Despite January ending with a few days in the mid forties, February is the coldest month of the year.  Today actually was not so bad temperature wise, the one thing about days when it’s snowing… its usually not that cold. The wind was a pain in the butt today. From about 11am until 1pm it was at it’s worst, while cruising down Summer Street past the World Trade Center I had to fight against the wind steering like I wanted to take turn the entire time just to go straight! The snow went from huge fluffy flakes that melted as they hit the street to almost icy sleet and then back to flakes again, this time accumulating.

My first route took longer than usual, 4 1/2 hours instead of 3 1/2. Part of it was because now that our HQ moved from Charlestown to Somerville and partly because I had a new location I’ve never been to before and I went in circles trying to find it.  I like having the new HQ in Somerville, mainly because it’s 1 block from my apartment and I just walk to work now. The location is pretty nice right in Union Square, and we share the warehouse space with some really rad people including the boys from Open Bicycle.  The downside of the shop being where is minor, an extra mile of riding in the morning on the work bike to pickup the food at Boston Organics in Charlestown, and an extra mile to get home, resulting in 40 or so minutes longer work day (however my commuting time to and from work has shrunk from 15 minutes each way to less than 5 minutes each way.)

My second route started with my battery power reserve pretty low,  the electric assist is for getting up hills but I  used it a lot to move through slush, get that extra boost through intersections, and when my legs were getting tired (which is often first thing in the morning when I’m headed to pickup the food and I just spent an hour doing stretches yoga style.)  I did this route in 2nd gear (usually ride in 3rd or 4th) and kept the battery turned off so that I would have the little bit that’s left available to help me get home at the end of my day when I’m exhausted.  It worked out pretty well! Instead of riding up hills I walked up them to make my deliveries and rode around the block to the next destination. In the North End, I find that its easier to find a central location to park the bike and then walk to the drop offs which can be a few on the same street or sometimes a block or two away. This may seem like a pain in the butt, but with all the one way streets (which never go in the direction you need to go) and all the hills, you save time and energy this way; trust me I have been able to shave up to 45 minutes off my work day by treating my North End route like a postal worker’s route.

Coming home I was on Gore Street in Cambridge by the Mall and a train passed in front of me. I’m a huge train nerd, I grew up with a father who had model train sets taking up the ENTIRE basement. We used to make our buildings and mountains from scratch. For about 10 years in the late 80s/early 90s he even had his own hobby store. I remember when he even made a replica of our local commuter rail station. So I took some pics of the train passing, because I’m fascinated by these machines. If I did not live in a tiny apartment, I’d have a train set, for now my craftiness I will just have to stick to painting Dungeons and Dragons metal miniatures for now.

One last thing, not relevant to work, but here’s a shot of my 3 speed on the way to a Super Bowl Party last weekend. Notice the excellent use of a Cetma Rack getting my beer safely to my destination!  Speaking of 3 Speeds, after selling my track bike, I am going to have a hand built frame by Geekhouse Bikes to replace my heavy cheap Schwinn frame.