out of the loop

A long time between posts, partly because not much has been happening except riding, and partly because the little bit that has been happening is not something I'm happy to write about.

I had a fight with the excellent wife about riding to work; I wanted to do it, and she was scared.to.death by the whole prospect. We got to discussing it by email because we couldn't keep sense in person, and in one of the emails she brought up that the bicycle might be affecting our marriage.

That's an argument I take most seriously, partly because this marriage is not my first, and I know what it is for one to fall apart. I immediately withdrew and apologized.

I had been making plans and rebuilding another bike so I could ride to work, and, when those plans were well in progress, to have them yanked out from under me was something to which I reacted like an adolescent, partly because it was the sort of thing that happened a number of times in my adolescence (which continued, more or less, until I was 39; I had a real problem separating from my parents). We're better now, mostly, I think, because I have completely surrendered, based on the "affecting our marriage" salvo. As long as it does not seem frivolous, I've got to concede to that particular demand.

In other news, it was a 160-mile weekend: rode the bike that many miles. I was off Friday 9/9, and rode about 35 miles with the old guys, a group of mostly-retired Freewheelers who ride together three times a week. Some of them are in remarkably good shape (and some are not). And it's one of the few groups I can hang out in these days where I'm the young guy. The next day was the Ride for McBride. The Hill Slugs were scheduled to add 12 miles each way to the 50-mile ride... but partly because of the early call (didja see? 6:45 am?), and partly because of the iffy weather, there were only three of us who rode in all that way... and then, because of some silly disagreements (in which your correspondent played a major supporting role), only two of us rode back. We missed the weather, but it was not the happiest ride of my life. Next day, did about 48 miles in Burlington County, which has the topography of a pancake.

On the McBride Ride, at one point a half-dozen or so of us were rippin' along at 21+-mph (and left some friends in the dust, leading to some more drama). Afterwards, a fellow rider (perhaps I will not be specific as to who it may be) referred to me as a "friendly engine" with whom she enjoys riding. "Friendly engine". It's not an uncomfortable fit. It might go with the "quo debeo agere satis sum" tattoo that I'm not going to get, to balance the "Harvest the damn organs if I'm brain dead" tattoo I'm not going to get on the other side.

Edit 10/25/11: It's only now that I realized that I left out an important part of the day. Part of the reason our time was so good was that we got to chasing some riders who dropped a smaller group of us, and, as a result, we dropped two riders, for one of whom the day probably had special meaning. That sucked. I'm not doing that again.