Birmingham Police

Here's a quick commuting to work story from this morning. I was traveling down 22nd street from downtown Birmingham to Southside at about 7:45 this morning, on my way to Lucy's Coffee & Tea. For those unfamiliar, 22nd street is a three lane one way street that is generally very busy during rush hours. I stopped at a red light and a giant Cadillac pulled up behind me, right behind me. After a few seconds he started honking his horn. I turned to look at him and he started making hand motions saying he wanted to make a right on red. I gave him a hand motion back showing him that I was going straight, and turned back around. He honked a few more times and then tried to go around me. At that point a Birmingham Police car pulled up and gave a "wew-wew." The officer in the passenger side leaned out the window and yelled at the guy in the Caddy "Hey, he has as much right to the road as you do, and he does NOT have to make a right on red." At that point I faced forward again, the light changed, and I went on my way. I turned a few seconds later to give the officer a "Hey thanks" but he had turned off.

As a disclaimer I need to say that I am all about sharing the street with cars and getting out of their way when possible. I don't deliberately try to slow cars down or get too high and mighty about my place on the road. I drive a car too. This particular stretch of 22nd street is what I call a "shit or get off the pot" stretch of road. You either jump in traffic and stick with it, or you are relegated to the sidewalk or another street. If I were to get off to the side of the road to let this guy make his right on red, then when traffic starts moving 40 MPH, I'm stuck on the sidewalk or the side of the road waiting for the light again. In other words it would have inconvenienced me more to get out of his way then it did him to wait 30 seconds behind me for the light. Were it the other way around, I would have gladly gotten out of his way. Not to mention it looked like it was about to rain and I wanted to get to Lucy's.

Thank You to the Birmingham Police.

Cape Cod Rail Trail

Lucy and I spent last week on Cape Cod visiting my parents. We spent one day riding up the cape cod rail trail. We rented bikes from Orleans Cycle - very nice people. Our ride was from Orleans to Welfleet. The trail actually ends before Welfleet, but we continued on for 3 or 4 miles into Welfleet Center. As you can see from the picture of Lucy, the weather wasn't great. Three days before the 4th of July this parking lot should be jammed full. We were the only two people there so we swerved around the parking lot as much as possible. 'cause we could. On the way back we stopped at a great place called the Beachcomber. It's a bar / restaurant that sits, almost, right on the ocean. After a few beers we had some fun riding back. We wondered if people could tell who was returning from the Beachcomber by their riding style. The whole ride was about 25 miles round trip. Below are some pictures from Provincetown. It struck me a odd. Provincetown is a friendly town, with lots of bikes. and everywhere there are signs that say "no bikes." I don't know the history here, so I'll just leave it at that.

el perrito de guardia

I pass this dog every day. I remember when he first appeared here a while back. I think they used to take him home at night, but now he is the full time guard dog. He has a little dog house and it looks like they take good care of him, but it must be some lonely nights by the railroad tracks. It was about 5:30 when I rolled up and decided to take his picture. As soon as I got up to the fence with my camera, a pickup rolled around the corner and pulled right up to me. A man got out and I explained that I ride past here twice a day and was just taking the dogs picture. He seemed to be cool with the idea, but said that people sometimes come by and throw rocks at the dog. How special. Apparently he didn't think I was one of these people. He gave the dog a few pats, explained with a laugh that it was the new guard dog, the dog returned a few licks, and he left. I left as well, figuring he probably was still watching what I was doing. I forgot to get the dogs name. I'll have to make a point of stopping and asking him. That way I can properly harass the dog by calling it's name as I ride past.

cut off at the pass

I was treated to a somewhat extended break on my ride in today. There is a spot where the trains do a jog across 1st avenue south and then turn and follow along 1st avenue. This train stopped during the jog in such a way as to block the only other way out down 34th street. The only other option was to turn around and ride back out toward 41st. Since I was within 3 blocks of work I decided to wait it out. Nice morning to sit around and wait for the train. I saw a lot of cars whipping u-turns and roaring back down 1st ave. I wondered if I was driving and decided to follow suit, if I would get to work any faster than waiting on the train and then heading on. Probably not. These situations are always interesting. In a car people make the assumption that there MUST be a faster way to deal with this. Stress out, u-turns, dangerous speeding. On a bike - well I'm late for work, fuck it, nothing I can do, enjoy the sun before it gets to hot, get to work a bit late, stay a bit late, miss rush hour on the way home. It all works out.

Gear reviews

Here's my first, possibly my last, gear review issue. These are some of the things I've collected since starting to commute on my bike.

Timbuk2 medium messenger bag:

What can I say. This bag rocks. I got it 50% off at REI. It doesn't move at all on my back when I'm riding. It's big for what they call a medium. Today was my biggest haul yet. 3 half gallons of soy milk, my thermos, tube etc, plus all of my work & personal stuff:

I crammed it all in there, no problem. The soy milk was actually nice on such a hot day. I could feel the cold from it on my back the whole way. So you can haul lots of crap, plus it's built solid. It has the feel of something that will last a lifetime. Waterproof too. I can't wait to try out the 2 six packs of bottles plus ice like they show on their website.

Next up, my Eleven81 trunk bag: This guy serves pretty well for trucking around a relatively small amount of stuff. It has an expandable top and straps on to your rack with strong Velcro ties. The biggest advantage to this bag is not having stuff on your back. But for a short ride commuter like me the cons win out. It is kind of a pain to take it off and put it on at every stop. So you either risk it being stolen or hassle with taking it off and putting it on when you stop for coffee, the library, the grocery store, etc.. It just adds up to a lot of on and off. It also REALLY bounces your stuff around. I never felt good about my camera or hard drives being in there. It also does NOT have that built to last a lifetime feel (it already has a stress tear after less then a year) and it's not waterproof.

next, my viewpoint cheap shit blinky light: pictured here after being smashed open at Jones Vally Urban Farm. I hadn't noticed until I got home. I went back the next day, found the pieces, got a new battery, and it was blinking away again. You have to give big points to things that get smashed to shit and still work. Anyway, 5 settings (of which I use one), comes with a seat post attachment, retail price $4.99.

And last but totally not least, my new Michelin 1.4" city tires:

These replaced the 1.95" tires. The front was a worn out knobby off road tire, the rear was a relatively new 1.95" city tire. These tires are great. They make a huge difference on my commute. Noticeably faster. They hold the road really well in turns. Surprisingly so. I was nervous about riding on wet pavement at first, but that was totally unwarranted. They are really thick skinned. A layer of "Protek" under the tread is supposed to greatly reduce flats. So far, two weeks, no flats. I have them pumped up to 90psi, so they are a little unforgiving on the rough spots, but I suppose that is to be expected. I payed full price for these - $25 each. I have since seen them for as low as $17.50 on amazon. Added bonus of a reflective sidewall stripe.

Woodlawn United Methodist Church

Terrible loss for Woodlawn today. I ride right by this church everyday. I'm not sure how old the church was, but it was old and beautiful. Just as tragic - it was an active church, and the loss of anything active and positive in Woodlawn is a bummer. My heart goes out to these folks. I wish I had taken a picture of the church before it burned. It makes me stop and think how many wonderful things we pass everyday, but never stop to appreciate them because we take for granted that they'll always be there.

Farmer's Market

I rigged up my bike up with a milk crate for the farmer's market today. It worked out well, with just a bunch of zip ties holding it to my rack. One more tie held on my blinky light on the back. I laid a small towel in the bottom of the crate to help keep any veggies from getting bruised on the way home. The market was jammed and the weather was beautiful. I found that riding my bike to the market instead of driving left me feeling like I didn't need to rush around and grab my stuff and split, it seemed to take the hurry out of it. I hung around and had a breakfast burrito and a sweet tea from Franklin's, took some time to check out Lonnie Holley's awesome artwork, and bought a ton of veggies. I loaded my new grocery gitter with sweet potatoes, new potatoes, beets, green beans, squash, turnips, tomatoes, and a bag of blue grits. There was plenty of room in the basket, so everything fit comfortably, except the tomatoes. I stuck those in my bag to hopefully keep them from getting knocked around too much. It handled great on the way home, maybe a bit bouncy, but nothing got tossed around. That's probably because my rack is just a seat post rack, no supports down to the dropouts. Just a snip-snip after the market and my bike was back to my commuting bike.

Shimano replacement pins

     I learned (on the internet, how else) that when you push out a Shimano chain pin with a chain tool, you aren't supposed to use that same pin again. You should replace it with a new pin. After my multiple chain breaks I did some searching and found lots of people talking about this. I remember a guy at Bob's Bikes telling me about this last year as well. At the time I poo pooed the idea and I didn't have any problems again until last week. So, I went out last week and got myself 5 Shimano replacement pins for about a buck each and I keep them in my patch kit. I haven't had any chain problems though, so I think removing the link may have solved the problem. I still don't have full confidence back. I'm a little nervous standing up on big hills. I can't stop thinking that the chain may snap, and I'll be castrated, and then run over. Although, I did find myself hammering it out to beat a train across the tracks the other day. I didn't think of the chain until after the fact.

     I'll be pretty excited if the chain thing is worked out, or even if the pins are needed, if they solve the problem. I was nervous that I was going to have to buy a new chain, and that made me nervous that it would lead to skipping, replacing the cassette, etc.. I'd rather spend a little money on finishing converting this (mountain) bike to a commuter bike. I would like to get some 1.4" city tires to replace the 1.95" that are on there now. I think that alone would make a huge difference. I'd also like to swap my rock shocks with the rigid forks on my mountain bike. I don't see any reason that wouldn't work, but I should probably talk to someone about it. Other than that I need a light for the front, overall tune up, and I can move on to my next bike project.

     It is now summer in Alabama. Finally, after a rainy ass spring, the sun is out and it looks like it will be out for a while. It's getting hot, and sweaty, and yummy.

Confidence

I went through a bout of what I call "bike confidence drain" back in the fall when I had a run of flat tires every couple of days. It got to the point where I had to factor in whether I had time to stop and change a tube on my way to work, and if I was running late, I would jump in the car for fear of that flat. So it hit me again this morning. Last week I had a run of chain breaks. After the one I wrote about, it then snapped on me on the way to work on Wednesday. I put it back together, and made it to lunch, then back to the office. But then it snapped again on the way home. At that point I dropped out what I believe to be the offending link, and it was fine on the way home. I'm pretty confident that the removing that link is going to solve by problem. However, when I was getting ready to leave the house today, and it was raining lightly, that bike confidence thing happened again. I suddenly had a picture of myself on the side of the rode in a downpour, chain tool in one hand, chain in the other, and I decided today was a good day to drive.