Ride In 8/31

Another exceedingly pleasant morning for bike ridery (not a word) and I wanted to meet it with a better attitude than the ones I've had lately. And I sort of did and that's something of a victory. Earlier in the summer whenever I was in the bike commute doldrums, I would take a different, more challenging or ambling route to work, but I haven't been doing that as much lately, perhaps on account of feeling more tired than usual. And since I try to make commuting seem as unlike a chore as possible and minimize its burdensomeness to the greatest extent I can, I elected to trundle down quiet and bucolic 5th street, a road empty except for dogwalkers and a couple of crews engaged in the planning stages of some sort of home improvement. Nary a car in sight, except for all of the cars parked on the street and in driveways.Were the intersection at 10th and Irving better, it'd really be a nice parallel (on the south side) route to Fairfax. I might have written all of this before. It sounds like something I would write. I can't recall.
What's up, meshie? I think that a greater percentage of bike commuters were mesh shorts than lycra.
Our couple of week, hyperlocal nightmare is over and the bike lanes are now unblocked near Clarendon and Pierce. That doesn't mean it's safe though- cranes unloading bundled metal pipes from the back of flatbed trucks aren't exactly precision instruments and there was more than enough sway to make me think about ducking to avoid the potential hazard. It's hard to judge things like that because in some many cases does one really have the opportunity? You just don't want to guess wrong, I suppose.
I don't think it's a great idea to wear headphones while bicycling. Mostly because I find that having the ability to hear things (an approaching car or truck, rampaging pack of elephants, whatever) positively correlates to safety. And don't get me wrong- I love audio entertainment. I can barely take the dog out for a quick trip without spending 10 minutes untangling my headphones (this is moderately infuriating to witness or so suggest the jawdropped looks I get from the Official Wife because it's taking forrrrrreeeevvvvvveeeeerrrr). And I get why people like having radios in cars: to sonically drown out the monotony of driving. And runners need headphones because, as we all learned in biology, the music bone is connected to the running bone (I went to public school). But biking is actually fun and interesting, so why miss at least 1/3 of the experience (sights and smells being the other two. I don't oppose a clothespin on your nose if you're biking in an especially malodorous part of town, though breathing might be an issue) and imperil yourself at the same time?
Crazy zombie jogger cut off a driver on the Key Bridge slipway then ran diagonally across M street into the path of oncoming car traffic. I said aloud "what the? what are you doing? You crazy?" because I'm paid my a viral marketing company to ask semi-incoherent questions in public, but also because this kind of zombie jogging was really beyond the pale in its ludicrousness.
Still not learning my lesson about R Street.
Still not learning my lesson about the intersection of Calvert and Tunlaw. (Light is still out! Geez.)
I really like seeing parents walking their kids to school. Something about it just seems Orwellian Rockwellian and right and schmaltzy.