two rides, one where i'm an idiot

On 10/17, I did a ride with the Old Guys, including the Ride-To-The-Ride with Erich W. It was a fun ride; I like riding with these guys.. but there was little distinctive about it, and how many times can I say, "Beautiful Fall ride!"?

Here's that route.  The one thing that I remember was that, before the ride back, Erich asked me not to set a pace that he couldn't keep comfortably. I kept him in my mirror and kept a pace where he seemed to be right behind me, but not crowding, and, at the end, he agreed that the pace was fine.

I've been less-than-charmed with Strava, and how I respond to it, and competitiveness generally. I had a short stint as "King of the Mountain" on a little-ridden stretch, and when I got the email earlier this month that said I'd lost my title, I had a brief, red-flushed idea of going out to defend my title... but this way madness lies; I know my pace and strength, and I don't need to be testing myself against other riders all the time. I ride, partly, for fellowship, and I don't want to be that competitive; there's enough of that in the rest of life. This interaction with Erich was a reminder of that. As the Hill Slugs say, amicitia quam celeritate (go look it up).

Yesterday, Laura agreed to lead Ed's "Castner Murders Ride" as a Hill Slugs ride, but the only Slug that showed was me (and Ed, who's an occasional Slug); there were two of Ed's riding buddies, as well: Roy, who does randonneuring, and Rick, about whom I learned little (except that the four of them all have PhD's, and I don't). I had not thought to do a group ride this weekend at all: The Excellent Wife (TEW) had been agitating for a date this weekend, as I have left her a bike widow far too frequently all season, but Friday she said that the other social responsibilities we had planned would count for the date. Yes, Jim, you can go on the ride; be sure to be home at 4:30 pm so we can be on time to the in-laws for the nephew's birthday celebration.

Yes, MA'AM! So I appeared at the start for this ride, delighted to be out riding with folks (have I made it adequately clear that I love to ride with people I like? And didn't Ed and Laura look pleasantly surprised to see me!). We had a great, dawdling time for the first almost-50 miles of the ride: sit-down at Thisilldous (see that Castner Murders ride for a link and a description); chatted with a local along the river about flooding; Ed zipped off the route, and got lost and found again; we met a few of Roy's rando buddies doing a short (for them) 90-mile ride (they have great bikes, with lights and carrying capacity for the up-to-600km [375-mile] rides they do).

But I get tired, and when I do, I make stupid mistakes. Usually, there are about navigation, like not knowing my right from my left. Yesterday, I looked at my computer and saw the time was 3:27, with about 11 miles to go. What! I've got to be home and showered by 4:30! So I bade a quick goodbye to the others, and ripped back to the car (pretty good speed for some of those uphills, too!); loaded up the bike; got in and started to drive home. Called TEW (the car has a bluetooth connection for my phone)... and noticed the time on the dash was about 2:35.

I had confused the time of day on the computer with the time riding. D'OH!

Not only is it safe to resume that Jim doesn't know where he is... it's also, apparently, not safe to presume that Jim is accurate on anything else of importance, either.