Car-Free Happy Hour--almost

Jenn and I rode the tandem to Car-Free Happy Hour tonight. We met some folks who decided it would be fun to ride as a group from the formal entrance to the UofL Belknap Campus, but...

not before having a flat tire. Not just your normal, run-of-the-mill flat tire, but a blowout. On the front. On the tandem. It was my first front tire blowout in YEARS, and the tire is flexible enough that it made the bike unmanageable immediately. Fortunately, we were only going about ten miles an hour at the time, so the fall was not so bad. I booted the tire with a folded dollar bill, as I teach in all manner of classes. It held for about eight miles. The hole in the tire was just too bad.

We were on our way home by then, on Eastern Parkway nearing Poplar Level Road. The tire simply let go--again--with no warning other than the thumping every revolution that I knew (or thought) meant I had a bulge from the failing carcass plies. I managed to keep the bike upright the second time, but we decided without even doing any more looking that the tire was not going to get us home. We weren't willing to trust it again. I called my stepfather, and he was willing and able to bring his truck to haul us home.

As it happens, with RAIN coming up in two weeks, I recently ordered a spare set of tires for the bike. I suspect that I bruised this one when on the gravel roads during our trip Tuesday, as I had noticed a slight bump in the tire when we were nearing home. I had noticed it again on our way to Car Free Happy Hour, but the tire didn't feel like it was going to give out so soon. I'll be ordering another front tire tomorrow.

Lesson 1: if you feel a bump in a tire, inspect it closely. Replace the tire rather than ride on it.

Lesson 2: dollar bills work for a while, but not as well on tandems with the extra weight they carry. Park Tool makes tire boots that work better.

Lesson 3: Maybe it's a good time to find a place to carry spare tires on the bike...

Overnight trip

Jenn and I had wanted to do more riding this year, especially since we were not doing the Race Across America thing. The Bike Virginia summer tour always appeals to me, although I've only made use of three opportunities to ride it. This year's adventure returned to southwest Virginia, the same general area I got to enjoy the first time I did their tour in 1993.

Sadly, it wasn't to be for us this year. The reasons are not really but so good; one was that I never felt the store had adequate staffing to deal with my absence, the other (and larger) was that I put off registering until I figured we'd have staff, and found that I missed the registration deadline.

Jenn, of course, had scheduled vacation months in advance, so she's off this week regardless.

Not being the best planner around, it took me until yesterday to finalize routing and destination for what became our two-day self-supported tour. Self-supported, in this case, includes things like two CPAP machines (ten or twelve pounds each), a tent, sleeping pad, sleeping bags (forecast lows in the high 50s for our destination), a change of clothing, and a way to carry some food. All of that stuff got stuffed into the Burley trailer. That trailer has developed a tire-scrubbing behavior that will need some attention--with the load, it reduced our average speeds from sixteen or better to less than twelve. Crawling up some long grades at less than four miles an hour on roads like KY 146 or US 42 or US 421 out of Milton is quite an adventure in traffic "calming."

I'm still not sure whether the destination was more important or the journey. It was good to get out on the bike. It was great to ride with Jenn, even if we were both feeling a bit out of sorts that last ten miles getting home (shifting when one is tired can be a bit less smooth than is ideal, and dealing with the captain's tired shifting is apparently an even larger challenge). We didn't fight over it, of course, but worked on dealing with the fatigue a bit and went on.

Our destination was a friend's farm in the hills behind Vevay, Indiana, not far from Bennington Pike. The road to their place used to be gravel from end to end, but got paved some time in the last ten years--at least from one end to their place. From their place to the other end (the shorter distance, of course) there is a steep hill that Switzerland County has not had the money to pave. The end of the road at the bottom of that hill features a creek crossing as well, and links to another gravel road that has its own problems--a wash out a year or two ago has closed the end nearer to our route, and the resulting lack of traffic means that the gravel is often VERY loose coming from the other end. Since all that gravel was on the shorter distance for us, we wound up walking a mile or two, including that aforementioned-steep hill, at the end of our ride when we were already tired.

I suppose well-traveled gravel roads are not as bad. This one had a LOT of loose 5s and 7s on top, with not a lot of dense-grade dust mixed in to stabilize things. It hasn't been rolled or graded or oiled in I don't know how long. There was mud from recent rains. Some folks like riding on such roads. I like staying upright on my bike, especially when the penalty for falling is gravel embedded in one's (and one's stoker's) skin.

For the return trip, we opted for the paved route. Although longer by a few miles, it was far more comfortable, and yielded better average speeds.

As much as I would like to put more about our trip on here, though, I'm tired. Jenn is off to the bus station with her older daughter, as my stepdaughter is going to study for a month or so in Quebec. Jenn's very tired, as am I, so it's time for me to get the bed ready for her return to make it easier for her to simply fall into it.

One more fun factoid: Our little tour poked my June 2011 mileage total to make it my highest month since I started recording on mycyclinglog.com. 854-point-something miles for the month, and we still have car-free happy hour tomorrow (and a few errands beforehand).

I can't help it...

As of my return home today, I have logged over 4000 miles of bicycle use this year. This includes 3561 miles of bicycling instead of driving since the beginning of the year, split among five bikes: My Vanguard, with 1255 miles, my Strada, with almost 89 miles, my Raleigh, with 525 miles (yeah, I rarely ride that one now that I have the Globe), the Screamer tandem, with 421 miles (Jenn and I plan to put a fair number of miles on that in the coming week or three), Jenn's Giro, at 48 miles, and the new-in-March Globe, with a bit over 1660 miles (yeah, it became my "it's threatening to rain or it's raining" bike, and April and May saw a LOT of wet days).

June isn't over, but I've logged more miles in June 2011 than I did in all but three months of 2010, and I'm only a few miles shy of besting one of those months. I don't know whether I'll beat my May 2011 numbers, but it's possible. I have a few days off from work this coming week, and since I fouled up and didn't get us registered for Bike Virginia before the deadline, Jenn and I will try to do some day tours on the tandem. We might even sneak in an overnight trip somewhere just to do it.

My CO2 miles are still at a bit more than 18% of the Louisville Bicycle Club's Commuting group miles. My nearest competitor among that group is more than 900 miles behind me in overall miles, and over two thousand miles back in CO2 miles. I'm sure some of the mileage junkies in the club have more bike miles, but I haven't done all that math, as they are mostly club miles which are not why I'm crowing.

More numbers games

In my recent crowing about mileage numbers, I had missed one that had been amusing me earlier in the year: how my YTD miles for 2011 compares to my miles for 2010.

At the moment, I am over one hundred miles ahead of my 2010 numbers for the end of August. By August 31, 2010, I had logged 3693 miles. I've logged over 3800 for 2011 so far, including over 3400 CO2 miles. My CO2 miles alone get me beyond my total for July 2010 by 500 miles.

At this point, it's quite possible that I'll reach eight thousand miles for 2011.

Another boring mileage post

As I got home from the New Rider Clinic David is teaching at Iroquois Park this evening, I hit a double whammy. 3800 miles year to date by bicycle, and a sort-of weird one. At the start of the year, I set the annual goal on mycyclinglog.com at six thousand miles. At this point, I'm obviously over half-way there, and the year is not half over. I've been watching the "average daily miles needed to reach the goal" stat with some amusement over the last couple months, as the number keeps dropping. As of now, I need to ride an average of eleven miles a day to reach six thousand for the year.

Nothing really special about the CO2 miles (as in, ridden instead of driven) number right now, except that it's over 3350. It will probably break 3400 this weekend.

It was raining a bit when I left for work this morning, but quit part-way to Crestwood. It decided to rain on me for the last mile or so, just because it could. I did manage to get to the store ahead of the heavy weather that came shortly after I opened. I was glad. There was lots of lightning, and I prefer to not ride when there is lots of lightning.


Oh, and I made the Ergon blog the other day. I had Jenn take a couple pictures that would, hopefully, show I was using the grips and gloves, and put one in a prior post. I'm still pleased with the gloves, aside from that they are a bit small (the largest they offered was XXL--I could probably wear XXXL in their sizing), and hard to get off my hands.

I recently ordered another kilt from SportKilt. It arrived yesterday. I haven't had a chance to wear it, and may not get to. I ordered a large based on the extra-large I already have that is a bit too big around for me. The large is a bit too small. We'll see what the manufacturer says about things...

Where did the weekend go?

I needed to be at a Club Ex-Comm meeting at four yesterday afternoon, so I drove to work. It would have taken me an hour and a half to get there by bike from the store, and I knew better than to think I'd get out of the store before 3:00. I missed a nice riding day.

Today, we had stuff to do around the house. Jenn has a Premier Jewelry Party coming this week, so the house needed to be spruced up a bit. It's not quite done, but we are a lot closer. We hadn't let it get too far away from us this time, which helped. Still, I missed a nice riding day.

Shortly after I got to work yesterday, my mother called me to inform me that my sister was having to have her cat euthanized. Caruso had been with her for thirteen years, and was probably four years old when he came to her. He had one of the more musical purrs I've ever heard from a cat. She is grieving heavily, as she (like yours truly) is very much a cat person. Neither of us has had children--we have had cats instead. I feel bad for her, as I know what heartache it is to lose such a close friend. I wrote on this blog in April of 2009 about losing my cat Aloysius Ebenezer Qat, Esquire, and what a friend he had been for the thirteen years I had him in my life.

We know our cats won't outlive us, but we get another, anyway. They bring us joy and entertainment in many ways. We miss them when they go, and somehow we never forget any of them. I've had some wonderful feline friendships over the years, and still think about each of them from time to time.

trying to catch up with things

Again, it's been ten days or more since I posted here. I haven't had much to say, aside from the occasional mileage boast. What I have been wanting to do, though is post a couple images of my new Ergon gloves. Sadly, I don't have any good ones yet. I do have this, though, showing off my wicking t-shirt from Commute Orlando:

I've been saying for a while that other gloves don't seem to do as well with these grips as riding bare-handed. However, since receiving the gloves earlier this week, I've been impressed at the comfort improvement, despite the distinct lack of padding compared to typical cycling gloves. My only complaint with these gloves is that the XXL size is a bit small for me, and thus takes a while to get off my hands.

It's almost disgusting for me, a long-time die-hard recumbent guy, to have put so many miles on this bike since I got it early in March (something like 1500 miles to date), but I've enjoyed having a new bike. I'm also getting spoiled on having disc brakes. This bike is my typical choice if I'm teaching (it's the closest thing I have to the bikes most of my students ride) or if I'm attending meetings downtown (easier to lock than my Vanguard). I also tend to prefer it if the weather is nasty--and we've had a BUNCH of rain this season.

Timothy made a comment on a Facebook post suggesting that I had left recumbents behind, based on the miles I've been putting on the Globe. A look at my stats for the year showed me that I had been neglecting my Vanguard too much of late, so I rode it to work today, and plan to ride it tomorrow. I won't get to ride to work on Saturday, as I have a time crunch after store hours. Still, I have half again more miles on the new bike than on the Vanguard, and it will take time to catch up. I'll have time to ride it a lot in the coming months, though. It won't take but another month or two to get another five hundred miles on it.

David Wittry has begun his New Rider Clinics out at Iroquois Park. I'm being a volunteer as much as I'm able with store hours, figuring that I can learn from him and better teach my own students. The round-trip to Iroquois adds thirty miles to my day, plus whatever riding we'll do for the class, so I get some fifty-plus-mile days every week for a while!

I'll likely ride the Globe to work on Mondays and Wednesdays for a while, due to commitments to New Rider Clinics. I get to ride the Vanguard the rest of my work days, though.

Gratuitous mileage crowing post

It's almost the end of the month. Jenn and I were ride marshals on the Mayor's Ride this morning, and of course rode the tandem to and from the ride. We stopped at Nancy's Bagel Grounds en route this morning for a bagel or three, then hustled to Waterfront Park for the shindig. On the way home, we ate at Shiraz on Frankfort Avenue, then stopped at Plant Kingdom for some flowers for Jenn to put in some pots here and there around the house.

By the time we got done with the Mayor's Ride, I had changed something like five flat tires for folks who had no supplies. I had adjusted a half-dozen seats while installing the giveaway flashing lights. Riding home, I felt really tired--more so than seemed reasonable given the output so far. However, I stopped at a convenience store and realized that part of the problem was hydration--I was underhydrated. Not enough to be a big problem, but enough to affect my available power. The quart or so of tea I drank at lunch, coupled with the liter of water I drank before getting to lunch, did a lot to get me back on the road. I was still a bit tired, but didn't feel as "off" as I had been feeling.

Now for the numbers: May 2011 has become the biggest mileage month since I started recording miles on mycyclinglog.com. My previous best effort was July of 2010, with 815 miles. I still have a round trip to work tomorrow, and I already have 820 miles for May. I have over 3300 bicycle miles for 2011 YTD, and over 2900 of those miles are "riding instead of driving" miles. By the end of the week, I will probably break the 3000 mark on that score--the more important one for me now. I'm apparently not slacking as badly, as I now have a bit over eighteen percent of the Louisville Bicycle Club's "CO2" miles (up from seventeen percent a couple weeks ago, but still down from the roughly twenty percent I had a couple months ago). The new bike has taken over as my apparent commuter bike of choice (despite that the Vanguard is more comfortable), as it's easier to manage in town when locking outdoors as an issue, and I'm using it for rainy days instead of the Vanguard. The Ryan Vanguard is showing a bit less than nine hundred miles for the year, and the Globe over 1400. The Raleigh has five hundred and some miles on it. The Strada less than a hundred (although the Strada and Giro combined show about a hundred miles of club riding). The Screamer has about 420 miles on it this year.

It's been several days...

...since I posted. I was unable to post from home, due to some browser setting on Jenn's lap top computer (the desk top unit died a couple weeks ago). There is something odd about a setting in the browser at work, making it hard to type anything there, PLUS things have gotten busy enough that I rarely have time to even look at emails or field calls related to the New Rider Clinics, let alone type out a blog post.

On Bike to Work Day, Jenn and I rode to Seneca Park to ride downtown with whoever met there. We had a good-sized crowd, including Mayor Fischer. Once we got folks where they needed to go, Jenn and I had breakfast at Toast on Market, then I had an errand in Saint Matthews (the store wasn't open when I went by there earlier that morning). On my way back to Fourth Street Live for the lunch time festivities, I found Jenn coming out of Bargain Supply, where she had been appliance shopping (we are considering replacing our range and fridge). After the festivities, we stopped in there again so that she could show me what she had found. We also ventured to another store on Market to see what they had to offer.

On Saturday, I rode the Vanguard to work, and Jenn brought out the tandem so that we could do the shop ride. During the ride, I decided it was time for me to do some service work on the tandem--the shifting was not suiting me, nor were the rear rim brakes, and there were a couple other minor squawks I wanted to address. Once done with that, we loaded it in the truck for the trip home, and as it was raining, left the Vanguard at the store. If you've been reading my blog for over two months, you can probably see what is coming.

Yep, on Wednesday (the first day I had time to do so), I hauled a trailer out to the store so that I could get two bikes home at once. This time I changed things a bit, by pulling the Burley instead of the Safety 1st, and rode the Globe to work instead of the Raleigh. It was a slight change hauling the Globe on the Burley, but it worked just fine.

Somewhere in all this, I caught wind of a plan afoot that involved riding bicycles to Lexington to greet Joe Ward during his stay in the Merkey Cancer Center fighting a form of blood cancer. It sounded like more of an adventure than the Horsey Hundred, and had potential to cost far less since we wouldn't have to drive to Georgetown and back with similar bike miles.

The ride to Lexington went pretty well. There were ten of us as far as Lawrenceburg, then two guys got separated from the main group and went on ahead. The remaining eight rode in to the UK campus about four thirty to find a sign in the courtyard below Joe's window that said NO BIKE RIDING. As we waved to Joe, one of the guys tried to lift the sign over his head. Deciding that it was too heavy for him to do so, he walked back from it. I hefted it, and found I could briefly shake it overhead one-handed, and did so for a couple of photo ops.

We went to dinner, and during dinner decided that we would, as a group, take advantage of the numerous offers to haul our bikes and selves home that night rather than ride home. There were only three or four riders interested in the return ride on Sunday, and I figured it would give me a chance to do some much-needed yard work.

Tomorrow is Bike to Work Day

I haven't really said much about Bike to Work Day/Week/Month this month. As I noted earlier, Bike to Work Day or Week is not so much about me as about folks who want to, but who keep finding obstacles to riding instead of driving. You've heard them, I'm sure: "I have too far to go," or, "I have to look nice," or whatever.

I ride thirteen miles each way, four or five days a week. I know of folks who double that. Many folks won't ride two miles. Why not?

My commute is far enough that it makes sense to change clothes when I get to the store. I have a place to keep several shirts, jeans, a couple of kilts, shoes, socks and such. My friend Kirk Kandle used to ride to Humana wearing a Brooks Brothers suit, or he learned how to roll it so that it wouldn't wrinkle as he rode to work in warmer weather.

When I worked for New Directions as a home repair coordinator, I needed my truck at work most days. I needed it at home on weekends. I drove to work Monday morning, hauling the bike. I left the truck at the office during the week, and hauled the bike home Friday evening, letting me ride home from work four days out of five.

Over the years, I've come up with ways to deal with many of the more common hurdles folks find as reasons, er, excuses for not riding to work. I figure a lot of the issue is that if one really wants, one can find resolutions for those challenges.

I've not driven to work since I don't know when, although I have gotten rides home using gas power five or so times in the last month. Customers notice my bike in the store and have that "A-HA!" moment when they realize they see me in my travels frequently. I feel that riding to work regularly adds some legitimacy to my statements to the effect that the highest, most noble use for a bicycle is transportation, and that utility cycling is a matter of several small choices that add up to bigger choices.

Sure, it helps that I work in a bike shop--I get better prices on parts for my commuter bike, and can trick out my rigs. But I could do much of what I do for far less if I would accept using older bikes (like my '74 Raleigh) or fewer doo-dads (the ring lock on the back wheel of my Globe is trick as all get-out by local standards, but I could make do with a U-lock if I had to).

Ride of Silence

As I mentioned in my previous post, I rode the Ride of Silence Wednesday evening. Turnout was a bit light, probably due to the wet weather we've been having.

Jackie Green recently asked if things like Ride of Silence wouldn't deter folks from riding, as it focuses on the bad things that happen to too many people. I think it worth honoring those missing cyclists, and letting other road users know that they were loved people, with parents, siblings, friends and perhaps children of their own, not just objects in the road to be gotten around as one gets to one's destination.

May Miles

As of Wednesday evening, when I got home from riding with folks doing the Ride of Silence, I topped my May 2010 miles. By the time I get home from work on Thursday, I will have topped three thousand miles for 2011, and twenty-six hundred CO2 (or bike instead of car) miles for 2011.

Just sayin'...

Objects in the Roadway

Thanks to this post on the Commute Orlando blog, I found myself reading this post from Andy Cline.

I like that the latter talks about operating on the roadway as if one is sharing a public space instead of as if one is the only user of the roadway and everything else is an object around which one has to maneuver. I have long felt that too few folks think about that they are sharing public space. They don't look beyond their own front bumper (or even beyond their windshields, some times), ignoring that others are around them who have equally-valid reasons for getting where they want to go. Doctor Cline mentions that acting as if one is sharing public space is harder to do than considering everyone and everything else on the road as objects in the road (I'll use the word obstacles, here). It requires that one recognize that others have equal rights to use the space. It also requires that one is cognizant that other road users deserve our care and attention.

With occasional lapses, I've tried to be this way for a while, myself. I suspect I came to it through being a cyclist--at least in part. I have found that being a cyclist makes me a better driver, although I haven't always been able to articulate why as well as I would like. I think part of it is this recognition that since I am not simply an object in the road (despite what some drivers seem to think), neither are they. They, too, are people, deserving of care and respect simply because they are living beings. I am compelled to pay attention to what they are doing, in part due to my lack of a cage like theirs.

Any thoughts on this?

I must be slacking

I'm hoping that third time's a charm--the first two times I posted this, I got the "your post was successful" message, only to find a blank post.

I no longer have over nineteen percent of the Louisville Bicycle Club's CO2 miles as logged on mycyclinglog.com. I'm down to about seventeen percent.

Of course, since I held that nineteen percent figure, five or six more folks have started logging miles. The weather has improved a little bit (although one wouldn't know it looking outside yesterday), so more folks feel like riding their bikes for utility.

I would like to see my mileage totals be more like ten percent of the club's CO2 miles, at my current rate of riding. It would mean that lots more folks are using their bikes instead of just recreating on them.

May you live in interesting times

...is a double-edged wish. I'm feeling it right now, as the President of the Louisville Bicycle Club, Andy Murphy, has resigned his posts (including that of Director for Old Kentucky Home Tour). The unofficial email organ--kycyclist--is ablaze with discussion, as is also the back channel among the executive committee.

There is a General Membership meeting scheduled for this Sunday. Apparently the venue that was planned has been deemed no longer available, perhaps in anticipation of a contentious meeting. Go figure. Seems like a great way to quell damaging dialog, n'est-ce pas?

The metaphorical snowball that has been formed is going to grow. I suspect something along the lines of an avalanche is in the offing.

Until now, I've considered the VP Education position I hold to be fairly low on the drama scale. I show up for meetings, toss my opinion out when I feel I have one to share, vote as I see best for the club, and generally just want to teach my classes without a lot of extra melodrama.

Interesting times, indeed...

End of April numbers post

I know, I did some numbers crowing ten days ago. Still, here are the numbers for April:

I logged a bit more than fifty-five hours on bicycles in April, and about seven hundred sixty-two miles. Since I typically log my work ride and most of my errand jaunts as round trips instead of as several separate trips, I tracked thirty-eight trips by bike. There were two days in April that I didn't get on a bike at all, and a couple during which I only went a little distance.

Compared to March, I had fewer miles. March was my second-highest monthly mileage since I started tracking the numbers last year. April 2011 was fourth by a couple miles to August of 2010.

I didn't make note of what day the Tempo died last April, but as it was in April of 2010, I can say we've been a one-car family for a year now. We borrowed a car from Jenn's parents briefly at some point, but haven't used it since we gave it back some time last May.

Jenn keeps talking about getting a fuel-efficient car to allow us to leave my truck sit more. I keep looking at what it would cost to have two cars again, regardless of fuel costs, and am thus wondering about replacing the truck with something that could pull my utility trailer (built to haul bicycles) and get better gas mileage the rest of the time. I find it hard to justify buying a ten- (or twenty-) thousand-dollar car that gets forty MPG if we can find a three-thousand dollar car that gets thirty. The annual costs associated with car use are high enough with either that I don't want to take on debt costs for four or five years to get ten better MPG at ten or fifteen thousand miles a year. If we were driving thirty thousand miles a year, it would be different. I need to sit down some time soon and play with the numbers a bit more.

We had more than thirteen inches of rain in April 2011. It's not done raining yet. I got soaked yesterday and again on my way to work this morning. If it keeps up, I'm going to be easier to convince that we "need" a second car. My thought, however, is that by the time I'm convinced to buy something, it will quit raining and we'll experience drought conditions for a couple months. As tired as I've gotten of rain, I'm not yet ready to buy a second car.

Bike Month is all but here

Bike Month, Bike to Work Week and Bike to Work Day are fast approaching!

They aren't so much about folks like myself, as I already bike instead of driving a car much of the time. They are about encouraging folks to try riding instead of driving. Lots of seasoned riders are happy to brainstorm with new riders to find solutions for challenges that keep those new riders from using a bike instead of the car. Here is an article from someone who is finding out just how encouraging the cycling community can be.

On a local scale, the folks at Bike Louisville, Bicycling for Louisville and the Louisville Bicycle Club are having some friendly competition to see who can do the most by bike. It involves tracking your bike use through Green Light Ride, but registration is easy and free. Go for it! Win the COVETED Gilded Handlebars!

Rainy ride to work

Decisions, decisions.

Jenn had a doctor appointment this morning. It was raining, and she knows I don't like riding in the rain. She was willing to haul my bike and me to work then drive to her appointment, but by the time we could have hit the road, there would not have been near enough time for her to get to Crestwood then to her appointment near the Gardiner Lane Post Office. She was willing to be late, but I saw no need for her to throw off her doctor's schedule for the morning and affect other patients over a little water falling from the sky. I've ridden in worse.

Despite my general dislike for riding in wet weather, I'm more willing to do so this year than in prior years. I'm not sure how to attribute this change. Maybe I'm getting (more) stubborn or something.

Yeah, we've had more than a little water fall from the sky. The river is well above flood stage, meaning that I will probably have to move the first meeting or two of the New Rider Clinics to higher ground.

"Do you know how dangerous this is?"

The above question was asked of me Thursday evening, as Jenn and I rode the tandem out to Mom's for a visit. As we were climbing out of the valley at Floyd's Fork on Aiken Road (always a butt-kicking hill, despite its short duration), a motorist passed us, but as he pulled alongside, he ran his passenger window down and (I think) asked the title question. I think he meant that what I was doing was dangerous, and I really don't think he had any idea of the level of irony in his asking while he occupied the wrong side of the road in an area with a double-yellow center line (and on a blind hill, at that). I, on the other hand, knew quite well what I was doing, and that where I was riding was the best place on the roadway for the situation. I've read the manual, you see, and I probably have a better grasp of the rules of the road than that driver, based on that short display of his sense of danger. I also would be willing to bet a fair bit of money that I have more bicycle miles this month than he does.

In other riding updates, I've really been enjoying the Ergon grips on the Vienna. I noted a while back--here or on facebook--that they feel better without gloves than with any of the gloves I now own, so unless it's cool enough that gloves make sense, I ride bare-handed. I haven't heard a timeline on getting my Ergon gloves to try them with the grips--they are claimed to be designed to complement the grips--but I'm looking forward to seeing how they do. I have been told to expect my pedals late in May. No word on the backpack, yet, sad to say.

I can't fuss. I don't have to pay money for this stuff. I would like to be able to write about it, though, since that is my part of the Ergon Commuter Team deal.

I haven't crowed about numbers in a few days, so here goes: Total bike miles, YTD: 2376. Total CO2 miles, YTD (as in, instead of driving a car), 2007. Yes, that's two thousand seven miles instead of driving a car so far this year. That's a bit more than nineteen percent of the Louisville Bicycle Club's 10311 logged CO2 miles YTD. With only 590 miles for April so far, I probably won't break last month's 806 miles, but that's okay. There were four months in 2010 that saw me go more than six hundred miles, and I'll best two of those months (April and September of last year) by the end of this month.

The 1978th anniversary of the First Zombie Uprising!

To quote P.Z. Myers:

Y'all remember what many of our neighbors are commemorating this weekend: the first Zombie Uprising of 33AD.

⁵¹ At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split ⁵² and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. ⁵³ They came out of the tombs after Jesus' resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

It's funny how this amazing awesome story didn't make it into any other historical accounts. Somebody ought to turn it into a novel — you'll have both the evangelical Christian audience and the graphic horror audience at the same time! Think how much fun the book signings would be!

 Yeah, I have been accused of being an iconoclast. So sue me. Just don't try to eat my brain...