The End of an Era

Today was The Boy's last day of daycare. Kindergarten orientation is tomorrow, and school starts Monday. Except for an interruption of about a year shortly after TB was born, we've had a child at Capital Kids for almost nine years! I'm still in denial about this. It's been part of our routine for so long, it'll be really weird not to have it in our lives anymore.

Criminey, it's Only Been a Freakin' Week!

Between my mom being in town and me working nights on the Lebanon Task Force, I haven't been on the bike since the 19th, and I haven't worked out since about then either. Actually, skipping workouts was mostly sheer blowing it off, but it was probably a good thing since my shoulder was still bothering me; I think I was exacerbating it by putting the stress of weight training on it.

S'winnyway, I have today and tomorrow off. I dropped the Jinn off at her day camp and took a spin around Wakefield. My God, you'd think I just got off the couch after months of inactivity! I was awful! I was sucking wind within 15 minutes, couldn't maintain a pace for shyte, and by the end of the ride was making errors in judgement and focus that I've recently only been making after rides about twice as long. It was humiliating. If I'd known getting in shape required continual , non-stop maintenance, I'm not so sure I wouldn't have chosen being a couch potato!

The good news is, I weighed myself after the ride and was down to 182. True, a chunk of that was probably water loss from the ride, but still! Plus, the regular bike commute starts next week, probably Tuesday. Almost 19 miles a day, 4 days a week (I'm gonna Metro in on Thursdays to replenish underwear, etc. and keep myself fresh for the MORE evening rides). If I can stick to the diet I've been following recently, I should be well into the 170s (and dare I say below?) pretty quickly. Fingers crossed.

Hear, Hear!

And yes, I do recognize the irony of putting this on my blog:

http://www.internetisshit.org/index.html

Oh, The Humanity!

So I'm slogging along on the 5th or 6th mile of my 9-mile, mostly uphill commute home from work on the WOD. 60 - 70 lbs or so of trailer, Boy and assorted other crap hitched to the rear skewer of my old, heavy hardtail with the oversized pogo-stick fork. According to Yahoo weather right before I logged off my workstation, it's 91 degrees out, with a heat index of 95. The ice packs in my jersey pockets have long since thawed to ambient temperature.

I'm at the point where the chamois starts to chafe, my butt's getting numb, and I'm on the verge of bonking in spite of my best efforts to hydrate and eat properly throughout the day. I'm taking it easy, spinning where I usually hammer, doing my best to make sure I don't succumb to the heat. I'm passing no-one else on wheels, and that's just fine.

Suddenly, a woman with a kid in a trailer goes barreling past me. On the uphill slope. In the direct sun. She's riding a road bike, her kid's maybe half the Boy's age (and weight), and she's obviously fresh - not a drop of sweat on her.

And as she passes, fast enough for me to feel her breeze, she calls out to me:

C'MON C'MON, LET'S GO! SHOW ME WHAT'CHA GOT! SHOW ME WHAT"CHA GOT! C'MON!

For the rest of the ride, The Boy asks me why I didn't pass her, why I don't pass anybody, why I don't go faster.








Bitch.

Nice Day For a Ride

Went for a loop around Rosaryville yesterday with Bald Gaz and BuKit. I had a great time, despite (because of?) the intense, muggy heat. I do like hot weather.

Gaz acquitted himself well, trudging right along even though he hadn't ridden in two months, was hung over, and (like sane people/unlike me) was not loving the heat. If our positions were reversed, I'd have probably given up and turned around. I received instructions from at least two people to obtain photographic evidence of Gaz actually riding his mountain bike on dirt. Here's the best I ended up getting:


We saw a turtle in the path - BuKit was kind enough to lift it over to the side before someone ran it over. Unfortunately, not before Gaz had his way with the poor thing.


A while later, we found our path blocked by a pair of Turkey Vultures (I think). Unfortunately, they flew up into the trees before I could get my camera out for a close-up, so I just got boring old "birds in a tree" shots instead.


I'd never ridden with BuKit before, except as part of a very large group last weekend. I hope to ride with him again, as he is a good rider and a nice guy. Unless he's just biding his time, waiting for that perfect moment when he can bring out the machete. Uh-oh... Anyway, here's a bad shot of him, shortly after clearing a log.


The best part was getting back to the parking lot. Gaz had two 12-packs of beer in a cooler for me (in trade for a Jersey) and BuKit (for whatever reasons they had). We cracked some open and had a nice post-ride cold one! MMMmmmmm - PLBs!

I brought my mom and my daughter along to go hiking while I rode. They seemed to have a good time. After due whining and complaining about being dragged away from her cartoons, Emma apparently really enjoyed herself. I thought she would, given how enthused she was about our little hike along the Wakefield creek trail a few weeks ago. I think I may have hit on a good father-daughter activity for us.

So to sum up: Went riding, had fun, Gaz did well, saw critters, drank beer, kid had fun too.

Whew!

I finally managed to be in town for one of Herr Doktor Beers' weekend rides. Black Hill to Shaeffer and back. A nice ride, but it appears I'm still not quite ready for prime time; I may be in better shape than I've been since I started riding but boy, I've still got a ways to go. Fortunately, I wasn't the only one gassed out after the BH - Schaeffer leg, and I was able to get a lift back to the BH parking lot to load up the Dos and go limping home with my tail between my legs.

On the other hand, I did my first commute with Alex in the trailer yesterday. A little over 9 miles each way, mostly uphill in the evening when I'm nice and burned-out from work. If I can keep that up through the end of the month when kindergarten starts, I'll be making the local racer crowd think they dropped a chain, I'll be smoking them so bad. (Not really, but hey - it's my Blog, Dammit!)