BTWD 2010

Great day for riding and lots of people on the roads. Met a few cool folks and forced myself to actually go to work in the end. Should have grabbed a pic before I left when the freedom plaza crowds had grown but this one is from about 7:30 when I first got there.

Tha 5-0

Today I decided to live a little dangerously. Been wanting a new bike for a while so I stole one I saw sitting out on the road (turns out it was Dave's! Sorry Dave!!!) Got into a gnarly chase with the local Po Po's and finally they had to side check me to get me down. It was like that classic get away video of the guy on the free way getting away from the cops on a bicycle... Cept, that's just not quite how it happened...

Rode home from Aimee's today after taking her to a couple of doctor's appointments and what not. Taking it easy after a long day in the saddle at the Frederick Water Shed yesterday, cruising mostly on the flats and just generally spinning my way home in the nice and somewhat warm weather.

Get to a blind corner with a green light (only maybe 300 yards from where I get on trails for nearly the remainder of my ride), spin it easy around the corner and "whoop whoop" a cop is in my lane coming at me with the lights flashing. Sh*t! I'm on the flats so I can't just grab a handful of brakes, maneuver as much as I can but there space is limited.

End up slamming the left side of my body into the rear drivers side door, bounce off a little and go down on the right. Cop gets out, makes sure I'm ok, I do the quick systems check and all systems appear a go, I mention I'm more worried about the bike so she gives me a business card and takes off to whatever emergency she was headed for.

Bike's alright but the new bar tape (2 short rides on it) is trashed and the front wheel is knocked a bit out of true. Loosen the brake and ride home. A guy in one of the 10 or so cars lined up at the light that the cop was heading around yells out I should get off the bike and sue that *^&^*(; I shrugged and kept going.

Back home it looks like I might have a bruise on the thigh (though doubtful), a couple of additional scrapes and not much else aside from a bit of soreness tomorrow. The bike on the other hand needs the wheels trued, new bar tape, new HANDLEBARS (the right drop is now bent in somewhat severely) and well, probably another general tune up similar to what I spent 3 or 4 hours doing on Saturday. I hate riding a freshly cleaned and perfectly tuned bike!

Whatever happened to karma anyway?

Oblivious case of the moondays

After my constant pestering and of course my gift with strings attached, Brian has got his review of the 53x11 The Early Break up on his site. Basically, B comes comes down to the same conclusion as I though he does a bit of a better job with the whole "knowing what he's talking about" thing.

Thanks B.

I've managed to start riding my bike to the metro here in Greenbelt lately; something I've struggled to find the motivation to do at times in the past year and a half. Basically my excuses are as follows:

1. I sweat pretty easily and it sucks to go to work all sweaty and nasty.
2. Which bike??? I'm not about to leave the nice road bike or one of my Mt rigs at the metro all day. The cross rig (finally dialed into the righ working gear works for that now).
3. Pedals. I don't own a single set of flats. WTF? So, I either ride my speedplays or spd's with regular shoes or bring an extra set of shoes to change when I get there.
4. It's cold.
5. I'm lazy.

So, lately I've been riding the speedplays while wearing my hiking shoes and just dealing with everything as I go. Finally this weekend I switched out the pedals for the spd's and just wore the old mtb cleats to work. They're black so I guess I don't look like that big of a dork. It works, I'm learning to use my clothing more dynamically to help keep me warm and cool myself off during the brief 2.5 mile ride (ie zipping and unzipping the zipper) and I generally reward myself with a mug of hot joe to sip during the long metro ride in. (Shhhh, don't tell nobody).

Where I was going with this story back from the beginning of this novel was that this morning I had a ridiculous encounter with a driver coming out of my neighborhood. I was riding down the road when a women pulled out from the left turning into my lane. She basically turned out right into me, not just ahead, not just behind but directly into the side of me while I rode. She didn't do in a fashion that really left me a comfortable space beside the curb as I've had cars do before and really it seemed like she didn't even see me.

I basically stopped and let her just go then caught up with her at the stop sign just ahead which she rolled through to make her right turn, effectively cutting me off as I made my right into the bike lane. After this one I accelerated and was going to bang on her window to yell at her, or at least make her aware I was there but she suddenly accelerated as if she knew I was trying to catch her. B*tch!

So we get down to the next light and she's stopped behind someone waiting for the light to change. I pull up beside her and stop next her her passenger side window. She's staring directly ahead not acknowldging me at all until I tap on the window and she looks startled and opens the window. At first I thought she was ignoring me on purpose; I was standing directly in her window staring at her yet she had no clue. I told her what she did and she apologized and said she had no idea and of course thanked me for letting her know...

Wow, just amazing how clueless a person can be. I'm glad I ride defensively and expect people to do stupid stuff most of the time. People are dumb.

Unexpected time frames

Have you voted today?

I figured I'd "beat the crowds" this morning by walking the 2 blocks down the street the Greenbelt Elementary School a bit before the doors opened at 7am. The line wrapped over and out of the parking lot by the time I got there at about 10 till. Oops. About an hour and a half later I was on my way to work. I'll be looking for my free Starbucks Coffee later on today and maybe even my free Ben and Jerry's later on.

Yesterday Brian and I commuted in to work. We took the usual route in, meeting around 7:15 at the usual spot. I decided it'd be cool to try out a different route going home and since I failed to get a ride in this weekend figured I could go for a few more anyway. We cut out West through Geaorgetown and up the Capital Crescent Trail to Bethesda. From Bethesda we cut East until we hit Beach and then headed North.

By this time it was getting pretty substaintially dark and Brian didn't have lights (aside from the urban commuter light I provided) so I had to stick behind him which was a bit tough going up Jones Mill by the Mormon Cathedral since he was in the easiest gear trying to spin slowly up the hill. In the end we got him home safely at around 20 miles and sometime near 6pm. I took off through Sligo Creek with a headlight and blinky on my way back Southeast towards the NW branch trail and back to my usual NE branch trail towards home.

In total my trip was 37 miles going home, probably at least half in complete darkness and about 53 for the day. A bit more then I'd planned for though it was good riding a bit more. Really my only issue was I just wasn't mentally prepared for the darkness so early. Despite knowing it's coming it always takes me by surprise the first commute home after daylight savings kicks in. Using that day to test out a new route was probably not the smartest thing to do this year.

Been a while since I've posted a car bike rant

This morning as I rode in to work a BMW came around me, entirely in the opposing lane of traffic over on D St, NE. Generally no big deal and maybe it'd even kind of the guy (albeit stupid) for the guy to give me so much space. Not this time. I was riding with traffic, cruising at speed behind a large pick up truck as a car would do (in reality probably even tailgating a little, also similar to how cars drive). The BMW had no where to go and I threw my arms up and let him know.

So, he drove along next to me for the rest of the block. The truck turned and the lane ahead was open so the guy took off... to the next light. Apparently though he didn't really notice it very quickly since he had to slam on the brakes and scared the shit out of a half a dozen pedestrians in the crosswalk.

I congratulated him on his ability to scare anyone and everyone; figured it was an early Halloween prank.

Commute cost analysis

For a while now I’ve been wanting to sit down and figure out my commuting costs based on the multiple different commuting options I have. I live only 2 ½ miles from the Greenbelt Metro station and there is a bus that stops almost directly outside my house so for the longest time I always just assumed that would be the cheapest way to go. Metro only transport it turns out I am correct, though of course biking to Greenbelt instead would be cheaper. Basically I’m looking at $8.80 roundtrip via bus versus $7.20 roundtrip via bike.

However, if I decide to drive to Greenbelt, which I have done on numerous occasions my RT costs jump to $11.45 (not including gas money for the 2.5 mile drive). On the other hand if I drive to Fort Totten to catch the Redline directly to Judiciary Square I only pay $8.25 RT plus gas for an approximately 10 mile drive. I’m guessing gas costs would run around 2 to 4 dollars putting this option at around the same cost as driving to Greenbelt, only faster and with the bonus perks of morning coffee as I drive AND the ability to listen to at least parts of the NPR broadcast.

So, basically from this I should be biking whenever possible to the metro, and taking the bus on the other days, like when it’s super hot or raining or something. (This of course excludes biking all the way to work which obviously would always be the ideal option).

Unfortunately though on the other hand, one additional option I have utilized in the past has been to essentially drive all the way to work. By hopping on 295 right outside my door any time before 6:30 or so I can get to Hains Point within a half an hour assuming no major issues, have a bike, not need to shower upon arrival at the office and be at least 15 minutes faster then through any other commuting option I have. On top of that, the only costs to me are gas money, which I’d estimate to be about $8 RT give or take a bit depending on the day, plus the ability to change post work plans without worrying about extra metro trips is always a nice plus.

I’m not saying I’m going to start driving to Hains Point everyday here, more just pointing out a fact. My most efficient option for getting to work is still to drive all the way into the city. Aside from an occasional traffic jam there are no real barriers to me doing so, especially major monetary ones so I can see how enticing driving can be to anyone commuting into the city. Now, if DC were to add the much talked about tolls to commuter routes coming into the city, things might be a bit different. I doubt I’d drive much at all unless I had somewhere to go right after work that I needed the car for.

So, my final conclusion? I need to Harden the fuck up and start riding in more every week. All that costs me is an extra shower in the evenings and an extra bowl of cereal in the mornings along with a quadrupling of my current weekly training miles. That’s a cost I’m more then willing to pay.

Called out by Le Unholy Rouleur last night; rightfully so too, though mine should have been a bit harsher. I haven’t commuted by bicycle in months. Ouch, I know. Now I do like to blame this on the new puppy, which is partially true, though partially I’m just a big pansy. In that end the hope is tomorrow to commute, though due to the pup I’ll need to leave work a little early to be sure I can get to our training class that night with her a bit worn out to boot. This morning I made a last second decision to drive to Hains Point and ride over from there. Unfortunately 295 sucked this am and managed about a 15 mph average speed from Greenbelt to Pennsylvania Ave. Ouch, cycling in would have been faster.

Getting out for an early and longerish ride at hains today for lunch though so that should make up for things. First race of the season coming up in two and a half weeks in Pittsburgh. The race is only 35 minutes long and is really just a nice excuse to get up to Pittsburgh for a visit with a ride thrown in for fun. So far there are only 6 of us; 50/50 odds at a podium? I like it. Wanna join? Sign up and come on up and spread some Mabra love.

Peer pressure

Kyle at Pedal’n Around wrote a post recently that caught my attention. He talked about how the other blogger/racers are motivating him to get out training and riding. I really need to start blog reading more cause my motivation and training is pretty much zilch at this point. Over the weekend I thought I’d at least get a ride in but nothing panned out and then Sunday I spent the whole day helping the folks and didn’t end up going to Race Pace Cross after all. On top of that I’ve taken on a little part time seasonal gig to pick up some extra cash for the holidays and such as well so that’ll probably take away from the QT with the bike as well. Well, hopefully I’ll manage to get some motivation going here, though I’m a bit worried that the PT work may keep me out of as many cross races as I’d like to be doing. We’ll see.

For now, Kyle will continue to make me feel bad about myself. Thanks Kyle!

The joys of "suburban" commuting?

As I’ve likely mentioned before my new commute is pretty great. So far I’ve done it twice on the fixed gear and once on the Cannondale so I’m getting the full effect of the ride. I really love doing it on the fixed gear as that is some of the longer fixed gear riding I’ve done.

Before the move most of my fixed riding was to and from locations in the city with my commute only being 3 ½ miles, barely enough to break a real sweat. Now I can really get into the flow on the bike and get a rhythm going in the pedals. That said I’m really hoping to be able to fix up the old Schwinn Traveler I picked up off a friend into a reliable commuter. Fixed everyday with my overly tight legs just won’t continue to fly. For the time being though the rear wheel is beyond repair and a search is being carried out for a used replacement.

I also LOVE the first parts of the commute. Once I get down across 193 I jump onto the bike trails for probably about 5 or 6 miles where everything is quite and peaceful and no cars come flying by, frustrated by the cyclist going under/near the speed LIMIT. This morning I saw a handful of other cyclists and said hello or gave a wave to each of them. Some were commuters while some were just riding; all the same to me though, as long as they’re on a bike.

One guy that I’ve seen twice now is a really large guy riding an old mountain bike probably from target or something. He kind of swerves back and forth and you can tell he is really working hard on the bike but all the same I was really happy to see him this morning for the second time in three days of riding. He’s very courteous and moves well to the right when I announce on your left and just fact that he’s out there giving it a try is awesome. I hope he sees some really positive results from his bike commuting time and continues it for a long time.

Downtown drag racing

At the end of my commute this morning I drag raced a big box truck. The passenger loved it and was laughing and yelling. I turned and flashed a big grin after I won (he had to slow down for traffic in front of him) and zipped between some cars and the curb. That was fun. My legs are thrashed today and I didn’t even race last night. I did pick up the new (used) pick up. It’s nice. I’m still commuting by bike though.

Bike commuters FTW

I've just got to say; right now I am SO happy to be a bike commuter most days. With the way things are going with the metro lately it just isn't a very reliable or comfortable way to travel at the time.

First I noticed this effort by metro to ensure safer train travel and knew things would be bad yesterday on all the trains with the excessive (it officially hit 102 at Ronald Reagan) heat.

Then last night when I got home I noticed a barrage of Metro Alerts and saw that there was a suspicious package snarling rush hour commuting on top of that. (Oh and apparently my Ad Mo Safeway had one too).

Finally this morning I noticed this post on Streets Blog on the latest NYC commuting nightmares. Apparently yesterday just was not a good day to be a commuter.

The best thing is that in the comments of the suspicious package post people start railing on bikes a bit. Not sure I understand why, it's not like it was a broken down bike causing all the problems, but hey just because you ride a bike and didn't get snarled on the metro yesterday go jump in the river. Right...

Some U St. Bike Commuter Morning Glory

After waking up this morning with a crick in my neck and a shoulder slightly more sore then usual I decided to change up my bike route in to work. Instead of riding 18th (which is full of bumps and potholes) down to the bike lane on Q, I cut over onto U St. to 14th. As I crossed 17th on U a girl stepped out into the street with her hand out, sort of like she was hailing a cab, but then not really. While biking I always see people trying to wave down cabs and am usually tempted to wave back as I ride by but rarely do; today though was different.

As I got closer I realized she was holding her hand out for a high five, not sure why, don’t think I knew her, not sure I’ve ever seen her before for that matter but she was cute, she was smiling and she wanted a high five. I of course obliged and made my way over and stole some morning glory. I was a champion on this morning and she knew it, or at least she liked that I was riding my bike or something.

It kind of made me think of that whole free hug campaign, just with high fives. Not sure what her motivation was (it's not national high five day or anything), but it worked like a nice smile from a stranger. On a morning that wasn’t starting off so well, on a day that has the definite possibility of ending up even worse, a little morning high five was the perfect way to brighten up my mood and my morning.

U St. high five girl, if you’re out there I just want you to know that you made my day! Thanks!

A Successful Day of Bicycle Commuting

Well this morning was bike to work day so I recruited my neighbor to join me and we rode out to the Rosslyn pit stop to meet up with a few of the Racing Unions’ finest. It was chillier out then I expected so I ran in and threw on my arm warmers and rode with them along with my racing kit. I later ended up wishing I wore more clothing, but I’ve dealt with worse before.

The Rosslyn stop was nice, some fun music along with a bunch of people coming in and out. It was great to see so many people commuting by bike, though had the weather been better and the clouds less threatening I think there would have been a ton more. The Union stood out like a sore thumb in our green kit and attracted a decent amount of attention from photographers and their cameras. Hopefully soon I can post some links to a few of these pictures and videos.

We rode in a good sized group to Freedom Plaza where we hung out for a bit as well and were approached by a number of folks promoting their causes including a newish organization promoting car free areas in dc (carfreedc though no website yet) and one calling a few of us out for not wearing our helmets. Saw Mayor Fenty posing for a couple of pictures before taking off though we missed his speech since we got there a bit late. Saw a big 4 wheel mountain bike monster looking thing (Chris was a bit skeptical of this since technically it fits into the four wheeled hegemony idea, though I thought it looked pretty sweet) and a number of folding bikes. I stood around and caught a few guys from dcfixed.com and talked to some folks for a bit while my legs started involuntarily shaking from the cold.

I caught up with Gwadzilla a bit and we started talking about some races including the Greenbelt Training series and the Cranky Money mountain bike series. He said he’d been thinking about going to the greenbelt races but didn’t feel like dealing with the roadies. After hearing today some things about roadies being unwilling to do things like bike to work day and some of the general attitudes towards non-road racing cyclists that many apparently have I can’t really blame him. This goes back to a few previous posts I’ve written on the old “can’t we all just get along” vein. Eh, whatever; I refuse to let that get in the way of who I ride with and what I do so f’ it.

We also talked about some mountain bike races, most notably the cranky monkey series and Wednesday’s at Wakefield. I mentioned I wanted to try out racing but that I’ve never done it before and he assured me racing those would be good as a beginner. I’ll definitely have to get out and try out the Wednesday’s at Wakefield which essentially sounds just like the greenbelt training series for mountain biking. Sounds like a great way to get my foot in the door, or woods as the case may be.

The final portion of the ride was pretty brutal coming down Pennsylvania Ave with the wind and rain blowing in our faces, but it was short and overall it was all worth it. Looking forward to next year’s event and hopefully we’ll get an even bigger turnout (and nicer weather). I may even join Chris in riding all the way out to Vienna to meet everyone else before riding back in, though we’ll see about that one.

(Oh and I was shocked this morning that on bike to work day, dcblogs went ahead and specifically featured the nations highway system. WTF is that about?)

LT and B to W Day! Get on that!

Tough, tough LT workout at the point tonight for Scott and I (Chris and Mikhail wussed out…). Mostly tough though due to the abnormally high number of busses doing weird things and causing issues for cyclists and cars alike; one almost ran over Scott twice. Otherwise it was good, though I wasn’t feeling that bad until I got back to office; since then however my legs have felt a bit weary and exhausted. LT is tough, as Scott explained to me because it’s so much of a mental workout to just keep hammering. While it is not the high level aerobic workout, the work is hard and the mind especially wants to stop. So far I’ve managed to overcome the stopping call, though I think a bit of a lack of focus leaves me with a little less of a workout then I would ideally be getting.

On another note, according to WashCycle tomorrow’s Bike to Work day is poised to be DC’s largest yet with 1400 registered participants and more coming! That is great! I’ll be joining my neighbor to ride out to Rosslyn to meet some team mates and another coworker before heading back in. Tomorrow should be a great time for an even better cause. Make sure you to bike to work with us tomorrow!

Beating the storm

Yesterday evening as the big storm that had been running along side of the city for hours, was finally about to hit us I was taking off from work for my commute home. I’d decided (probably against better judgment) to ride home despite the impending ruckus and within the ten minutes between looking at the radar at my desk and then walking by a coworker’s cube on the way out and seeing the new image I knew I had a very limited amount of time to get home. I figured all was well here though since I wasn’t racing at greenbelt and needed a workout anyway so a hard ride would be good. The hard ride I got ended up being much different then what I expected.

It seems in my subliminal desire for efficiency I’ve worked out the perfect pace for my commute home as a relatively easy ride with very few interruptions from lights. In riding faster then this pace I essentially achieved no decrease in time since every time I tried to ride faster I ended up pulling up to a red light to wait for traffic to clear and lights to change. So, essentially I had a great drag race ride home of quick hard acceleration followed by hard braking at each light (eerily similar to what we cyclists always laugh at cars for doing). While I didn’t decrease my commuting time by much I did manage to get what is probably a great sprinting workout due to all the hard starts. I guess that’s one good way to look at it.

I luckily managed to get to my street just as the real heavy winds picked up and about a minute after walking in the front door the down pour began. From the Racing Union Listserv shortly after I left work yesterday:

“Kevin apparently just left the office to bike somewhere, giddy with excitement at the publicity his soggy rap has inspired. More on that later, but for now, he’s riding into a terrible storm, and what the weather radar data on my 21 inch monitor tells me is sure death. Here at DOL, we’re pretty much sure he’s a goner. If the brick throwing kids north of U street don’t get him, the wind and lightning will. The feral cats will pick the carcass clean. It was good knowing him. We’re putting together an advertisement for a new person to replace him. if you all know anyone who rides bikes and is also good with numbers and shit, drop me a line.

-sg”

And later:

“Right on. Just don’t go out in the squall tonight.
We have already lost Kevin and Bryan.
Don’t give the storm what it hungers for.”

Stupid emancipation day...

Apparently today is the official DC Emancipation Day and as such all DC public offices and services are closed for the day. Of course this would be no big deal normally and wouldn’t even cause me to blink an eye but unfortunately today I blinked. With my quickly filling schedule and busy nights lately I’ve been struggling to find time to get over to the pool to get in laps, especially since the Marie Reed Center pool is only really open from 3pm to 8pm and any time after 6 the lanes are uncomfortably full for me at this point in my training.

Last night I finally decided to bite the bullet and forego the extra hour of sleep and bike to the Takoma Community Center whose pool opens at 6am on weekdays. So come 5:15 I was rolling out of bed and 5:30 I was rolling up 16th St into the headwinds from hell with memories of early morning crew practice running through my head (except then I had a car and drove to practice). The ride there was actually not nearly as bad as I expected and I was able to safely ride up 16th street and over on Van Buren St with the only issues being the occasional blast of wind and the typical SUV blowing by in a coffee and war fueled rush to get to it’s next destination.

I got to the center 10 minutes early after my great warm-up ride and decided to ride loops around the building to keep from cooling down too much before the doors opened and when I finally rolled up to the front door and saw the signs I just wanted to kick myself. Who knew today was emancipation day anyway? I mean I guess if I watched the news every once in a while I’d have heard (though even wapo's description didn’t make me think the pool would be closed), but then I’d have to watch about this shooting and that robbery and the other natural disaster killing how many people? No thanks.

So, instead of my invigorating morning swim, this morning I got a nice, almost car free commute with a handful of extra miles and I’ll get a good core workout today for lunch. Unfortunately I couldn’t even go run when I got in an hour earlier then I planned since I don’t have any running gear here at work. Oh well, I guess if I can get out of bed again tomorrow morning then I’ll have to try it again.

To make things worse for this Emancipation Day, I doubt they'll have a great turnout with this gloomy weather we're calling spring.

Mind over body

This weekend I finally went and picked up a cyclo-computer for my for my bike so I could start documenting my rides a little bit. Since I still hadn’t used my $50 member rewards money and the accompanying 20% off coupon expired on Sunday I grabbed the computer and a new rear blinky for my bag there and ended up getting cash back instead of actually having to pay anything. Boy does that feel great! Granted I had to spend a bit of money there in the first place to get those rewards but that was long past and at this point it just feels like free money. (My college econ professor who believes getting tax refunds back is ludicrous would flip on me for this but we don’t need to tell him about it now do we?)

Anyway, I threw it on the bike the other night and riding in this morning I noticed a marked difference in my riding style. When I first started commuting by bike from my Adams Morgan apartment I would typically do a little bit of car racing and really hammer out the couple of miles between home and work. As I started to ride more I’d start to purposely make myself ride easier to and from work, typically since I was already tired or had plans to wear myself out sometime soon in another ride or activity. I also began to notice that it was more fun to cruise by cars sitting in traffic without looking like I’m giving it any effort (maybe a little bit of smugness involved there but we’ll leave that for another day J).

Anyway, this morning riding in with my speed displayed right in front of my eyes, I kept drilling it from the stops and continually hammered along until I absolutely had to break for the next light instead of just cruising along like I’ve become accustomed to doing. I can see where this is headed and hopefully this doesn’t start causing me to become a head case analyzing why I’m not hitting such and such a speed on this stretch or why I can’t reach that speed quick enough.

I guess today’s hill ride during my extended lunch will be the first test of how much this thing might affect me mentally. Scott suggested a sleeve to cover the computer for when things like that start to happen; I think I may need to start carrying one around in my jersey pocket. "Easy" days may be hard to come by if I'm always racing my computer.

Gone postal

I finally got myself motivated enough to ride into work this morning after almost two weeks of public transportation. The ride in was great featuring very light traffic and no aggrivated and impatient motorists. There seems to be a trend along these lines for leaving before 7 for my commute. The ice was there but the roads were free of aggresive drivers so I was fine taking up the space I needed to ride safely on my route in. Coming home however was different story all together.

I left work around 5pm with the ground wet but clear of any rain; since I'd finally mounted my rear fender and broke out the rain pants I wasn't too worried about it either way. I made it to R St and turned left and rode at a nice and easy pace using the bike lane when I could and easing into the main lane when it was fully blocked. Coming up to 11th St there was a car and a USPS vehicle waiting at the light so as usual I made my way past the two vehicles in the bike lane and checked for traffic coming on 11th. A quick track stand to assure the busy road was clear and I was off on my way. The light changed as I was in the intersection and the two vehicles came flying by me in a hurry to the next wait at the next light. The postal vehicle however made a very noticable effort to be in as close as possible to my side and then got over even further into the bike lane after passing me.



I of course caught up at the next light, gave him a funny look while he ignored the fact that I was there; likely confirming that he made his move conscientiously. In the next section of road the postal driver does the exact same thing only this time comes even closer to my arm while I expecting this try my best to ride as far away from this ass as the snow will allow.

Traffic gets even more backed up in front of the guy and I manage to squeeze up next to the postal truck and mention something about bike lanes and some sort of profanity while the guy looks at me with the abger and distaste that you only see in a road raged driver knowing they are getting royally f****d by the traffic. I stop my babbling after a couple of quick sentances and pull up to the next light.

After the third such encounter I decided the best way to deal with this situation was to collect whatever identifying number off the vehicle that I could and politely wave (or at least give a thumbs up) to the postal driver (literally and figuratively) and ride away while his jack ass is stuck in the rush hour traffic. I caught up to him hopped off the bike and entered the ID number off the back of the vehicle into my phone and rode away with my thumb held high (ooh, this is a good one here... since he decided he needed to take up the whole bike lane I got to pass him on the left side and really make sure he saw me!)

"Surprisingly" the postal vehicle had no license plate visible on the back of the vehicle, seems a little strange to me...

Anyway, the ID number I collected will find it's way to the USPS via whatever complaint venues can find come tomorrow and though I don't really expect anything to come of this I hope at least the guy gets a notice about his wreckless endangerment and his use of a United States Postal Vehicle as a weapon.