After work biking
Yesterday Andrew and I tried to go for a ride after work. We loaded the bikes onto the car rack, drove up to the Vienna Community Center (the W&OD trail goes right by there), and started on our way. After about a mile and a half, Andrew’s gear thingy broke (the control on the handle-bars). His bike was stuck in gear, though he was able to bike back to the car. So we went a total of 3 miles, round trip, and then brought his bike to the bike shop. It will be there for about a week. Sigh.
So, today I decided to go on a ride by myself. This is usually Andrew’s cello lesson night, so I would have been alone in the house anyway, so it seemed like a good night. Unfortunately, his lesson was cancelled, but I decided to go anyway. Maybe I’m crazy. It was 92° with a heat index of 100°. No matter.
Benefits of going out at 5:30 PM when its 92° with a 100° heat index:
- Few other crazy people on the trail
- Maybe it was my imagination, but cars actually stopped more often at crossings than usual
The down-side of going out at 5:30 PM when its 92 ° with a 100° heat index:
- A high proportion of the other crazy people on the trail seem to be brainless cyclists of the not-warning-when-passing sort
- Children. When we go out on weekends, there are generally few children, and those that are on the trail are supervised. Tonight there was a group of 10-year-old (or so) boys. They started by zooming past me (to their credit, they gave me a warning), but then stayed at about 30-50 feet in front of me putzing about. I finally got tired of them, and pedalled for all I was worth to get ahead of them…of course, even though I had signalled with my bell, one of the kids decided to start hot-dogging it at that point. ARGH!
- 100° heat index, of course
Total miles: 3 miles Tuesday, 9 miles Wednesday