James H. Cutts III's Weblog

Well, maybe they didn't actually lie, and perhaps I'm responsible for making my own decisions. Carrie and Uncle said it was 37 this morning. Well above the 30 degree cut off for bike riding. So I ignored my wall thermometer, which said 24, and dressed for biking to work.

I think that my thermometer was a bit closer to what I experienced than the announced 37. It was cold outside and quite cold on the bike at 35 mph. I'm somewhat use to the inside of my helmet fogging up on these cold days. What was interesting about this morning's ride was today the fog from my breath didn't do as much condensing on the visor, but it swirled around inside the visor creating a fog immediately in front of my eyes.

Steering and general riding was fine, but I did have some trouble remembering to down shift when coming to a stop. At the first stop light, at Business 70 and West Boulevard, I completely forgot to downshift. I was concentrating instead on the right side and breaking with both the front and rear breaks. This focus on the breaking, caused me to attempt to start off, once the lights turned green, in third gear. My bike didn’t like that and stalled a couple of times.

Once I got past that intersection, the bike ride went smoothly. I did forget once more to downshift while I was coming to a stop light. But, fortunately, I remembered to get the shifting done before I started up again.

As I rode on, it remained cold, but as I passed the thermometer behind Perry Chevrolet, it read 33. Perhaps the radio was right, and maybe my home thermometer was right as well. I live in a valley that is frequently cooler than the surrounding “high lands.”

The ride was a blast and I’m looking forward to the warmer days to come when more and more frequently I’ll be able to ride my bike to work.

And now I get to ride back home.

In addition to getting to ride home, I got to ride to lunch. It's 63 at lunch time, warm enough to make a full winter level riding gear hot. But the ride was a great deal of fun. I love riding up and down Rock Quary Rd. It has the perfect combination of curves and hills for some fun bike riding. (As long as the bike is motorized.)

The ride home was wonderful!!

I left work at 2:30 to stop by the barber shop. I've figured out the secret of not waiting at the barber shop - - Go with plenty of time and a book to read. I walked into the barber shop and even before I could get my helmet off, I was being offered a chair.

Robin was planning a Valentine's Day surprised asked me to get home about 4:00. This gave me 45 minutes in which to go riding about and that was really very fun to have that much time on a perfect biking day to get out on my bike and simply ride. I did about 35 miles over the back roads north of my house.

I wished that Robin had her helmet already and I would have suggested that we ride the bike to Ruby Tuesday for dinner.