Again, with the bike riding. Yes.

Word has gotten out, apparently, that I bike to work. I am now getting questions about it daily, mostly along the lines of "But you didn't bike TODAY, right?" (Yes, yes I did. It was cold, yes.) You'll be pleased to know that I am no longer annoyed at all by these comments... zen: achieved! Or more evidence that I should be locking myself in Tyler Lockwood's werewolf shed every month or so. Instead of being annoyed, I'm now finding them kind of hilarious:

You must be in such great shape!

Yeah, so my ride to work takes seven to ten minutes. It's uphill and it takes a little bit of huffing, which is especially apparent in the summer when I start sweating buckets. I often do count it as my daily workout, but really... it's less than ten minutes. It doesn't count. The ride home takes between five and seven minutes because it's 100% downhill, so that certainly doesn't count as exercise. Unless you count the increased heart rate and adrenaline rush from when cars try to run me over.

I take this recurring comment as a complement, especially because it's often paired with something along the lines of "you're so healthy!" (um, thanks but... no. I bring the same granola bar, yogurt, and apple for lunch because I am a lazy, lazy person.)

You must really care about the environment!

I do, and I have the most adorable composting worms in my basement to prove it! I'm glad that biking to work is good for the environment, but that's really not my primary reason for doing it. Before I had a bike I walked to work. The bike just allows me to go faster and therefore sleep later.

It must really suck riding in the winter!

It's not that bad... most of the time.  I've had a couple rides over the past few months that really, really did suck. On my way home from class a few weeks ago it was so windy and cold that I pretty much wanted to die.  I couldn't feel my fingers for the first 15 minutes (which made it hard to brake) and when I did regain feeling, it was pins and needles pain of fire. It was awful. Last week I had to go by the library on my way home from work and it was so cold and windy again that I could not feel my thighs when I got home. That was extremely unpleasant. But as long as I plan my outerwear correctly, it's (usually) not that bad. Sometimes it totally and completely sucks, but so does every other mode of transport -- sometimes. Metros and buses run late all the time. My boss commutes from a DC suburb, and it took him 2.5 hours to get to work when it snowed last week. I was pretty cold on my bike that day, but I'll take that over spending nearly five hours on one roundtrip commute. Biking is not pleasant when it's really cold, but we luckily live in the faux south where it generally doesn't get that cold.

Other random comments about how hardy/dedicated/awesome I am

I'll totally take the complements and roll with them, but honestly it's about self-preservation. I feel like I complain about the parking in our neighborhood all the time, but I'm not sure you can understand how frustrating it is until you've actually dealt with it. I used to think parking was bad in our old college neighborhood, where sometimes late at night we had to park a block (or sometimes, TWO!) away from our apartment. It was an annoyance but it didn't ever affect my plans. And then we moved.

I love, love, LOVE our neighborhood. I love it. But the parking, you guys. It's enough to counter out all the awesome things about our location. Here's an example from last night: Joel and I went to a yoga class that started at 6pm. We decided to drive there because we are stupid. Getting to the studio was OK, although it wasn't any faster than biking thanks to outbound rush hour traffic. We parked in Joel's office lot, which is conveniently a block away from the yoga studio.

The class ended at 7:30 and we got back in the car at 7:50. We pulled up in front of our house at 8pm. Then the search for a parking space began. After about 10 minutes of unsuccessful searching Joel dropped me off at the house so I could start dinner (and possibly because he could feel the rage starting to boil up inside me).  I'd made a pizza, put it in the oven, cleaned up the pizza mess, and made salads by the time he walked in the door at 8:35. 7:50 to 8:35. It took him FORTY FIVE minutes to get home from a yoga class that is less than a mile away. It only takes about 25-30 minutes WALKING to get to this place. It would have been a 10 minute ride each way if we'd ridden our bikes. That kind of completely wasted time just burns me up. It's worse than sitting in traffic for me; I just cannot deal. It makes me angry at other cars that I see who've just nabbed a space, it makes me want to bash in windshields when I see people parked in the middle of two spaces, it makes me mad at the people who have off-street parking, it makes me grumpy at the cats because those assholes never have to drive anywhere. It's just not pleasant to feel that way. Nor is it pleasant to feel homicidal, which is how I tend to get after receiving a (YET ANOTHER) parking ticket or a speed camera ticket.

And that is my treatise and confession, Internet. I suppose I could tell all this to the people in my office, but I kind of like hearing about how awesome I am every day.

Comments

[stephanie]

At my old job, I used to walk to work every day. It was only 3/4 of a mile or so, so not bad at all, but people seemed impressed that I did it when it rained, snowed, etc. Why pay $100/month for parking at work when it takes 15 minutes, tops, to walk there. (Although my boss used to bike something like 20 miles to get to work, which did seem a little crazy when it was snowing. Plus he has a recumbent bike, which looks a little silly.) (Uh, but not if you ride a recumbent bike. Then they are awesome.)

Now I have to drive to work (11 miles away) and I HATE it, especially when it rains or snows and traffic is awful.

[J. Aerts]

that people are so astonished at biking does make my Amsterdam mindset giggle a little (ok, a lot). :)

As for the parking, that SUCKS. Can you look into buying a parking spot? Is that insane?

[nancypearlwannabe]

Having a driveway to park in is probably the one thing about living in the suburbs that I enjoy. Well, and the rent prices.

[Life of a Doctor's Wife]

I feel the rage for you, parking wise. How infuriating. When I lived in StL, I had to park on the street and it was maddening. Especially when some jackass decides to park 4 feet behind the person in front of him, leaving you a choice between squeezing your car into those 4 feet or the 4 feet behind him that constitutes a "space."

GAH.

[Lindsey]

Wow. Yoga AND biking to work? You must be in such great shape. ;-)

[heidikins]

Meh, we can't ALL be rockstars, you know. You biking people have to fill up some strata of society, and rockstar may well just be it. Crazy is already taken. ;)

xox

[Samantha]

I'm short time lurker. Oh Boy- Do I feel your pain with the parking issue as I live in Canton, hon! What really gets me is the amount we pay in city taxes is seriously nuts, and we can't even get guaranteed parking! Obnoxious! Don't even get me started on the pot holes in this city! Biking is the only logical choice. I get it.