All of the rides I took this past week I was over or under dressed for part of the ride. The weather here in the Beautiful Suburbs of Hell has been a pattern of temperature extremes lately. Last night it was mid-50s F on the way out to RPG group, and just over 40 on the way home. On the way to church it was right at 60 out, and almost 70 back. That wasn’t as bad as last night but I was still overdressed for the trip back. And there is a huge difference in the clothing for mid-50s and the clothing for 40 F. You can get hypothermia at either temperature but a whole lot faster at 40F, and what works for mid-50s will get you hypothermia at 40F. With temperature swings like we have here in Texas, dressing for the weather is a guessing game that I play to the warm side. I will be uncomfortable but not in danger, either way. On the days where I dress a little cool expecting warmer on the return trip I’m usually right, on the days I expect it to be a lot colder on the return trip I’m about 50/50 for the amount of drop, so some times I’m too warm in both directions, and some times I’m perfect on the way back, and once in a while it drops more than forecast and I’m too cool both ways because I didn’t pack enough additional layers.
Moving on to the RPG group, I’m still waiting to level up my warlock. We have been fighting with a demon that teleports in and out of the battle and has damage reduction except against magic, meaning the only people that have been able to inflict damage against this monster are the people with lots of muscle and big weapons (our barbarians) and me. The problem I have been having is the monster knows I can inflict damage unchecked against it and has been avoiding me and the barbarians while swatting the less powerful members of the party and inflicting huge amounts of damage against them. I find this annoying to say the least.I’m hoping that since it is now dark and everybody is tired (and the monster has taken a lot of damage) that we will get to let our characters sleep and recover (and let my character get his level up) at this rate I will be at level 7 before I can use any of my upgrades I get at level 6 as we go into the 4th game session since I reached level 6 without being able to claim my level up. With the quality of the monsters we have been facing we have been getting 300-500 XP per session with bonuses for good Role Playing and I’m about 1/5 of the way to my next level already… And next level I get a bigger attack bonus and 4d6 damage from my magic weapon. (That’s a lot of damage.)
I’m still working on the 20/20 crank forward full suspension bike so I have a bike that I can take on the bus bike rack. This is important because I can take a bus through places where riding a bike would be unsafe, and because full suspension means I can ride on the worst of the roads around here without permanently injuring my back. The combination would mean that I would have extended range from transit to about 90% of the DFW area pretty safely. And I have a year to get it ready for the Autorama that I won class in back in 2004, 10 years earlier. This is the bike that the solar bike light is being built for. I think that particular feature may be the tipping point to winning next year. The time I won my competition was a pedal car kit that was built stock with a fancy paint job versus my heavily modified bike with a simple monochromatic paint job. I don’t know that my competition will be so easy this time, so I’m thinking that little things like lights made for the bike will make a difference. I’m pretty sure there won’t be more than 2 other vehicles in my class because of the number of classes available to compete in. I know I won’t be in the lowrider bike class because this bike will have a fairly high bottom bracket and not having the pedals scraping the pavement. The seat will be low, but the pedals will be at a normal riding height.
And that’s all I have today.
PSA, Opus
Witch on a Bicycle 