This morning's commute and other commuting stories

lady riding down the hill from honour oak to peckham with no lights, pulling a wheely case on the road side was living life at the edge at 6:30 this morning...

Down Forrest Hill Rd? That is seriously steep. Must have been noisy as hell.

just passed herne hill tavern... I hope (assume?) she'd skipped the steep stuff. That's sketchy enough with good brakes, and a head for bikes in the rain...

pulling a wheely

Impressive

case

Oh.

Good thing about stoners is that they don't tend to drive very fast

Pissing rain, 6C, 13 mile ride home. Sod that. I’m on a bus to Kings X, tube to Victoria and train to Thornton Heath. Probably gonna catch covid-19 at some point on my trip but it’ll be worth it.

Didn’t cycle today for reasons. Overground pantograph started arcing on the train I got on at Highbury and Islington and so now sat in a nearby pub reading and drinking. Also likely to be my Covid moment

sat in a nearby pub reading and drinking

Total win. Thread ends.

I recommend The Lamb just up the road. Wish I was there now, there’s nothing decent around Victoria and I boycott Wetherspoons for obvious reasons.

I initially started typing that as an annoyed complaint. Then realised it could be worse.

Ended up in the brewhouse because it was next to the bus stop that I couldn’t be bothered standing at in the rain whilst the 30 took everyone who’d been in the train. Letting it all blow over then I’ll have a leisurely bus ride back

Fucking dreadful!! Wind picked up again and close passed three times

Had fun getting wet on the way back. Ofc soaked feet and tights by the time I got home (kinda same as yesterday) Maybe need to get some cheap overtrousers.

Yeah, not much right by the station; I always used to drink slightly further afield before catching a train. I recall the Jugged Hare on Vauxhall Bridge Road was decent, and is about a 5 minute walk from the station at a trot; if you don't mind Sam Smiths there's one (the Windsor Castle?) behind Westminster Cathedral. Best of all are the Antelope and the Star in Belgravia, but they're 10-15 minutes away on foot.

The 'pricey' overtrousers from Decathlon have been an absolute revelation the last couple weeks - 34quid or so. Got ankle zips and stretch round the back of the knees.

Ridden home and stripped off the waterproof layer at the door. 10miles of warm and dry is pretty great.

Ride home tonight was nice: calm, cold and covid free.

Soggy, wet, fuck all visibility and usual sketchy drivers/riders. Mostly however people along Tower Bridge, OKR, NX Road and further was courteous and mainly up for helping people getting ahead rather than annoyed that someone else can move forward faster than them. Nice when it happens, sadly doesn't happen often enough. Weirdly today goes in the books as a good commute. 9/10

First altercation with some guy in a BMW on a recently 20mph-limited stretch of road. His argument flip-flopped somewhere between "you should be in the bike lane" and "you're too slow", which, well, I was going ~36km/h at that point according to GPS in a pretty open area, so you do the maths. What made his entire 'point' especially moot was the fact that all I was really doing was following a car in front with about 10m distance...

Sometimes I wish I could just laugh at those people but they really trigger my anger switch.

(Oh - almost forgot: on the plus side, some guy on a single speed with some nice Cinelli (Mash?) flat-topped bullhorns.)

I had a similar discussion with a cabbie last night heading home past the Waterloo Imax. He didn't like that I was riding primary into the corner towards the station/Old Vic, beeping and driving right on my wheel. Caught up with him when he got stuck at a red light about 10m after the pass and asked if it was me he was beeping at. The basis of his frustration was that he didn't know where I was going and that "there's a 1.5m path painted on the left, you should use that".

I tried to explain that the buses tend to cut in to the cycle path, the weather, the potholes and the mass of peds about to cross the road also make that 1.5m into a much smaller gap but he wasn't having any of it, so I wished him well (genuinely) and carried on my way.

I'm still trying to find the best way to approach those sort of situations, used to get angry, tried to ignore them for a while and now I'm experimenting with having a more level-headed discussion kinda vibe. I would've liked to have offered to buy him a pint or a coffee and to chat about it some more, he seemed like he was just having a bad day.

I’ve been doing this too. Not getting angry and just being genuinely curious about other people’s behaviour or calmly pointing out that they’re not getting anywhere with it is definitely less heart attack inducing than having a row with someone every two or three days.

I'd love to take the same approach (not much problems with cabs here) but some people just do so stupid maneuvers, I'd like to smash their mirrors off. I never do but I should probably find a better outlet for that anger. It's just infuriating how they don't seem to understand how they put cyclists in unnecessary danger + don't understand some basic rules.

while ive not actually tracked it, i get the impression the most of the worst actions happen on quieter roads - its not so much me that worries me, but the lack of awareness of the impact they might have on a kiddo or person not dressed up like a christmas tree

Anyone lose a pair of full-finger gloves on CS7 this morning?

Got aggressively beeped out of the way by a big lorry on the approach to Southwark Bridge this morning.

Made my displeasure known as I breezed past in the cycle lane on the bridge. Enjoy your time waiting in the queue, fucker.

That has happened to me more than once. It's such a fucking stupid thing to do. There's always a queue of traffic there, drivers are always going to have to wait.