A nice 5- or 6-mile round trip to the PathMark. Since I don't have a road bike / commuter, I borrowed my wife's 1999 GF Gitchee Gumee. Some lessons learned...

- I'm now officially useless on platform pedals. They might as well have been greased.
- The GG is super comfy, but an aerodynamic nightmare.
- I definately want drops on my commuter.
- 2 blocks of cream cheese, a jar of crystalized ginger, 2 boxes of Knox gelatin and a big bag o' chocolate chips is heavier than it looks.
- Living way up in the hills is beautiful but rough on the leggies.
- I'm even more out of shape than I thought :) When I lived on Staten Island I was doing regular 20 mile trips on my GF Tassajara MTB on the road. A few trips pushed 40. Today I damn near had to walk up one of the longer climbs. I guess "regular" is the operative word here ;)
- Biking to do an errand is way more rewarding than driving.

The hunt for my first road bike continues...

-Joe

You sir are a man of character. Most would have blown a 1/2 gallon of premium in their SUV to fetch those items.

Just don't do what I did last week and buy a bunch of canned goods, which are then carried in a backpack. Didn't really expect it to be that heavy--time to call Nashbar and get a set of those townie panniers.

Why did I ever sell that BoB trailer?

by the looks of your avatar!

You sir are a man of character. Most would have blown a 1/2 gallon of premium in their SUV to fetch those items.

Just don't do what I did last week and buy a bunch of canned goods, which are then carried in a backpack. Didn't really expect it to be that heavy--time to call Nashbar and get a set of those townie panniers.

Why did I ever sell that BoB trailer?

Yeah, I know the feeling. My girlfriend called me the other day and asked me to get some cat food on the way home. My commute isn't that far (6 miles or so) and the grocery store is about half way. So, I figured "no problem". We have 4 cats, and they eat about 4 cans a day total, so I picked up enough for 3 days. I carried them in the basket with one hand and it didn't feel like much weight at all. Then I throw them in my backpack and hit the road... ugh. It was like I just picked up a load of bricks...

The last two weekends I've tried to go completely carless. And I've been doing a pretty good job.

Its about a 5 mile round trip to the Grocery Store for me. Last trip was two gallons of water, two bags of cleaning supplies and some veggies...All fit into my bombproof (and cavernous) PAC messenger bag. Heavy, yes, but oh so rewarding to carry it all home and not have to use the car!

The weekend before that, I went to the post office, the record store, and the grocery store (about 20 miles total) on the bike. Slowly but surely!

Cheers,

KonaRider

looks like your Corgi does some might fine fetching
by the looks of your avatar!

Looks like all that cycling and dieting has done wonders for you, by the looks of your avatar......