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You know it is cold when:
Those of you not aware, we have had a bit of a cold snap here in Texas (Dallas) the last few days. It has frozen a couple nights in a row now!
Not trying for sympathy here . . . and I know there are places colder . . . that is why I live here don’tcha’know.
Anyway. Cold. Brrr. How cold did it get? Hard to tell on a bike. Once below 38 F or so, it all feels pretty much the same if you dress right. But I did get a pretty good indicator of how cold it was this morning on the way into work.
Driving down the freeway. The speeds were up, there was nobody else on them this morning. Holiday I suppose. I had almost reached work when I heard a very loud, kind of wet squishy, “ka-thump-bump” from the rear. The seat shuddered. Sounded/felt like I blew a tire, but the bike was still handling ok. Oh well, its been a lot of years since I had a running flat, and I have never had one on the Valkyrie . . . maybe I just forgot what it feels like (yeah, right). I was doing 80+ and eased my way over to the shoulder and coasted to a stop. Tires ok. Hmmm. Must have hit something . . . but I did not see anything. Weird.
Continued on to work none the wiser. Got to work and came in the building. At my desk I opened my “magic bag”, a water-proof “Cordua” canvas duffel that I carry stuff in. Stuff like my cell phone. Extra batteries for my mp3 player. My digital camera. Extra CD or two. A book or two. My flashlight. The lightweight gloves (it is supposed to be in the 60’s this afternoon). Enough Cokes for the day . . .
Enough Cokes for the day . . . Oh crap! The mystery is revealed. The Cokes, 4 of them, one diet Cherry, one diet Vanilla, one diet Lemon, one just diet, all exploded in some sort of bizzare freezing chain-reaction, coalescing into some kind of foamy, icy slush stuff taking up the complete inside of my duffel, and like the slime in a horror movie, eating everything in the bag. Uck! What a friggen mess.
The bright side is my cell phone has had display problems for some weeks now, the display simply not working most of the time, after submerging it in hot water to clean out all the sticky weird stuff that results when you freeze diet coke, and then drying it with a hair dryer, well . . . it works now!
Oh, and did I mention? It is 68 degrees out there now for the ride home.
Those of you not aware, we have had a bit of a cold snap here in Texas (Dallas) the last few days. It has frozen a couple nights in a row now!
Not trying for sympathy here . . . and I know there are places colder . . . that is why I live here don’tcha’know.
Anyway. Cold. Brrr. How cold did it get? Hard to tell on a bike. Once below 38 F or so, it all feels pretty much the same if you dress right. But I did get a pretty good indicator of how cold it was this morning on the way into work.
Driving down the freeway. The speeds were up, there was nobody else on them this morning. Holiday I suppose. I had almost reached work when I heard a very loud, kind of wet squishy, “ka-thump-bump” from the rear. The seat shuddered. Sounded/felt like I blew a tire, but the bike was still handling ok. Oh well, its been a lot of years since I had a running flat, and I have never had one on the Valkyrie . . . maybe I just forgot what it feels like (yeah, right). I was doing 80+ and eased my way over to the shoulder and coasted to a stop. Tires ok. Hmmm. Must have hit something . . . but I did not see anything. Weird.
Continued on to work none the wiser. Got to work and came in the building. At my desk I opened my “magic bag”, a water-proof “Cordua” canvas duffel that I carry stuff in. Stuff like my cell phone. Extra batteries for my mp3 player. My digital camera. Extra CD or two. A book or two. My flashlight. The lightweight gloves (it is supposed to be in the 60’s this afternoon). Enough Cokes for the day . . .
Enough Cokes for the day . . . Oh crap! The mystery is revealed. The Cokes, 4 of them, one diet Cherry, one diet Vanilla, one diet Lemon, one just diet, all exploded in some sort of bizzare freezing chain-reaction, coalescing into some kind of foamy, icy slush stuff taking up the complete inside of my duffel, and like the slime in a horror movie, eating everything in the bag. Uck! What a friggen mess.
The bright side is my cell phone has had display problems for some weeks now, the display simply not working most of the time, after submerging it in hot water to clean out all the sticky weird stuff that results when you freeze diet coke, and then drying it with a hair dryer, well . . . it works now!
Oh, and did I mention? It is 68 degrees out there now for the ride home.