So I've had my bike for a month now, and I'm pretty happy with it so far. I've ridden approximately 90km on it over six rides, including two commutes.

The plan, if I see it through - is to do four 12km commutes to/from work in a week, and at least one 20+ km ride on the weekend. But I'm not going to kill myself to do it, so we'll see how that goes.

I've got a bit of drama with the gears on the bike though, the chain is slipping pretty regularly some of the time. That's not too uncommon with a new bike, as you wear in the shifter cables they get some slack.

I've taken the bike for its first service (albeit a bit early), and had them tighten up the cable which has helped a lot, but it's still a bit of a problem so more investigation is required.

That aside it's great fun to get out and ride, it's been simply years since I've been for a proper ride and I'm not nearly as shitted afterwards as I thought I would be. Hooray.

Anyway, my short term goal is to crack 100km, which I'm set to do tomorrow when I do my next ride home from work, and also to get up to 20km/hr consistently on all my rides.

I'm keeping track of my rides with Bikemap.net and MyCyclingLog which is useful, but not very accurate when you're going on overpasses/etc and the elevation data is wrong - might be time to find a very cheap second hand GPS or some such, as the iPhone apps I've tried as abysmal.

Most rewarding experience of the week? Riding across this deceptively steep overpass two days in a row without stopping or feeling like I'm about to die.

Hooray.

After thinking about it for a while, I've finally bought a new bike! Hooray, now I can start being active in a way that doesn't make me want to gouge my eyes out. No really, exercising because you know you should isn't very exciting, and who says you can't enjoy it?

The last bike I bought was wayyy back in... 2004, a mountain bike that got stolen when our house got broken into - and was (suprisingly) recovered by the police in Mirrabooka, complete with damage to the rear rim, shifters and a few other things - fixing it up was going to cost a few hundred and why not get a new bike suitable for where I'd now be riding.

Enter shiney new road bike, and a bunch of accessories meaning I can actually use the bastard.

I've also already bought a set of replacement pedals with mountain bike cleats, so once I've got some skate style shoes with cleats I can ninja on and off the bike without a wardrobe change. Impressive, huh? :)

However, let it be known that I'm well aware bicycles are the gateway drug to faggy bike pants and other assorted lycra products. I pledge to you all here that I will not go down this dark and dangerous place!

Anyway, enough of that - I'm going to go for the first ride on the new bike (and first ride on a proper bike in a number of years).

... it's so cold outside *pout*