Not again

It's time for another biking post! The Biking Commute Challenge Thingy is almost over, and I've biked 15 out of a potential 19 days of work thusfar. (I felt something pull or tear or tweak just above my right knee starting out in too high a gear right at the beginning of the month, so I took a little break, until I realized that it actually hurt more to work the gas pedal.) There are a few people with 100%, but I think I'll take the total mileage crown, which I am hoping involves an actual crown, but which probably consists of nothing. I got some raingear, but so far I've only needed the gloves, as it's been surprisingly dry, if foggy and windy. That reminds me:

Pete's List of Bicycling Things What Suck (Amended 9/27/08):
Hills
Headwinds

So here are yesterday's numbers:
Total Miles: 534
Total Peddlin' Time: 42 hrs. 50 min.
Trip Dist.: 18.58 miles
Trip Time: 1 hr. 25
Avg. Speed: 13.15
Top Speed: 31.94

Yep, 32 mph coming down the 33rd ramp over Columbia. I'll have to try again on Monday, though, 'cause I swear I hit the exact same speed at the same place on Thursday.

The End

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Sigh

So I thought I had a nice little idea for a retarded post about Sarah Palin, and her being the first ever VPILF. Turns out not only am I too late, there's a goddamn website: vpilf.com. There's even a post about the foresight in setting that site up two months ago.
Aha! No google hits for LOLVPILF. My niche!


Comedy gold.

PS Yeah I know, I can't figure out how to do a black outline.

::UPDATE::
Here's Syd's submission, and she's right, it should just be LOLVP:
















And here's mine:

We're puerile

Highlight of the 'lympics thusfar: the opening ceremony, beating France's ass in the relay, or the fact that Bulgaria has a male volleyball player called Gaydarski? It's a tough call...

Blogged with the Flock Browser

My feet, annotated

I swear we just vacuumed.

Footwear

So my shoes were shot to hell and I actually had some spare cash, and I was tired of playing basketball with my students in running shoes, so we willingly engaged in shoe shopping. I’m pretty finicky about every possible aspect of shoe purchasing, which makes for frustrating times. I eventually settled on some Adidas that didn’t look totally retarded, which I find to be an issue with 95% of shoes, but the weird thing was that the whole time I was worried about the opinions of my class. I’ve always been surprised by the lengths they go to to keep their “kicks”* nice; getting a couple sizes too big and stuffing socks in the toe; avoiding grass; meticulously scrubbing... I should be glad that they take care of nice things, given their often dire financial situations, but it’s so unexpectedly prissy. So along with my concerns of retarded shoes and shoes that didn’t feel right, there was a little voice saying “get some Jordans, or some Forces.” The trouble, of course, was that I had no damn clue which were tight and which were swap. So it was not without some small measure of apprehension that I wore my new shoes to school today, and as should come as no surprise, nobody commented on them at all.

*Slang for shoes.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Mo' bicyclin'

I bade the MAX farewell this week, thanks partly to the cyclometer-facilitated realization that it only cuts the ride roughly in half, and takes no less time than riding the whole way. Monday and Tuesday I rode, tagging along with a couple of coworkers some of the time. More painful, but good to have impetus to keep going, and go faster, as they're in better shape than I. I was developing this habit of stopping when things got difficult. Took a break and drove Wednesday, and rode again Thursday (I have Fridays off in the summer. This only slightly mitigates my job's sucking.). 18-19.5 miles all three days, avg. speed 12 mph (it doesn't count time spent not moving toward avg speed or trip time), max. speed 25.71 (riding the brakes down the Alameda ridge), total odometer 78 miles, which doesn't include, obviously, distance traveled before I got the thing. Whee, geeking out with basic telemetry!
Syd rode some too, but was stymied by insufficient panniery, so I'm gonna slap a basket on the front of her bike today.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Woo Bicyclin'!

So here's this week:

• Monday: MAX in the morning, rode back from work via 33rd.
• Tuesday: MAX in the morning, rode back via Vancouver.
• Wednesday: Legs were not interested in bicycling. So very not interested.
• Wednesday night: went to REI, got super-cushy seat for Syd, water bottle holders, and a cyclometer for me, since I needed a clock, and it tracks a bunch of other interesting stuff, like current, average and max speed, distance traveled, time traveled, and odometer and total time.
• Today: MAX in the morning, turns out I still bike about 4 miles with MAX, so it cuts the biking in half. Rode back via Vancouver, stopped to get a little Allen key kit because it turns out I didn't tighten Syd's new seat enough and it shifted angle quite significantly halfway through her morning commute, rode to Syd's work, fixed her seat, and we rode home. Total distance almost 16 miles, how crazy is that? My legs felt a lot better, too. I still had to stop a couple of times partway up some hills, but I think that's partly 'cause I wasn't picking a good gear, 'cause when I started back up it went much more easily.

Things I still suck at:

• riding with weight off my arms, or hands off the handlebar, which is to say:
• signaling, and the faster I'm going the harder it is. I would like to be one of those cool people who can ride with their arms at their sides all cool-like.
• Inclines. You win again, gravity!
  

Blogged with the Flock Browser