I got excited when I slipped on the ice last night. That meant the temperature was dropping back to normal, and hopefully everything would be frozen solid and I could ride my "A-ride".

Woke up, got out of bed (there's a song in there...), looked at the thermometer. 30F. Not quite as cold as I had hoped. Walked out on to my newly exposed lawn; ground was frozen solid.

Excellent.

First pedal stroke I feel / hear my chain pop. Maybe I forgot to lube it after my last ride. As I started to climb out of the saddle, I could feel the bb spindle rocking back and forth. Maybe I could ignore it? Nope, too annoying. Mechanical negligence gnawing at me. I was hoping to wait until closer to the racing season to replace the bb bearings, but looks like if I'm going to ride the Singular, I'm replacing them (and with the promised deep freeze coming, I'm riding the Singular).

So I headed back home to get another bike.

I could ride the Fun Machine, but I had spent the last two days on the road, or Mary Jane, which was sort of set up as an extreme hybrid. Even though I had to swap pedals to ride Mary Jane, it was overcast, drizzle was starting, and the people who had to go to work were pissed, so I'd rather spend my time in the woods.

My Mom is always preaching about meant to be's and today was one of those. Drizzle turned to sleet, frozen rain and snow and being on the road in that would be no fun at all. As I turned on tho the first rocky fireroad, I realized, I hadn't grabbed a 15mm spanner, or a tube that would fit into the 37's I had on my bike. The torrent of rain and snow melt that had flowed down the the path of least resistance, i.e. the best line, was still flowing, something about physics, or science, and moving water not freezing. There are a number of trails that if the fireroads had rivers flowing down them, which they did, then they would also be a stream. With no way to fix a flat, and with possibly fragile trail condition, I'm glad I was on a bike best suited to fireroads.

I also found out windproof is not waterproof, and after 2.5 hours in damp weather right around freezing, my hands stop functioning.