Wednesday 26 November 2008

On why Monday should have been the last day of biking

It turns out that it was colder last night than expected. Not by much, but enough to make a difference. About 1 or 2 degrees. The same as the dew point early this morning. Unfortunately, I didn't know this.

Today today dawned bright and sunny so I threw caution to the wind, and biked to work. At the second corner, my wheels slipped out from under me on the dew that had frozen onto the nice, new and above all smooth pavement that is such a rarity in this province. Fortunately, this corner was a back street and there was no traffic to run me over as I lay on the ground recovering my breath after the joint jarring fall. I picked myself up and with pig headed determination, rode rather cautiously into work.

Apart from a few bruises, the only damage seems to be that the brake lever on the side that took the fall (the left hand side) has been banged out of place making it harder to operate. However, this was enough to convince me that the gods don't want me to keep biking this year. I have taken the Castafiore in for the winter. I had thought of bringing her into the shop for her end of the year upgrade, but with the expense of Christmas coming on, I thought it best to wait until February.

I rather wish that I had put the bike away after Monday's high note.

2 comments:

Victor Chisholm said...

The gods don't want you to stop cyclo-commuting - they just want you to get winter tires for your bike.

Bikemoose said...

Nah, if the gods wanted to me to bike in winter they would have provided me with a way to clean slush and salt off my bike after every ride. Also, it gets too miserable at some point. BMW for me, BMW.