The Negative Files

So we are living in the negative, temperatures that is. My poor long-haul is not looking her best. The snowy/salty/dirty roads have done quite a number on the frame; rendering her a ghost of her former self (seriously she is all white with salt...spooky!) I vow to dedicate part of my day to some genuine maintenance time with her: grease the chain, clean out the gears, wipe off the mucky muck, and pick out all the shit in my tires. Speaking of gears, I recently encountered my first gear freeze up. I think all the shit in the road and the cold totally effed with my back derailleur. Thanks Surly for my sweet convertible shifters ( When your shifting goes awry: simply convert to friction shifting!) I once heard freezing gears is the only good good utilitarian excuse for riding a single speed, but who needs an excuse to ride in the cold?

Due to the frigidity yesterday, I decided to take the bus to the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts. I assumed my commute would be much warmer if I took public transportation. WRONG! The bus only runs every hour on Sundays, so while I barely waited for the ride out, I just missed my ride back and had to wait 45 minutes until the next tropical paradise on wheels arrived. I went into total cold shock, and frantically called my mom begging her to look up the next bus time. Somehow knowing the countdown of icy doom was better than no knowing. I even started to get all irrational, envisioning my toes were actively chilling into a frost bitten state. I guess this is what you would call a break down, although I 100% defend my state of panic.

Lesson learned: It is to best bike in the cold than wait around in the cold. Thus, I vow either:

1) continue biking everywhere or I go

2) not go anywhere when the wind chill is -2

-The Velodict