Desultory bike commuting

So far I have only managed to bike commute three times in three weeks.

My criteria have been:

-Not in severe pain
-Not coming home after dark
-Reasonable weather
-No mechanical failures

I think that I have solved my saddle fit issues, just as I've come up on a week where I'm working two late nights and it's going to be thunderstorming the rest of the week.

(I will work up to cycling in the rain and darkness! But I feel like I need to grind up a few levels first, in RPG parlance. Also a rain jacket.)

I am enjoying it. It is nice to get some fresh air in the mornings and even with the traffic noise and honking it feels like time to myself more than riding the bus and having to listen to someone's cell phone argument.

I am not yet managing to beat the bus home, which is weird, because I can almost beat the bus home just walking (and, judiciously, jaywalking); it's just that the rush-hour traffic is awful on that avenue. I'll try a new route tonight, see how that goes.

If the weather clears up by the weekend I think I'll try going for a longer ride!

Things I wish parents knew about reading

1. If your elementary-school kid really likes to read, they're ahead of the ball game, even if you think they're reading books that are trashy or too short and easy.

2. You're not looking for a "Level M" book or a "Level P" book. You're looking for a book that your kid really wants to read, which might be anywhere from "pretty challenging" to "really easy."

3. When you tell your kid, "You can't borrow that many books, you're not going to read them all," it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. It's no skin off anyone's nose if the kid takes out 10 and reads 5.

4. I don't have a magic list of the right book to give every second-grade girl (even if I suspect it may be Clementine). It helps to have some idea of what your kid likes to read about. Or what they like in general, if they don't like to read.

5. You may have fond memories of what you read as a child, but your kid doesn't care and the publisher probably didn't reprint it.

6. If you spend all your time yelling at your kid about what they're doing wrong when they go to the library, they might come to associate going to the library with getting yelled at for everything they're doing wrong.

7. Books are not that thing you have to do to get smarter. Books are that thing that teaches you how to make clothes or do science experiments; books are that thing that tells you fantastic stories. Books should look like dessert, not like spinach.

8. If your kid is excited about reading, and you do anything to minimize that excitement, turn it into a chore or a burden or a thing to argue about, I will probably forget you. But I will not forgive you.