This morning's commute and other commuting stories

Less mud today, but much more ice to make up for it. I decided to stick to the trails rather than take the ice rink, sorry road.

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still a mad amount of shorts being worn in London. Is it because of a lack of longs or a lack of feeling?

I'm still in shorts. I don't actually own a pair of longs - not ones that fit me, anyway.
I must confess to having donned some long ski socks this morning .

I'm sure it's Simon's pernicious influence. :)

-4 this morning and still in shorts. Because I’m stupid.

See I don't mind shorts in the cold, I'd be a sucker for those thermal bib shorts I've seen. Feet get cold, crotch gets cold, but the moving bits inbetween are mostly fine.

Also can't stand the bunching of material behind my knees.

Aborted due to sheet ice here oop north, looked lethal, esp with front wheel drive e-bike. Busses fucked too.

I aborted in the sleet on Tuesday morning for the first time in my life. Gloves and shoes still wet from Monday night didn't help, must get more organised

Lots of drivers thinking their cars can swim this morning… two wheels good etc.

i had to take a bit of a diversion this morning rather than subject my BB to another submersion

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lol…

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for ducks etc.

Would leave them to it, likely that overflow is also full of turds :(

Clearly not worn by former/current fixie skidders who's knees have been shot since their mid 20s. Mine start to ache if it gets below 15° and I'm in shorts.

This afternoon there was a Chinese Water Deer stood in the road. I’d never seen one so close up before. Weird little fuckers to be sure. Cute teddy bear ears, but those fangs! Be the time I got my phone out it was gone.

Witnessed a pretty bad collision last night on my way home outside Southwark station between a guy on a bike and a pedestrian. Cyclist cut the light and slammed into pedestrian crossing the road - both went down pretty hard but guy on bike was hurt worse. Didn't stick around as lots of people were assisting, but really makes me think twice about my own cutting of the same set of lights before...

Tbf there's no excuse for running lights. Nothing annoys me more on my commute than other cyclists running reds, gives us all a bad name and paints the worst picture to drivers.

Obviously the rider's fault—did he at least leave his details, or was it a hit-and-run?

Totally agree with this

gives us all a bad name

There's no excuse for using this phrase.

Yes definitely his fault - I left at the next green but he didn't look like he was getting away/ pedestrian he hit was with him, so imagine they must have..

Don't think I agree with such a blanket statement on lights (I usually feel safer leaving junctions early and avoiding cars by running lights - but only when no one is crossing), but in this situation there was definitely no excuse.

It's 100% true though. Every cyclist who runs a light is red rag to the drivers and media who try and tarnish us all with the same brush.

Only if you believe that every single driver who runs a red light or speeds tarnishes every single other driver with the same brush.

I know I'm able to differentiate between twattish road users and mostly normal road users.

There's no such thing as collective responsibility.

Even if every bike rider rode perfectly within the rules many/most car drivers would still hate cyclists.

We sadly live in a world where the mainstream media in this country is anti-cyclists. Not running red lights is one small thing we can all (easily) do to not give reasons to car drivers to fuel that dislike.