weekend rides

 I don't really know how to write about the two rides I did this weekend.

My mother died a week or two ago. I'm having a hard time with it. She wasn't as bad of a mother as Medea, but we did not have a happy relationship. My reaction to her death has been unpredictable. Everyone grieves in their own way; I'm angry and anxious and depressed and anhedonic and who even knows what else.

In hopes of some relief, I went on Laura OLPH's ride for the club on Saturday. We went to Seargentsville over mostly-familiar roads, largely to visit the new Covered Bridge Cafe that's taken over the bagel shop there.

I like the place. They've spent a lot on the building, and they seemed to welcome us cyclists. I wish them the best, and I hope we return.

But the ride was mostly interesting in that it proved that I can cover forty miles, and still have my head up my ass at the end of it.

Laura enjoyed my post-ride hat enough to get a picture of it:

 I hope you enjoy it as much as she.

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On Sunday, I'd listed a ride to that bakery in Raritan that some of my riders like (that picture at the top of this post is the gang outside the establishment, as we were planning to depart to return to the start). Many of The Usual Suspects had already signed up for a different ride (as usual, I was late in posting), but I still had fifteen.

As we do, Joe E took the faster folks off the front. I was chatting with fellow retrogrouch Matt F about our disdain for such modern conveniences as electronic shifting; I pointed out that the need to recharge every few months was most inconvenient: if it were once a year, you could just do it the first ride of every season (or, say, on New Year's Day); if much more often, you could do it every week, but the need to recharge every few months, I felt, could not help but lead to mid-ride battery failures.

Sure enough, a few miles later, a rider had a dead battery; in his case, not a charging problem, but a dead CR-2032 coin-sized battery. He took one from his heart monitor and put it in the shifter, and finished the ride. (When he was telling me about it, I thought he meant a medical heart monitor, and feared for his safety. I've clearly spent too much time dealing with death and health problems recently.)

I've had complaints about part of the route, that there's too much distracted and dangerous traffic, so I'd rerouted. We avoided that traffic, but it was still busy as we went through the Duke Estate property.

You can see Saturday's route, and Sunday's.

I'm better than I was before the rides. I'm glad I did them, and I'm glad, and grateful, for the people who came along.