Well, now that I've had a real exposure to it, I think it's safe to say that rain kinda sucks. Late-ish work day today; I got out around 6:15 and headed to the bike. This time of year, it's full dark by then, and the rain was coming down pretty seriously - seriously, at least, for Seattle, but it'd been going on long enough that there was a fair bit of water on the roadway. Traffic was slow and fairly heavy on I5, and you could see the rainbow sheen of oil or gas or whatever in the center-track of the lane. Real good incentive to stay at one of the edges, in the wheeltracks where the water was lessened.

I made the journey home without incident, but with a fair bit of discomfort. Vision is pretty difficult in heavy rain at night, with the water beading up on your visor and the anemic low-beam on Zoë, and I found myself trying to wipe it clear about every 20 seconds with the palm of my glove. I need to look into whether there's some sort of plastic treatment that'll keep the rain from sticking, or something. Drivers were doing their usual clueless tailgating; I had one tool in a Civic right up on me for some time. I guess he objected to my long following distance, but there was no way for me to let him pass, and flashing my brake lights only got him back about a car length. I was very glad when a space opened up for me to pull aside and let him go.

I saw another rider on a Harley see an open space in traffic, roll on the throttle hard to get into it, and lose the back wheel immediately in a skid. He managed not to lose the bike as well; wish I'd seen exactly what he did, but the wheel snapped back to center without tossing him off, so I guess what he did was right. A few other riders were around as well, everyone being really cautious and leaving a lot of space, but I couldn't help but feel really vulnerable. I didn't feel the bike act much differently than usual in the rain, but then I don't have a good sense of just how much grip I have when it's wet, and I'm not sure how to figure that out.

And to think we've got another six months or so of this...damn, I miss the summer.

(Yes, I know it's a trashy reference in the title of this post. Name the song and you get a cookie, and then you get to feel terrible for recognizing it.)