esmith2039

Hot and hot! Been a long time since I posted on here. Overseas for a month and had a lot of things come up the last two months. Rode all last week and four days this week. Feel great! Looking forward to riding the rest of the year, not even 750 miles yet this year and should be up to 1.5k by now... ouch!

mgw4jc

@noglider - very cool sunset picture. And that river looks big enough to land a plane on!

We had a couple of short downpours yesterday afternoon. One was right as I was leaving, so I waited a few. The rain stopped but streets were wet and drainage was overflowing making for some wet early miles.

This morning was back to the typical warmth and humidity.

I see the news talking about the heat wave hitting the north east. NYC Triathlon was canceled to protect athletes and spectators. Be careful up there!

wphamilton

So far all the thunderstorms have missed me this week, which I pretty much expected from the forecast. Less than .5" in a day usually leaves me gaps enough. The irony is that after a rain has been the most dangerous for me, when you let your guard down, so I've been more nervous this week.

pdlamb

Good weather for ducks!

Pardon this weather rant. It's hard to separate "How was your commute?" from "What was the weather like?" since I'm outside experiencing the weather while riding.

While I've missed most of the hurricane, it's been fairly miserable for riding this week. Consider:

At least one of my commutes every day this week has been affected by rain, or the threat of rain.

I've left early, and late, to miss the rain, and still got wet.

I wondered why my eyes were so blurry last night, until I realized the reason was water spots on my glasses.

The weather gauge nearest my house has registered an average July's precipitation (over 5") in the last seven days.

Not directly rain, but humidity: sweat was dripping off my shorts when I got out of the shower this morning.

I'm not planning to take the car, because traffic is so bad when it rains that I can bike home faster than driving. But this is getting ridiculous!

Afla-a-ack!

noglider 

Are you referring to the Sullenberger heroic story, or are you coincidentally making it up?

I hadn't heard about the triathlon! Good call, I guess, but it's a big shame. I participated in it in 2010, in a relay team, and my part was just the cycling part.

Wolfhaven

First day back after a couple week break to rest the knees. Mid 60's with a dew point high enough my hands were wet the entire ride. Fingers pruned up by the time I got to work. Was a nice ride over all. Chances of storms later this afternoon with temps in the upper 80's. Think it'll be ok for the ride home.

mgw4jc

Definitely a reference. The plane has been on display here at (or near) the Charlotte airport, it's original destination. Recent local news said the display will end and it will go to storage. Good movie too if you haven't seen it with Tom Hanks as "Sully".

Darth Lefty 

Who owns it? I'm not sure if airplanes work like cars but if the insurance company owns it they'd likely want to scrap it. It seems like it should be in the Air and Space Museum (or Udvar-Hazy) if no museum in NYC wants it. I'd hate to think of it sitting out at Mojave waiting for someone to decide they don't want it after all. It's the best aviation story in recent memory

noglider 

@mgw4jc, thanks. I will definitely watch it. I just watched the trailer. If you haven't seen the New York Harbor, I recommend it. It is vast, and I can feel the history when I stand there.

Then again, the San Francisco Bay is even bigger and awesomer. I shouted when I first saw it.

madpogue 

Wide enough to land a plane, I've heard.....

No commute this week. Out of town Mon thru Wed. Thu it poured rain. Today, the plan was to telecommute for two hours, then ride in, work the rest of the day from my office downtown, and run some shopping errands on the way home. Any given Friday. Until.... about 45 minutes into my telecommute, the router kept resetting. Finally stayed stable for about five minutes, then all the power went out. It was this:


This on a day with mid-90s F, heat indexes around 110F. Power plant is about six blocks from here. "Mechanical failure" caused an explosion and huge fire in the substation. About a half-hour later, another explosion and fire in a substation near the UW campus. This was shot from an apartment building at the end of my block; you can see both fires:


Power was out through most of downtown, including my building. So no point in riding in. Traffic was a complete cluster; bicyclists were the only ones with any mobility. Battened down a few things house-related, then I grabbed the jump-box out of my truck, connected an inverter, plugged in my DSL router and my work tablet and was back on the clock.

The Isthmus MUP, the main artery for non-motor commuting on this side of town (busiest non-motor thoroughfare in the state), runs right past this facility. I imagine the morning's bike commuters got an eyeful. Fortunately not on my commute route for Monday. Knock wood, Monday's commute will be routine....

Darth Lefty 

Today on the ride home I really pushed because I felt good and I wanted to beat my prior time home. And... I did, but that's not the important thing. What's important is, I haven't allowed myself to think this for ten years, because I would be hitting either my medicated limited heart rate, or my chest pain, more recently mostly the latter.

I still feel limited by my heart but it's so, so much better than before the myectomy.

Next week I'm getting out my BIL's old steel road bike to see what I can do with that. I'm betting it's about 30% faster than the trike. And I feel safe riding it in the bike lane... which cuts about half a mile off. I might be at work in fifteen minutes. I'll have to add a lap of the neighborhood. Imagine!

Steely Dan

gorgeous ride this morning. 67° with a 57° dew point.

topping out today around 73° with humidity staying low.

that's about as nice of a july day as one can reasonably expect in chicago.

pdlamb

This morning's ride started off pleasantly: cool, calm, and clear. Sunshine! and 73F, which is really nice after 90+F, and no sign of the impending 90% chance of rain later today.

Getting into the ride, I started feeling a little sticky - got to work and found out the dewpoint was 72. And by that time we were under a dark overcast - here comes the rain!

On a more pleasant note, there was a bob-white (quail) calling half a mile from the office. I don't think I've heard one this year, even while riding out in the country. I used to hear them all the time, and my family and my wife's family independently used to call the family together with a whistled "bob-white" in stores and malls.

mgw4jc

Ride in this morning was fine. I left early and went to the gym for a bit on the way in. Our weather is still hot and humid, but that's forecast to change tomorrow with rain and a high of only 75F.

jade408

First commute on my new bike! I have to say, my 650b x 42 tires are so great! Such a commute game changer. The roads I have to deal with suck. And they did not feel too bad with the wide cushy tires. So glad I went bigger. Also, gearing seems pretty good on the new bike, and some segments were easier than I remember. Which is nice. My commute is a false flat climb almost the whole way.

I am so excited to join the daily commute party!

Skipjacks

Was really nice on the ride in this morning.

Looks like torrential downpour for the ride home.

robertorolfo

I'll see your Hudson River, and raise you one East River (during "Manhattanhenge"). No famous plane landings that I'm aware of, but sea planes are taking off and landing on the river a few times a day (probably ferrying people out to the Hamptons).

mgw4jc

Quite humid and sticky out and rain is forecast for most of the afternoon. I'm hopeful it will mostly break up by 5pm.

A couple of bikers passed me this morning. They seemed to be on some sort of workout mission so I didn't even try to keep up. But I did see them 2 more times as they were taking some meandering route that crossed my way to work.

madpogue 

No as-sploding power stations on my commutes Sunday/yesterday. The peregrine falcons, whose family have made the power plant their home for several generations now, have returned. Street alongside the power station that had the fire is still closed, and with the construction on one of the main routes up Capitol Hill, this street has become a busy alternate bike commute route. Lot of my co-workers/customers are having to get creative with route alternatives. Fortunately, my current route is restriction- and construction-free (something of an exception this time of year).

arsprod 

From heat indexes temps in the low 100's to 58F this morning. I honestly don't prefer either but wish it was more consistent

pdlamb

Lovely ride in this morning. Temperature was down in the 60s -- I didn't expect to see that for a couple more months -- and it sure makes a nice break from the steam bath or oven-like riding conditions. Hmm, I need to pull up weatherspark.com to see just how unusual it is for summer weather here...

One close pass on the new bike lane. I'm beginning to believe the research that says MV drivers pass cyclists closer when there's a white line to show them how close they can come.

@robertorolfo, was that Manhattangate picture this morning? I have to admit, I'd never heard of it until this year.

Darth Lefty 

I sold the surgery-recovery trike this weekend. I'm not sure how it went so fast - I posted it on Friday night about midnight and on Sunday it was gone. Either I was asking an embarrassingly low price (I don't think so) or I just hit that customer exactly at the right time. I expected it to languish on the classifieds for months. BIL's road bike isn't ready yet so I rode the MTB, and... it's 10% faster than the trike, give or take. My fastest trike rides were just under 21 min, first ride back on the MTB was 18:36. That's with circling around at a light and some inching along at the guard gate, OTOH I was feeling really good and pushing really hard to make a meeting.

It feels good to feel normal.

A couple of days ago I saw an e-bike that was made to look like a really old dirt bike or other small single motorcycle - like a Harley Ranger, maybe. I liked it.

awfulwaffle 

First commute since I graduated college 3 years ago, moved to Michigan, and found out I couldn't bike commute because the roads are treacherous and there are no shoulders on any route. Finally had a rail to trail conversion reach close enough to my place to bike to work!

Much excite.

808HIcycler

Never a cool day in Guam. Luckily it is only three miles each way, but the weather overall is pretty bad with the storms and rain here right now. Best part of the days was coming out to a flat tire and portable pump that failed on me. Great way to start my time biking everywhere.

beachball42

Rode this morning and loved the weather. I like the cooler temps and it was right around 58 this morning. As I'm loosing more light each morning I'm realizing I need to invest in a better headlight. My current one is really just a day time running light which was fine most mornings but its not going to work as I have to deal with more darkness.

I've been happy this being my second summer of bike commuting to have been able to ride a lot more. Last year my first year of doing it the season was cut short due to all the road construction along my route. This year I haven't had to deal with it so getting to experience a little more this year. Schools start around here in just over two weeks so that will put a lot more cars on the road in the morning as well so that will be a new twist plus with more darkness I might have to alter my route a bit since I go right by the high school.