If you had a fairy godmother when you started riding...

[lph]

I'm massively privileged when it comes to bike-friendly facilities at work, so I have lots of clothes, toiletries and a towel stashed there and drying opportunities for my bike gear. Since I always put my office clothes on immediately after a shower I can use them quite a bit before washing. Still, it took me a while to learn the following tricks:

- always have an extra bra and undies at work. I leave a ratty pair that I otherwise would have thrown away. If not you WILL someday forget one or the other, and have to go commando allday or wear sweaty bike shorts. Yuck.
- ditto for stashing an old pair of bike shorts. At some point I get caught in a cloudburst and soaked to the skin, when that happens I won't have to bike home in wet shorts.
- don't take something essential (like the towel) home to wash until you've brought another one to work. Or if you have to, don't take it out of your backpack until you've gone and fetched another one and put it IN your pack.
- learn when not to commute by bike. Some types of weather just aren't worth it - heavy, wet falling snow is one of them.
- always eat before riding home, and know where to stop for a snack if necessary. I've had a few rides home where I bonked and it wasn't fun.
- carry a couple of small blinkies on your bike as spares, in case the regular lights stop working. It's not always the batteries, sometimes they just die on you, especially if you take a fall.

Oh, and diligently noting down what to wear at which temperatures makes dressing in the morning easier and riding more comfortable. The best approach for me was to note down not what I wore, but what I think I should have worn. I ended up with a neat little chart that takes me down to about -10 C.