A downside to bike commuting

I should've known not to trust Jennifer Lopez.

No, I'm not talking about the singer, J Lo, but our newest meteorologist for NBC5 who just moved here from Atlanta after finishing her stint on The Weather Channel. The girl hasn't quite learned about Texas weather yet. Or maybe her skills on localized meteorology just need some polishing. I'll cut her some slack though, as she's only been on air here for about 2 weeks. And I know what she's going through.

In any case, ol' Jenn told us that thunderstorms for Tuesday would be very scattered and west of Ft Worth. So I believed her; trusted her, and took off on my commute to SWA that morning thinking all would be good with the world on the way home. Cool even.

At about 4:45, I was closing up shop here at work and decided to take a peek at the radar. Sure enough, there was a huge storm which looked as if it might be just east of my route, but there was more light rain all over my route home. Surely, I didn't mind a little light rain. Still, I thought it might be time to high-tail it out of the office and try to get ahead of some of it.

The first few miles through the neighborhoods were just fine, thankfully. I was enjoying the relative cool of the afternoon and not having to try to duck under as many trees as possible to enjoy brief moments of shade. But by the time I got to 635 (about 6 miles into the ride), I knew I was toast!

It started to sprinkle, yet I still thought I might miss the bulk of the rain. I peddled furiously as the sky darkened and I heard my first rumble of thunder. Sure enough, I topped a small hill and saw that there were sheets of rain coming up and I had to find a place to get cover soon.

The rain started coming down heavier, so I pulled up to a laundromat on Josey with a good overhang to wait it out for a while. There, I chatted with an older lady who had coke-bottom glasses and a cigarette dangling precariously out of her mouth. Back in the day, her car broke down once and she was too scared to ask her co-workers for a ride, so she walked about 10-12 miles home one night. Wow. What can you say?

The rain appeared to lighten up a bit, but I could see trees still blowing hard with wind. It was getting to be about 6:05, so I decided to brave the wind and light rain and just go anyway. I was already wet, but worried about running out of daylight before I got home. As I rounded the corner of the building, once again, I could see a sheet of rain pouring just ahead of me on my current path. Sure enough, within about 100 yards, I was again in the middle of a downpour so I dove into the next shetered area, the awning of a gas station. As my neighbor Marsha would say, "It's a gully washer. It's a turd floater". Crap!

Here, I was "lucky" enough to have Pedrrrrrrro come chat with me as he exited the gas station. Pedrrrrrro had a beautiful way of rolling is r's, but his accent was thick. But that's not the most interesting thing about him. Nope, Pedrrrrro had about 1/4" of a big ol' hanger-downer from his nose and it was all I could do not to make eye contact or even stare at it as he yammered on and on. Now don't get me wrong, he was a very nice fellow, but holy cow, it was awful! It would teasingly wave at me with every exhale he did. "Hello, Kari! You can't ignore me! Look at me, while still trying to maintain a conversation!"

He rambled on and on about some things, occasionally asking a question to which I'd vaguely respond. He soon realized that I wasn't reciprocating the conversation much and told me that he didn't want to wear me out and that his girlfriend Marrrrrria also chatted a lot. So much chatting that he had to limit her to his 450 minutes a month. I had to laugh at that one. After about 10 minutes, Pedrrrro went on his way. It was one of those places where you wonder if a Candid Camera person is filming this interaction somewhere.

By about 6:15, the bulk of the rain had passed enough that I was ready to just get going again. I was thankful that I'd just bought a great Brooks shirt at Run On recently for safety - it's one of those day-glo greenish-yellow numbers that you can't miss. I took off and stayed on the sidewalks until I could get to side streets off Josey. As cars passed puddles, they'd spray a wall of water on my already drenched body. Im' sure a few thought it was comical.

The side streets werent' nearly as bad and I really only had one last leg of the ride that was a bit scary which was on Sandy Lake. I made it through that fine and by the time I hit the intersection of Sandy Lake and 35E, the rain stopped. I kept watching the sky, though, wondering if I'd finally found a breaking point or if I was in for another round of misery. EIther way, the motivation to get my butt home was high and I found myself making up all kinds of time the last 1/2 of the ride.

The streetlight fairies were who tortured me with red lights while I was in the rain decided to cut me a break and I managed to hit nearly all the lights green the last hour of the ride. It was a relief. Finally, I made it home about 7:30, unscathed and starting to dry out. I'm not sure my shoes will be dry enough for another ride to work tomorrow.

We'll see what miss Lopez has to say in the morning.