I had a hiatus from riding my bike to work for the past month – the week before I left for Christmas in Indiana I felt overwhelmed by things that needed doing and errands that needed running.  Of course, while I was in Indiana I did not ride to work.  The following week we had our End-of-Year sale which always entails longer hours, lots of energy and total exhaustion at the end of the day.  This was all capped by a dreadful cold which kept me home for 3.5 days.  I was itching to get back to riding, especially because I added lots of things to make the commute nicer.

Item #1) A rear rack for saddle bags (or panniers, if you will).  Naturally, once I had the rack, I had to get bags to go on it.  I wish timbuk2 would make their panniers available in the highly reflective fabrics like my giant-ass messenger bag. Instead I have some basic black bags from REI and blinky lights clipped onto loops.  The balance on the bike felt a little odd this morning, but the fact that I didn’t have a bag on my back was enough to counter that effect.  I’m sure that once I’m accustomed to the bags, the balance will feel more natural.

The rack is from Topeak and works with their quick-release bag system -  perhaps a future purchase.  The height of the rack is just low enough that  my Burley Travoy Trailer clears the rack to attach to the seatpost. If my legs could manage it, I could probably make a full grocery store run with the saddlebags and the trailer.  I’m not sure what the weight limit for my bike frame is though. Both the rack and the trailer have weight limits of 55 – 60 lbs.

Items #2 and #3) A new computer and a thermometer.  My old computer decided to work only intermittently and the cadence sensor/wires were completely ka-put.  The guys at Richardson BikeMart were incredibly helpful with figuring out what model I needed wanted, so it is wireless which made for a relatively painless installation.  And since I got really excited about another computer that offered temperature (but they didn’t have a wireless model or the model with both cadence and temperature in stock), they gave me a thermometer that fits in place of my stem cap (from a company called StemCaptain).   I have this thing with knowing what time and temperature it is.  When I was younger, I had the phone number memorized for calling in to get the temperature from our local station.  Sadly, my personal weather stations with temperature don’t have sensors that work anymore (and I don’t really need one).

Item #4) Klean Kanteen water bottle cages.  I actually got these and installed them pretty early on for my commute, but I haven’t shown them to you (since mid-October,  I think).  The Klean Kanteen bottles rattled around in my old cages and nothing drives me crazy faster than a rattling noise I can’t correct.  They fit my 27 and 18 oz bottles, plus I know my (brand spankin’ new and totally awesome) 12 oz insulated bottle fits.  I have not tried the 16 oz insulated bottle yet.

I’m slowly converting this road bike into my Commuter Beast, so I’ve not been too concerned with the weight of anything.  I’m hoping to get a triathlon bike for racing and training by October.  I had to keep my hands in my pockets and my mouth from drooling over the latest Specialized models at the store.   In May, I’ll have had my road bike for 9 years, which seems a pretty decent amount of time (even considering I didn’t really ride it for 4 of those years) and thusly, time for an upgrade.