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May 29, 2007
Musings on My Commute
I'm posting this from the ferry, thanks to Bluetooth, my Treo, and Cingular's (sllloowww) data connectivity.
We don't have standing holidays - employees get a block of paid time off, you take it when you want to take it. The office is open on Christmas, New New Years, and every day in between. So, since we didn't have plans for Monday, I worked a normal day. There were like 12 people on the ferry at 7am, and had I not seen fit to keep my speed in the reasonable double-digits, I could have been to work in no time at all.
As it was, it took me 25% less time from the ferry to Bellevue than normal. And getting back to the ferry in the afternoon was pretty much the same.
It was great.
As the weather gets nicer, the motorcycle count on the boats steadily increases. There is a (small) group of riders, myself included, who are silly enough - or forced by circumstance - to ride year round, and we watch with bemusement as the "spring/summer warriors" come out. We snicker at them, bikes with low miles, raingear that never sees the rain, but deep down, none of us would ride through the winter if we felt we had a reasonable alternative.
Finally, as riders and ferry workers get more accustomed the new ticket-less fair system it's increasingly clear that they (the they who do these things) didn't really think it through. Tales of high school students buying senior discount walk-on tickets on the web. Lines at both sides of the Seattle/Bainbridge route taking significantly longer to get through the toll booths. It's a mess - and it doesn't look to get better soon.
But from halfway across the sound, on a clear day, it sure is pretty.
Posted by dberger at May 29, 2007 7:07 AM