Happy Bike-to-Work Week!

It's a little known fact that May 12-16 is National Bike-to-Work Week. In fact, I didn't even realize this until after I'd biked here today. I'll do my duty as a cycling evangelist and encourage everyone with a manageable commute to get out the old bike just once this week. Good for you, good for traffic, good for the environment.

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My shoe broke this morning. Most people don't realize that I have special cycling shoes that clip in to and attach to the special pedals. They make me go a little faster and keep me under control. Also, they make it very difficult to disengage from the bicycle after you get hit by a truck. It's a small price to pay for an extra mile-an-hour.

The cleats attach to the shoe by three adjustable screws. Maintenance isn't much; you've just got to check the screws occasionally to make sure they don't loosen or fall out. I apparently don't do that as much as I should. So today, about four miles in to my fourteen mile commute, I noticed that I was having all sorts of trouble clipping into the pedals.

I pulled off to investigate and found that my left cleat was dangling there - the screws were barely intact. Pedaling clipped pedals without the cleats is disastrously impossible; then again, I was in no-man's land; and was strangely without my Allen wrenches. I have no idea why I took them out of my bag, but this post will be given the "I am an idiot" label.

I had to try something new. I rode the last ten miles of the trip basically with one foot - this is possible if you're clipped into the pedals. However, the one-footed method makes it tough to maintain a speed, use a high gear, or move with any sort of urgency. Still, I had to one-leg it through farmland, in traffic, and down a very familiar section of road.

That's where the German Shepherd appeared. It was like he sensed that this was my moment of weakness; today he would get me. I gave everything I had with my right leg; my left leg was left dangling in the wind like a sort of doggy treat. He could practically taste it.

He was going to catch me; that much was inevitable. Then something unexpected happen. He barked a few times and then maintained an angry dog jog right alongside me. Never bit, never snarled; really, all he wanted to do was run with me.

In the chaos of everything that were these moments, I realized something: I'm not scared anymore.

I'd like to see that truck try to hit me now. I'm hitting back.