Ever Forward

I hear people object to bicycle commuting on the grounds that “I sweat too much”, or “I don’t want to arrive at work smelling like I’ve been working in the fields all day”.  It’s hard to blame them for this objection.  Many offices don’t have showers available for workers to use, and mine is no different.  The CEO has a shower, but I honestly can’t see me running up, and saying, “excuse me, I’ll only be a minute.  Uh, can I borrow your soap?  Thanks!”.  I just go into the Men’s restroom and use No-Rinse for a quick ‘field’ bath.  Recently, No-Rinse really proved its value when I found myself confused over whether I had previously worn a t-shirt.

When I commute by bike, I normally wear a cycling jersey to work, freshen up with the No-Rinse, don my t-shirt and uniform shirt, both fresh out of my hanging bag panniers.  At the end of the day, I change back into a cycling jersey for the trip home.  I usually take out my uniform and t-shirt so I can wash them.  Well, last week was a bit different.  I biked it on Friday night.  For whatever reason, I forgot to take my uniform shirt out until Saturday, and completely forgot the t-shirt.  Yesterday (Tuesday), when I went to put in a fresh t-shirt, I encountered the old one and couldn’t remember if that was a spare or if that was the one I had used last week.

I started smelling the shirt, and Maty, who was with me, looked at me funny.  “Did you forget to put your shirt in the wash?”  She was half-laughing at my forgetfulness.

“I must have, but this smells too fresh.”

She smelled it.  “Yes, this one is clean.  This must be the spare.”

“Fine.  I’ll just wear it.  I can put it in the wash tonight.”

So  I stuffed it back in the pouch and off to work I went.  This time I put the definitely-used t-shirt in the main compartment with my uniform shirt when I put my cycling jersey on for the trip back home.  Today I opened my side pouch again, to see what other spare t-shirts might be lurking.  There was one I know I didn’t wear, along with a tanktop like the one I was confused over.  It smells fresh too.  The bottom line is, I have no idea which of the two tanktop t-shirts I wore, and which was the spare.  I’m sure the No-Rinse is at fault.

No-Rinse is a body wash you can use when you don’t have the ability to take a bath or shower.  It is used in hospitals and camping situations.  I can break a sweat just by walking out into the hot humid Charlotte air.  At 90+ degrees Fahrenheit & muggy-as-all-get-out, I’m usually dripping wet by the time I finish my 8-kilometer commute to work.  I probably smell like last week’s roadkill.  So to use the No-Rinse, and then later find myself confused as to which t-shirt I wore 4 days ago, I can only say the No-Rinse is great stuff!

That’s probably more than you wanted to know, but have a laugh and know that we cyclists have a tool at our disposal for freshening up after the ride to work.

I have an MP3 Player, a cell phone and a cyclo-computer (fancy word for bicycle speedometer).  Whenever I ride my bike, I usually wind up taking all three along.  If I have a problem and need to call for help, I’ve got the cell phone.  I enjoy listening to music, and I just gotta know how far and fast I’m travelling.  But Sprint’s HTC Evo literally changes how I roll. I’ve always loved gadgets.  The more creative and useful, the better.  I even try to keep current on what’s available, although I admit that’s a real challenge in today’s rapidly changing technology frontier.  That’s important, because, for the first time in many years, I am able to use a gadget that is actually still near the frontier.  Mostly, I’ve been in the back of the wagon train.  So when I saw I had the opportunity to upgrade from my Blackberry Curve to the Evo, I jumped.

My iAudio MP3 player stores 1GB of music, which is fine.  If you want to use it for multiple purposes (not just music), you have to transfer songs and audio books back and forth.  I prefer to listen to fast-paced, upbeat music – not War and Peace – when I’m cycling.  My Blackberry was capable of a number of functions, but the screen was so small that it’s best purpose was as a phone and text messaging tool.  The cyclo-computer has wires and needs to be ‘installed’ to function properly. The HTC Evo does all of that and more.  With 8GB of data storage, I’ve probably got more music than battery power.  And the GPS capability means I don’t even need to ‘install’ a cyclo-computer to figure out how far and how fast I’m travelling on my bike.  And, of course, I can still make that call if I need help while I’m out on the road somewhere.

The Evo just saved me the purchase of a Garmin GPS running around $250-$350. And you know how those infomercials go… “And wait! There’s more!”  And there is!  It holds my photos and other files as well.  It’ll record my Sunday morning sermons – either in video or audio, depending on what I choose to do.  Facebook functionality for Android outclasses that of the Blackberry Curve by a mile.  And I may even be able to check in with my other social networking sites more often now. One of the really great things is that I can now watch college football live on Saturdays.  I haven’t been able to do that since I ditched the television back in 2008.

The size of the Evo’s screen makes a huge difference – documents, photos and websites are infinitely more readable than on a Blackberry Curve.  The 2.25×4.0-inch screen (roughly) is plenty big to see decent photos, and reading documents is pretty darned easy on my eyes, compared to other devices. Now if the cases for these things could just hold my driver’s license and credit card, I’d leave my wallet at home.  Aside from that, the Evo doesn’t seem to be the best platform for editing documents (word processing and spreadsheets, etc.), and it doesn’t seem to keep beer cold for very long.  Come to think of it, it doesn’t cook, wash dishes or clean the house, either.  But it sure does just about everything else.

The iAudio set me back somewhere in the neighborhood of $400 back when I bought it.  The cyclo-computer was probably only $40.  The Blackberry was around $100.  So a $200 upgrade replaces more than $500 worth of gadgets.  And, frankly, it’s worth more than that.

I’ve finally gotten around to uploading the photos I took last year, both during the 2009 Presbyterium Invitational Criterium (bicycle race), and from my trip to the UK.  I still didn’t have my Nikon when I saw the Criterium, so those photos are taken with the Canon Powershot 540.  And no spare battery.  I’ve added photos in the Dunstable Downs and the Saint Albans albums as well.  Those photos are, of course, taken with the Nikon D70s.

Dunstable Downs is, effectively, a chalk hill with a phenomenal view over the area below.  It just so happens that there is a glider  club situated just at the foot of the Downs.  Thus, you will see I’ve caught a few shots of the gliders in their brief flights.  Additionally, you can see a bit of Saint Albans, particularly the Six Bells pub, where my Mom’s husband and I ate lunch.  Then the park, leading to the abby, and the abby itself.  Of course, we had to come back, so a few more shots coming through the park.  Here is a sample of what you’ll find in the 2009 Criterium album:

Did I mention I’m no expert at photography?  The Criterium was my first experiment in sports photography – not at all easy.  Enjoy your browsing!

I frequently encounter friendly, polite drivers on the mean streets of Charlotte.  Today was a great example of how drivers can sometimes make a difference in a bicyclist’s commute.  The lead drivers of 2 lanes of traffic on Park Road let me out ahead of them.  And there were two long lines of cars behind the two drivers.

I’m out there everyday, so people who travel that stretch of Park Road frequently should recognize me by now.  Maybe these drivers were two such people.  Maybe they’re just honest-to-goodness, salt-of-the-earth kind of folks.  Who knows?  But here’s the really cool thing.  I knew I would have a safe commute for that brief 1/3 of a mile stretch of Park Road that can sometimes make me wonder if I’d be safer jumping into a hornet’s nest.

With the huge, honkin’ SUV behind me – willingly, no less – I knew it’d be a challenge for everyone else to run me over.  So, for that stretch, I had some protection.  And then, when it came time for me to get in that left lane for my turn, once again, the lead vehicles behind me simply let me over.  It’s a lot nicer than having to slow down (making the people behind you even angrier than they might already be) and feeling like you’re gonna have to fight a car or delivery truck to be able to turn – and get out of everyone’s way.

It’s kind of sad to realize that drivers frequently hamper their own cause by trying to push past a bicyclist – even when it should be apparent that the latter is trying to get out of the road.  Yet everyday, on this short stretch of Park Road, there are people who recognize the need to cooperate with the bicyclists.  See?  We really can share the road!

Most people I talk to tell me they can’t get along without a car.  They don’t understand how I can live completely car-free.  I understand where they’re coming from better than they realize.  It was only 2008 that I was still driving a car all by my lonesome 15 miles one way to work.  Change doesn’t just happen though.  You have to make it happen.

In 2008 I moved to within 2.5 kilometers (1.5 miles) of my workplace.  Not only that, but I had scoped things out pretty well.  I knew I could get a cheap apartment right across from a grocery store, dry cleaners, as well as tax and insurance offices.  To top it off, there are three good restaurants and a pub.  The mall is near my workplace.  Another shopping center is 1.6 km (1 mile) up the street from me.  Bowling alley, movie theater – I got most everything I need.  There are 4 bicycle shops within 3 miles.

Bearing all this in mind, it’s extremely difficult to justify the cost of owning a car.  I mean, really, how do you justify spending $6k-$8k per year to drive 3 miles?  If the bike isn’t good enough, I can usually combine it with the bus.  In some cases, though, you can actually beat a bus across town on the bike, so it’ s not always worth the effort.  Still, it definitely beats walking, and I probably get better quality of exercise in the process.

So I’ve traded a 15-mile one-way daily grind for a 1.5-mile mostly relaxing ride to work everyday, plus more and better exercise, plus more convenience in my lifestyle.  In addition, I’m eliminating roughly around 7 lbs (or more) of CO2 with every trip I make, which contributes to improving our air quality.