Ride home for Thursday, 20 December

It was snowing most of the afternoon and the back roads hadn't been cleared, so I took the main roads most of the way. I couldn't ride around the queues of traffic because of all the snow at the sides and centre of the road, but it was better than slipping around the ruts on the back roads. On Bayer's Road I tucked in behind the 81 bus and rode in its tyre tracks the whole way to Joseph Howe. It wasn't the fastest way to get along, but it was (a) out of the wind, (b) on a clear bit of road, and (c) no-one was going to complain I was going to slow if I was right behind a bus. Since the traffic was massively backed up going across Joe Howe I stayed behind the 81 all the way till it turned right on Joe Howe and then hopped off my bike onto the sidewalk and waited on the corner for the lights to change. While I was doing that a police van pulled up next to me and the officer looked at me, I gave him a cheery smile and wave and he gave me the hard bitten, "in the force for 30 years and seen it all" thousand yard stare and slight tilt of the head. He would have pulled this off better if he looked older than 25, I feel.

Sketchy ride up through Fairview as it hadn't been ploughed at all. I skidded a couple of times and could hear the studs scraping and biting on the pavement, but I never went down.

Distance logged: 10.294km
Time: 43:32
Average speed: 14.2km/hr
Max speed: 28.7 km/hr
Temperature: -6C, snowing, windy
Cumulative distance: 4964.747km
Cumulative cost per km: $0.19
Monthly distance: 499.269km
Monthly cost per km: $0.09