountain bike tubes) for testing with Jenn's new Globe Live 3 Mixte's front rack. These are pretty cool! I haven't put them to use as of yet, but they seem pretty sturdy. I'm glad to know these are available. Let me know if you want me to get you some of them!

Bike stuff

I ordered the bikes the other day. They arrived at the store today, as mentioned in my last post.

As I was examining the Crosstrail, I noted that it had threaded sites for a disc lock--those oh-so-Euro locks mounted (often) on the underside of the seat stays that immobilize the rear wheel, quite independent of locking the bike to a relatively immovable object such as a lamp post. My Vienna has similar threaded inserts, judging from the online images. Jenn's Live doesn't seem to have them, but I haven't had opportunity to examine the actual bikes yet. That comes tomorrow some time (after getting some work done--there are some repairs awaiting my attention when I get there in the morning).

I looked at the online catalogs for a couple of our primary parts vendors, and found this series of such locks at one. There is a model that has as accessories either a chain (with a fabric sleeve) or a cable that mates with the main lock. Here's the lock:

And here are the optional cable and chain:

I opted for the cable, as it's a shade longer than the chain (and likely lighter). I don't know if the little pouch will come with it--I expect to receive what I've ordered tomorrow morning some time. Anyway, here's a shot of the combination in use:

All three images are shamelessly copy/pasted from the Abus web site, by the way--I like the concept of these locks, but not enough to plagiarize the images.


The locks come with self-tapping screws, should the bike on which they are mounted not have pre-installed holes. I also have the ability to install threaded inserts into some frames, and may be able to do so if necessary here, just to make the installation a bit tidier. These locks are not cheap, nor are they light, but they seem a bit more practical than some I've seen--out of the way when not in use, easy to put into use and so on.





Jenn's bike comes with fenders. Mine did not. However, I have a set ready to mount, along with a rack for the rear. What I don't think I have is taillight mounts to go on the racks (Planet Bike makes a gizmo that bolts to a reflector bracket and accepts the SuperFlash taillights), although I think I have the rest of the odds and ends I need to make these bikes commute-ready. I'm not ready to buy more headlights this month, so I figure to move light sets from Jenn's Vanguard and from my Raleigh to the new bikes for the nonce.





Having read about them in another blog--probably Tex's Luavull Cycling--I've decided to try a different taillight than my standard Planet Bike Super Flash. If memory serves, Tim is quite hot on the Portland Design Works Radbot 1000 lights.

I know of brighter taillights, but given that these and my long-time favorite the SuperFlash are both visible at over a mile, I don't see the point. I honestly think that if the taillight is TOO bright, overtaking motorists will get target-fixation and run me down (or run me down to make the bright light quit flashing in their eyes). I don't see many bicycle commuters on my route, and the two or three I see on occasion are usually going the opposite direction, so I don't have time to look at their visibility profiles.

I guess that since I work in a bike shop, I tend to like having a tricked out commuter rig. I also want my wife to have her own tricked out rig. I don't just settle, in other words.

Transportation pictures

As I noted here and here (among other places), we've been thinking about additional options for commuting. The bikes arrived at the store today. More on them in another post.

Of course, I had scheduled the day off, thinking I was going to a Mayor's Budget Forum, and got the dates wrong! The Forum I thought I was going to attend is actually scheduled for Monday, which I have also scheduled as an off day. There is another Forum scheduled for next Tuesday (8 March), and I plan to attend it as well.

I'm going to as many of them as I'm able, simply to make it clear to Mayor Fisher that bicycle infrastructure is important to me and to my friends. I have long said I'm not a fan of poorly-designed bike lanes, but I believe in the need for well-designed ones as a way to encourage folks to ride more--whether for pleasure or utility or whatever. Cycling for ANY reason is an important part of our transportation picture, for reasons that both of my readers already know well. Sadly, though, work realities will keep me from attending every one of the forums. I've missed one, already, for example. I look at it as sort of like voting--in the "Vote early, vote often" sense.

There are many things I think that we as a community need to do, and not enough money for half of them. However, I think that investment in public transit and other alternatives to single-occupant motor vehicles will pay far greater dividends than investment in more lane-miles of interstate.

I got to hear portions of a program on NPR the other night titled, "Back of the Bus." I intend to sit for a while and listen to more of it if I can figure out how to make my computer play the audio. If not, I'll read as much of the transcript as I can. One thing I heard in the ten minutes or so I was able to listen the other night was that when MARTA, the light rail system around Atlanta, was being built, a lot of poor neighborhoods were bulldozed to make way for the project. In the three or four decades since, however, one important factor has arisen as an indicator of real estate prices--proximity to a MARTA station. Where poor neighborhoods were razed for MARTA, new owners have increased the property values many-fold, so that the poor who were displaced by MARTA now cannot afford to live close to it.

Atlanta was not alone in this. City after city leveled houses and shops in less-affluent areas creating space for limited-access freeways that would allow folks to live in segregated suburbs and work in the city, not having to live in integrated neighborhoods. In my own lifetime, I remember the "white flight" of folks leaving Jefferson County due to a school desegregation plan that had me graduate from a high school twenty miles from my home in Middletown instead of one six blocks from my back door. Much of Oldham County's growth in the 1970s and 1980s was due to this phenomenon, and its growth continued right up until the housing boom went bust a couple years ago as folks figured that Oldham schools were better than Jefferson County's, Oldham County neighborhoods were more homogenized, and so on.

Cheap gas and faster roads contributed to this, of course, and the latter is discussed in "Back of the Bus" as well.

Of course, now that gas is getting far more expensive, folks are starting to think about living in town rather than "out in the 'burbs." Some are predicting that many suburban neighborhoods will soon resemble areas of blight now only seen in really poor areas of our west end, with many abandoned large McMansions boarded up to keep out the miscreants. I don't see it happening in the next five years, but I may be wrong--there are certainly pockets of suburbia in other metro areas where clusters of houses sit vacant due to foreclosure after folks lost their grip in the economic downturn.

Along with this, folks are starting to realize that they don't HAVE to take little Johnny to ball practice across town--there is a league down the street that will do. Little Megan can take music lessons within five miles of home instead of fifteen miles away--her success is largely determined by her own diligence, anyway. And who

I think this is an important group of concepts for our local politicians. It will take political will that reaches far beyond a term or two, and I doubt that we will see it happen in this era of tea party nutcases like Rand Paul and the current (mis)governor of Wisconsin--both seemingly determined to give even more wealth to the already-obscenely-wealthy. One of the things I was glad to see when Jackie Green ran for Mayor was that he forced some discussion over how transportation figures into the future of our community.

The Reason for the Season is Axial Tilt!

Before I forget (again): I had noticed one day last week that the sky had not gone completely dark by the time I left work. Last Friday, I could still see the remnants of the sunset (or, well, at least a little light) when I left the store. I didn't see any sunlight when I left Monday, in part because it was raining hard when we closed for the day and in part because Jenn came to get me and didn't get there until almost 7:30, after first going to Middletown to get some food for one of the cats.

Still, it's nice to have seen some light at the end of the metaphorical tunnel, telling me that spring is on the way.

Oh, and, while I did get a ride home this evening, I rode to work this morning. By the time I get to work on Wednesday, I should have over 900 miles for 2011 year to date!

Snow bike, revisited

Now that it seems to be no longer snowing...

As the primary ordering person for the shop, I ordered a Crosstrail Disc for display, thinking that if nothing else it would end up as my icy-roads bike. I really wanted to look the bike over closely, as there were some details I could not ascertain by looking at it online, and I didn't really know what questions to ask the tech folks at Specialized. I do like the Crosstrail--it's a versatile bike, a bit more street-friendly than the closely-related Hardrock 29 Disc with which it shares the component group and price point. However, as I examined it in person, I found little details that made it a bit more challenging to outfit as my icy-roads bike. To wit: the suspension fork on the lower-price model lacks a lockout function, AND lacks fender eyelets. The chainstay has a brake cable routed along its length, complicating (although not preventing) connection of one of my trailers (and the disc brake prevents using the other trailer--more on that in a moment).

An email from a potential customer got me looking at the Globe line (sort of like Saturn's line from GM--Globe is part of Specialized) in a bit more detail. I had already found a 2010 Globe Live 3 Mixte bike as a potential bike to resolve some of Jenn's questions, as noted recently. I looked a bit further down the page, and noticed that the Vienna from 2010 was still in stock in several variants, including (dant dant dah!) the Vienna 3 Disc!

We had gotten a Vienna in our initial order of bikes from Specialized in October of 2009. It finally sold a couple months ago. I liked the bike in several ways--the rigid fork made it lighter than its Carmel stablemates, for one thing, but the color on the one we had in the store just wasn't right for me. I was disappointed that it didn't sell well for us. I hadn't realized until today (or had forgotten) that there was a disc-brake model (even though I had noted disc brake tabs on the frame of the one we had at the store... DUH!). In short, this bike "fixes" the things that kept me from being sold on getting that Crosstrail--it has a rigid fork (I don't really feel a need for a "boingy" front end on a bike) that has fender tabs at the ends (no fabricating fender stays to meet the oddly-placed threaded holes two inches above the axle on the suspension fork on the Crosstrail), and it's a tiny bit cheaper to buy, due to its being a 2010 bike instead of a 2011. It even has slightly nicer drivetrain components, AND better brake calipers (Avid BB5!).

The color is not a reason for excitement--it's a sort of brown/gray that approximates oily mud--but that's okay. This is not going to be a show bike. It's going to get dirty in its use patterns. However, it will accept fenders, racks (both rear AND front, should I decide to install a front rack on it), any of three types of kickstand (center mount, center-mount double (Esge), or rear-mount proprietary from Specialized), and all manner of lights, bells and whistles to make it comparable to my Raleigh in night-time utility. The one slight downside is that trailer hitch thing I mentioned earlier. The cable for the rear brake is routed in a way that I have to be careful how I attach the Safety 1st trailer. The Burley trailer won't connect to the bike as it is configured (I may be able to find a work-around on this, but it's hard to say), due to the Burley hitch that connects to the chain stay AND the seat stay near the frame dropout and the placement of the disc brake caliper trying to occupy the same location. Once upon a time, BikeE offered a hitch conversion that allowed one to use a Burley trailer with the BikeE frames, and there was once an example of this little kit in a bike shop in town, but I haven't been in that shop in a couple years and don't know if it's still there. I may have to go look some time soon, and if it's not to be had, I'll have another reason to keep the Raleigh around.

Oh, and I can have this new bike in time to say an early, "Happy Birthday to me!"

Knickers

So, Why Ride a Bicycle? I found this article at the Bicycle Fixation web site, which also happens to have other cool stuff about bicycling (go figure).I happened on it during a search for knickers other than Lycra.

As I am getting nearer to my fiftieth birthday, I have been pondering the style I've seen on some friends who cycle for utility. I've long admired Joe Ward's ability to wear cycling knickers of tweed or corduroy, and never felt "cool enough" to do so myself. A web search on the topic led to these, these, and these, any of which would serve well as I ride the Raleigh (or, perhaps, the bike my Raleigh admires, Kirk's Pashley), not to mention these others that could work for some folks, those that are trying a bit too hard, and that pair that just are not for me. Even Chrome, known perhaps more for their messenger bags, has a couple options, like their Loop Pro and Telegraph models (which I must admit look like they would better serve bike messengers than me). I do like that the Loop Pro has a special loop that allows one to pocket a u-lock while riding--something I reckon would be very useful for a bike messenger. I also found some knickers from SWRVE, but while they have some interesting features, are probably better-suited for the younger guys without the "lunch muscle development" I have.

An earlier search on "wool knickers" led to many golf wear sites, as apparently golfers still wear things like "plus twos" and "plus fours." The thought of wearing argyle-pattern knickers is a bit more than I can stand, though, despite that I would probably wear a wool kilt whilst riding at times (and have often worn one or another of my Utilikilts on the Raleigh).

Yeah, well, I do tend to go my own way, don't I?

Is Jenn getting a new bike?

I got to ride to work four times over the last week wearing short sleeve jerseys. This morning was a bit different--I awoke to outdoor temperature in the 35F range. It's probably 50F outside as I type this. By the time I get on my way home (after store hours and Tool School), I'll still have the right combination of layers to get home comfortably.

On a slightly different front, Jenn and I talked for a while about her employer's lack of bike-friendly facilities. When she rides to work, she goes in by a back/side building entry, ducks into a restroom off the cafeteria, and changes clothes/does her hair, etc. The building dress code is "business professional," meaning that jeans are a no-no (save for special events having to do with United Way programs), shoes must meet a standard, and so on. Bike clothing is not approved. At all. There is no locker room, nor can she keep clothes at her work station and change closer to that site in the building. She lugs her panniers upstairs after changing, then lugs them back down when she gets ready to go home. It gets aggravating, and makes it a drag to ride some times.

As much as Jenn likes to ride her Vanguard to work, it's a hassle to deal with the lack of facilities at the work end of the route.

It's always a fine line between being avant garde on green transportation and looking like a weirdo to a careful company like hers. As much as they talk about careful husbandry of resources, saving money by not using a car as much is not encouraged actively.

To that end, we talked about her bike a bit. She wants some flexibility that her Vanguard doesn't really support, like the ability to ride to work wearing a skirt, or ability to deal with snow on the roads. Desirable features include a step-through frame and disc brakes. Being that I work for a Specialized dealer, I found this:

It's a Globe Live 3 Mixte. Yes, that's a Gates belt drive, pulling a Shimano Alfine 8-speed internal-gear-hub. Those are hydraulic disc brakes, too. The integrated front rack has a 25kg weight capacity. The double-leg Pletscher kickstand comes with the bike. I suspect that it would have mounting points for the euro-style rear wheel lock. Too cool!

800 miles

By the time I arrived at work this morning, I had logged a bit more than eight hundred miles of bicycle use for the year to date. To compare to last year's numbers, by the end of March of 2010, my total bicycle miles were 800.7. When I got home tonight, I logged my commute and have 814.7 miles. It's two-thirds of the way through February or so, and I'm five or six weeks ahead of last year's mileages.

It's starting to sound like I'm aiming for some record here. I want to be about more than a single goal--whether that goal is how many miles I can ride in the course of doing my thing this year, or some other manifestation of that concept. There is more to me than how many miles I ride instead of drive.

At least I hope so...

It's getting warmer

I've been able to ride to work twice this week wearing short sleeves instead of a jacket. Spring isn't far off!

This morning's ride also featured pulling the Safety 1st trailer, so that I could haul a repair stand with me. I have a Tool School class starting tonight, and wanted to have both of my stands at the store. The next decision is whether to leave the trailer at the store for a week and a few days, and use it to haul both of my stands and my tools home after the class is over--the alternative being pull it home empty tonight so that it's not in the way at the store.

The trailer always gets some funny looks from motorists--especially this time of year. People think I'm insane for pulling a kid in traffic, or something--one motorist actually took the time to pull over and yell at me for putting a kid in dire peril, as his wife had been hit by a car on that road (Frankfort Avenue). I didn't have time to ask them whether she was riding as a vehicular cyclist or as a bike ninja, since he only wanted to yell at me rather than discuss anything.

I've often said I want to get an infant-sized or toddler-sized manikin and toss it in the trailer--with no clothing, of course--so that I can enjoy the reactions of the occasional attentive motorist.

Not that I'm one to play head games or anything...

February miles to date

Here it is, the seventh of February, and even before I log today's commutes to work and back, I've logged more miles this month than in all of January of last year.

over-technical geek gear woes

Sometimes, technology gets in the way of people's acceptance of technology. Witness the 3G/4G Hotspot we got last summer.

When we moved to the new-to-us house last summer, we took our time dealing with moving the land-line, eventually simply dropping it altogether. By the time we had made that decision, however, Jenn had been sold on using the aforementioned hotspot for our home internet connection. I was skeptical, and said so, but went along. And have never really felt that I was right to go along. The thing gave me roughly 67% dependability--two out of three times I went to go online, I would have to reboot the device and/or disconnect it from the desktop computer I prefer to use (which does not have a wireless card--the hotspot plugs into a USB port, which also serves as the power supply for the little black box) and/or also reboot the computer. The ONLY thing reliable about this device is that it would piss me off--often.

After my numerous and increasingly heartfelt threats to toss the thing across the road from the house (escalating to "at the next locomotive that I see"), she finally got the idea that since she had wanted the darned thing so much, SHE was going to have to get it fixed. She took it to the Sprint store, and they waved their magic screwdriver over it or something and declared it working. It came home, and never worked any better than it had. Jenn eventually got a USB2 card for me to add to the computer, figuring that was a factor, and WOW!! an actual improvement! While online, I got dropped far less often (I would be in the middle of, say, typing a blog entry and find myself disconnected from the 'net). I still would have to restart the Hotspot two out of three times I went to get online, but, well...

I had more troubles with this thing in a given month than I had had in several years of having a DSL connection. "State of the art," indeed.

The "reliability" index went up to four out of five times about a month ago, and on every reboot I would see a message that an update was available for the hotspot. A several of failed attempts at downloading the update later, Jenn took it to the Sprint store again, where they force-fed it the updates and told her that it should work better now.

Sure enough, the reliability index went to over 95%. Almost every single time I wanted to get online, I found it necessary to reboot the hotspot. Over the two-week period after the "fix" was made at the store, I got online one time without having to first turn off the hotspot and restart it. I made some time to work with Sprint on Friday evening, figuring I'd be spending at least half an hour just getting to the point I would be speaking to a live person that could imitate a sentient being. Since getting to that point required that I be shunted from person to person to person, I was having a horrible time hearing what the tech was trying to say, so she called me directly (reluctant as I was to release a line, given the trouble I'd had connecting to her in the first place). I need to talk to the Sprint people about changing some protocols on my phone, too--in the middle of all this I received a text message which fouled things further--I want to switch it so that incoming text messages do NOT override everything else happening at the moment.

Long story short (I know--too late for that), Sprint is sending me a replacement Hotspot. I figure it will arrive Tuesday or Wednesday, and while I'm getting it working I will be insisting that we deserve at least three months' credit for having to deal with this piece of garbage. I'll settle for a two months' worth, I suppose.

We'll see how it goes.

It's that time of the month again!

It's time again for Car Free Happy Hour!

Even cooler is that I get to be there this time! Come discuss getting places without gasoline over a micro-brew or some other celebratory beverage!

January numbers

I finished January with a half-commute. I rode to work, but since Jenn was in Middletown with the truck and it was raining and below 40F, I opted out of riding home.

That's okay, though. I still had more miles in January of 2011 (473.2) than in five (!!) months of 2010. As mentioned, I also beat out my January and February 2010 miles combined. I fell short of besting my March or October 2010 miles by seventy-five or so, and was only forty miles shy of my November 2010 mileage.

Okay, so beating my June 2010 miles wasn't such a big deal--I spent almost two weeks out of town working RAAM that month, plus we moved at the end of that month. We spent much of May preparing to move, so I wasn't on the bike much then, either. I spent a week in December driving to work due to icy roads, and was off a few days over the holly-daze, so I didn't ride as much then as I might have otherwise. Besting my January/February 2010 miles has largely been a function of lowering my temperature threshold, although I recall there being a fair number of days those two months in 2010 that saw icy roadways as well.

On to February! I drove on the first--again, due to rainy weather. I rode this morning feeling that if I'd had a bit more of a sail to deploy I could have not pedaled at all. I was glad to be going downwind, and concerned that I'd be fighting that same wind intensity going home. The wind speed lessened a bit--from low- to mid-twenties to about fifteen knots by the time I was homeward-bound--and I chose my route to take advantage of some known windbreaks (rows of trees) instead of fighting the headwind all the way along Westport Road.

Jenn was out walking the dog when I got home. She came inside, fixed dinner, we ate dinner, and now we are both winding down before heading to bed.

Another "Change of address is a moving experience" experience

Not my own address, but Andy Dyson's.

Andy is the Executive Director of Bicycling for Louisville, the local not-for-profit agency that advises and advocates at the local and state level for continuation of bicycle access to roadways, bicycling education and more. He and his wife, Moira, recently moved to Louisville when she accepted a job teaching at Bellarmine University.

They started off renting a house near Shelby Park, but found and bought a house in the Schnitzelburg area of Louisville. The buzz among the utility cycling crowd built around plans to move all their stuff by bicycle. In January. Just to prove it could be done.

Of course, the weather cooperated nicely. It was cool to cold in the morning, with temperature in the low- or mid-thirties when folks started gathering. It got pretty warm, though--up to fifty or sixty degrees, depending on which thermometer one believed.

Jenn and I rode to Andy's old house, pulling our two trailers. Since the Burley trailer won't connect to my Vanguard, I wound up riding my Raleigh. It would have been fun to have both Vanguards involved, but I'm okay with how things turned out.

There were something like twenty folks involved, most with some form of trailer and/or large panniers or baskets. Those who didn't have lots of hauling capacity did a lot of moving boxes into or out of the new or old houses, as appropriate, then hauled what they could in the last couple of rounds.

It would have been fun to see an overview of all those bikes moving up and down Shelby Street, carrying stuff southbound and dead-heading back to the Shelby Park area for another load. I had occasion to do a little hardware store shopping (Jenn's bike lost some seat attachment hardware somehow), and the staff at the store was marveling at the number of bikes they were seeing hauling all manner of stuff. There were a couple people using video cameras, so maybe some good videos will be online soon. There is a group pool of images on flickr already, with possibility for more shots added as folks have time.

The party part of the move was just getting underway when Jenn and I had to leave. Her nephew was having a birthday party, and we were supposed to be there. We were only half an hour late.

Total bike miles for the day was 35, over the course of about three hours of riding.

Miles and miles

A look at my mileage stats, just for giggles:

So far in 2011, I've logged 368.6 miles. By the time I get home from work tonight, I will have logged over 390 miles. I am helping Andy Dyson move tomorrow, so I'll get in a few miles that way, and I hopefully will ride to work Monday, which will get me over 425 miles for the month.

I logged 425 miles in May 2010. The five lowest mileage months for 2010, from worst to best, were January (65), February (187), June (271), December (382) and May (425). Humorous side note: May, the fifth month of the year, was my fifth-lowest mileage month for 2010--in part due to home-buying stuff that was happening at the time. June was very low due to the two week hiatus from personal cycling called RAAM. February and January of last year were a time when my temperature threshold hadn't gotten down below 30 and we had a LOT of ice on the roads. December had a week or more of icy, fouled roads plus the "holly-daze" mess.

Going from my worst cycling month of 2010 to the same month of 2011 having more miles than four or five months of 2010 is kind of a kick. Makes me wonder what I'm capable of doing the rest of the year. 6000 miles should not be a big problem to accomplish for 2011. Jenn and I intend to get in a fair number of club miles on the tandem, which should yield an annual total closer to 7000.

Beats heck out of driving...

A few weeks ago, I made a lot of noise about being on the Ergon Commuter Team. I found out that I will be waiting until some time in March before I see my box of gear. That's okay, I suppose, as it is coming to me free of charge, but I was hoping to put some time on the stuff on a snow bike. Of course, the budget has kept me from getting a snow bike, so I have even less reason to complain.

Yet another odds and ends post

Last Thursday's mini-blizzard was severe enough that we put the final meeting of our January Tool School on hold. We finish it tonight. I've been thinking about when to do another class in February, and need to finalize the dates this week (since, of course, it's almost February).

As is usually the case, this Tool School group is made up of good folks. Maybe there is some self-selecting mechanism at work--I rarely get any one person in these classes that is problematic (if pressed, I could come up with one person who wasn't as attentive as I would prefer), and have not had a troublesome group.

I've now had two days of driving to work instead of riding bike. We had some snow yesterday morning--an inch or so--plus a meeting scheduled far enough away that riding wasn't going to work in the time I had to get there. The roads were not quite clear enough for me yet this morning. Hopefully things are warming enough that I can ride tomorrow. Even so, I don't know that I'll best too many of last year's monthly totals this month. My next, um, er, milestone is the December 2010 mileage (382 miles), which I may outdo tomorrow if I get to ride to work. Next one after that is May 2010 at 425 miles or so, and if I get to ride to work Monday, I just might beat that. I've already beat January, February, both of them combined, and June of 2010 with my January 2011 miles. Not a bad start for the year.

I keep thinking about that ice-day bike...I even got a bike of the model I'm considering for the store's inventory, just so I can check it out first-hand. It looks good, and seems like it would work well enough. I have mixed emotions about some details at the left rear triangle area--it doesn't look like it will accept my Burley trailer, for example, but it will probably do okay with the Safety 1st one. If Jenn and I find it useful to haul stuff in both trailers at once, I'd have to ride the Raleigh, as it's the only one of the fleet at this point that will pull the Burley as configured. It's mildly surprising that the inexpensive (when new) Safety 1st trailer fits more of my fleet than the Burley, a fairly expensive line of trailers.

Speaking of trailers, both of mine will be in use this weekend, along with a slew of others. Andy Dyson, Executive Director of Bicycling for Louisville, is moving this weekend. I caught wind of the details on Facebook, oddly enough, but if you would like to help and don't "do" facebook, drop me a line (since facebook likes for you to have an account before you can see stuff on it).

"It's Soup Yet!"

A couple months ago, our friend Ian was hit by a car as he waited for his turn to proceed through a traffic light. The woman took off without waiting for a police report to be filed.

Long story short, her insurance company provided Ian with enough money to get a new bike. Being the kind of guy Ian is, he decided to give Bluegrass Bicycle a chance to help him out with replacing the bike.

Sadly, when we first discussed it, Surly was out of Big Dummy bikes! They had some on the way, but it was going to be late December or some time in January before they could ship the bike to us. When they were getting close to being able to ship, I learned that there were over forty folks watching for the bikes to be available. They released fifteen or twenty bikes, so I made sure I ordered one as soon as I learned they were available.

It arrived at the store today.

That's a lot of bike. The box is 73" long, and weighed about fifty pounds with the bike inside. It's not a complicated assembly, though it does take a while to get all the stuff on there. I got to test-ride it briefly, to be sure Ian would have brakes and accurate shifting, and it's a great ride. The picture shows some details that still needed to be handled before Ian could take it home, but it's road-worthy for being the Soup Express!

Tuesday is soup-cooking day for Ian. Wednesday is his biggest delivery day. He wanted to ride his old bike out to the store and have me move stuff over to the new bike (and, I suppose, take the old one home on the trailer), but it wasn't to be. Still, I had the pleasure of seeing one happy Souper Man!

Now I want one. I don't have any place to keep one, but I want one. *sigh*  I don't know what I'd DO with it--I don't have the cargo to haul that I need one, but...maybe one day.

The truth is out!

Commuting by car crushes your soul!

The Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M recently released its annual Urban Mobility Report. In it, they discuss why and how traffic has gotten worse over the last two decades. Also discussed are topics like travel times, and the difference between travel time index and planning time index.

I did see a couple comments suggesting that modal changes would reduce congestion--using public transit, car-pooling, or bicycles as opposed to personal motor vehicles.

The entire Report takes a while to read--longer than I have at the moment. I will be reading more of it in the coming days and sharing some thoughts here, I hope. If you take some time to read it, please comment on what you find.

Ah, the hassles of winter...

I had planned to take the morning off, then attend a meeting downtown with Bike Louisville's Education sub-committee. However, Wednesday evening, we found that our furnace was not working well at all--it was often blowing cold air rather than hot air.

Thursday morning, I called the HVAC folks who had installed the unit, as they are usually a pretty good outfit. I made arrangements for their tech to come by this morning.

He found a switch that had somehow been turned off. It seemed a simple enough cause for the symptoms, so he charged me for the service call and went on his way. However, about an hour after he left, I noted that, again, the furnace was blowing cold air. I called the tech, who told me he would call the office. I hadn't heard anything by about noon, so I called the office myself. He had called, but they hadn't gotten down their list as far as my name yet.

Anyway, the second tech arrived a bit after two. He poked around inside the furnace, finding a dirty flame sensor, a wire connection that had somehow gotten unplugged, showed me some diagrams and how to read them, waited for the machine to prove that it was going to work right, and then went on his way.

About an hour later, I found that, again, the furnace was blowing cold air. I called the HVAC outfit again, and they told me they'd fine another tech to send my way.

He arrived about 5:00 or 5:30. Since he was primed to look for intermittent problem-causing failures, he almost immediately noted some discoloration on the PC board that controls the furnace. He pulled it to inspect its reverse side, and saw damning evidence that it had gotten hot and that the resistors had failed. He also found indications that this was not the original circuit board.

$320 more later, I supposedly have a furnace that will be reliable for a while longer.

A couple years ago, I was working in a program that tried to find money to fix furnaces for low-income elderly folks. Having experienced that, I know how fortunate I am. I have a fairly well-insulated house--certainly compared to the houses of some of those folks I tried to help. While it's a burden in the short-term, we can afford to fix this out of our own pockets. We can afford to pay the gas bill to keep this furnace running for a while longer.

It's good to have heat when the low temperature for the night will be around 10F.

Of course, I missed the meeting, having to be around waiting for the HVAC techs to arrive. I also missed getting to ride a bicycle today. I had intended to ride to Feeder's Supply to get cat food, or to ValuMarket, since one potential mission was going to be a trip to Lowe's to return some furnace filters for ones that are not so restrictive and the two are close together. Having to wait for the technicians to arrive put the kibosh on those plans, too.

Snow forecast

Our community is all atwitter (does that have something to do with a large number of twits?) over the weather forecast for Thursday. Something like three to five inches of snow--maybe six, depending on forecaster--expected to fall some time Thursday.

Bah!

Aside from not having a snow bike, meaning that Jenn and I would have to coordinate our commuting using the one car, I find this worry over a few inches of snow baffling. We get snow every year. Sometimes more, sometimes less. I know folks who are happy to have *only* six inches of snow on their yards this time of year (meaning: a lot has melted off since the last foot of snow fell a week ago).

It could be far worse: This is not Atlanta, after all. My sister spent a few years in Atlanta in the early 1980s, as a student at Emory. I recall her glee that she was getting friends around with relative ease when there was an inch or so of snow on their roads one time, just because she had driven in snow here under our mother's tutelage, and knew to be smooth in applying control efforts and to think ahead planning for less traction than she had.

Still, that this town gets so worked up over half a foot of snow is really bewildering to me.

In the interest of disclosure, I will have to say: I used to drive a wrecker. I did a LOT of pulling cars out of ditches on "snow days." I was able and wiling to put my truck in places that many of my coworkers avoided, simply because I knew how to make use of the traction I had. I also knew when to stay out of potential trouble--most of the time. Sure, I got stuck a time or two, and learned from those experiences. I also learned to drive in snow during the aftermath of one of Louisville's bigger snowstorms--the 1977/8 winter had at least one two-foot snow dump on us. My car at the time had bias ply tires--not even snow tires--yet I got where I needed to go, learning about traction and "slideways" driving as I went. I learned about using the throttle to steer when the steering wheel doesn't do all it should--something front wheel drive cars don't seem to do as well, although they don't seem to have the same frequency of the problem, either.

In the mean time, I'm always surprised that the weather forecasts don't start with, "This weather forecast brought to you by Kroger, since we have an over-stock of milk and bread we need you to buy so that we are not stuck with it." It seems that would be a bit more honest...

Mid-month Sunday stuff

I am now set to begin my third term as Louisville Bicycle Club VP Education. The Club's annual banquet was last night, and part of the club business on such occasions is election of officers. Nobody stepped up to run against me, meaning that either a) I'm doing a good enough job that nobody figures they can do better or more likely b) I'm doing it well enough and nobody else wants to do it.

It isn't like it's a power trip or anything.

The cycling year is getting off to a good start, as I mentioned yesterday. I now have 231 miles for the year, compared to 252 that I had by the end of February last year. Jenn and I rode the tandem to Baptist East/Milestone Fitness Center for the 2:00 club ride, rode the ride, and rode home from the ride. Both of us were a bit chilled by the time we got home--we had both under-dressed just slightly. I was actually pretty warm around my shoulders most of the ride--as shown by the fact that my shirt was sweaty in that area, but that sweat was cooling off a bit faster than I like on the three-mile ride home.

Since I live outside Ian's delivery zones, I hadn't taken opportunity to try any of his soups. I had some stuff to drop by his house the other day, and procured a sample of his peanut soup to share with Jenn. We planned to enjoy it after the ride today, and boy, was it good.

Tim mentioned on his blog the other day, and I had linked to Facebook a few days before that, that Ian got some good press on the Surly Bikes blog a bit more than a week ago. I don't know how Surly got wind of all this--other than the fact that I've been in contact with them on a weekly basis getting updates on when we can get Ian a new bike to pull the soup cart. After the hit-and-run just before Turkey Day, Ian had been off the bike for a few weeks. Now, he's riding what's left of the bent Big Dummy, hoping it holds together until the new one arrives, hopefully later this month. Surly is awaiting some parts from Xtracycle before they ship bikes to dealers, so don't go fussing at Surly. No real need to squawk at Xtracycle, either, at this point--I'm given to understand that the parts are in transit to them already, and it's only a matter of time before things get delivered and we get to have Ian on his new rig.

I got to ride to work today!

Not quite halfway through January, and I've bested my mileage for February of last year. If the weather doesn't dump more snow on us between now and then, I'll best the total for January AND February 2010 by the end of next week. I only need to ride to work twice and do a trip to the grocery store.

Mileage for 2011 to date: 200

January 2010 miles: 65
February 2010 miles: 187
March 2010 miles: 548.76
First quarter 2010 miles: 800.76


If things REALLY go well, I'll best the first-quarter 2010 miles by the end of February. 801 miles is possible. Not particularly likely this time of year, but possible. I'm a quarter of the way there, two weeks into the year.

I've not been one to set goals like this in the past, but I think I'll shoot for six thousand miles this year. It shouldn't be too hard to do. I might even try for seven thousand.

Second quarter miles will be a bit tougher to beat. I did not drive to work even once in April of last year (Jenn picked me up twice--once for house-hunting, the other time for really bad weather). I drove some in May. We'll ride more in June this year than we did in 2010 simply because we are not working RAAM this year. We might do a bike tour that month--no decision yet, but we'll need to make one soon.

Second quarter 2010 miles: 1309.06
First half 2010 miles: 2109.82

Put in those terms, I should be able to best last years first-half record with a margin.

Of course, all this record-setting will make it harder to break my personal record next year.

Heh.

Denver to Louisville

As you know, I'm on Ergon's Commuter Team for 2011. I haven't gotten my goodies yet, but am eagerly anticipating the arrival.

I have been keeping an eye on Ergon's blog, too, and the folks at Ergon posted today about a Mayoral candidate in Denver who had a fund-raiser at Great Divide Brewery recently. Candidate Chris Romer is in favor of extending the scope of Denver's bike infrastructure.

The reason I find this noteworthy is that several years ago, our own then-Mayor Jerry Abramson cited Denver's fairly extensive bike path network when he asked that the first Bike Summit happen in 2004 or 2005. That a candidate wants to improve on an inspiring system is great. That the existing system inspires leaders in cities like ours is even better. It shows that we can do it, with the right focus of political will power. Help me encourage our new Mayor to focus some of that will power, won't you?

Snow bike thoughts, part whatever

Since I don't have enough money to buy a snow bike this week (or month, probably), yet am still thinking too much about it, I decided to look at my log for January and February of 2010. As it turns out, I've logged 174 miles since the first of the year. In February of 2010, I logged 187 miles. In January, only 65 miles.

Those numbers were estimates, based on reading my own entries in this blog, as I didn't start logging daily miles until March. Those numbers may have been on the low side, since my cyclometer was miscalibrated. Still, I'm not as worried about monthly mileage now as I was. My riding weather threshold has lowered a bit since then, so I'm more likely to ride this month than I was last January.

I still want a snow bike, but I'm not as focused on buying one right now.

I don't have a bike with snow tires...

...so I drove to work. Again. For the second time this week, and what will likely be the second of a string of times, as the temperatures are not high enough that the roads are clearing off effectively. There remains a small ice floe at the south end of my street. I can get around it by using other streets, but those streets have some of that annoying fake brick that jars the bike's lights into far more pieces than they were designed to have.

I keep wanting a snow and ice bike. We don't have the money for me to buy one this week, or month, so I get to spend money on gas instead.

If my commute was more urban, I might be able to make do with the bikes I have--I've ridden the Raleigh on packed snow, and it did reasonably well. All the clothing layers I would be wearing would serve as padding if I fell--a little bit of padding, anyway.

Last night was the first night of our seventh Tool School class. I normally limit the class to seven students, but wound up with nine this time for some reason. It's a good group of folks, so I think we'll be okay. Having nine students will get pretty busy for me the last two nights--good thing Bob will be there to help me with the hands-on stuff we'll be doing.

Mikael has made a couple recent posts concerning bike infrastructure in cities other than Copenhagen. In one such post, he mentions that it's tiring to hear "it's just Copenhagen," or "It's Copenhagen and the Netherlands, but nowhere else," as if those are the only places that "get it" when it comes to the desirability of bike-specific urban infrastructure.

He makes a good point--many other cities are beginning to get the idea, and make the investments. I want very much to see Louisville "get it," in ways that our No-Longer-Mayor Abramson started to see.

It takes a LOT of political will power--usually more than can be utilized in one term of office. There are many "anti-cyclists" in the local community, and much of the infrastructure discussion is focused on the Ohio River Bridges Boondoggle instead of surface-level projects that would cost less to do, cost less to maintain, and serve more people--in part by taking traffic OFF the existing Interstates and thus reducing pressure to build Interstate bridges.

That lowly little old me can see this but lofty politicians cannot says something, but I don't know what it is. Despite letters written to various people who are at least titular leaders in the community, I feel like I'm standing in front of a steamroller with a cap pistol. Or one of those gag guns seen in the clown shows that spits out a flag with the word BANG on it. The powers that be want big bridges, they want to spend a ton of money before creating big bridges, and they seem to want to drag out the pre-construction BS long after it's due to be done.

I suppose the delay could be okay with me if it really gave me the feeling that we could impress upon the powers that be that the idea of having two more Interstate-level bridges is more a 1950s-era solution than a 2011-and-beyond solution. Gas will likely never be as cheap as $2/gallon again, as it was when the two-bridge thing started really gathering steam. It seems more reasonable that we could build several bridges on order of the Clark Memorial Bridge for about the same money, connecting neighborhoods instead of interstates, and improve traffic flow to a far greater degree compared to two Interstate bridges. It also seems that if one such bridge is taken out of service due to some unforeseen event like a barge getting loose and hitting the supports, the traffic diversion would foul up more bridges by less rather than REALLY fouling up one bridge (this is about what happened to the Sherman Minton bridge in 2009--inspectors cleared the bridge for use shortly after the event, but that morning's drive time was BRUTAL for a lot of people).

Such smaller bridges would allow for more bicycle-friendly travel across the river, as well.

But what do I know? I am one of those crazy folks who rode his bike to work this morning, into the teeth of a headwind the whole way, thinking that if the wind continues until I go home I'll have a SWEET tailwind and a fast trip home!

A recent post on Copenhagenize discusses how that city prioritizes cycle-ways in its snow cleanup efforts, and briefly touches on why. Citizen cyclists, as Mikael calls them, are so large a factor that not clearing the cycle infrastructure first would mean that tens of thousands of folks would suddenly descend on the public transit system or get in cars, causing a much larger traffic problem for all involved.

Would that we had such a situation in Louisville Kentucky.

Mikael also observes that few folks in Copenhagen use snow-specific tires--in part because the cycle ways are cleared so well and so often.

I thought about that a moment, given my recent post pondering whether to buy a snow-specific bike (which would have studded snow tires). I observed in his comments section that much of Copenhagen is relatively urban--even in residential areas. My own commute is mostly suburban in nature, with a fair bit of rural thrown in for good measure. Even the suburban areas have greater elevation changes than I ever seem to see in Mikael's photos of Copenhagen. I've not looked at a topographical map of that city, so I don't know how varied the terrain really is. He may have streets like those in Seattle that figured prominently in some youtube videos recently seen--cars and trucks sliding down a hill on icy pavement and stacking into one another with noises that only a body-shop owner could love.


I don't have anything quite so daunting in my commute--the steepest climbs in my normal route are on Houston Lane and Rollington Road between Pewee Valley and Westport Road by Forest Springs North subdivision, and traffic through there is usually pretty light. I expect that if the road was impassable, I could use grass berms and ditches on either side, if I get a snow-day bike as I'm considering doing.

One thing that has occurred to me is that the snow-day bike I'm pondering could eventually replace my old Raleigh three-speed. I don't know whether this would happen, only that it's a possibility. I've surprised myself by how fond I am of that old bike, after all the years I spoke disparagingly about "wedgie bikes." Of course, some tempering of my attitudes came as part of working in the bike business, so I'm not as vocal about recumbent bikes being superior as I once was. I've had to recognize that the "different horses for different courses" analogy fits well when it comes to bicycles. I also have found that the correct number of bicycles in the garage is n+1, where n is the current number of bicycles in inventory and n+2 is the most the garage can hold. At the moment, however, I need to get some boxes out of my garage so that I can get to the n bikes we currently have.

Snow vehicle choices

As I mentioned the other day, Jenn and I are considering replacing my aging pickup truck, or adding a gas-powered something, or otherwise augmenting my ability to get to work when it snows. As also mentioned, I'm considering just buying a bike that I can outfit with studded snow tires for days when there is ice on the roadways.

One bike I'm contemplating is a Specialized Crosstrail Disc. I like that it has the 700c wheels and will accept wider tires like the 40mm Schwalbe Marathon Winter. I can get off the side of the road if traffic gets really stupid. It doesn't have the fanciest brakes or fork, but I don't figure it makes sense to buy a more expensive rig for the little bit of mileage I'm likely to put on a winter bike. The rear drive is seven-speed, rather than the higher-end nine- or ten-speed drivetrains I maintain for customers, but I also ride a '74 three-speed, for cryin' out loud!

A very similar bike that is also in the running is the Specialized Hardrock 29 Disc. Aside from some minor differences in geometry, these seem similar enough that the choice comes down to color. Since the Crosstrail's wheelbase is longer, it would probably serve me better on the road (the primary use for this bike being transportation).

In either case, I can use the Ergon goodies I'm scheduled to receive soon as part of my being on the Ergon Commuter Team on either bike. 

Part of my interest in Specialized bikes at this point is that I work for a Specialized dealer, and can get better pricing on their products as a result. As it happens, if one is going to get a wedgie bike, as I sometimes refer to non-recumbent bicycles, Specialized makes a wide variety of very good ones, suitable for many applications.

First post for me this year

The Holly-daze is more or less over, now, and it's back to work! And, of course, I rode to work this morning.

Discussions over the weekend included whether to buy a different gas-powered vehicle, given the realities of our commuting and other wants/needs. My truck now has something like 225,000 miles on it, and will not last forever. The other car has been out of service since April. We've done reasonably well on one car and a bunch of bikes, but we haven't tried it in winter. Yet. At least, not a full winter.

One alternative idea was that I could get a bike better suited for winter roads, so that I could ride to the store from the end of TARC service lines if things are icy (using yards beside the roads if need be...). I have a set of grips and pedals coming from Ergon in the next few weeks, and this would be a great way to put them to use--enabling me to wear footwear that would be warmer than my usual cycling shoes or sandals, even WITH the Planet Bike shoe covers I recently purchased (more on those in a bit). I could get a really nice mountain bike with larger wheels and disc brakes, and that has room for some manner of fenders and ways to attach cargo racks (or use that Ergon backpack I'm about to receive), for well under a thousand dollars. And that's buying high-end new stuff. If I look around for something used, I could do for less money still. A car would cost several thousand dollars the first year of ownership. I'm kind of attached to the idea of not adding a monthly car payment to the outgoing budget lines!

Oh, those Planet Bike Blitzen shoe covers: NICE! They are warmer than the ones they replaced, AND more comfortable. I'm glad I got them. They are easier to put on over my big shoes than the old ones, too. I haven't tried them with my sandals yet, but will soon (a favorite way to deal with cold weather being to wear two pairs of warm socks with Gore-Tex socks in my sandals, to avoid constricting blood flow in my feet, then put shoe covers over all that for additional warmth). The sandal outsole is wider than that on my mountain bike shoes (Lake MX250 Wides, circa 2002).