Snow Means Snow!

We've had some interesting weather, here in Denver, the past week or so. Sub-zero temps (Farenheit), at night, and not too far above that during the day (although it did actually get up to about 30, yesterday). The same weather system wreaked havoc in the mid-west, yesterday, apparently.

So, I got up this morning, looked out the window, and saw that it was snowing. When I turned on the TV, the weather man told me it was 20 degrees, with a projected high of 23. I didn't need him, though, to know which way the wind blows.

Naturally, I decided to bust out the fixed-gear mountain bike and ride down to the coffee shop. It's only about 2-1/2 miles to Kaladi Brothers Coffee, so I figured I could have an enjoyable ride.

Out of the driveway, I made the first 100 feet or so of the trip, and promptly crashed my butt off. The "high" temps of yesterday had apparently melted some of the earlier snow, which then froze into a sheet of ice where it had puddled at the corner. The new snow, this morning, effectively camouflaged it, and caught me in a tiger trap.

I got up and continued on my merry way, with my annoying little blinking LED lights (hopefully) making me visible to the cars on the road. Luckily, traffic is light at 8:00 AM on a Saturday, through the Observatory Park neighborhood.

The observatory looked so picturesque in the snow, I just had to get this shot.

I made it down to the coffee shop with no additional drama. The roads were completely snow-packed, but not too icy. And, as I said, there wasn't a lot of traffic out. I did see one hardy D.U. student out on a multi-geared mountain bike. She was going even slower than I.

That's one advantage of the fixed-gear in snow: I don't have to hit the brakes to slow down or stop, so it keeps the falls to a minimum. (Except, of course, at the corner of my street!)

When I walked into Kaladi's, the crowd seemed split in their impressions of my ride. It was about 40% "hard-core" to 60% "crazy". Ah, well, they don't know what they're missing.

The view from inside Kaladi Bros.

I stayed at the coffee shop for quite a while. Brad stopped by, and spent a couple of hours, and I was working on finishing the final story for the comic book I've been working on. I have only to do the insides of the front and back covers and the outside of the back cover, now. I want to get it finished before I go out of town, this week (CDOT lab inspections).

Here's one of the panels I was working on:

It's all black and white, cut-and-paste published with the finest equipment available (at Kinko's).

By the time I headed home, the snow had stopped, the sun had come out, and the roads were clearing.

But, I did have to shovel the walk.

It's a pretty wet snow which sticks to semi-slick tires like that.

x