In Which Some Additional Bikes Appear

Damp and cool weather has returned, but it is now spring in Iowa. A magnolia bush located by the building where my office is started blooming this week.

Cooler weather is settling in—not winter cold (snow is still possible in Iowa in April, but doesn’t seem to be a thing this  year), but normal spring cool.

Along with the shift from an unusual taste of summer is the return of the Gulf of Mexico. Water vapor sweeping up the plains from the south makes for grey skies and rain in Iowa. Oh well, April showers and May flowers and all that.

Partly cloudy sky as I pass the C Avenue Pond during my morning commute early this week.

Which also means my biking has been a bit limited. I know that there are bikers who brave the wet by wearing the right clothes. I’m like that with winter cold—I’ll ride basically all year round in Iowa because I can wear layers and dress for cold.

But I want my bike and myself to be dry. I’ll gamble with quick passing storms or with light morning mist—but rain will take me off of two wheels.

Morning bike ride to work, Monday or Tuesday. Clouds and sprinkles on this ride, but dry enough for two wheels.

It rained Friday, and I was working from home for other reasons on Thursday. But I did get rides in earlier in the week, and early this week saw what is a bit of a rare sight—other bikes parked at campus bike racks.

At one time, the university where I teach had an active bike club and a fleet of bicycles that students could borrow. Unfortunately, the bicycles were mostly stolen one summer, the student who was the organizer of the club had graduated and the club fell apart.

A short side ride down the Lindale Trail on the afternoon commute home. Spring comes from the ground up--grass is green now, trees still have bare look. That will dramatically change soon, as a close look shows the tree leaf buds are swelling.

Yet here we were, spring of 2021, after a year of pandemic biking—one outdoor thing one can do in this weird year of moving through the planet masked and avoiding human contact is rolling through it on two wheels. Bicycle sales were way up and some other bicycles appeared on racks on campus.

Not as many as I would like. Too often, my bicycle is all alone in a long bike rack behind the oldest building on campus. But other bikes are nice to see.

Lots of room left in bike rack behind Warde Hall where the Fancy Beast is tethered.

Meanwhile, at a bike rack near the library--bikes! That others rode to campus!