My COVID shot on Tuesday threw my schedule for a bit of a loop this week. I normally bike in to the office on Wednesdays, but I decided to telecommute this week so that I could “recover” from the shot. Instead, I biked in today (Thursday), which is a day that I usually telecommute and run in the morning. The great news is, I was able to commute on my mountain bike, which I haven’t done much of lately. Nowadays, a lot of factors conspire to make regular mountain bike commuting challenging. For one thing, I only go in to the office on Mondays and Wednesdays, and I climb on Monday evenings, so I try to avoid MTB commuting on Mondays because it tires me out for climbing. That leaves Wednesdays, and then, the weather and trail conditions have to cooperate. I’m not a fan of mountain biking during the summer months, both because of the heat and humidity, and because the trails get very overgrown. In the winter, the freeze-thaw cycle often means that the trails are in good shape in the morning, but a muddy mess in the afternoon when I’m riding home. That leaves spring and fall, and oftentimes, rainy weather can make for poor trail conditions those times of year. Things were pretty good today — it had been over a week since our last measurable rainfall, but some shallow fog this morning dampened the trails just enough that they weren’t dusty. I felt pretty comfortable on the bike, in spite of it being over a month since my last ride.

As I did last year, I may convert Monday to a telecommute day from November through March. During the pandemic shutdown, I used to take occasional morning mountain bike rides for exercise, and an extra telecommute day would give me a great opportunity to start doing that again. I could go out in the early morning when it’s at or below freezing, thereby avoiding the freeze-thaw issue in the afternoon, and I’d have enough time to recover for climbing in the evening. On paper, it seems like a great plan…