If I could dial up a perfect day for cycling, I would design one just like today. It was pleasantly warm, just enough breeze to be comfortable, blue sky with not a cloud in sight.
I tried to talk myself out of riding, since I had just had my hair cut and hated to put on a helmet, but I just couldn't waste a day as perfect as this one.
It was my favorite kind of ride (if I MUST ride alone) in that I left home with sort of a general destination in mind, but not a route. Of course I can't meander forever, so eventually I asked Hubby via text what time he would finish playing golf and then I planned to be at the golf course when he finished. The timing was perfect too. I inched up the kick-arse hill that leads to the golf course, and I still averaged over 13 mph. If I had looked at the GPS and realized I had ridden 15.98 miles, I would at least have circled around the parking lot to get those other two hundredths.
Two funny things happened on my ride today. Not hold-onto-your-sides-fall-onto-the-floor-laughing funny, just sort of chuckle funny. Or maybe you won't find them funny at all. Maybe I was just drunk on the perfect October day.
Not long after I left home, I had to cross a major highway that connects I-85 to Athens, home of the University of Georgia. It's a very busy highway with a gazillion red lights on it. I was at an intersection where there isn't a whole lot of traffic, but there is a traffic light. There were no cars, and I wondered if I would be able to set off the sensor to trip the light. [Note here: It's a magnetic field, it's not the WEIGHT of a car that makes the light change. So there.] I drank some water and glanced down the highway. There was an 18-wheeler approaching, and I realized he was stopping. I had managed to trip the light just in time to make him stop. As I crossed in front of him, I raised my left hand with my palm to the sky and mouthed to the driver, "I'm sorry!" He laughed and waved me on across the road. I thought that was cool.
Later I was riding through the Little Town of Bethlehem, home to many streets with Biblical names and a post office that gets inundated with folks sending their Christmas cards to be mailed FROM there every year. And a huge church that a race horse built. Oh, and a poultry processing plant. Gotta love riding by there at certain times on a hot summer's day. Anyway, I was passing the poultry plant and heard a car behind me. The car slowed down as it got even with me, and I thought "Uh oh." Then the driver said, "Hey!" And I thought, "Oh crap." I was afraid it was going to be one of those guys who throws bottles of water at cyclists or at the very least screams obscenities at them.
It was one of my students. He recognized me because I had my bicycle at school last week. I told him to stop wasting gas, he laughed, and they went on. It made me smile because even with his car full of friends, he stopped to speak to HIS TEACHER. On a BICYCLE. And he was NICE to me.
Man, I hope the weather next weekend is exactly like it was today. It's times like this when I love living in the South.
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