I'm back from the Lenexa Midnight Ride

Well, that was a blast!

I'm kind of glad I took the mountain bike. I got to the registration table pretty early, about 10:00. I got my rider number, my t-shirt and my inspection pass right off the bat. What I didn't know is that I was directly behind Warren's sons. Warren was, himself, in front of them. So our numbers were sequential. How strange is that?

After getting my bike inspected by the safety crew, I swung by the Mix93.3 van to pick up some free stuff. I don't listen to the station a whole lot, but hey, free stuff is good. One of the Mix underlings was taking pictures of people kickin' it with radio personality, Kelly Urich. I got mine taken, too. He's actually got a pretty sweet Cannondale R800.

I spent about an hour and a half riding around the parking area and blocked-off streets, waiting for the ride to begin. About 25 minutes before midnight, someone said "There's Noah!" I turned around and that's when I ran into Warren's clan and found we had the sequential number thing going on. Just for my blog, I took a picture of Warren taking a picture of me for his own blog. Or was he taking a picture of me taking a picture of him for my blog for his own blog? I'll let you decide.

I was kind of surprised that a few other people knew who I was, or mentioned my blog. To all of you who said hi to me or who saw me out there: Hi, right back at ya :)

Most of the photos I took were blurred pretty bad, but the ones that made the cut can be found here.

The pancakes were tasty but I didn't eat enough to make it worth $6. I ended up going back out to grab Denny's for my wife and saw a whole bunch of midnight riders there (no, not that Midnight Rider) including Eric from my local PHP user's group.

Well, it's about quarter to 4 in the morning now. I need a nap.

Gearing up for the stormy ride :)

Looks like the Lenexa ride is in for some rain and maybe a little more. I'm gearing the Sorrento up. Not only does it handle rain better, but it's more comfortable and I can goof off a bit. I'm not anticipating the need to go fast, so the mountain bike will be great.

Pics will come later tonight. I don't know what they'll do if it's really bad, they'll probably delay it for a later weekend.

Statistics

July is pretty much half-way over. I recently revamped my commute log so that all the summary information and month-to-month stats are on the first page. This reduces clutter and ambiguity from each of the pages.

Check it out to see the cold, hard facts.

In my June Wrap-up post, I said that I wanted to:

• Do two round-trips per week without the bus or the car
• Get my cumulative Bike : Drive ratio up over 4.0:1
• Put in at least 400 miles

Needless to say, I'm well on my way to meeting and/or exceeding those goals. I did two round-trips completely by bike last week, and four this week. My ratio is at 4.21:1, and I'm closing in on 250 miles. Another 150 on top of that should be a piece of cake. Now, can I stay the course?

Raytown to Lenexa... Ow. OW. OW!!!!

So, I forgot I had a meeting at my company's uber-secure, top-secret, underground mega n-plus-one-redundancy mission-critical data center. Of doom.

I carpooled there, shoe-horning my bike into the back of a co-worker's car, and intended to take a bus to get me within 10 miles or so of home. The problem? By the time I got out of there, it was going to be a half hour wait for the bus. With a bottle full of ice water and another full of lemonade and temps in the high 80's, I took the plunge, knowing full-well that I'd have to put my nerves to the test on the treacherous road known as 63rd street.

I took it west for a little more than a mile, and it was a test of my patience and I'm sure I was a test of motorists patience as well. I swerved off onto Swope Parkway and rolled past the Kansas City Zoo, and onto Meyer Blvd. Meyer is a BEAUTIFUL road to ride on once you're west of 71 highway, which fortunately is not very far from the zoo.

Next, crossing Ward Parkway was a chore. It's basically a six-lane divided highway with roundabouts for all the major intersections. And guess what? I was on a major intersection. I slithered through the roundy-round and onto Tomahawk, to Belinder, down to 75th street, and all the way across to Wedd, which is the little road that's part of my "new" route that goes into the ugly industrial park. I ended up using the sidewalk for part of the trip near the I-35 overpass. Traffic is simply too unpredictable and dangerous there, and I don't even like driving my car on that particular stretch of road.

I got home from the data center, a total of almost 18 miles, in about an hour and 15 minutes. Did I mention I averaged something like 13 MPH and that my legs feel like they are on fire?

Oh yeah, Here is the route I took. A bridge out on Tomahawk forced me to go back to Belinder and I could have saved myself a bit of hassle by just taking Belinder. My plan was to go all the way to Mission Road, which -- if I recalled correctly -- has a nice bike lane. Belinder was nice and didn't have much traffic, though.

Ow

My goodness! This morning is the first time in quite a while that my legs have actually ached when I woke up. Yesterday, they were sluggish. Today, they are just painfully wrung out. My average speed dropped a little bit again.

I was off to a late start after wrangling the *second* brown recluse spider in the last week. I didn't post about the first one here, but I left a comment on mrmacrum's blog about it. In general, I don't mind spiders, but brown recluses are one species that I won't let live if I find them.

I already sort of ruined my chances of a 100% bike commute week since I did the bike/bus thing Monday. I made up most of the miles Monday night, but it's not the same thing. Despite my weakened and sore comdition, I'll probably suck it up and still ride home this evening. I'm really chomping at the bit in anticipation of a 500-mile month. By the end of today, I should have close to 250 miles for the month, so I am right on course.

I'm going to have a little bit of recovery after I get home. The Lenexa midnight bike ride kicks off 10pm Saturday night, with the start happening midnight Sunday morning. Once I get home tonight, I'm off the bike until the midnight ride.

Oh yeah. The tire patch held its own on the way to work, and the new brakes feel like they're going to work great, although I broke them in gently.

Upgrades... and more Turkey Creek pics

My old brakes were absolutely trashed. They've been on the way out for a few weeks, and may have had a week or two left in them, but I decided to replace them with SwissStop green pads, which from the sound of the bike shop techs, are a lot like KoolStop Salmons. We'll see. 80 grit sandpaper would probably have been better than my OEM pads at this point, though. The rain this morning had my bike grimed up pretty good, so while it was apart to replace the brake pads, I gave it a thorough clean and lube. I found yet another flat on the back tire, but it was a slow leak. I hope the patch holds. If not, I have everything I need to fix it en route. I think this will hold, though.

I hopped on Turkey Creek Trail even further north than usual today and got pictures of an area a mile or so north of where yesterday's pictures were. Click here for the whole album.

Rain drops keep falling on my head...

Edit: I just realized... TODAY IS MY 100th BIKE COMMUTE DAY OF 2007!

Yesterday, the forecast for today was 30-80% chance of rain, depending on who you want to believe. This morning, tall billows draped the sky in many directions, but it was nice and balmy. Not too warm, not too chilly, and humid without being overkill.

Without a second thought, I departed, and saw Chris ahead. Someone else was also behind me on a bike. A ways down the road, Karen was just pulling up to Quivira. 4 Bicycles?! Not quite. The guy behind me didn't follow us, and didn't appear to be headed to work either, unless he had ALL of his belongings at work already waiting for him. That's a possibility, I suppose.

I lagged pretty far behind for most of the trip. I'll make a halfway-through-July statistics post tomorrow evening, but right now, I've managed to rack up over 100 miles this week alone so far, already beating last week's miles with the very real possibility that I'll have racked up more than 140 miles by the end of the week, so long as I make these final three one-way trips between home and work this week. It's certainly not the 179 miles I rode during Bike To Work Week when I lived even further from work than I do now, but it still feels like a lot of miles and I'm to the point where I can ALMOST recover from the previous day's riding by taking my four- or five-hour long nightly slumber. The key word in almost. So yes, I was a little sluggish today, with about a 15 MPH average for the whole trip.

Anyhow, on with the rain. Oh, the rain! About 10 miles into my 14 mile ride, I felt a water droplet hit my arm. At first, I thought it was sweat. Then, I felt another drop. And another. This went on for about a mile. Then, it was sprinkling for about a minute. Then, it turned into a full-on rain shower. Nothing major, but it made the pavement wet, which in turn means it was slippery as well. Chris and Karen had both turned off down by Boulevard Brewery. I was still a ways behind.

I went ahead and rode straight to work through the rain. It wasn't that bad, really. I am really missing my morning mocha, though. If it clears up, I may walk down and get it a little bit later.

Fun, cool ride home

Click any photo for the full album.

By cool, I mean 80 degrees or so. Cloud cover kept the temperatures at bay this afternoon. Getting out before 4:00 PM also helped a lot with traffic. Yes, this was a great afternoon for a ride. I took my time and soaked it up. Click the photo above for an album of the southern half of my commute. I also took a picture of a really tricked out Focus (visually, no clue on performance) that I saw on my way home. Many of you might know that I like the Focus almost as much as I like my bikes. I'm a tinkerer by nature, and I love watching Foci take on the challenges thrown at them in WRC events and tinkering with my own Focus on occasion.

This is just for Warren T. My new route takes me through some parking lots that are, in essence, private property. I really don't have any qualms riding through them, especially since they are part of a detour that gives me nearly two miles of pavement that are virtually free of motor vehicles in motion. I'm a wild and crazy guy, you know!

Shortly after I got home, my wife and I had our minds set on picking up some yummy Mexican food. It so happens that there's a nice little place nearby, but my wife had just woken up, and wasn't in the mood to go out. I went ahead and hopped on the Trek (sans panniers) and bungeed our meals down to the rack before heading back home. I'm sure the people in the restaurant were befuddled, but that's okay.

All kinds of cyclists this morning!

As I left my apartment complex, I heard a noise behind me. A rumbling sound, like that of a 150 horsepower diesel engine in an underpowered Johnson County bus. I glanced back, and sure enough, the D (Dreaded!) bus was bearing down on me at the stop light. When it changed, I took off. It passed me. A short while later, it stopped to pick someone up. I blew its doors off. It passed me again. Leapfrog with buses!

As I approached 79th street, I encountered Karen again. I'm usually riding too hard to talk much but we exchanged greetings and worked our way towards downtown, taking turns pulling, although she pulled more than I did. We encountered the Dreaded bus again at 79th and Neiman, but this time it was ahead of us.

I'm feeling kind of weak from 4 days straight on my bike. I'm at 73 miles for the week and more than 170 miles total for the month. By this time tomorrow, I'll have close to 200 miles for the month and we're not even half-way through it yet!

Karen and I ran across another cyclist near Antioch (the intersection shown in the first photo). This is who I had seen ahead of me on Thursday during B2WW. I didn't catch his name, but he lives near where we met him, and works at Cerner in North KC, making his commute easily as formidable as my own. As you can tell, he opts for a gigantic backpack. Wow.

I actually did slow it down on Baltimore today. I was even going slow enough to break out the camera for the death slog uphill. There was a bicyclist behind me by about 1/10 - 1/8 of a mile (about a city block) but he never caught up, even though I was just putzing along in the granniest of granny gears on the Trek, which isn't all that granny compared to my hybrid or MTB.

I rode to Starbucks as usual. At first, I saw Lorin ride by. He must have caught the L bus from Oak Park Mall. No coffee for him this morning, as he continued through the intersection. Then, as I'm locking up, lo and behold, the Dreaded bus arrives! Glad you could make it, buddy! I'm pretty sure the driver saw me, as I saw a silhouette of the driver's head visibly glance my direction, then mutter something. Take that. Slow and steady, pal. Slow and steady.

I went inside for my machine-fabricated mocha handed to me by a button pusher. He's a friendly button pusher who happens to know me by first name, but a button pusher all the same. As I'm standing in line, the cashier (a different kind of button pusher) mutters something about how everyone is riding their bike today. I look over my shoulder, and it's Bob, a 50-something (maybe older) guy who I talk to on occasion.

Bob has been talking about bikes with me for about 2 months now. I see him maybe once a week or so, sometimes twice. He used to ride a lot, but it started to hurt his back. He asked me about different kinds of bikes, and last week, I pulled up some websites and showed him some things to look for in a comfort hybrid bike, which would allow him to sit more upright, possibly with a suspension seatpost, and a seat that's easy on the tailbone.

He went to River Market Cyclery, my favorite bike shop by far when it comes to the downtown area, and they hooked him up with a Schwinn Sierra GSD. Not a great bike, but not your average wal-mart Schwinn, either. I checked it out, and the components aren't too shabby for the price. He was having problems with his gears grinding and I offered to look at it after I got done drinking my mocha. A few minutes talking to him revealed that he was cross-chaining it, which is a big no-no. I helped him understand his bikes gearing a little better. Hopefully this helps his shifting woes. As we sat and talked about bikes, I saw at least 3 or 4 other cyclists ride by, including the headphone-wearing helmetless bee. Ugh.

Took the new route home

I used Mark Thomas' suggestion for a way to get home while avoiding some of the more capricious roadways in Merriam and Lenexa. Aside from being hot and humid -- which I don't mind so much going home -- it was a nice ride. The new route took me onto Turkey Creek trail for a few miles south of Merriam Lane, and then through a bunch of suburban industrial areas and business parks, which had very little in the way of auto traffic. This allowed me to slow it down a bit.

Of course, the whole northern part of my commute was the same old crap. I got out a little bit later than usual today, so the impetuous rush-hour motorists on Southwest Boulevard were as antsy as they come.

I got confused a few times and had to turn around, so it added about half a mile to my commute from what it would have been had I followed the correct route the first time. I'll probably try it again tomorrow. It adds some pretty good climbs to my route home, but I think the trade-off of being able to ride in the shade on the trail, and ride without traffic for the rest of the alternate route is a worthwhile compromise.

Another Bike Commuter...

Not just another bike commuter, either.

I tried to take Chuong and John's advice and slow it down. The main place where I start to get sweaty is hammering on Southwest between Pennway and Baltimore. This stretch of road is plagued by grouchy motorists that have just gotten off the highway and now must muscle for the correct lane or be forced to take a less-than-ideal detour to get where they're going. I don't have much of a choice of route, all I can do is pick a lane that will get me where I want to go, and hope for the best. Usually, that's the furthest left (center) of three lanes, as most people want to turn right on 20th street or so.

What really finishes off the sweat-fest, however, is Baltimore. It's a relentless 3/4 mile with 200 feet of gain, or about 5% grade average. There's no level section. It's just one solid climb. As hills go, it's not that steep. It's just the cold-hearted wrath of one lengthy climb. This is where I had intended to "slow it down" a little bit.

Well, a problem happened. See, I'd gone this whole way without seeing another bicycle, save for one nestled neatly into the bike carrier on the front of a metro bus some 1/4 mile before this death slog into downtown. Then, I saw something. A blinking light. *sigh*

Stop.

Hammertime!

Keep in mind that my flabby ass hammering up a 5% grade means maintaining 11-12 MPH. Pretty weak, but I wanted to catch up and it seemed to be working. I'm not sure if he saw me and was slowing down, or if he was taking it easy (like I should have been) to hold back some of the sweat. I could already see from a distance that the guy in front of me was in RAGBRAI kit. I eventually caught up to him around 13th street and exchanged greetings.

As it turns out, he's not only a bike commuter that works at the same company I do, but he lives about 2 miles west of me, out in Lenexa as well. He doesn't work in the same building as I do, which explains why the bike rack at my building has never seen a bike other than mine.

It sounds like I might have another recruit for the Monday bike commuter convoy.

In other news, it did clear up last night, to I took my mountain bike out to the Trek Store ride. I was introduced to one of the bike shop employees who wrote this interesting story on choose2bike where he organized a group to commute to high school on bike, using pirate jargon on their route to announce turns, stops, traffic, and road hazards.

The Trek ride was fun, faster than normal, and had some interesting twists that would make any masshole or Prairie Village Yacht Clubber proud. No offense meant to Critical Mass or PV Yachters - but you guys have a reputation for pulling some interesting and/or dangerous stunts on occasion. Other than the one little incident where we jammed up 75th street pretty good and probably made a few new friends, it was a smooth ride, and I learned a new way to avoid some of the higher-traffic areas of my ride home at night.

Zealous, not stupid: Redux

Hail, lightning, rain, and an aluminum frame do not go well together, so I am taking the D bus (the D stands for Dreaded!) back to Lenexa, as it will drop me off right near my apartment. It looks like the storm should be a quick one, but it'll be intense while it lasts. If it clears up before 6:30 I'll try to make up some miles by hitting the Trek Store ride tonight. I'll likely be riding the trusty Sorrento, though.

Happiness is a Fan and a Sun Ray 1...

... OR how I learned to swim to work on a bike.

I brought this little fan to work last week. It was my wife's desk fan at our old apartment, but we have a ceiling fan in the data center office now, so she doesn't really need it anymore. Since it's getting warm and humid in the mornings, I decided it would be put to better use on my desk at work. This morning is the first time I've come to truly appreciate the value of a little, weak, quiet fan. The SunRay was just in the background of the fan, so I framed it in the picture. It's the computer terminal that I use to get much of my work done every day. If you're a geek and don't know what a SunRay is, think of it as a WinTerm or MSTSC hardware client for Solaris. If that doesn't make any sense to you, then it's just a small computer and I'll leave it at that.

I don't know what the humidity was this morning, but it was so moist that the air felt super-saturated. Sweating was doing no good, but I couldn't tell if the water on me was perspiration, or condensation. I'd bet the dew point was high enough that I could actually get condensation on my skin. It was that humid. I felt like I was swimming to work, between my sweat and the humid air.

No one was around to ride with me this morning. I took it solo, and aside from the heat and humidity, it was a nice ride in. I took this photo of the little Wyandotte county ghetto I ride through every day. It's a pleasant enough neighborhood, but it always feels like someplace I wouldn't want to be after dark. I'm not sure why. I'm not willing to find out, though.

Then, I snapped this pic of the industrialized area right before you leave Kansas. This is a nice, flat stretch of 45 MPH road that varies between two lanes with a really wide outer lane (enough room for parking, bicycle traffic outside the door zone, and car traffic) or three lanes without parking. 30 MPH on this stretch of road is no problem, and it's one of my favorite parts of the journey to work. You see lots of friendly people out in the morning. In the rush hours, it serves as an arterial for getting to and from I-35, so my afternoon ride though this section can be intimidating at times. In the morning, I roll through early enough to miss the heavy traffic.

As I made my final approach to the heart of downtown, I glanced down to see what my gearing situation looked like. As I did, I was greeted with a face full of warm, fresh-squeezed helmet juice. Fortunately for me, I regularly rinse my helmet out, so this wasn't carrying any pre-fermented human sweat broth with it. It was just recently-extracted sweat. I'm not sure where it was hiding, but there was quite a bit of it that materialized seemingly out of nowhere.

I stopped for coffee as usual. This half-hour or so allows me to cool down a bit and dry off while checking my personal e-mail before work. Even with all that, I was still sweaty when I made my final approach to the office. Needless to say, my pre-work clean-up ritual was a little more thorough this morning, including a sink shower that was a bit more extensive than usual. I don't know if I mentioned this, but I finally found a locking restroom close to my office. This makes getting ready to work a little easier. You can't exactly peel your sweaty shirt off and start soaping up your armpits in a communal restroom.

How does a security guy lock up?

I'm currently at Oak Park Mall waiting for my friends to arrive. There are a lot of annoying and/or bad things here.

* This place is crawling with emo kids.
* Malls are just evil.
* The whole mall is a "No Skateboarding, Rollerblading or Bicycling" zone.
* Bike theft is probably more prone here than in the secure garage at work.

I have no legal way to remedy the first two problems, so I'll tolerate them for now.

I know the "No Bicycling" thing is meant to keep the "gnarly dudes" at bay, and that I'd probably be able to talk my way out of any trouble with the rent-a-cops here, since this is my primary vehicle.

On with the big problem. Locking up in a somewhat hostile environment.

Tactic:

1) Take the front wheel off and set it next to the rear wheel.
2) Thread Ye Big olde ghetto tube-wrapped chain and lock through the main triangle, rear triangle and spokes of both wheels, then around a stationary object such as a natural gas pipe.
3) Thread cheapish cable lock through the wheels and frame, and around another stationary object.
4) Thread a really cheap thin cable lock through the rear rack, seat rails, and bottle cages.

I'm pretty sure my bike will be there when I go back outside.

Somewhat unintentional commuter convoy

Well, we had some practice for Monday. Chris had already planned on riding and Karen rolls through my route at about 5:45. I took off at 5:40. Just as I pulled up to the first stop light, Chris comes up behind me. As we're stopped at 79th, we see Karen coming up the street. We had a cool little 3-person bike commuter echelon (not quite a convoy) going.

My average speed was a little higher today than yesterday. I took the hill on 67th street at almost full tilt, hitting 41.7 MPH. It's not the fastest I've ever been on my Trek, but it's the fastest I've ever gone on a stretch of road where I have to dodge unpredictably-placed manhole covers and storm drains. Truth be told, I've gone faster than that -- but not by much -- on my Outlook. We took a slightly different route this morning, opting for the slower, longer, and curvier bike path instead of the more direct roadway that's littered with some of the bumpiest railroad crossings known to man.

Anyhow, we all agreed to try it again Monday, but I might ask that anyone interested in riding with us gets to Skate World by 6:00. Karen has to get to work pretty early for parking reasons. We'll try yet another route, since we will have to go through skate world.

Sorry I didn't get any photos. We were too busy riding!

Oh yes, before I sign off for the morning, I have a little bit of a rant. It starts with a trend I started seeing 10 years ago that I never thought would take off, but today it seems to be going like gangbusters. Why in the heck are people -- LOTS of people -- DRAGGING their stuff behind them in little wheeled luggage carts these days? I'm not talking about ginormous luggage cases. These are little bookbag-sized things with wheels and handles. Heck, some of them are even shaped like bookbags and seem to have the usual assortment of straps and handles for carrying on your back or in your hand in a traditional manner. What happened to plain old bookbags, briefcases, laptop bags and the like? I think my laptop bag (which I admittedly stick in my left pannier every morning instead of carrying it on my back) is the only non-wheeled case I've seen this morning. I would ask if people have actually gotten THAT lazy, but I already know the answer.

Baz...

... Foo ... Blah ... Stuff, whatever you call it. This is a miscellaneous post of quick, short, bike-related randomness.

Quick fun. Night riding on 87th street is kind of dicey. I ran some errands, grabbed some beer and soda for tomorrow's party at my place. Then I had to get some iced tea and other assorted stuff from the grocery store. I was running all over the 87th street corridor tonight in the dark... with proper lighting, of course. Fun stuff, but not a great road to take the lane on once the sun goes down.

Next, I have a meeting tomorrow at Oak Park Mall (before the party at my place), which is just a meeting with a bunch of nerds, including the nerds I was setting fireworks off with yesterday. I'm riding downtown tomorrow all the way (probably with Chris leading the way, crazy spin machine he be) but I'm taking the L bus to Oak Park Mall when I get off work.

Then, I have to mention that I'm getting excited for the Lenexa Midnight Bike Ride on July 14th. 10pm registration July 14th, starts as July 15th arrives, just in case there is any confusion on which midnight it is. If anyone wants to join me, feel free.

Finally, for anyone interested in joining the commuter convoy on Monday, sign up soon, please. The weather looks to be great. If you'd rather the Monday morning commuter convoy change times either earlier or later, just let me know and I'll try to coordinate it with anyone else that wants to join up. This is a great opportunity to learn the layout of a popular bike commute route while gaining road confidence and the wonderful freedom that comes with getting places under your own power. If you're interested, PLEASE e-mail me and I'll try to get you up to speed. This is a slow-medium paced ride for anyone interested in bike commuting, even if you've never thought to try it before. If you'd like an easier trip home, I can help you find a Johnson County Transit bus solution that will get you close to home for a reasonable fee. All the big JO buses have bicycle racks to accommodate cyclists.

That's all for tonight!

Fireworks aren't all that's hot!

Sweet merciful crap! 14 miles doesn't seem too far to ride from work to home, but it's a whole different deal when it's over 90 degrees. It's cooled down a little bit since I left work, but it doesn't really matter. 90 degrees is HOT.

I'm glad I had two bottles of water today!

Fire, Brimstone, Carnage, and Bicycle Commuting

Last night, the air was full of sulfur, sparks, and smoke. If there's a rule of threes for pyromaniacs, those are the ones! You can see some of the annihilation and aftermath on my flickr uploads. I had to take an extra-long shower when I got home, because I reeked of explosives. Even though our budget this year was less than half of what it'd been in recent years, it was still awesome. I'm thinking of budgeting a line-item every month for fireworks. I'm thinking of transferring $20 or $25 a month into my PayPal account, then taking the PayPal card out of storage on July 4th next year. Keep in mind that other people pitch in for the display, too. An extra $200 from me for next year would probably be welcome, though.

Anyhow, I had a nice ride in this morning. I ran into Karen again about a mile from my apartment. The first and only other time I've seen her was on Day 3 of B2WW. We took turns setting the pace, which was an upbeat but not painful 17 MPH average.

It looks like I'm in for a heck of a ride this evening. My weather widget says there's a high of 92 degrees predicted today. This morning, it was a humid 71 degrees with light fog... or was it smoke? :)

2 hours of riding for 4 hours of work

What a great day to spend 2 hours on the road!

My homeward commute is slightly more uphill than my trip to work. Also, the typical summer breeze out of the southwest usually gives me a headwind to deal with in the afternoon, but it's a boon on the way to work!

My homeward commute is almost always slower, or at least it requires a lot more effort to keep a good average clip. Today was no exception, but it went a lot smoother than yesterday's attempted full round-trip. My ride home was about 57 minutes rolling time and about 1 hour 7 minutes ET. I didn't reset my computer before the trip home, but my 16.7 MPH average as I pulled into the parking garage at work this morning had dropped to 15.1 average for the day by the time I got back home. We're 3 days into July and I already have 50 miles racked up. I can tell this is going to be a great month for riding!

Tomorrow, as you can imagine, I don't work. Instead, I'm going to be causing a lot of destruction. I don't make a huge deal out of being a pyromaniac, but I am definitely one. July 4th is basically my flagship holiday -- the yardstick by which all others are measured. Nothing can trump the fun associated with not only watching stuff blow up, burn, and explode but also MAKING stuff blow up, burn, and explode.

I'll try not to lose any limbs tomorrow, but I'll make no promises.

Nice ride in

It's a little warmer and a little stickier outside this morning than it was yesterday, but I felt really fast. Before I started the slog into the downtown loop, I was averaging 18.1 MPH over the first 11 miles or so of my trip. Overall, I'm at about 17 MPH average after the climb into the heart of downtown, which is still pretty quick for me.

Today's a short day. The stock market closes early, which means that my employer's services are not going to be required for the whole business day as usual. We're being released at 1:00 today, and the company is issuing 4 hours of holiday pay to most employees. Instead of making it to work by 7:00 or so, I'm just going to kick it here at Starbucks and get to work at 8:00.

While I was waiting in line for my mocha, I saw another bicycle pull up and park alongside mine (shown above). It's Lorin, who is another bike/bus commuter that gets on the bus at Oak Park Mall, where I've started riding to on the days that I ride the bus. I've shared the bike rack with his bike a few times

I left at about 5:45 this morning and got downtown at about 6:35 with a rolling time of 46 minutes.

In what seems like just a few hours, I'll be homeward :)