Today I reached 100 miles of bike commuting (plus a few short errands) in May. I wouldn’t ordinarily keep track, but May is the bike commute challenge at work.

I am a lazy bike commuter– there’s secure parking in my building, so I ride in, leave the bike overnight and use my bus pass to get home, and ride the bike home the next day. It’s about 50 minutes to work and an hour home (homeward is uphill), and the one-way time commitment is all I really want.

I am loving my new bike, which I sprang for in celebration of completing 100 straight days writing on 750words.com.

Things I love about my bike:

• it has a kickstand
• the lights are pedal-powered and integrated so I never have to decide whether to turn them on
• the gearing is continuous so I don’t have to decide whether it’s worth changing gears or have a gear-shifting strategy
• the belt drive is very quiet and grease-free
• I can wear my normal clothes (hiking pants and running shoes, we have a very lax dress code) to commute

The gearing range is pretty small; I top out and bottom out on my commute. I’m slow, but I’m slow at lots of things so I don’t mind. In general, everything just works.

I like how absorbing riding a bike in the city is. I am busy and don’t have time to mull over something from work or whether I did the right thing six intersections ago. And my commute is on Clinton Street, which I love because the car diverters make it feel like Portland of 20 years ago except bike-centric, and then on the car-free bridge.