Commute, fender repair, Monday Night ride

I finally feel back in the swing of things. Today brought with it about 50 miles. The afternoon was ridiculously mild for August, but it doesn't surprise me given the chilly morning we had.


Barely any wind, hardly a car on the road this afternoon. Southwest Blvd was practically barren for the time of day.


Mail Call! The spring clip holds all the mail nicely so I don't need to open the bags up and shuffle stuff around to make room for it.


When I started using the Twelve again, I noticed that my rear SKS Fender had started cracking. This was almost certainly from user error. If you recall, I had an incident where the rear fender got mangled, back on May 14th. I'm pretty sure that's why it was cracking now.

I tried to epoxy the fender back together a few days ago but it kept getting worse. Today, the crack had worn all the way through, my rear fender was two separate pieces of plastic. It's time to get serious. My original plan was to use fiberglass and resin, but as I thought about it, I figured that denim and epoxy would probably be fine. This epoxy is pliable, but needs something to really bond to the plastic with. The denim provides this.


Denim soaked in epoxy...


A layer of epoxy-impregnated denim inside and out. It set nice and hard, and seems to be holding up.


On my way to the Monday Night Ride, I saw two guys with huge messenger bags. Both were on Bianchi Axises ...axes? ...axii? well, whatever. Definitely commuting. One offered to let me carry his payload. I told him I had just dropped off a similar payload at home, and declined his generous offer. At Goddard and 87th, they grew tired of waiting for a chance to turn left and pushed onward. Shortly thereafter, I made my left turn. I saw them a while later behind me as they turned from a different side street.

The Monday Night ride was a blast, as usual. Here's Tim sporting the C'Dude team Jersey.


Mark found a new shortcut. Its hard to see, but this is a narrow sidewalk between two fences.


When we got back, there was a sweet Torker cargo trike there with an older Schwinn World Tourer. They weren't with our group, they'd just ridden to get something to eat.


Now, at about 10:00 PM, it's just perfect outside at 72°F. If only it would stay like this all night. Somehow, I know it won't.