After Sunday’s ride, I entered a two-day period of nothingness. Other than catching up on some stuff, getting some house chores done, and another doctor’s appointment there was not much going on. Well, I guess there was the rodeo on Tuesday night. Yeah, you read right, Mr. Artsy-Fartsy, Smiths listening, left winger, shaved legged bicycle boy went to a rodeo.
There has been little time to get any miles in on the bike for a variety of reasons, including a home tournament for B-Man over the weekend that had us at the fields most of the weekend.
Tuesday marked one week since I last rode my bike. It also marked the last day I broke a sweat doing anything other than breaking a fever (or wind). The days that weren’t marred by illness were marred by heavy rain, high winds, or traveling for B’s soccer matches. And the days not marred with any of those things, were marred by a much dreaded, mentally crippling overnight trip down to Chicago to hang out with Wifey for a night while she was away at a work conference.
After last Tuesday’s ride, the rest of the week was lost to illness and shit weather. Thursday night I finally got more than 2 hours of sleep, as a result I felt the best I had in days on Friday. Not “let’s go for a ride” good, but good enough to catch up on some adulting, then hang with B-Man and Jake (the dog) in the yard of the Cul-de-sac Shack, capturing some of the backyard nature that can be found around our home with my camera. Due to a complete lack of doing anything, all of today’s images are from that afternoon of backyard slack.
As I mentioned here in my last digital dispatch of dystopian cycling life, I appear to have contracted some sort of allergy. Since Tuesday morning I’ve been dealing with itchy eyes, sinus pressure, a scratchy throat, clogged ears, coughing, endless streams of snot, and a bright red nose that only goes to further the general public’s assumption that I am some sort of jobless, beer drinking scoundrel.
Alas, it’s taken me two days, and two sleepless nights to finally admit; I don’t think this is an allergy, I think I’m ill. If it’s not illness, it’s one bastard of an allergy, and the trees from which the pollen spores fled should be burnt to the ground by hordes of torch wielding warriors on horseback, Game of Thrones style.
I don’t want to sound negative, but there was nothing all that special about today’s ride. After two days of wet snow and rain, the weather was near perfect today, the wind was so calm it felt like cheating, and I completed my 30+ mile road loop without much mental or (perceived) physical effort. It was swell, but I’m not going to blow smoke up your blog reading asses by telling you it was something all that amazing. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll take that shit all day long, but it was nothing special.
So, I give you three photos, by the numbers, that sum up the ride and my Saturday…
Earlier this month I lamented the fact that after a pretty sweet February of warmer weather and riding, March had come in like a lion with snow, ice, rain, and a lack of riding. Now here we are on the last day of the month and March is still twerking its wet, cold, slushy ass cheeks in the face of central Michigan like a trailer court queen drunk on wine coolers, wooing her step dad into paying for that dolphin tattoo she wants on her ankle. Thankfully I found some time–in between those unwanted wintry twerks–to get some miles in.
So far this week [month?] there’s been a distinct lack of doing stuff outdoors, so today’s photo is from a ride back in February. I like the photo well enough but I hate the utility lines that cut through the middle of it. Yes, through the magic of Photoshop I removed them and the pic looked fine, but it didn’t feel right. I have no problem with retouching images to get rid of sauce spatter on a food photo, the zit on your nose, those nips poking through your wife’s t-shirt, or to make myself NOT look like the poster model for the upcoming, soon to be self-produced movie Dad Bod Gone Wild, Every Day I’m Jigglin’. In other words viva la narcissism! when it comes to spatter, zits, nips, and blubber, but in landscapes and/or documentary style photography I find it creepy and wrong (like hearing your parents talk about sex). So the power lines stay.
Last Friday Wifey and I went out for a couple of beers before dinner at a local college bar/pizza place. It was fun to hang out with her, talk one on one, and catch up on stuff at the end of the week.
My family and I spent a long weekend back in Pennsylvania paying our respects to Wifey’s grandfather who passed away last Wednesday. It was a sad weekend indeed, but it was a beautiful ceremony and it did well to celebrate the life of a great man.
With all that car travel, sadness, stress, and a jam packed non-stop schedule came poor diet choices and a complete lack of exercise. I feel like I put on ten pounds in four days!
Now home, I was anxious to bet back into the routine of daily exercise and eating healthier home cooked foods. Sadly the weather would not been cooperating for outside activities. As I’ve mentioned before, the past two weeks it was ice and slush, most of that is gone but the dirt roads are a quagmire of mud and standing water. The paved roads are clear but today we were socked in with fog and misty rain most of the day and I somehow lost my rear blinky in the garage somewhere. Not wanting to be struck down by a cement truck, I needed options.
