Ride In 10/8: Boxes of Foxes

In a maneuver that is to some decidedly #cyclegauche, I got a Road ID. The purpose of the Road ID is to have my emergency contact information readily available to a first responder, you know, in case of emergency. But why stop at sharing this bad news with my loved ones when it can be broadcast to the world via social media?

I don't think this will become a trend.

It was cold this morning and I wore a wool hat and wool gloves and a long sleeve shirt and wool socks. I don't mind riding in the cold but I don't like to be cold when I ride, if that makes any sense.

It's Columbus Day and I rode through Columbus Circle. In the District of Columbia, every day is sort of like Columbus Day, meaning fraught with divisiveness.

Attention pedants: AJ Cooper is running for DC City Council. His campaign signs say as much. If you're cringing, you're a pedant. But my kind of pedant!

I took New Jersey Avenue and it wasn't very trafficked, but it was still an underwhelming experience. I find that too many of DC's streets just don't really live up to their potential. Is it unreasonably to ask that our public spaces look nice? Probably.

There's a truck that parks on R Street that has on it a bumper sticker that reads "I'm surrounded by idiots." I'm sure other drivers really appreciate that. Maybe I can get an antagonizing sticker for my bike. Perhaps a "Bike Commuters for Romney" if such a sticker exists. Maybe I should make a whole line of Romney/Ryan-themed bike stickers and sell them to raise money for AAA. Popular slogans might include "My other bike is a dressage horse" and "47% of bike commuters take no responsibility for their lives." But in all seriousness, bike commuting isn't (or shouldn't be seen as) an activity confined to supporters of one candidate or the other- it's for all people of all political affiliations and it'd be nice if our funding priorities at the national level could reflect that.

I stuck to the road on the way up Massachusetts and I wasn't passed too closely once and I attribute this to my decision to stay a good 5 feet off the curb. Close enough to the curb not to raise too many hackles, but far enough away that someone isn't going to pass me in the same lane. Riding up the hill was quite nice as it warmed me up a little. Sure, that sounds like my putting a bullshit positive spin on something I didn't especially enjoy, but that's ok.