It’s not an uncommon occurrence that the majority of blog post in my feed reader are bloggers trying to come back from the land-of-the-lost. Sadly, most of the blogs in my feeds have had no posts at all in several months. I keep them in my feed hoping that they will return with a post now and again.
Others may argue with me, but I blame the social networking boom for the demise of blogging. Many of the inactive bloggers are active on “the networks.”
It’s great to have company when you’re out on the road for extended periods of time. Today, I was fortunate to have Bill along for the ride.
You wouldn’t know it, but Bill is 77 years young. He rides 3-4 times a week with his bike club and my mom. I hope, when I am his age, that I am still going, and going, and going like Bill seems to be.
Bill and I had an awesome 55 mile ride rolling up and down through the hills and past reservoir after reservoir after reservoir.
We have a new visitor in our house this week. Only 8 weeks old, the little guy is still adjusting to life away from the litter. Last night, being his first night of separation from his siblings, he was particularly emotional. It didn’t help that he spent most of the night in isolation.
Somewhere about 3 am, I emerged from my sleep to hear a dull but audible wreer-wreer-wreer sound. It took a bit to identify it. In my sleepy state, I mistook it for a car alarm. Oddly, it sounded like it was coming from my garage. But when I got up to investigate, it became clear that the sound was the sad yelping of the new pup.
I couldn’t, for the life of me, figure out why it was coming from the garage as I clearly witnessed BoBo setting up the crate in his room.
Moments later, BoBo emerged…
“It’s okay, Ma.” he said, “He’s needs to adjust.”
“He needs to SHUT UP is what he needs.” I responded. “Why isn’t he in your room?”
“He’s needs to separate from me.”
“Huh?”
“I’m reading a book.”
“You need a NEW book.”
At this point, I realized that I wasn’t being very supportive. I was tired and the pup was clearly NOT adjusting as BoBo’s book suggested. But I returned to my room, inserted some earplugs into the depths of my ear canal, and added some additional finger pressure for good measure.
It did no good. An hour later, Lil’ Yelp had turned up the volume so much that Señor Yappy took it as an invitation to join in. Soon, both dogs were singing the chorus of a very l-o-n-g song. And I completely lost my composure. “SHUT UP!” I yelled.
BoBo and I met in the hallway, where I informed him that he was to retrieve both crate and dog from the garage and bring them to his room. The period of separation was over. I then returned to my room and, all through the neighborhood, people and animals breathed a deep sigh of relief…and we all went to sleep.
When you’re riding with stronger cyclists, you have a tendency to fall behind from time to time. This was the case on this week’s long ride. Peddling as hard and fast as I could, I tapped my body for all it had. When I was in lead, I felt strong, but as soon as the stronger riders moved in front I my self-evaluation and cycling self-esteem dropped severely. “I suck” was the only message to be heard. Nine miles into a 50 mile ride, “I suck” is NOT the message that needs to be playing in one’s head.
I found a way of changed it up by telling myself that I was out for a ride by myself. Soon after, I was feeling okay again. For a while anyway.