Recently in Bike Category

I'm starting to think maybe I wasn't meant to ride my bike to work.
This morning, I took off early in very dark conditions, using my new light to guide my way. Things were going well: the sun was starting to come up and light the roads, the high school kids were trudging toward their bus stops. I was coming up to the last big turn on my route, looked back over my shoulder to make sure no cars were approaching, then turned back to face forward and started to get into the left lane to make the turn. Suddenly, a clink of metal under my tires, and my back wheel locks up, and I start skidding. Crap, I think, Here I go again, and my last road rash isn't even healed yet. Luckily, I was able to counter-steer and control the skid, sliding to a stop on the shoulder of the road, where I was able to assess the damage. I could still smell the burning rubber from the tire, and I anticipated the worst. My rear fender was a disaster: it had crumpled up from the back of the wheel, getting itself wedged up under the seat area, and scraping the top of the tire. I still couldn't see what had caused everything though, until a car passed by and made a familiar sound. I looked into the road and found my pump (which had just fallen off in the confusion) and a foot long piece of rusty metal. I still don't know what it is.
Now safely over on the shoulder, I took off the rear tire, which surprisingly hadn't deflated. Just a big gouge in the top of the tire, the tube inside was intact. I dismantled the fender and packed it in my bag (for pictures later, natch). Put the tire back on, inflated it, and got back on the road, slightly shaken, but no worse for wear. With less than a mile to get to work, I took it easy and made it in safely.
Even once I got here and had the chance to look everything over, I'm shocked that there wasn't more damage. The gears and the brakes in the back seem fine, and it looks like the tire will be okay to make it back home (though I'll be going out to the parking lot at lunchtime to check on it). I'll probably have to take it in to a shop to have someone check it out to be sure, but I consider myself pretty lucky at the moment. I'm hoping that I got all this stuff out of my system and that I'll have a few incident-free weeks in my future.

I tried this morning to get out of the house earlier than usual. I just really wanted to try out my new Dinotte 200L light on the ride in. It worked pretty well, though the sun started coming up partway through, so I didn't get to the really dark part of my ride to truly test it out. I couldn't really say how well my two new PlanetBike Superflash taillights worked, but I can guarantee that I am a lot more visible with them now.
So for all those who have been asking if I'm going to keep riding now that summer is almost over, I think it's safe to say that the answer is yes.

The end of the Zipcar Low Car Diet is tomorrow. It was a complete and total success from my point of view. I didn't drive the Civic a single time, and Lisa only drove it about 4-5 times, to go to doctor's appointments and such. I ended up taking the bus four times, and biking the rest of the days. The experiment was such a success, I decided to run some numbers to see what it would be like to get rid of the car altogether. During the warm months, I can bike most places, so the costs of owning a car are pretty much only the insurance. But let's look ahead to the colder winter months when I might not be biking as often.
First, the current costs of the Civic. Insurance, now that I got a new policy, costs only $30/month. Gas is probably about $40-50/month. Maintenance and such, averaged out over the year, probably runs around $30-50/month as well. So we're looking at anywhere from $100-150/month.
Now, going car-free. Taking the bus every day would cost $2.50 a day. Averaging around 20-22 work days per month, it'll cost about $50-55/month.
Even looking at keeping the car and riding my bike every day (only expense being insurance at $30) versus riding the bus every day ($50), I'd only be saving $20/month, and obviously it's not a fair comparison. At this point, it kind of looks like getting rid of the car is a good idea. There is one more thing though: extracurricular activities like curling.
During the curling season, I usually play on Sundays and Mondays. When I play on Sunday, the whole family comes to watch and have pizza, so I wouldn't need the car for that. On Monday evenings, I could take the Metro to a station in Maryland with a Zipcar and rent that for 3 hours or so. If I had a late game, I could even just drive the minivan (or the Zipcar from the Vienna station), since the Metro closes around midnight, and our games probably wouldn't be done in time to Metro home. On those days, renting a Zipcar for 3 hours at $7-9/hour would cost $21-27/week, or about $80/month. Even with those numbers, it's a close contest. $100-$150/month for the car versus $50 (bus fare) plus $80 (Zipcar) equals $130/month.
Let's also consider that selling our Honda Civic hybrid could get us about $13k. That could help accomplish any number of things. $13k would go a long way toward defraying the Zipcar costs. I could also upgrade the lights and such on my bike. Or, it could help pay off a good portion of the $20k we have left to pay on our minivan (which costs over $420/month in payments). And it's here that it starts to look better for the selling argument. Selling the car for $13k and having $130/month in Zipcar and public transportation costs gives me 100 months of costs paid for. That's over 8 years! Let's say I "only" get $11k for the car, and that my Zipcar and public transportation costs balloon to $200/month. I still have 55 months, 4 and a half years, of expenses paid for by selling the car. And all those numbers assume that I don't ride my bike and that I use the Zipcar a lot! Suddenly, owning a car seems like a silly idea. I am going to have to seriously consider it.

There's a saying among motorcycle riders: You will lay your bike down at some point. There's no way to avoid it, even the most careful rider will have something happen to them. Likewise for bike riders: You will fall off your bike. For me, it happened yesterday.
I was riding down a hill, going pretty fast to stay in front of the approaching traffic behind me. I got in the left turn lane, and sat up in the saddle to get a view of the oncoming traffic. Sure enough, a car was approaching from the other direction, so I put on the brakes. Apparently, a little too hard, as my front wheel started going wobbly, and I lost control and went over the side onto the asphalt, hard. Luckily, all the cars around me were able to stop, and at least 4 of them made sure I was okay before proceeding. I ended up taking a large chunk of skin off my forearm near my elbow, and scraped my back and bruised my hip. But I didn't hit my head, and I was able to ride the 25 minutes the rest of the way home. Lisa cleaned me up and bandaged me up. Changing the dressings this morning was pretty ugly, and it's going to take a while to heal properly. I felt like I could have ridden to work if I really needed to, but I decided to ride the bus instead. I really only feel a little bit sore, and the wounds look a lot worse than they feel, probably because I have no nerve endings left there.
There is one week left of the Zipcar Low Car Diet, so I'm committed to taking the bus for at least that week. But man, it is tempting to just hop in the car and drive in.

First, an update on the 100 pushup challenge. I managed to struggle my way through week 4, and I'm moving on to Week 5. However, I did my max pushup test (39, even though I might have managed to squeeze out one or two more) last night, so I won't actually start week 5 till tomorrow. Also, I have attained "bronze" level on the President's challenge. Not too shabby.
Tomorrow is going to be a big night. Our neighbor is coming over to babysit the kids, and Lisa and I will be going out to dinner. A real sit down dinner, with reservations and everything! As part of the fun, I'm going to go pick up a Zipcar to use for the evening. I mean, who wants to go out on a date in a minivan? So I'm going to go pick up the Mini Cooper and we'll scoot around town in that for the night. We're heading to Et Voila, a Belgian restaurant. I'm excited to try their mussels, and Lisa will have plenty of desserts to choose from.
On Friday afternoon, I took a couple of pictures on my commute home. Now remember that these were taken before 4pm, theoretically before "rush hour."

The Beltway, getting stacked up already.

The W&OD Trail, no traffic here.

The sun is starting to come up later now though, so soon enough, I'm going to have to either start delaying getting to work, or get a stronger headlight for the darkness. No thanks to Congress moving daylight savings to November!

Awesome video and article from Salon about the Xtracycle Free Radical, an add-on frame that converts your mountain bike into a sport utility bike. I think I'm still a few years away from one of these, but the blender attachment is so sweet! Last weekend at the market, we saw a guy with a Yuba Mundo, which is a bike built specifically for tasks like grocery shopping. He had no problem getting his stuff on his bike, while I was glad that we had driven (since I was still weak from my stomach bug) so I didn't have to try to transport our 5 bottles of milk home in my meager panniers. I also just found out that our CSA today will have a watermelon, which I am likewise sure will not fit in my panniers. I clearly have bike envy.
Anyway, check out the video below for a taste of what can be done with a properly equipped bike.

I managed to recover from Thursday's stomach bug enough to ride my bike in to work again today. If I hadn't been able to, I'd have had to ride the bus. Not a big deal, just requires more planning. Plus, I like riding the bike better. Thankfully, after Thursday's difficulties, I was able to slowly work my way back to health on Friday, and on Saturday and Sunday I was well enough to eat just about anything, including gumbo yesterday, made with our first batch of okra from the CSA. Yummy. Unfortunately, week 4 of the pushup challenge got sidetracked, so I am redoing week 4 starting today. It's not any easier than it was last week, believe me.
Not much else to say at the moment, so I might as well get to work.

This morning, I went downtown for the start of the Zipcar Low-Car Diet program. For the next month, I have to keep my Honda Civic parked and try not to drive it. For some of the participants, they're trying to avoid using any car at all, using only Zipcar and public transportation.
I threw myself right into the thick of it, taking the train downtown for the kickoff event. Then after the event was over, I had to figure out how to get to work. I took the train to the West Falls Church Metro, and just narrowly missed catching the shuttle to where I work. Instead, I hopped on the 3T bus and ended up walking about a mile to my office. It was warmer than I would have liked, but I succeeded. On the way home, I just have to walk .25 miles to catch the bus, then walk about 1.5 miles the rest of the way home. The best part so far is that I just started a new book this morning, and I'm 86 pages into it already.
Oh yeah, and if you click on the Zipcar link above, you can find me under the Washington, DC participant list. Mine is the third picture, the giant eyeball. They're supposed to update those pages when we send them emails about our progress. Mine should be interesting this week, since I have to pick up Lisa and the kids from the airport tonight. Unfortunately, the Toyota Matrix Zipcar isn't available when I need to pick them up, so we'll have to take Metro instead. Ellie will be thrilled: airplane AND train both in the same day!

Week 3 of the One Hundred Pushup Challenge was a killer. I tested into the "> 25 pushups" portion after doing 30 on Sunday, and immediately on the first day, I had to start with 25 pushups for just the first set! It doesn't get easier, as you have 60 seconds to recover and move on to 17, 17, 15, then 25 to finish up. My form was... not good. But I pretty much finished it. Eventually on Day 3, this morning, I had to do 30, 22, 22, 20 and 27. I barely eked my way through that, leading me to consider redoing the week. However, after looking ahead to week 4, I realized it wouldn't be that much more than I did this week, so I will forge ahead and see how I do.
On the President's Challenge side, I'm now 86 % of the way toward the goal of 20000 points for a Bronze Award. I should be able to surpass 20000 by the end of next week.
On Monday morning, I'll be headed downtown for the Zipcar Low-Car Diet kickoff. If anyone happens to be near Gallery Place around 9am, stop by and say hi. The requirements are pretty simple: don't use your car for a month, and see how it goes. I have to send them email updates every couple of weeks, and I might record a video of my commute or our trips to the market or something. In return, I got a free Zipcar membership for the year, $150 driving credit for Zipcars, $250 MetroCard for riding the train or bus, a copy of How to Live Well Without Owning a Car (which I already read and own a copy of) and a free one year membership to the Washington Area Bicyclists Association. Not a bad haul, I must say. That MetroCard should definitely help on those bad weather days. Who knows? Maybe I can eventually sell our second car.

I completed Week 2 of the One Hundred Pushup Challenge this morning. So far it hasn't been too terribly difficult. Sometime this weekend, I will do another test to exhaustion, to see which column I have to do for weeks 3 and 4. I'm pretty sure I'll be in column 3 (the hardest) again, since I should be able to do more than 25 easily. One thing I do need to add is situps in the off-days, to make sure I stay well-rounded.
In the President's Challenge, I have 13413 "points," meaning I am roughly 2/3 of the way to a "Bronze Award." Not too bad after only a month of recording the data. I started getting points more quickly now that my biking speed has gotten faster, and I'm no longer in the "Moderate, 12 - 16 mph" but in the "Vigorous, faster than 16 mph" category. It's a big difference too, I have found that I can stay in the big gears going up hills for much longer. I am still definitely winded once I get to the top, but I'm getting there much quicker, which makes me feel good. And this morning, I raced the bus and won for the first time. We were both at the same stoplight, and when it turns green, the bus takes a short detour to pick up a couple of passengers while I go straight. The bus usually catches me before I get to the end of the mile long stretch, but this morning, I beat it by a good 30 seconds or so. A good way to start the morning.

A couple of weeks ago while browsing the Fatwallet forums, I stumbled across what seemed like a sweet deal: Sign up for the Zipcar "Car-Free Diet" plan. You agree to keep your car keys in your junk drawer for just one month, from July 21st through August 15th. In return, you get a loaded public transit pass, a free 1-year Zipcar membership, some driving time and more goodies that we'll tell you about a little later.
Seemed like a no-brainer, so I signed up and waited. And waited. Turned out, they only took 30 people from each area, not everyone who signed up. But, lo and behold, I was one of the chosen 30! Schweet! So on July 21st, I'll be downtown for the ceremonial key-relinquishing (they give them back, but I don't anticipate needing them). Coincidentally, that night, Lisa and the kids will be flying home from Detroit. Luckily, they are arriving at National airport, so we can take the Metro back. I could also potentially pick them up in one of the Zipcars, but the kids do love the train.
As I mentioned in my last post, I've done damn well riding my bike to work pretty much every day, so I don't think it'll be a big deal to keep doing so. The fun part will be the stuff I send in to them to document my experience. I'm planning on taking pictures of the receipt from my last gas fillup (June 26), my odometer which shouldn't move, and maybe some video of my ride to/from work, especially the part where I pass over the packed Beltway while on the trail. It should be a lot of fun.

I feel obliged to mention that yesterday, a young woman riding her bicycle was struck and killed by a garbage truck in DC. The driver apparently never saw her. There is also apparently a bike lane on this road, but it's not clear whether she was riding in the bike lane or not. Either way, it's certainly a wakeup call to everyone to pay attention when riding, driving, or walking. My heart goes out to her family. Ride safe out there everyone.

I need to make sure my GPS watch is charged better. I know these totals are going to be low because I didn't have the watch charged and thus it didn't record my stats those days. Still, for what it's worth, here they are:
Driving roundtrips: 5 (two of which were when I had a flat tire)
Biking roundtrips: 16
Bike mileage: 205.02 miles (I know I am missing two days of GPS data, so that probably adds another 30 miles or so)
I've gotten really good at the big hill on my commute home, and I've managed to get my average moving speed up over 16 mph a couple of times. Now if only I could avoid those couple of stupid traffic lights....

I bagged out of work early on Thursday afternoon so that we would go up to Hartland Orchard for some blueberry picking. We ended up with 12 pints of blueberries for $20, less than $1.67 per pint. They were on sale at the farmers market for $4.50/pint on Saturday. A good deal, even accounting for gas costs. Of course, now we have 12 pints of blueberries to eat. We gave away 3 pints to friends and neighbors, and Lisa made blueberry buckle for breakfast. That leaves a lot of blueberries left, though Evan has figured out that he can reach up on the table and grab handfuls at a time to snack on.
We biked up to the park on Friday for the Independence Day festivities. Shockingly, the "all-you-can-ride" bracelet was priced at a reasonable $10, so Ellie got to have all the fun she could handle on the various moon bounces and slides. It was a bit hot, but we brought plenty of water and had a lot of fun. We skipped out on the laser light show though (last year's fireworks went horribly wrong, shooting into spectators and badly injuring at least one woman) since it was starting to rain. Instead, we picked up Baskin-Robbins where Ellie had the very patriotic Nation's Birthday ice cream.
On Saturday, we headed down the street to our neighbor's second birthday party. They had a moon bounce there too, so Ellie was in heaven. Burgers, popsicles, cake, fun times had by all.
Finally, on Sunday we headed downtown for the last day of the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. Featured this year were Texas (skipped it, except for the BBQ), NASA (50th anniversary), and Bhutan. Learning about Bhutan, a small country wedged between Nepal, India and China, was fascinating. I particularly enjoyed hearing about the various alcoholic drinks they make all from the same fermented mash, the most popular of which is called ara. Unfortunately, the rules didn't allow us regular folks to sample the drink, so we'll just have to plan a trip to Bhutan sometime. Maybe then I could actually try some real "ema datshi," which they served in a watered-down, barely spicy version at the vending stands. We could also try the equally fascinating butter tea, suja. At any rate, the kids had a good time, especially at the NASA area.
So now I'm back at work after riding in this morning (73 degrees can be surprisingly oppressive when combined with 84% humidity), wishing I just had one more day for the long weekend.

Today marked the fifth straight day I rode my bike to work. That's right, a whole work week without driving. I haven't made an official total yet (I do still have to ride home tonight after all), but my total mileage for the week should be about 78 miles. And last night, I somehow managed to make every single light on the way home, finishing up my 7+ mile trek in just over 26 minutes, beating my previous best by over 2 minutes.
This week's riding included riding home in the rain on Monday after the worst of the thunderstorms rolled through, once again knocking out power throughout the area. But on my bike, I could easily zip through the clogged intersections with their dark signal lights while the cars couldn't do anything but honk their horns. The only obstacle was a tree down across the biking trail at one spot, but that wasn't much trouble. On Tuesday, I once again took a 3 mile detour to pick up our farm share, which is working out well. The rest of the week riding was fairly ordinary, with beautifully cool weather all week long, as opposed to the oppressive 95+ degree heat last week.
So while I continue to ride my bike the rest of the summer (at least), I've decided to take on two more challenges. First is the "One Hundred Pushup Challenge." It's a six week plan to work your way up to doing 100 consecutive pushups. I figure I should work on my upper body strength in addition to biking for the lower body. Sometime this weekend, I'll do the initial test (do as many pushups as possible to exhaustion), and I'll start doing the 3 days per week training to build up my strength.
Second is the President's Adult Fitness Challenge. This is similar to what we did as kids. There are four tests: aerobic fitness (1.5 mile run), muscular strength and endurance (situps and pushups), flexibility (sit and reach) and body composition (BMI and waist circumference). I'm going to try to do these tests sometime in the next couple of weeks, and then again near the end of the summer or possibly into September. I'm also going to register and log my daily activities to earn "points" for Presidential awards. Since they allow you to enter data back 14 days, I'm already 26% of the way to my first award!
Those are the challenges I'm taking on this summer. What are YOU doing with your summer?

Politics really piss (pisses? what's the conjugation there?) me off sometimes. This picture of Barack Obama taking his kids for a bike ride has been roundly mocked as "nerdy" or "geeky." The reasons given: the helmet and the tucked in polo. What the hell is the guy supposed to do? If he wasn't wearing a helmet, he'd get absolutely blasted. No one looks good in a bike helmet. (Side note: it seems odd that he only has one strap going under his chin. All bike helmets I've seen have a triangle shape coming down from the helmet, meeting under the earlobe, then a single strap from there under the chin. Strange.) I suppose you could argue his fashion sense for tucking in a polo, especially into jeans, but damn people, I wear a freakin tucked in polo nearly every day at work. It'd look pretty sloppy if it wasn't tucked in.
It's unbelievable to me that this kind of shit is what people are focused on while the dollar is tanking, gas prices are through the roof, and soldiers are dying in Iraq. But please, let's go ahead and criticize the man for wearing a fucking helmet and tucking in his shirt instead of focusing on the issues.

Bike geek side note: some people have noticed that the bike didn't seem to fit him particularly well. I'm not totally sure on that, but I'm not an expert. In one of the pictures, his leg does seem to be almost fully extended at the bottom of the pedal stroke, so he might raise the seat only slightly. More likely, he probably just needed a slightly taller frame, and he would have been good to go.

Update: And yes, I am White and Nerdy.

The forecast for yesterday afternoon and evening was for thunderstorms again. This time though, I vowed to ride home one way or another, and kept a close eye on the radar to see when I would have to leave. As it turned out, I was able to leave at my normal time, and I was even able to throw in a side trip to pick up our CSA share (broccoli, beets, swiss chard were new!). On the way down the trail, there were a surprising number of bikers out there, and there were almost universal nods or waves of respect for being out in the heat. I was even able to take another side trip to vote in the Congressional primary. It was a good ride home, even if it was 10 miles instead of the usual 7.5, and I didn't get rained on at all.
But with the good must come the bad, as I discovered this morning. I had all my stuff hooked up to the bike and ready to go, but when turning the bike, it sounded more squealy that usual, but I chalked it up to the rain and moisture from the previous night's storm. But then I got on, something gave out somewhere, and I looked back, and the rear tire was flat! Note to self, ALWAYS check your tires before riding. Duh. Since I haven't yet bought a spare (good thing it didn't go flat riding yesterday in the 95 degree heat), I had to drive in to work this morning. That really ticked me off since I also have to drive tomorrow to go to the dentist, and I'll be driving partway on Friday as well to drop my car off at the shop.
Oh well, there's always next week for the first 5 day bike commute.

On Friday, I got a package containing the missing pieces of my bike commuting puzzle: new pedals and a rear rack. And a bell too, but that wasn't totally necessary. I was lucky enough to get some bike shoes from a co-worker last week for free, so I went ahead and ordered some Shimano PD-M424 pedals to take advantage of the shoes. The pedals have a regular platform on one sides, and clips for SPD cleats on the other side. I installed them in the shade of the carport on Saturday afternoon, and spent 10 minutes practicing getting my foot in and out of the pedals, because you don't want to be falling over after being unable to get your foot loose. That would hurt.
I also put the Axiom Odyssee rear rack on the bike, finally enabling me to use the panniers I got for Christmas. The rack was really easy to install now that I have the proper mounting points on the bike for it. And surprisingly enough, the panniers stayed on the bike the whole ride in to work this morning. Yep, I rode in to work this morning without parking my car here first. I'm car-free now. Well, except for Thursday, when I have a dentist appointment at 3pm. I don't think the dentist would appreciate me sweating all over his nice chairs. Anyway, I was especially pleased that all of my stuff fit in the panniers with no problem: shoes, clothes, towel, toiletries, and lunch. There was even room for my book and newspaper. Tomorrow should be an interesting day, as it's supposed to rain like crazy in the afternoon. Luckily, it's also forecast to be a Code Red day, which means that I can ride the bus home for free. I'll play it by ear and see how it goes before deciding to bail out though.
The ride itself was blissfully uneventful. I got caught at both long lights for longer than I would have liked, but it was great to not wear a backpack and be able to have the breeze blowing through me and cooling me down. And those pedals and shoes really helped carry me up the hills, since I can pull the pedal up with one foot while pushing down with the other, using the full range of motion. Best of all, now that I've been doing this for a few weeks, I'm not nearly as sore when I get done with the ride. I'll be interested to see what my actual riding time and speeds were once I upload the data to the MotionBased website.
Speaking of which, I uploaded my first week's worth of new bike ride data over the weekend. I was pleasantly surprised to see that MotionBased separates out the time I spent stuck at lights from the time I spent actually in motion. As such, it shows that with my mountain bike, I usually averaged about 13.4 mph while riding, but with the new bike, I have not averaged any less than 15.0 mph! That's a pretty big difference. Now, if I could just get those lights to cooperate so that I can get places just a little bit faster.

Holy crap it's hot around here. We tied a record on Saturday (which was set in 1999, when we were conveniently in Italy on our honeymoon) and had a heat index of 103 yesterday. So naturally, we spent a lot of the weekend outside.
On Saturday morning, we got up bright and early to head out to the Arlington & Alexandria Community Bike Ride. The ride thankfully started at 8:30am, and was only 6.4 miles (we were on the "family" ride, the full ride was 23 miles and went through Arlington on bike lanes, which we weren't quite p for). Of course, it was so humid out, there was a thick fog that didn't really burn off until we had finished the ride around 10am. The kids did fairly well, except for the one bit where Evan's helmet slipped forward and he couldn't see anything. He was sweating like crazy by the end though. Ellie was great, helping Evan with his water bottle and food. Lisa managed to pull her old Huffy all the way through, even up the last super steep hill. And we all loved the water mister tent at the end.
After the ride we picked up Ellie's friend Claire, and hopped in the baby pool for a bit to cool off until heading downtown to Georgetown. We hit Five Guys for dinner, and Ellie actually finished her whole burger (minus the piece she donated to Evan). Then we walked over to Holy Trinity Church to watch our neighbors perform in an Irish dance recital. Ellie LOVED the whole thing, so we may be stuck spending a lot of money to sign her up for those classes. It was quite the range of talent at the recital. There were kids who had qualified for national and world championships, down to the kids who were brand new, but still better than me, where half the class was going one direction, and the other half the opposite, resulting in comical crashes. Like I said, Ellie loved the whole thing, and we stayed to the end, at 9pm. We narrowly avoided getting caught in a heat-generated thunderstorm, which had quite the impressive lightning show.
The next morning, we got up early again, this time to head down to the zoo for a meerkat class. Ellie and Claire learned about meerkat guards, how to dig with their eyes closed, and other fun stuff. Thankfully, I had parked at the bottom of the hill that the zoo is built on, so we slowly made our way down after having some lunch from On The Fly, hitting every water mister along the way. Evan finally crashed near the lions and tigers, so I took him into one of the restaurants to cool off and nap.
After we got home and Claire's parents picked her up, we were lucky enough to get invited to the neighborhood pool (we don't yet have a membership, so we must beg to get invited as guests). Evan was a little freaked out by the big pool, maybe there were too many people or something. But he eventually warmed up to it when I started playing with him. And he really liked the baby pool. Ellie of course had a great time, but she is still scared of putting her head underwater, and she really has no idea what she's doing when I tell her to kick and try to swim. Still, the pool was extremely useful for cooling off after a hot weekend. Now, if we could just get that membership.

As mentioned, I decided to drive home yesterday, thinking it was a better idea that trying to ride my bike down the trail with possibly downed trees and power lines. I should have ridden my bike. Traffic lights were out throughout the area, snarling traffic and causing me to take an hour to get home. I could have ridden in 40 minutes, even with traffic lights being out. This morning, just one of the lights on my commute was still malfunctioning, but it still caused me to spend an extra 10 minutes getting to work, even at 7am.
I meant to write about this yesterday, but with my account being suspended, I didn't get the chance. On Tuesday evening, we went to pick up our latest CSA share: more turnips, radishes, greens, and the last batch of strawberries. Lisa made a lovely chicken stew with the turnips, but she was hoping for more spinach instead of salad mix. Not much you can do with salad mix other than, duh, salad, but spinach you can integrate into other recipes easily.
Anyway, I also stopped by a co-worker's place. He's a fellow bike commuter, and he had an extra pair of bike shoes for me to try on. Turned out they fit me perfectly! Free stuff rules. So now I have bike shoes with cleats, so I had to order new pedals with bindings to fit the shoes. I also finally ordered a rear rack for the bike, so I can commute every day. I'll definitely have to make sure I have my Metro farecard and bus schedule as my backup plan (though not when the power is out everywhere!).
I'm also going golfing with some of the guys in the neighborhood in a couple of weeks. Some swanky type place that requires you to wear a collared shirt and have soft-spiked golf shoes. I didn't have golf shoes, so Craigslist to the rescue! A guy who is moving to Germany and outgrew his old shoes sold them to me for $5. He also gave Ellie and Evan some bunny statues and a baseball so he could get rid of the gratuitous stuff he didn't need to take with him overseas.
$5 for two new pairs of shoes? I'd say it was a good day.

One of the recommendations of the book, How to Live Well Without Owning a Car, is to always have not one, but two backup plans for getting to and from work, in case you can't bike or whatever. Today is one of those days. A huge storm (with a bow wave leading the way, freaky) just passed through causing power outages throughout the area, and knocking down the trees all over. Seeing as how much of my bike route passes under the power lines that run along the W&OD trail, and that trail also happens to be lined with mature trees, I am going to go with plan B.
Luckily for me, Plan B today is simple: drive my car home. I drove it in with my clothes on Monday morning, and it's been parked here ever since, so it'll be easy to drive it home today. I'll drive back tomorrow and ride home, hopefully. If I hadn't had my car, I could have also taken the bus (which reminds me that I need to put my Metro Farecare in my wallet), had Lisa pick me up, or taken our shuttle bus to a Metro station and over to the station near our house. Options are critical, and I'm lucky I have a good one today.

Average speed: 14.6 mph
Max speed: 27.6 mph
Total time: 29:10
Distance: 7.07 miles

Caveats: I was pretty pumped up to ride the new bike home, so I definitely pushed it. But, I also kept the clock running while I was stopped at both long lights, so that brought the average down somewhat. By comparison, my last commute on Thursday evening was 6.91 miles (must have started/stopped my watch at a different point. Actually, come to think of it, I think I was trying to stop my watch at every stoplight, so I know I forgot to restart a couple of times), I averaged 13.8mph (again, since I stopped my watch, this is the average on all riding time, and does not include time spent stopped at lights), maxed out at 27.2 mph, and finished it in 30:08.

Not too shabby for the first ride out. It should be interesting to see what the averages end up at for the full month of riding. I know this much: my pulse rate after most of last week's riding was only around 120-130, but I was just over 150 today. Must be new bike excitement.

My diligent browsing of the Craigslist bike section finally paid off this weekend, as I picked up my "new" used bike: a 2004 Jamis Coda Comp. I had been looking at the Jamis Coda a bit, but they were few and far between on Craigslist. Finally, one came up that was my size. It's a little bit older, but the guy actually replaced a bunch of the components (he's a real bike geek: he sold this to me so he could get funds for building his new commuter bike) and it's in good shape. Plus, the Comp model is just below the top-of-the-line on all the components, and even has a carbon-fiber fork. I really liked it putzing around this weekend, but we'll see how it goes riding home this afternoon on the big hill. Here are the pictures from his CL posting, unfortunately I haven't had the chance to take my own yet.

Did I mention how awesome my wife is for letting me get this new toy? Father's Day is well taken care of, thanks honey!

Yesterday, I went into my nifty GPS software and tabulated my biking totals for May. I've gotten better about starting/stopping the watch at the appropriate times, but the numbers from the beginning of the month are probably short by a mile or two roundtrip due to me not starting the watch until it found the satellites (sometimes it wouldn't find them until a few minutes into the ride). Now, I just start regardless, and it seems to figure out the distance properly. Anyways, here are my stats:
Driving roundtrips: 8
Biking roundtrips: 12
Bike mileage: 169.58 miles
Average speed: 12.2 mph (I believe this unfortunately includes the 0 mph while I am stuck at the two traffic lights on my route)
Top speed: 32.1 mph (yes, on a big downhill)

Since I usually average about 35-40 mpg in the Civic hybrid, at $4/gallon, I've only saved about $20 in gas money, but I'm in a LOT better shape than I was when I first started. And now that I've figured out my routine pretty well, the numbers can only go up from here.

We had a lot of fun this weekend. Much of it was spent cleaning up the patio and carport so that we would have room for our barbecue yesterday, but we did manage to squeeze in a fun side trip to Viva Vienna, our local carnival. We decided to bike up there, but Lisa also wanted to bring a stroller so that we wouldn't have to carry both kids around when they inevitably got tired. The solution? Strap it to the trailer!

It's no Kona Ute, but it'll do.

It just took a bit of rope to tie it to the top of the trailer, and we were good to go. We made it there and back with no problems (except for Lisa's bike not shifting properly at first, which was fixed by the guy at the bikes@vienna booth in less than 2 seconds), and got a little exercise too. We're hoping that we might be able to ride up to the farmer's market on upcoming weekends too, though we may need to get a wire basket for the eggs and milk (I don't quite trust the kids to carry them for us!).

Just a little bit wet for Bike to Work Day this morning. Luckily, it was nowhere near the downpours we had last weekend, or even Monday. Hopefully it stays that way for the evening commute too!
I got to chat with a guy from Fairfax Advocates for Better Bicycling and a woman from Potomac Pedalers Touring Club, and even got taped by a Fox 5 news crew hopping on my bike to leave. Not sure if it actually aired or not though. There were about a dozen people there at any given time, with 2 or 3 leaving, then 2 or 3 more arriving to take their place. I stayed until they did the raffle, which meant that everyone there got a prize. I picked out the rain cover for my helmet, useful today!
The ride in was mainly wet, and drivers were very careful driving past me, thankfully. Unfortunately I wasn't as careful, and had to jump off my bike while riding too fast down an unfamiliar path through a park. Luckily, I wasn't street riding at the time, and I tried to be more careful on the roads.
The forecast called for the rain to taper off and from the looks of the radar, it's already moved through the area. So hopefully the roads and paths will have the chance to dry up a little bit and make for a smoother commute back home.
Next week, I'll probably be writing less about biking though. Last night, my back wheel popped right off while I was crossing a street and cranking down hard to get going. I have no idea how that happened (possibly because of the bike trailer attachment I had on the rear axle), but it emphasized that I need to get the bike in for a tuneup, including getting the wheels trued and gears tuned. Then again, I might just have a new bike by then, so we'll see!

As previously mentioned, last week there was a photographer for the Washington Post out taking pictures of people riding their bikes to work, myself included. And lo and behold, my picture did make it into the paper today!

Despite the chilly, rainy weather, I really did have all intention of riding home from work today. I changed into my bike gear, got my bike from the rack, and went to my car to drop off clothes and grab my helmet. Only to find, no helmet! I called my wife at home and discovered that I had managed to leave it there after carting it around all weekend to test ride new bikes. Hence, no bike riding home today. Instead, I took all my work clothes inside and drove home in a comfy car.
So instead of biking two half days and three full days, I'll be biking each day for the last four days of this week. Hopefully it goes better than day one.

Here's a quick summary of my weekend bike shopping:
Bike Club: dingy, hardcore bike shop, good for bike geeks, not me.
Hudson Trail Outfitters: good selection, need to compare prices further.
Performance Bike Fairfax: good on the cheap end, need to test ride.
Spokes Etc: my most local shop, but higher prices, need to test ride.
Oasis Bike Works: my favorite shop so far, great customer service, on the cheaper side.
REI: couldn't get anyone to help me for 20 minutes.

Next weekend, I plan on going to the WABA bike swap meet up in Maryland and also hitting up three more bike shops: Big Wheel Bikes in Arlington, City Bikes in Chevy Chase, MD, and Revolution Cycles in Arlington. I will also try to get back to Performance and Spokes Etc to take some test rides, and I plan on taking better notes so that my head isn't spinning with all the possibilities.

My last stop of the weekend bike shopping was REI. I knew REI had Bicycling Magazine's top commuter bike editor's choice for 2006 and 2007, the Novara Transfer, and I wanted to check it out. Unfortunately, I picked a bad day, as Saturday was the next-to-last day of their Anniversary Sale, and the place was packed. I lingered around the bike area for no less than 20 minutes, waiting for someone to help me, and never got anyone's attention. One guy was helping a buyer get a bike ready for a test ride and never got freed up to help me. The other guy was helping some idiot pick out a bike, and he literally was asking if it came in other colors, and was "test riding" by spinning the wheel in the air and braking it. Jeebus. I did get the chance to look at the Transfer, and while it does come well-outfitted with a rack, lights, and fenders, it seemed too bulky and heavy to be a good commuter for me. They also had some better candidates like the Buzz line and the Radonee, but getting to the right level of bike for me was reaching into the $750-900 price range.
I probably won't be back to REI for my shopping, since their sale is now over and the prices are 15% more than they were this weekend. Plus, the store isn't particularly close to my house, so I have to make a special trip to go out there.

I wanted to make sure to visit Oasis Bike Works because I knew they carried Kona bikes, and I wanted to test ride the Kona Dew, which I had run across in my bike research. Not surprisingly, the owner of the shop pointed me to the $399 Dew after I went through my usual routine. He also recommended the $499 Redline R540 as a bit of an upgrade, a little bit lighter, faster, better components. I'm pretty much clueless when it comes to what better components really means, and which ones are better than others. Plus, there are good brands and makes for shifters and derailleurs, and totally different ones for wheels and frames. So I'm pretty much reliant on the bike shop expertise for help there.
I test rode both the Dew, which they only had in a slightly small size for me (which meant that I was riding a little more hunched over than usual) and the R540. I personally thought either one would have been fine for me. The R540 had skinnier tires and would have been a faster bike overall, I'm sure, but could take slightly wider tires and fenders according to the owner. I'd have to make sure of that before deciding (it seemed a tight fit to my uneducated eye, plus there were no rack braze-ons, though he said it could take a rack as well), since the Dew could definitely do both of those. I do have two other dealers to visit, and one carries Kona and the other Redline, so I'll see what they have to say as well.
Oasis had the best overall experience thus far, with a knowledgeable helpful owner, and small shop feel without being skeezy. I could definitely see myself buying a bike from them, as they could also special order for me.

I didn't have to wander too long in Spokes Etc. before Floyd came over to ask if I needed any help. I gave him my info, and we started a whirlwind tour of possibilities. To be fair, I never made any mention of price requirements to any of the bike shops I visited, so as to leave it open to the salesman as to what would be the best fit. As such, the cheapest bike Floyd recommended (he said it was the minimum bike I should consider, since the component level was good enough to handle my requirements) was the $569 Trek 7.3. We also talked about the $899 Specialized Crosstrail and $1199 Specialized TriCross, both of which are pretty much well out of my current price range, though they do look nice. Again, it was raining the day I went in, so I'd have to visit again to test ride the Trek at least.

Performance Bikes has multiple locations in my area, including 2 within 5 miles of me. I went to the one in Fairfax recently, since it's right next door to Hudson Trail Outfitters. I wandered around the store for a few minutes, momentarily lusting after the old school Schwinn at the front (the model escapes me), and then drifting over to the comfort bikes, where I ran into a saleswoman. I gave her my spiel, and she directed me away from the comfort bikes, of course, and towards the entry level road bikes. They still had a 2007 Schwinn model for fairly cheap, and also the Fuji Newest for around $400-500 (I need to take better notes!). Since it was raining, I didn't get the chance to ride anything, but I felt good about the lower cost options they had here.

My next stop was Hudson Trail Outfitters. I knew HTO sold bikes, but they don't sell them on their web site, so I had no idea even what brands they carried. I never did run into anyone who helped me, it was kinda dead on a Friday mid-afternoon when I visited, though to be fair, one of the employees was working on a bike nearby, I just didn't bother going over to get help. HTO carries Fuji, Gary Fisher and Giant bikes, so I took some pictures of bikes I thought were strong possibilities along with their prices. The prices did seem reasonable, but I'd have to compare to other shops to be sure. I would definitely give them a second chance, since I didn't bother to seek out an employee to help me.

Much like I previously reported on my search for a Lasik doctor, and for a replacement window company, I've decided to report my progress on looking for a new commuter bike. I visited a couple over the weekend, so I'm going to post the results throughout the day today. Very appropriate since this is Bike to Work Week, culminating in Bike to Work Day on Friday for you slackers out there.
At each shop, I attempted to find a salesperson who could pick out a bike that met these requirements:
1) Get me to work for my 7.5 mile commute over all asphalt trails and roads, some mild hills.
2) Takes a rear rack for my panniers and fenders for rain riding.
3) Occasionally tow the kids in the bike trailer on weekends trips to the grocery store and other errands.
4) New or used doesn't matter.
My first visit was to a little shop in my old neck of the woods, Falls Church, called the Bike Club. I wouldn't be surprised if the first rule of Bike Club is: Don't talk about Bike Club. It's a tiny little shop with myriad bikes hanging from the ceiling. When I arrived, the manager was finishing lunch or something, and the bike mechanic was taking a smoke break in the store. I gave the manager my requirements, and he called back to the mechanic and they agreed they could build up an older steel lugged frame road bike that could work for about $350. We talked a bit about those possibilities, and he started warming up and talking about other newer possibilities, including the Fuji Crosstown hybrid.
I wasn't particularly impressed with the shop. Yeah, it'd probably be cool if I was a bike junkie who needed spare parts and was a geek about components and bike building. But as a regular person, it was a cramped dingy shop that only a mother could love. Plus, I could get a similar used bike from my local bike co-op for cheaper and support the kids who are building them too. Probably not going back here.

Had my first commute in the rain today. I've only been doing it for a couple of weeks, and previously the worst was a light drizzle. Today it was actually raining, so it was a different experience. I ended up wearing my sunglasses (so THAT'S what the clear lenses are for! Too bad they were in my bag at work) because the spray was blinding me (so THAT'S what fenders are for. Too bad my bike doesn't have a good way of getting those on). Fenders are now a big requirement of my search for a new bike, in addition to being able to mount a rack, climb the occasional light hill, and occasionally haul the kids behind me in the trailer. Taking suggestions for those requirements.
Also, it was pretty exciting to see a Washington Post photographer as I rode down the W&OD trail toward Gallows Road. I saw him taking pictures from a distance and thought it was odd that he was taking pics in the rain of the trail. He was excited to see me, since there weren't too many hard-core commuters on this rainy day (it's easy when you left your car at work, like I did, and had no other choice but to ride). He got my name, asked a few questions about my commute, and I went on my way after the long wait for the light to change. The story would probably run next week, during "Bike to Work Week," I imagine. I'll update if they actually put it online.
Overall, I was pretty lucky that I didn't have any rain-induced incidents. The motorists were fairly courteous in giving me room, didn't get splashed by any huge puddles, and rode safe the whole way. Hopefully, good karma stays with me.

(All white boys who listened to Dre in the early 90s who immediately thought of The Twenty Dollar Sack Pyramid raise your hands. Thought so.)
I'm riding into work 3 days this week, with the hope of doing 4 days next week, during "Bike to Work Week," which culminates in "Bike to Work Day" on Friday, May 16. My 4 day bike commute works with me driving to work Monday morning with all my work clothes for the week, riding home Monday evening, back and forth Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, in on Friday, and driving home on Friday with all my laundry. It works for me, so my clothes stay clean and don't get squashed in my backpack like my lunch does.
Still, I've been scanning Craigslist for a better commuter bike, and there sure are a lot of them out there. But unless I find a great deal in the next week or so, I'm going to head up to Maryland next Saturday for a bike swap meet. I think there should be a decent selection of some better bikes than I might find on Craigslist. Plus, there should be better pricing, unlike the ridiculous $250 "vintage" bikes on Craigslist. Seriously, your 20-year-old beater probably shouldn't sell for more than a 2-year-old bike in good shape.
In the meantime, I need to get this bike running a little better. The wheels are getting slightly out of true, and rubbing a bit, and the gears are shifting rougher than I'd like too. At least I can do most of this myself though, unlike fixing my car. So riding a bike not only saves money on gas, but on the wear and tear on the car, meaning less oil changes and costly repair work. (Yes, that's me trying to soft-pedal buying a new bike to my wife. Hi honey!)

Yesterday, the Honda dealer called to say that, oops! They forgot to install a part they were supposed to replace! Apparently a miscommunication between the service advisor and the mechanic, so they thought it was done, but it wasn't. They offered a loaner, but I decided I would just ride in again. Thus, I took a trip to yet another bike shop to try to get a rack that would fit, and this time, I brought my bike.
Problem is, the guy had seen it before, and pretty much nixed my plans for a rack. Not only are there no braze-on mount points on the seat posts, there are no eyelets near the axle to attach to either!
So I'm still a wannabe commuter, and I'm left with few options. I could buy an Old Man Mountain rack at $100-150. There's also a rack by a company called Axiom that looks like it would work as well. I could use the (big) two-person trailer that is usually for my kids to ride in. Or, ditch the mountain bike and buy a "real" commuter bike. I originally got the mountain bike a few years ago back when some of the guys at work were regularly trail riding, but we haven't done that in a while, so it is still an option.
Today, I crammed everything into my backpack again, and just used that. It was a lot harder than Tuesday, and my legs were feeling the burn. Worst of all, my hands were freezing! It really hurt when the warm water from the shower hit them. I noticed that Spokes Etc. had their winter riding gear 50% off, so I may have to pick up some gloves for cheap till it gets reliably warmer. For now, though, I'm off to find out more options for my rack.

It was only 3.3 miles, but it seemed to take a lot longer to ride back to the car dealership yesterday afternoon. The scary hill was definitely scary, crawling up with no shoulder, and cars trying to squeeze past me while traffic was zipping down the hill. I doubt that I'll take that route again. But most frustrating was the fact that my panniers kept falling off, and the rack kept rubbing the wheels. The panniers were probably overloaded for the single bungie cord that holds them on. The hooks were fairly useless for keeping them in place, since as soon as I would hit any bump, they'd jump right off and go sideways. The rack would wobble when pumping hard up a hill, causing it to rub the tires.
So last night, I went in search of another rack. I found one at REI that advertised "disc-brake mounting" and was encouraged. However, it needs the braze-on mount points that my bike still doesn't have. I tried the clamp adapter they had there, but it would fit around the tube properly, so I returned everything immediately. The good news though is that we got our free Ben and Jerry's cone, since it was right nearby REI. (Verdict: the new 7 layer bar flavor was yummy, but Lisa doesn't like to chew her ice cream; Imagine Whirled Peace was good, but I'd take Phish Food over it; and Ellie actually likes Cookie Dough Ice Cream, much to my horror.)
I finally called up my local bike shop, Spokes Etc, and told them my tale of woe. The guy checked his stock and said that he thought the Trek Bontrager rack (with disc mount) would work, and that I should bring my bike in so that we could find the right adapter to get it to fit. Hopefully I can find something that really works this time. Of course, I probably should have started with these guys in the first place, rather than the chain bike store...