I attended the Auckland City Bike to Work breakfast this morning – it was well organised, and I got a free yummy breakfast of Vogel’s Scroggin Muesli, which was totally excellent.

It was very strange seeing all the cycle commuters there. It seems to me that it takes a certain (utterly mad) type of individual to cycle through Auckland’s rush hour traffic. And that type of person doesn’t play well with others – there were loads of people there (like me. ahem) on their own, avoiding eye contact with their fellow cyclists, talking to no-one. But themselves. It was like a convention for high school science teachers.

Fair play, though. Cycle commuting, when you take out the random car doors opening, drivers on the phone, or worse, TEXTING, Auckland’s driving rain, road filth flicking up in your eyes and all over your clothes, the heat, the stifling humidity, your utter invisibilty to cars… Yes, when you take all that out, cycle commuting is great fun. You get to notice and appreciate all kinds of details about Auckland you’d never see. You get to actually look forward to your commute home. You get to arrive at work clear headed and ready to go (ish).

And funny stuff happens. I somehow provoked a driver in their 50’s (this happened to me a couple of weeks ago) to give me the finger when I got in the way of their reckless right turn before the oncoming traffic. I gave them the thumbs up.

Sometimes life is sweet.
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