almost bike to work day

Today is National Bike To Work Day.

The city of Denver is a huge advocate for this day because so many people bike in this damn town. The past four years that I have lived here, I have never biked to work, for reasons that really aren’t justifiable. This year I had full intentions of biking to work today.

But sometimes things just don’t work out, and that’s okay.

Let me start from the beginning…

I set my iphone alarm for 6:15am so I could get up, eat breakfast, and be out the door by 7:30ish. Well, my alarm never went off. Guess who’s a complete tool and left their phone on silent? Yours truly. Apparently, I didn’t switch my ringer from silent to regular when I got home from work so when the damn alarm went off this morning I couldn’t hear it. Such an idiot!

Thanks to no alarm, I didn’t wake up until 7:15am. You can image the shame I felt when I knew I was behind schedule. I thought maybe I could make it out the door so I quickly got dressed, shoved breakfast down my throat, and went to grab my bike. But guess who didn’t air up their bike tires last night? This girl. I got home from kickball late last night and didn’t think about checking my tires. I felt like such a boner.

After that I gave up. I literally threw my arms in the air and said, “You win!” I don’t know who I was speaking to exactly, but I didn’t care. All I knew was that I wasn’t biking to work today. Once the realization set in, I changed out of my biking clothes into my regular work clothes, took one last sip of coffee and left the apartment feeling defeated. I was really excited about biking to work today. Don’t you hate when you’re jacked to do something and it doesn’t happen?

I honestly could have cried.

I drove to work in a very bad mood. Traffic was insane because they’re milling the roads and to make matters worse, I could see the bike path from the the road and there were a ton of people pedaling their bikes. I felt like the kid that didn’t get invited to the party. Everyone was smiling and laughing, and here I was stuck in the Jeep with a huge rain cloud over my head.

I arrived at work and felt sour towards the entire Bike To Work Day event. Why couldn’t I have been apart of something so fun? Why did I give up and not spend the ten seconds it takes to air up my tires? Either way, I was mad.

As the day went on and I calmed down, I came to the realization that there was so reason for me to be upset. I mean really, just because I didn’t “ride” my bike to work doesn’t mean I couldn’t “ride” my bike after work.

So that’s what I did.

As soon as I got home, I changed into my bikes clothes (no, I didn’t wear spandex), and pumped air into my tires. I bought my Trek in Manhattan, KS at Pathfinder with my college graduation money. The bike was $300. I felt like a baller. Funny how things have changed.

I decided to bike to Wash Park because the bike path to get there is a straight shot.

The bike path was INSANE!! OMG. It was like trying to drive on a Texas highway. There were people everyone. Between the roadies (bikers who wear spandex but have beer guts), the cruiser’s, the messengers, and me, it might as well have been a NASCAR race.