Many bicycles

Bikes in Florence
Originally uploaded by ccorlew.

In Italy there are bicycles everywhere. I kind of liked it. Except for the sad, lonely ones with missing parts left cold in the rain, awaiting rust and longing for their absent owners.

Diablo. Still uphill.

Our friend Joyce rides lots, so she thinks we should too. She talked me into doing the Diablo loop: Up the North Gate, Down the South, back through Danville and Walnut Creek. 30 miles that starts with about a 2000 foot climb. I haven't done it since the 80s. It's still steep. My goal today was to survive, and I did. Thanks Joyce! (Joyce, single: possibly available for the highly qualified; For a good climb call...)
Where's my wife you ask? Apparently having a 16-year-old daughter going to the prom involves a lot more Mom than it did when I was in school, so she did pink stuff today. I'm in hiding.
Thanks also to Diablo Scott's Bike Blog for providing a bit of inspriation as well!

I don't think bike commuting is saving me money

I commute on a Cannondale 500 Mtn. bike. I've added fenders, and lights. It's very geeky now. My last purchase was a set Ritchey Tom Slick MTB Tires. They're 1" slicks and a ton faster than my knobby Mtn. tires.
But more is never enough. I started thinking "Wouldn't it be nice to have a second set of wheels so I can swap mtn, and street tires painlessly?"
So I found a set of Mavic 517 rims with XT hubs (just like the ones on my bike) on EBAY.
But that's not enough. Oh no.
After consulting endless online gear calculators, and the amazing Sheldon Brown bicycle site I figured I knew how to kick things up a notch.
On EBAY I found (and purchased) a 12-23 cassette with a much "tighter" range than the 11-30 that's on the bike now. My hope is that this will make the perfect no-hills-involved commuting machine! Of course I had to order the installation tools as well, so even with the EBAY used part purchases the project is costing me money.
Pictures and installation reports to follow.