November Rain

In E-Ville, rain in November is never a good thing. For one, somebody always posts that stupid G’n’R song on Facebook and then I get it stuck in my head until the weather changes. It was sweet riding for a couple of days, though. The rain ate away the snow on the ground and with a good jacket, high boots and waterproof gloves I was quite comfortable and enjoying riding at high speed downtown.

A gorgeous moment between precipitations

Since the first snow this season, I’ve been riding the fixte because I haven’t had time to put winter tires on my other bikes, but mostly because it’s fun. Skiddly-skiddly. Those who’ve known me for a while have pointed to the influence of a certain ridiculously speedy courier, but I’ve recently realized that the influence has gone both ways.

Fixies with fenders and baskets and green wheels, oh my!

Check out the full fenders and front baskets on these bikes.
Of course, November rain turns to slush and freezes, creating the dreaded bumpy ice. It didn’t take long for me to have my first wipeout, and despite momentarily forgetting I was strapped into the pedals, I didn’t suffer so much as a bruise.
Eventually the rain in this late season turns to snow and we got eight inches of the wheel sucking white stuff over the weekend.

There’s even enough snow for the ol’ Canadian kickstand.

Looks like I can put off installing a kickstand for a while.

I still need to make some more changes to the fixte. Installing that pretty white crank increased the gear ratio a little too much and put my chain line a little too off and I’ve had a larger cog and shorter bottom bracket on order for what seems like forever. Ironically, it was only this past week before the snow flew that I was feeling like I was fully managing the gear ratio. In the mire of oatmeal snow that now encompasses most of the roadways however, I won’t be getting very far without that bigger cog. Hopefully the wait will end soon.