My son and I were recently having a discussion about how he didn’t like going to school. I told him I didn’t really like going to work either, but that I made it a lot better by giving my self something to look forward to throughout the day. And for me of course, that something is a bike ride!
I’ve been riding at lunch since 2001. I’ve been doing it for so long now that I don’t know what I’d do with myself if I couldn’t ride. And now with bicycle commuting, I get to tag on a fun bike ride at the beginning and end of the day too.
Work has become the thing I do between rides, almost insignificant in the big scheme of the day. It certainly makes work more tolerable, and I probably even do a better job at it, since I don’t dwell on it.
I had originally thought I’d do a whole “day in the life” photo shoot for this post, but after considering how unbelievably boring shots of me sitting at work would be (although the Cube Self project is kind of fun…), decided to include only riding photos. Here are a few shots of my riding day starting with my commute to work, and finishing with returning home.
8:00 AM – On the Way to Work
1:40 PM – Late lunch ride with the wife, climbing Combs Canyon
1:45 PM – Overlooking Washoe Lake. Yeah! Shaved (most of) the beard!
2:00 PM – Heading South back to Work. Hooray! They cleared the bike path!
5:20 PM – Back Home
And somewhere in a parallel universe Charlie is happy to go to school where he blogs and e-mails his friends all day.
potter, i think i know where that place is…
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains you never change your socks
And the little streams of alcohol come a-trickling down the rocks
The brakemen have to tip their hats and the railroad bulls are blind
There’s a lake of stew and of whiskey too
You can paddle all around ’em in a big canoe
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains
Scott, Google Maps can’t find “Big Rock Candy Mountains”. Did you spell it right? I need to get directions…
trust me, i’m trying to find it as well.
sexy pics!
Thanks, Bob. I was going for a Paul Stanley look in the 2nd picture.
Thank dog the deforestation has begun. I’ve been worried about you being mistaken for a vagrant while out riding only to be hit by empty beer bottles thrown from ‘merkin-made pickup trucks.
Keep talking about the lunch rides…it’s motivational and I’d be doing it already if our weather would cooperate! I only wish our scenery was something like yours 😦
The day in a life of a commuter extraordinaire. We should all be so lucky.
The beard was slowing you down anyway; should be able to shorten the commute time now.
I often wondered if the beard brought me bad press. Thankfully I can report that no, it seems to have had no effect! I got buzzed today again by a pickup truck while out on the lunch time ride. I do have a reoccurring theme happening here though. It’s always a damn pickup truck! What’s the correlation here?
That is a long time to stick to something. I think I have only stuck to one thing for seven years and that is marriage.
chris, keep in mind, those kinds of years can be longer than standard years and oftentimes are multiplied by different factors (depending on the equation they’re being used in); sometimes Pi, sometimes Avogadro’s number. your stick-to-it-ness could be greater than you suspect!
“I do have a reoccurring theme happening here though. It’s always a damn pickup truck! What’s the correlation here?”
Jeff,
You taking too much credit here. I guarantee you those same morons treat other drivers in cars the same way they treat cyclists.