Road Trip!

I have a giant case of bike lust. Meet Jake. You remember Jake from Sixteen Candles, right?

I always knew you'd come for me, Jake.

Well, he was one "Jake crush," and here's the other. Meet Jake the Snake.

Yeah, you.

How much do I need a bright lime green bike named Jake the Snake? Uh, bad. Real bad.

This is a cyclocross bike, so maybe I will also have to take up cyclocross, an idea that has crossed my mind before...

But that's neither here nor there right now, because what Jake the Snake offers me, besides beauty and form, is disk brakes, a nice commute to work ride (even...gasp...year-round...something I should really give more thought if I don't want to spend the first three months of my bike commuting year whining about how out of shape I am from not riding for six months...)

Okay, there's only one Jake the Snake available in my size on the whole freaking west coast. And it's in Portland. It literally has had my name on it for over a week while I hem and haw about shelling out that kind of bank for a bike. I have drivers ed and football and soccer and, and, and to pay. But you know what? Mama wants a new bike!!

I told the bike shop this morning that I would see them at 10 a.m. tomorrow, if I could pull together all the details. Um, the details are filling up the gas tank and pulling some benjis out of the bank. I think I can do it!