not-at-my-best ride with ken g

I haven't been on the bike in weeks, and (since next week is Father's day) I'll probably miss one group ride next week, so I wanted to get out today. I needed to see Ken G about something anyway, so I decided to do his "Ride the Hills with Hart's" ride.

But after the long ride yesterday, and being not-entirely-healthy (dregs of a cold, I think, with coughing and lost voice; people who know me may think I'm not entirely healthy much of the time, but they would not usually be referring to my respiratory function)... anyway, with the long ride and feeling a bit off, this was a tough ride for me. I kept up, but when Ken suggested we could shorten the route after the stop, I was not the first to assent, but I wasted no time in adding my vote.

We did this route. Ken hadn't pre-checked the mileage when he set it up online, but he's got a sense for these things, and the mileage came in right where he had expected. We had five: besides Ken and me, were John K, sometime-Hill-Slug Peter, and Bob. I started out hot, but I was just managing by the time we got to the rest stop.

By that time, we'd gone up Spring Hill to Lindbergh Road. I've written before about Ken's uncanny ability to meet people he knows, and today provided another example. I huffed and puffed around a corner to find the other riders and Ken talking to a guy with a dog on Lindbergh; it turned out to be Mel of Tandems East. (Shoulda got a picture...)

At the stop, and for much of the ride thereafter, Ken told me about people he'd run into in various places: when he lived in Colorado, he met a woman he'd met when he was racing out here; he also met a rider on whose bike he'd worked a few months previously in NJ, and so on. When he wasn't doing that, he was trading puns and groaners with John K.

I was mostly just keeping the pedals spinning, and had had enough by the end. I spent the obligatory few minutes in Hart's, and then came home, and after a shower and a laundry, I installed cyclocross brake levers on The Excellent Wife (TEW)'s bike. I now have experience with internal cable routing.

Next week, a dilemma. I'm only riding Saturday (if the weather holds). Friend Ed C is leading one (I like to do his rides)... but John K has invited me on a Father's Day ride (on the Saturday), and Paul I is leading an impromptu ride (see the comments on the Freewheeler's Facebook Page for yesterday's post, if he hasnm't mae a more formal announcement, yet). Hrmph! At least three people want me to ride with 'em. Good problem to have!

Pictures:

Yeah, not many. I was beat, remember?