Wednesday's commute was a classic. It was cold in the morning, but not uncomfortably so. The real story is the afternoon ride home. The weather said there would be a chance of scattered showers. Well, I guess my downtown location was right in one of the scatter zones, because I looked out the window around 3:30 and it was raining steadily.

An hour later, when I hit the road on my bicycle, it was still raining steadily, with temps around 45 degrees. Luckily, I was well outfitted for the weather, so no problems there. The ride home was cold but uneventful, except that around twelve miles into the sixteen-mile ride, just as I was feeling good about almost being done, I ran over a pile of glass and flatted badly. A huge piece of glass got embedded in my (brand new) front tire, and when I pulled it out it left a pretty good gash. It was still raining, and even colder than when I'd started, and I just didn't have it in me to fix the flat and maybe boot the tire, so I just started walking.

I'd walked for a few minutes when a guy stopped and asked if I needed help. I asked if I could use his phone, and he kindly obliged. I called MB for a rescue, thanked the guy, and kept walking for a way. By the time MB got to me I was freezing and very glad for a warm car.

When we got back to the house, even though I was freezing, I still took the time to rinse and dry my beloved new Serotta commuter, the bicycle that I'd washed and waxed just last Friday. It's amazing how much crud gets on a bicycle riding in the rain (especially since I'm still riding without fenders, thanks to the great service (not) from Bike Source, who screwed up my first order and still hasn't contacted me for a week about the reorder), and there was no way I'd let the bike sit with all that crud on it. I still didn't have it in me to fix the flat, so the bike sits there awaiting further attention until this weekend. Sorry, bike.