Greg's First Post (done under duress)

Louise has been pioneering the Fennell Blogosphere for a couple weeks now, and has asked me/tasked me/threatened me to post a, uh, post.  I think her posts have been pretty awesome, but sometimes it IS good to have a male perspective and since letting Kai onto the computer tends to leave files erased and renamed at random, I guess its up to me!

Louise has captured the spirit of the house & neighborhood quite well (she knows the area much better than me), so I'll talk about the commute and MIT a bit.  I bike to work nearly everyday so far along the Minuteman Bike Trail, whose website says its one of the most heavily used rail-to-trails in the US.  I wouldn't doubt it: even at 615am (I'm already getting out of the military-speak after 4 weeks in grad school!), there are a good number of runners, bike commuters, and the occasional hazard-waiting-to-happen rollerblader.  The rollerbladers make me the most nervous - they can move at quite a pace, rarely wear protective gear, take up over half the trail while skating, and ALWAYS have headphones on w/ no helmets.  I guess when you buy your rollerblades, you must be given a choice of complimentary gift: helmet or headphones (but not both).  Since most rollerbladers seem to have long, flowing hair (male & female), the obvious choice is: headphones.  

There's a wide range of cyclists on the trail, from people in business attire cruising along on beach cruisers to serious triathletes/time-trialists hammering away on tri-bikes.   I see 2 triathletes nearly every morning, and they never wave.   One of these days I'm going to shout at them "Swim practice today is CANCELLED!!!" and watch as they crash in a panic while figuring out what workout they'll have to replace swim practice with.   (sorry Jo & Ed, triathlete bashing will stop now, hehe!)

Anyway, most of the cyclists are friendly.  Not everyone waves, but that's probably because if you waved at every person you saw, you would effectively be riding with one hand.  Sometimes it really is that busy (especially as you get close to the end).  I ride a cyclocross bike w/ a rack and panniers on the back and hope to install some fenders soon.  I also have a bell at the end of my handlebars - probably the coolest $5 purchase I've ever made.   Instead of using your thumb, you can reach down & whip your hand up, causing a sweet r-r-r-r-r-ing as your palm twists the bell.  The bell is pretty vital, tho it doesn't help much with the people wearing headphones.  I just give them a wide berth and close my eyes as I go past.  The rack & panniers are a little hard to get used to - I've brushed them against some things and when you get out of the saddle to sprint, they cause the bike to wonkily go side-to-side at a different rhythm than what you're pedaling, leaving you feeling like you're one step behind everyone else in the Electric Slide/Macarena (or Chicken Dance, for our Canadian readership).

The trail ends at Alewife station, the end of the Red subway line.  From there, I go on another path for about a mile and jump onto Mass Ave at the far western end of Cambridge.  At this point, its gets a little more exciting, but not any less safe, oddly enough.  I think since there are so many bikes in the Cambridge area, drivers are pretty aware of them and much more patient when they're stuck behind one.   But there's always the risk of a car turning in front of you, a driver opening his door as you go by a parked car, or pedestrians waltzing in front of you at crosswalks (this happens a lot near Harvard).

The ride in every morning is generally pretty pleasant, despite the dour attitude of my two time-trialing buddies I discussed above.  Coming home, however, is often much less so....  First, I'm usually a bit tired after a long day of mostly math classes.  The weather is either hot, or extremely stormy.  The trail back to Bedford is slightly uphill going back (no mountains, mind you, but noticeable!) And the traffic is much, much heavier, both on the roads & on the trails: kids are out of school, parents are taking their Kaister-equivalents out for walks/jogs/bike rides, dogs are getting walked, teenagers are looking for people to make fun of, you get the picture!   The group that makes me most nervous (aside from rollerbladers) are the little kids on bikes.  The thought of hitting one of these little tykes as I barrel past is enough to make me come to almost a complete stop as I inch my way past their randomly-steering, training-wheel-equipped bikes.  My beloved bell is pretty much ineffective; even if the child DID hear the bell (and normally, as I've found w/ Kai, they're looking at some plant or leaf or something else entirely), they would probably steer their whole bike towards the sound....right into me, then!  So I definitely give the little ones a wide, slow berth.

Once I get back to Bedford, off the trail, I face one of the more unpleasant parts of the ride.  The traffic through town and along the streets leading to our house is bumper-to-bumper and buzzes with impatience, filled with drivers whose grace and humanity displayed in Cambridge has now vapourized.  I haven't had any honks or curses thrown at me yet, but its definitely sketchy and I normally dive onto the sidewalks to avoid any trouble.  

I was going to write about MIT, but I'll have to leave you panting for more; I have some studying to do and Louise is starting to wonder if the blog can handle this "book" that I've written.  Aloha! Greg