I'm so hardcore

For those of you not in the Nashville area, we are having a bit of a gas shortage. It's a little surreal, but interesting in a, "Someday, I'll tell my kids about it," kind of way. The downside is that for the last 4 or 5 days, I had no gas, and none of the stations close to my house had any fuel. Which meant that I couldn't really go anywhere, including church and work.

I had to miss out on church. No worries, I can listen to the podcast today. But Monday, I rode my bike to work out of necessity. Big thanks to my sister, Sara, for giving it to me for my birthday this year. This is something I'd been hoping to start doing so it was more like an adventure than a trial.

Overall, it was a very fun experience. I loaded up my messenger bag with a change of clothes and a little bit of makeup, because I really am that vain, and took off. The ride itself isn't too bad. It's a little less than 4.5 miles. There's a stretch that's on a main road where I rode the sidewalk, which you really aren't supposed to do, but no one seemed to mind. I made it to work in about 30 minutes, with another 10 minutes of clean up time on arrival.

I did have a minor spill on the way in to work. Clip-in pedals, for the uninitiated, are both a boon and a hindrance on the road. On the pro side of the equation, you stay connected to the bike, allowing you to pedal more easily, particularly on hills. On the con side, if you don't clip out when you stop (or if you clip out on one side, but pitch to the other because your messenger bag thought it would be an opportune time to shift), you will fall. And you may hurt yourself. I got a pretty awesome bruise / scrape about the size of half dollar just below my right knee and another on my left that was smaller but bled a little.

The ride home was a little more difficult, as it was mostly uphill and there was more traffic. I did a little more sidewalk riding (sorry, pedestrians!), but I also didn't fall so a success on that front.

Later that night, I was walking home from community group and the gas station just down the road from me had gas. I had to wait a few minutes before I could fill up, but not too long. The moral of this story is that I should ride my bike to work because it's not difficult and it doesn't take too long. We'll see if it sticks...

Posted by Natalie Stone at 12:21 PM