The commuting dilemma

As I said before, I have a new job (yay!). And one of the good things of this job is that there is a bike trail that pretty much starts at the door of my house, and ends in the parking lot of the building where I work. Just like that, if I ride to work, I do not have to deal with cars any more.

On top of that, the ride is just beautiful. The trail goes in the middle of the woods, away from any roads, very rarely you see anyone else and it feels like you have the entire space for yourself. It’s also fairly flat, and the distance is 7 miles exactly, so I’ve been riding my single speed and I end up with about 25 really nice minutes on the bike each way. To make things even easier, I have a shower at work too. It couldn’t be more perfect.

So…. What is the dilemma? It seems like a no brainer, right?

Well…. The trail is in PG County, which, as many of you may know already, is one of the most dangerous areas around DC. And, I’ve heard/seen reports of a few commuters being assaulted there before. So, maybe the solitude of the trails is not such a good thing, after all. The route also goes under 4 bridges, which are far from any civilization and provide the perfect hiding and ambush place.

I guess my rides in the early morning are not such a big deal, since thugs that enjoy assaulting other people are probably sleeping at that time. The evenings are another story. Right now, I still have daylight during most of my ride home, but pretty soon that will no longer be the case. I have already noticed the vampires starting to show up around the trail when the sun goes down, and believe me, they are kinda sketchy looking. I’ve also seen a few cops cars in certain areas of the trail at the vampire hour, which made me feel better. Aside from the vampires, there are also the drunks (although, the intersection between these two groups is most likely not empty); I had to ride off the trail last Friday since one of them was passed out across the trail. The smell of alcohol was noticeable about 20 yards before running into the guy. Nice.

I *do* want to ride though. As I said, given the conditions other than this little PG County detail, it feels almost like a crime not to ride to work. So, so far I’m riding, bringing only my ID, health insurance card and $20. I’ve also been considering buying a really cheap bike to commute, but I think my single speed is fine, and since at the moment I own (gulp) 6 bikes, getting another might be somewhat embarrassing and excessive (I am thinking of selling two of them tho!!).

Sooooooo….. Anyone knows where can I get pepper spray by any chance?