Hey Roger! I did the same two years ago except I bought an old bike (for
$35) specifically for the trip and gave it away when it was time to fly
home. Having the mobility of a bicycle and not having to lock it up (due to
its low value) was great! I was staying at Basler and riding all the way
around the airport was much faster than the buses and going to the grocery
store was east too.

Mike
MU-2

"Roger" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 10 Oct 2005 02:40:56 -0400, "Morgans"
wrote:


"JohnH" wrote

But even if you were completely adverse to riding in bad weather (not
*cold*
mind you), what does that really reduce your # of cycling days by? A
couple
weeks a year?

OOOOhhhh. You haven't spent much time in Iowa, have you?

There is also a factor of arriving to work so sweaty in the summer, that
nobody can stand getting near you for the rest of the day. Also, it does
get really hot there, and you can't take enough off to stay cool, unlike
rutting more on for the cold. Cold is also a real excuse, when you talk
about getting frostbite from a half hour outside, in the wind. Oh, did we
mention that it gets windy there?

One year, my wife and I took our road bikes to Oshkosh. We were able
to ride them on the grounds until about 3 days before the fly-in
proper opened. We then took them out to the stand "On the hill" by the
bus stop. When ready to fly home, we put them on the "welcome wagon"
for a ride to the Deb.

We stayed in town. Weather was near 100 most of the time, but for two
days where it was cold, windy and rain. Riding in 100 degrees
wasn't all that bad. It was when you stopped it got miserable.
Did I mention I came down with one of the worst colds I've ever had
the night after we arrived?

Every place I've worked had showers. Even when I worked 18 miles from
here we had one younger guy who rode his bike nearly every day unless
the weather was *really* bad. Really bad means thunderstorms and wind
too strong to ride, or ice on the roads. He didn't ride when the
temps got much below 15 degrees, but he'd ride in rain so heavy my
windshield wipers would hardly take care of it.

He'd get to work, shed his rain gear, take a shower and head for the
office. When I worked at the main plant here in town we had a number
of people who rode in, including some upper management. I know one
who was making well up into the 6 figure range. Normally they'd all
head for the showers as soon as they made it to work.

If Midland were laid out differently I'd bet we'd have hundreds of
workers riding into town. The problem is the town is bisected by a
river with only two bridges. A third river coming in from the WSW
joins the first river right between the two bridges. No place in town
is more than about 6 miles from me with the airport only being a tad
over 4, but it takes 10.6 to get there. The shortest route is via
suicide alley where no one with an IQ over 70 would ride. The safest
is across the other bridge which is only about 3/4 of a mile from the
first, BUT you have to travel 5 to 6 miles farther to get to it.
There's another river in the way and that can only be crossed 4 miles
west of town where you then have to go nearly 3 miles south and then 3
miles back north to get to the bridge. If you live north of the
express way (US-10) there is no safe route into town via bike. Heavy
traffic on narrow streets/roads with no, or almost no shoulders. No
place to be on a bike.

They really are working on making our streets bicycle friendly.
and plans call for bike lanes although we'll have to watch for
impatient drivers passing on the shoulder. We have a very long way to
go before getting any where near as bike friendly as Boulder Co.

OTOH my wife is getting rid of her 37 MPG mini, mini van and replacing
it with a Prius. Now if I could get that kind of gain with a
replacement for the 4-Runner which gets 18 MPG around town. Anyone
make a SUV that gets 36 MPG that I can afford?

Some have mentioned losing jobs to low cost labor, but several
corporations have mentioned opening plants in other countries due to
low energy costs compared to here. Depending on the product, a high
tech chemical company doesn't save nearly as much on cheap labor as
they do with cheap energy.

In our specific area we don't have all that many unskilled jobs as
most of the work around here is high tech due to the nature of the
work, not that we can get labor cheaper some where else.

We do have a lot of farms that could use unskilled help in the summer,
but try and find someone who'll work out in the field.

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com