Bike to Work Month - Day 5 - For Want of a Pant Clip

The minutes were clicking away, I searched frantically for them. I rummaged through the garage. I emptied the contents of my bike bag. It was all in vain. They were no where to be found.

I cried out, "For want of pant clips my commute is lost!"

In their absence, I resorted to the only thing that prevented the unspeakable, driving my truck to work, I reached down and rolled up my pants leg.

I had to set aside the clean cut look of pant clips...

I shudder to think the impact that something so small (pun intended) had on my sex appeal.

Bike to Work Month - Day 4 - My Morning Routine

4:30 AM - I'm out of bed.

4:32 AM - making Coffee

4:34 AM - let the dog out

4:35 AM - go to bathroom

4:45 AM - getting dressed.

4:50 AM - let the dog back in.

4:53 AM - kick back in recliner with iPad and Coffee. Blog, read, surf the net, pray, listen to music, check e-mail. This is my time. No noise. No distraction. I protect it religiously.

5:55 AM - replace battery in riding lawn mower (normally I would be climbing on my bike and heading for the gym, but the grass needs cutting and to do that the lawn mower needs starting. I hate it when life gets in the way of what I really want to do).

6:25 AM - climb on bike and take short route to work (normally if I were leaving at this time of day I would be taking the longer route, but I played golf yesterday and bummed a ride home with a buddy and like an idiot left my riding shoes at work. This is shaping up to be one heck of a day.)

6:55 AM - I arrive and work and lock up my bike.

7:00 AM - I walk across the street to Ernie's (small restaurant) and have a big breakfast of eggs, sausage, potatoes and toast (normally I would walk to my office and eat yogurt and granola, but I'm a bit frustrated with my morning so far, so I skip the stupid yogurt and granola.

 

Bike to Work Month - Day 3 - Caught Between Winter & Summer

Riding in April and early May in VA can be a crap shoot. I'll wake up one morning and the weather is absolutely beautiful with clear skies, mild temperatures and a gentle breeze - its the kind of morning when no matter how slow or far I ride, I still get there way too soon. I wake up another morning and it's hot and humid - it's the kind of morning when I get to work soaked in sweat. 

This morning I was expecting warm temperatures and sunny skies. I was playing golf that afternoon and so, as tradition would have it, I donned my pink, Nike, golf shirt. I was only a few pedal strokes down the street when I realized that I overestimated the temperature (that's what I get for believing the forecast in Eastern VA) and found myself a bit underdressed. I was cold, but once I start pedaling away, I generally have a rule of not turning back. My shirt which is perfect for letting air in and sweat out, performed to perfection. It let lots of cool air in to rotate freely around my goose bump covered skin. It was the kind of morning when no matter how fast or short the distance I ride, I still don't get there soon enough.

 

Oh well - at least I still rode and that's always a good thing.

 

Bike to Work Month - Day 2 - A Random Epiphany

I've mentioned before how when riding back and forth to work, I have lots of time to think. That is simultaneously a good thing, but also, considering my mind, can be scary as well.

A case in point, there's one particular house I pass each day in which lives a middle aged couple. They don't have any children. They don't have a dog or cat or goldfish (at least they don't take the gold fish outside). What they do have are two or three of the biggest, hairiest, ugliest rabbits I've ever seen. Now, I've known folks that raise rabbits, but they have been entirely confined to a little wire cage. This couple actually takes their rabbits outside everyday and let's them rummage around the yard getting exercise, fresh air and vitamin D. Sometimes they bring them out in a little cage. Other times they construct a small portable fence and let the wander around this makeshift corral. Often times though they let them wander around the yard freely.

Most days that I pass, this couple are on their hands and knees trying to coax these small minded mammals out of some bush that they've burrowed themselves into. Every time I see this couple, I actually feel sorry for them. They have pets that don't bark, don't fetch, aren't squat for home security, don't come when they're and have very little to no personality. This couple's lives are relegated to scooping up little round turds, crawling around on their hands and knees trying to keep their critters out of the shrubs while all the time scanning the skies to assure a random hawk won't swoop down and carry away their loved ones.

Just today as I rode past their house, after stopping at the tavern for a pint or two, I once again witnessed this couples poor plight in life and was struck by an epiphany. I was one pint shy of crying aloud, but it still screamed in my head - "eat the dadgum rabbits and be free!"

 

 

Bike to Work Month - Day 1 - Good Boy

I haven't blogged in a while. Been busy - distracted - kinda gotten out of the habit. I'm not ready to give it up. I've been looking for a way to get back into the groove. May is Bike to Work Month. I thought I would try to jump start my blogging again by attempting to Blog for each day I will commute to work by bike. Considering the fact that I am also committed to riding to work everyday, that means that I will blog each and every working day during the month of May.

Today as I rode the foot bridge across the drainage ditch from Huntington Park, I climbed onto the adjoining neighborhood street and two BIG German Shepherds came charging across their front yard in my direction with barks and growls that didn't exactly instill a warm and fuzzy feeling. I didn't feel particularly threatened by their advance because they were in a fenced in yard. Were this incident to end here it would not be particularly blogworthy. What troubled me for the rest of my commute was the response of the dogs' owner. As the dogs barked ominously and displayed obvious signs of aggression, the lady in the front yard with them kept praising their antics repeatedly with "good boys - good boys - good boys!!! ".

Other than giving her a look that clearly relayed that I thought her a less than intelligent female dog, I held my tongue. Shaking my head exasperatingly, I rode on. I pondered this event for the rest of the ride. Not choosing to assume the worst in my fellow human race, I refuse to believe that she was encouraging their aggressive behavior directed at an innocent cyclist. Instead I choose to rationalize that what she was praising was their self control in not jumping the measly 3 foot high fence that separated them from their arch enemy - a cyclist.