Fall Stuff

I love this season. At first glance, what's not to like? The gorgeous foliage, crisp air, the smell of mud and sound of cowbells at cyclocross races. It's perfect. But I realized today during my commute on the W&OD that all these great things come at a price. They call it "Fall" for a couple reasons.

There are leaves that fall. There's rain that falls. And the combination of those two wonderful Fall things creates another wonderful thing: slippery sludge. Runners, strollers, and pets all trampled across the wet leaves and it forms this slick, rotten pulp that coats the surface of the W&OD and makes it impossible to go anywhere fast, but it's still a million times better than driving anywhere. Riding a bike with full coverage fenders and 28c tires, I'm far from complaining. I didn't even fall during my commute. I'm just saying that riding at Commuter-TT pace is no longer possible. As a commuter I pay a lot of attention to how long it takes me to get places, mostly because it directly affects the number of alcoholic beverages I can consume once I reach my destination. So I was five minutes off my pace today. Which means that I missed out on two beers before class today. Which also means that I will soon be investing in a flask. This special edition USGP of Cyclocross is looking mighty fine right about now.

The cool, crisp air is another thing that I love about this season, but it is also a sign that our days are getting shorter. Not like apocalyptically shorter (though I do have several zombie contingency plans), but in terms of the amount of exposure that we have to that round, warm ball in the sky. So I spent a lot of time in the dark riding home tonight. What better than a trusty ol' Niterider MiNewt to guide me home? Well for starters, one that was fully charged would have helped. Five minutes into my 50 minute ride, my MiNewt battery's button changes from happy blue to angry red. I tried to salvage what was left in my battery by switching to strobe-mode. Not only was this ineffective at saving what would be a total of 15 additional minutes of light, but damn near gave me a seizure. So I spent the rest of my ride home going even slower than the slippery sludge pace I had ridden on my ride in. Safety, what a son of a bitch. I was fortunate enough to catch up with another commuter on the trail who had a decent headlight. I cordially said hello, told him my light was out, and followed him to my exit. You gotta love the bike trails for things like this. Even if it is riddled with triathletes, pathletes, and people that walk to get places, it's nice that people can use it as an efficient, car-free commute. However, I will note that not all commuters are as friendly as yours truly. After following through on proper path etiquette, saying hi, asking for permission to tailgun it for the ride home, and saying thank you, all I got was a gruff "Yeah. Later." from my leadout guy. Meh, teaches me to drunkenly sing show tunes on a bicycle around other cyclists. At least there's always 'cross races where I can be as weird as I want.