For experienced riders and frequent commuters, be courteous to your fellow riders – many will be attempting to ride into work for the first time. We have to encourage bicycle commuting by making it fun and as stress-free as possible for everyone. Yes, the trails and bike lanes will be more crowded than usual, but it’s Friday. Take it easy.

First time riders, make sure you map out your route beforehand. I often use Google Maps’ bicycling directions but your coworkers may have some suggested routes too. Bicycle maps from the Washington Area Bicyclist Association (WABA) are also available here. And don’t be afraid to ask for help if you’re lost. Many cyclists will stop for you and get you back on your way.

To stay safe on the road or trails, be predictable. Signal your turns and remember to also look behind you before passing someone.

While it may be too late for the free t-shirts, go ahead and register at the Bike to Work Day Metro DC website. This will help ensure a more accurate count of riders and help for planning purposes.

Finally, it’ll be in the 70s this Friday. Perfect cycling weather – go ride!

You can see the Flatirons and the Rockies beyond that, and who doesn’t love being surrounded by mountains? Boulder folks are some of the most active people in America. And here it’s sunny around 300 days out of the year, making it very easy to be outdoors all the time. Residents are fairly affluent – except I guess the college students – and tend to be very liberal, so there’s a fair amount of homogeneity. But the food is great, the beer is great (with breweries like New Belgium, Oskar Blues, and Avery all based nearby), and the options for what to do are nearly endless. Great first visit there.

Riding Boulder’s B-cycle bikeshare along the Boulder Creek Path.

We tried out Boulder’s own bikesharing system, the B-cycle, for a casual ride to explore the area. You can feel the effects of the elevation almost immediately – we’re not used to being 5,000 feet high! Considering we’re typically just above sea level, the elevation change took a little getting used to.

More photos after the cut.

We enjoyed a few brews (and a fancy lemonade) in the sun. The effects of elevation and the sun in Colorado are no joke! Apply sunscreen liberally.

Drinks at the West End Tavern in Boulder, CO.

You can also take trips to nearby breweries for some sampling and to tour the facilities. We joined an informative tour of the Oskar Blues Brewery – and even picked up a Dale’s Pale Ale-infused hot sauce (haven’t tried that yet).

Inside the Oskar Blues Brewery in Longmont, CO.

Refreshing views.

The University of Colorado at Boulder has lots of buildings made with sandstone, giving it a unified and distinctive look.

Student center at CU-Boulder.

And the hiking nearby is incredible. We decided to make a day trip into Rocky Mountain National Park, only a short drive from Boulder.

In Rocky Mountain National Park.

It was a little hot, but very dry (none of that DC humidity), and the hike to Fern Falls was beautiful. Nice variety of terrain. IA small snake ran right across my path and we also spotted a cute squirrel.

The trail to Fern Falls.

Boulder has a nice range of independent businesses, like this spice shop that my friends found. There’s a stretch of shops along Pearl Street, which is partially a pedestrian mall.

Savory spice shop.

I met a nice couple on the shuttle who were also first-timers, but lost sight of them early on because we got a late start (waiting in the bathroom line after the hike had begun). I was hiking with a friend who had been training for the hike mostly in the gym, and he found out quickly that conditions in the gym didn’t really prepare him for the gravel path we were hiking on. The first four miles were backtracking to get the complete distance right, then things were pretty easy for awhile – we were having fun, enjoying being outside, and making good time.

My friend made it to the support station at mile 17.5 before his knee gave him too much pain to continue. After that I was mostly hiking solo, which wasn’t an issue until it started getting dark. The path through the woods, when only lit by your headlamp, can be a little eerie.

After mile 20 or so, it felt like my motions were just robotic. Any time I stopped it was hard to start walking again, so I just kept walking with as few stops as possible (except to take photos of every mile marker).  At the second and third support stations I had to stop to get my blisters popped and bandaged by the first aid volunteers. The volunteers on this hike were really supportive, and what a relief it is to see them at the stations and checking up on hikers on the trail! My feet were taking a beating, but my willpower was high and my legs weren’t really tired.

At mile 27, I pretty much hit the wall. After miles of constant pounding on my feet, most of the pain was concentrated there. I had some pretty intense blisters and hot spots on my heels. It started to get dark out. There was a light drizzle going. With 4 miles remaining, I honestly didn’t know whether I’d be able to continue; at the same time, I knew that quitting wasn’t any better – it’s not like they could have air-lifted me out of there, after all.

So I kept going, even though my pace dropped considerably and it wasn’t much fun at that point. All I could see was the path immediately ahead of me, lit by the headlamp as I proceeded into the darkness. Mile 30 brought me into Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, where there was a half-mile uphill looming before the end point. The change from a mostly-flat hike to a short uphill climb did help break the monotony and the pain on my feet, though. I chatted with a couple 100K hikers on the way up to the finish line before I fell behind again. The last tenth of a mile seemed especially difficult because I was already mentally drained –  yet somehow I pushed myself up to the community center, where a shuttle back to the Metro waited to take back a pack of tired hikers.

Now, three days later, I’m still sore in my left foot and the blisters are on their way to healing. Would I do it again? I know it’s possible.

Currently the reporting side of this is in progress, but thought I’d throw in an update anyway. Here’s a preview of our working notes.

Year 2012, Quarter 1

From January 1st, 2012 to March 31st, 2012

Both of Us

Click for detailed view.

We primary drink beer. Adam didn’t have a single glass of wine this quarter (I had 11). There was a scattering of whiskey and soju and the like, but not much of it. Beer’s our go-to.

It raises a few questions for us: Where’s our beer coming from? How local do we drink? This year, thanks to the revival of Washington DC brewing, we’ve been drinking a lot of DC Brau and Chocolate City. It’s available everywhere we hang out.

Breweries (mapped quickly in Google Fusion Tables):

Here’s a zoom into the United States:

Drinking plenty of local(ish) beers!

Also interesting: The United States recommended maximum intake of alcoholic beverages is about 1 drink/day for women and 2 drinks/day for men, and according to Wikipedia that differs between countries. Among the countries that have a higher recommended maximum than the U.S.: Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Hong Kong, New Zealand, and the U.K., Denmark, Ireland.

That’s it for now. More data and observations to follow in a later post.

As a scholar of Romanticism, Professor Plotz introduced me to some of my (now) favorite poets, including the English peasant poet John Clare. She taught me to memorize poetry, believing in its powers to sustain a person. She measured her love for poetry like the cadence of one’s gait, each word dropped like a step upon the earth. I’m thinking back to her advice now, as I do more walking and prepare to spend over 8 hours straight walking in the Sierra Club’s annual One Day Hike.

Recently, another of my former English professors, Margaret Soltan (University Diaries), has begun to record an online poetry lecture series at Udemy, called Modern Poetry. Her focus is on Modernism and Post-Modernism. It’s a free online course, so no risk in poking around and seeing if you enjoy it. Every human being owes themselves this appreciation of language and its power. In particular, Professor Soltan goes through detailed analyses of certain famous poems, such as Ashbery’s “Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror“. But it’s also just nice to listen to her speak of poetry in general.

Give poetry a chance, especially if you’re only ever been forced to read it. Especially if you find it challenging. Poetry expands your understanding of the breadth and depth of human experience, shaping language to express desire, pain, tedium.

“The present moment is constantly slipping into the past…”

I’m lucky to have a very knowledgeable friend teaching me the ins and outs of road cycling, and I’ve also been learning about bike maintenance and repair (“wrenching”) by just reading and practicing on my own. It’s exciting diving into this new world – though I’ve had a bicycle since I was a child, I never knew much about upkeep or riding position and didn’t think much of it. My boyfriend tells me the bicycle is a simple machine, and really, it is. Putting a little time into learning about how to fix up a bicycle on your own pays off.

I stopped in at the Velocity Bicycle Cooperative in Del Ray, Alexandria last week and I think it’ll be a great space for the neighborhood. They offer shop space for you to work on your bike using their tools, for a small donation. There are also volunteers on-hand to assist, though you are expected to work on your own bicycle. It’s not near enough to me that I could see myself going regularly, but there’s a similar co-op in DC called The Bike House. The Bike House is now at the Annie’s Ace hardware store in Petworth on Saturdays, which is a new hardware store run by very helpful people. And once the Bloomingdale Farmers Market is back in season, The Bike House will be there on Sundays. I’m looking forward to checking that out. In the meantime, lots of riding!

Saturday. Rode to the Orange line and transferred onto Metro to go to lunch out in Virginia. The bike’s heavy so it felt like more of a workout than when I ride my own bike. It’s also very upright. I made the mistake of not confirming the location of a Bikeshare station before heading out, but managed to find a station by asking a fellow CaBi rider. Docked a couple blocks from the McPherson Square Metro station, where there was some construction going on. Nice weekend morning ride.

Sunday. Didn’t Bikeshare – just rode my own bike around all day. But I did notice that there’s a CaBi station near my friend’s house, which is way up 14th Street. The pace of expansion is pretty sweet, with several new stations planned in Arlington, and some stations on the National Mall!

Monday. Rode to the Orange line again since I work in Tysons Corner and I’m trying to use Bikeshare to regularly replace one leg of my commute. I saw a neighbor leaving for work from the same station. Also, I downloaded the Spotcycle app for finding CaBi stations on the go. The UI is a bit wonky but it’s vastly more useful on a smartphone than the station map on the website, which isn’t mobile-friendly.

Tuesday. Morning ride had the benefit of pleasant weather, though it was warmer than I thought and kept shedding outerwear along the way. Shed scarf as I wait at a stoplight, and so on. Evening ride was non-existent. I was a bit late getting back into the city because I went to happy hour with coworkers and all the docks at my two nearest home stations were full (checked on the Spotcycle app). Walked back from the Metro, but by the time I got there it appeared that a bike-shuffling truck had been by because there were now 4 empty docks.

Wednesday. Morning ride was great – ideal weather, no jacket riding, few cars downtown around the time I left. In the evening I ran a bunch of errands, which was improved by being able to bike between several points. The stations are, at least for me, conveniently placed. Capital Bikeshare even crowdsources suggestions for new locations here: Crowdsourcing Map. A lot of people must have been hanging out in Dupont Circle (or maybe a lot of members live around there?) because the dock was full at the Massachusetts Ave & Dupont Circle station and a couple others on CaBi bikes were waiting for a docking spot to open. After errands I rode home from Dupont with no issues.

Thursday. Again, superb weather. Just cool enough around 7:30am that I wasn’t feeling too warm by the time I got on the Metro. Also discovered one of the best features of Bikeshare – the Rental Statistics on your member page! See total distance traveled, calories burned, CO2 saved, time spent riding… perfect for any data geek like me. Rode back without a hitch after going out with friends.

Friday. Rode a little further in the morning, though it was grey and (relatively) chilly out – saves me a couple of stops on the Metro for not much more effort. The ride back almost didn’t happen. The Spotcycle app told me that there were no docks open at either of my home stations, but I took the chance and rode to my nearest station… full. Then I biked over to the next-closest and there was one spot open!

Week 1 Statistics – or really, 6 days -

• Total Distance: 14.02 miles
• Total Calories Burned: 602.86 calories
• Total CO2 Saved: 9.52 lbs.
• Total Duration (last 200 trips): 2 hours, 52 minutes, 43 seconds

Not bad for what would have been bus rides instead.

Here’s another cyclist’s story of how bikeshare was his ‘gateway drug’ into commuting by bicycle. And, it’s faster than any other mode of transportation within the city.

Bicycle polo takes some serious skill. By the way, the DC Bike Polo group is hosting a “Beginners Day” this Saturday, March 17 at noon at 13th & D St SE if anyone wants to try it out. I’m told you only need to bring your bicycle and a helmet – you’ll be able to use their mallets and balls.

Big open space – they rented out a parking garage in Crystal City on Saturday for the event.

Cyclists waiting to race.

“Checkpoint: through the van!” One of the ways to get your diamond card stamped in the open-class challenge was to dismount and go with your bike through the van.

MapCrunch: Randomized Google Streetview images. It’s fun to select “Hide location” and guess with friends where in the world the view is from. We’ve spent probably hours doing this, tallying up points and starting to learn the differences between the features of the different Scandanavian countries, for example. You can think of it as a high-speed contest in the vein of Andrew Sullivan’s View from Your Window contest. But yes, it’s absolutely geeky.

Try this one:

but does it float: A collection of art projects with a tendency towards the abstract. Great mix of photography, drawings, typography, computer-generated imagery, etc. It’s easy to lose a lot of time exploring this site because you can scroll down for as long as you’d like.

Graph of Cosmetic Surgical Procedures: This is how the number of different types of cosmetic surgery in America changed from 2000 to 2011. I find it interesting to note that the number of plastic surgeries dropped from 1.9 million in 2000 to 1.6 million in 2011 – a drop of 17%.

Other notes:

Planning to do the One Day Hike this year. Really excited about doing it but haven’t done much in the way of training yet – guess I need to toughen up my feet and my resolve.

I’m visiting a friend in Boulder, CO in May. I’d love any suggestions about what to see/do there, since it’ll be my first time there. We’re planning to do some hiking and sample many delicious microbrews.

And speaking of cool cities, I’ve also been getting to know Baltimore, MD a bit better and it’s a really fun, artistic place. Last night we grabbed a beer at the Brewer’s Art and struck up a conversation with a Texan girl who’d been living in Baltimore awhile before moving to DC. She happened to be back up there this weekend and we talked a bit about all the great (and more affordable) places to eat in Baltimore, the way the music scene has been changing in the last few years, and how she’s trying to convince all of her friends in DC to move to Baltimore.

It’s not the first time I’ve heard current and former Baltimore residents rave about how great of a place it is to live. Its proximity to DC means that there are even people who opt to live there and commute daily into DC – trading a shorter commute for lower cost of living, amongst other things. Job-wise, I’m not sure how attractive Baltimore is, however.

Another thing I find interesting about Baltimore is that there’s a group, Baltimore Green Currency, that is trying to spread a form of local currency called the Bnote. They report that over 130 local businesses currently accept Bnotes as payment. One of the bars we visited let you purchase Natty Bohs for 1 Bnote each; the equivalent of only 91 cents for a beer!

Plenty of people looking for cool maps or charts, and travel-related searches are common as well: mind map for london; time value of money chart; garbage manila bay; how to buy standing room tickets on ktx; map of states that florida’s coastline runs through (?). 

And many references to Modernist literature, and the “aesthetics of ___ ” searches abound.

Then there are the accidentally poetic: turn a factory into a home; prison money card; young buddhist let go.

If you have a WordPress blog, you can find these search engine terms – the most recent and the most frequently used – in the Stats area of your blog dashboard.