They give bicyclists a smidgen of road and it happens that stretches of that smidgen are still occupied by ice and the pace of ice removal is (what else?) glacial and you could and should feel bad about that. I got the Ogre with the understanding that the only thing that would prevent me from bike commuting would be my decision not to bike commute and not outside factors, such as ice-covered smidgens, and so I set out this morning in my winter get-up and with my rubber winter boots (I stepped in a puddle yesterday and my foot has yet to thaw) and rode through the cold and over and around the ice and for that was that, for the most part.
I took my own advice and stuck to the roads today. My reward for this was impatient drivers. I really do try to be charitable and understanding towards drivers (it's not always easy to understand what your actions look like from the perspective of outside the metal box), but I find that snow and cold makes me less charitable. "Give me a break!" I want to say, but I don't say because I'm more or less just trying to get out of the way. There's less way, to either get out of or get in, thanks to the snow and ice and I tend to feel myself more exposed than I normally do as a result of riding maybe 18 inches farther from the curb than I normally would. Little distances can make for big differences.
What else is there to say? I don't know. Some ice might melt tomorrow. I'm looking forward to that.
Routes:
East Capitol --> Pennsylvania Avenue past the White House --> Pennsylvania Avenue ---> M Street --> Wisconsin --> stopped for an everything bagel with cream cheese at the Open City by the National Cathedral --> Massachusetts
Massachusetts --> 21st --> L --> 15th --> Pennsylvania --> wrong way up the Senate side of the Capitol grounds --> East Capitol
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