can we all just agree that riding home from work is, in fact, totally excellent?

i have recently decided that the freeway i take to work is way too dangerous. it has all the normal freeway problems (serious slowdowns, accidents, ladders/wheelbarrows/recliners/boxes/mattresses in the road, stalls, cars on fire, etc.) but lately it has also had pretty spectacular problems as well. almost daily. so the freeway and i? no longer friends.

i also realized that i've been comparing driving and biking/taking the train in an unfair and inaccurate manner. i always think that driving takes 20-25 minutes, and i know that the train sometimes makes me wait up to 17 minutes, when i miss the one i wanted by a second or two, and then the train ride is 24 minutes, and then i bike for 10-15. but when you consider that the best case driving scenario is incredibly rare, and that i at least know how long the bike-train-bike operation will take, it becomes sillier and sillier to think about driving.

i rode my bike to the train station and took the train, and then rode from the train station to my office today, but i finally got a chance to ride home with a friend this evening and it was fantastic. i feel amazing (but really tired) from the exercise, and i didn't have the stress of driving at all today. score one for me! (and one for the polar bears!)

i hope that we will make a habit of riding together. she is a pretty serious cyclist and she rides almost every day. some days i know i can't do that because i've got things to do in the evening, but it just felt so good that i hope to do it often.