Ride Saturday, May 3: Over the Hill(Slug)s and Far Away

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Saturday
May 3
B-/B
9:30 a.m.
46 +/- miles

OVER THE HILL(SLUG)S AND FAR AWAY:

The drive to Pluckemin will be worth it for this scenic ride in the northern Hunterdon County hills. There will be a few big climbs for us to take our time on and a huge downhill that will blow your mind. There will be two rest stops. Nobody will be dropped. Pace-pushers are not welcome. Wet roads cancel.


If you want to carpool up there, please contact me at perpetualheadwinds at gmail dot com. We'll probably meet at my house around 8:15 and figure out how many cars we'll need to take.

If you want to drive to Pluckemin on your own, here are the directions:

Rt 206 N to Somerville Circle
1/4 of way around the circle and follow signs for Rt 22/Rt 287
Stay in left lane and follow signs for Rt 287 N
Rt 287 N to Exit 22 (towards Pluckemin)
Drops you onto Rt 202/206 South
1st traffic light is a jughandle for the shopping center
Go through that traffic light to the next traffic light
Make right onto Burnt Mills Rd
Parking lot is behind bank - first left

Leading from the Back

24 April 2008

The weather is good. The roads are dry. I’m not sick. I can see out of both eyes. Hallelujah! I’m leading a ride!

Today is the Freewheelers’ Spring Fling, where we gather at the Masonic Temple in Princeton at 1 p.m. and lead rides until 4 p.m., at which point we go inside, pig out, pick up our ride leader jerseys, and hang out with all the people we haven’t seen since the mercury dipped below forty degrees five months ago.

Except there was a screw-up this time: Nobody told us ride leaders or the coordinators that the Fling was today and we all submitted morning rides, which got published in the Freewheel. Which is fine with me. I’d rather not have twenty-five people in a hurry to get back to the lodge for the food. This way, we can take our time, get home, get showered, and not stink by the time 4 p.m. rolls around.

So I meet Cheryl at our usual corner. Mike B. is still down for the count with his version of the plague. Chris and Mike M. are at the parking lot when we get to Pennington. There’s a guy I haven’t met before but whom Cheryl told me about, named Murdo, from Glasgow by way of Montreal. He’s best buddies with Drew, also from Montreal, who went on a handful of my rides last spring. The two of them are identically matched: they’re small, muscular, friendly, and fast. Big Joe bikes in and I re-think the route so that he’ll stay for the whole ride. His back is still giving him trouble, so I figure out how to avoid the big hills. John Danek arrives. There’s one more guy at the end of the lot. None of us knows him. His name is Jerry, and he’s new to the Freewheelers.

We’re heading to Stanton, home of the Giant Muffins. Cheryl brought her coffee club card for the Stanton General Store, so I’m not allowed to go anywhere else today.

It’s clear in the first five minutes that we have a fast crew. Drew and John know each other. Joe knows Drew and Murdo; I figure this out because he’s cursing at them already. Drew, Murdo, and John are darting ahead, Mike M. and Joe close behind Cheryl. I’m in the back.

Chris is busy criticizing me, mostly telling me that Spinning over the winter has made me slow, unlike him, with his wind trainer at home. He seems to have forgotten that I’ve been riding outside, with him, along side him, all winter long. He seems also to have forgotten that I no longer care if I’m last up a hill.

I check in on Jerry, who has been holding his own up in front with Mike and Cheryl. He says he did fifty miles in the Watchungs a few days ago and that his legs could have used another day of rest. He’s the only wild card in the group; everyone else I either know or know about.

I’m having fun watching everyone zip up the hills ahead of me. John, Joe, Murdo, and Drew are clearly feeding off of each other. Mike is enjoying his new-found speed. They all wait for everyone else at every turn.

At the top of the Sourlands I give the instruction to have fun all the way to the bottom of Rileyville Road. As I crest the last roller before the descent I make sure I can see Jerry behind me. He’s there. Down I plummet.

We seem to be waiting an awfully long time at the bottom for Jerry to appear. He doesn’t.

Cheryl suggests I call the emergency number Jerry signed in with, just to tell whomever it is that Jerry seems to have left the ride without telling me, and to ask that he call me when he gets in. I dial the number. It’s disconnected. I pass the sign-in sheet around. “Tell me what you think this says.”

Half the crew can’t read it without glasses. Chris says, “This is what you get when you ride with people over forty.” The gang agrees that I dialed the right number.

Drew, Murdo, John, and Mike volunteer to climb back up to look for Jerry. I’m glad to let them do it; I’m not climbing Rileyville if I don’t have to. “They just want to go down the hill again,” Joe says.

While we wait, Chris notices a few pieces of wax left on Kermit that I didn’t manage to wipe away. “You realize you’ve done nothing but criticize me all day today, don’t you?” I ask him.

“Yeah, well…” He trails off.

It seems an eternity before Mike comes back down the hill, followed by Drew and Murdo, and then John. John had gone all the way back up to the top of the ridge without seeing Jerry.

This is my fault for not giving my usual lecture at the beginning of the ride, the one where I tell people that if they’re going to leave the ride they need to tell someone. Cheryl says, “He said he belongs to four bike clubs. He knows better.” I feel exonerated by this. We push off again towards Stanton.

As we turn onto Manners Road for a short incline, a green tractor pulls in behind us. Drew, or Murdo, or John, or somebody, says, “We’re NOT going slower than that tractor!” I say, “I am,” as it passes me. Just then Drew stops short in front of me, his chain off. Even the tractor is out of sight in the few seconds it takes to fix it. “You might want to go back down the hill and start over,” I tell him as I try to pedal fast enough to clip back in without falling over.

By the time we crest the hill everyone is so far ahead that half of them have missed the turn I plan to make. I signal, shout, and turn, hoping everyone sees me. They have, although I worry for a few minutes that I might have lost Joe. It’s a real buzz kill that I put that turn in there, just before the bottom of the hill. But the turn is worth it for the farms, the steel bridge, and the herd of cows at the edge of the pasture at the end of the road.

At some point, John asks me if I have any duct tape for Chris’ mouth. “I have a little,” I tell him. He says, “I finally set your blog as a feed and the posting stopped.”

“I couldn’t see.” I clearly have some catching up to do. “Today will definitely make it in.”

As we approach Stanton, I choose the easier, slightly longer, and possibly prettier route through the back roads part of the way up Cushertunk Mountain. There’s a bend in the road that never fails to fake people out. It’s worth the detour to see people react to what looks like a wall of a hill to climb but turns out to be a driveway. It even fools me today, and I already know it’s there. On the final turn down Stanton Mountain Road, I look to the right. Last year Tom took a picture of hay bales on this slope. There’s no hay today, just rolling hills in the distance.

Stanton General Store is hopping. The tables we’re used to sitting at in the back yard aren’t out yet. I go into the bathroom, which is in an outbuilding behind the back patio. A long green rug with black lettering lines the center of the room. It reads, inexplicably, “fresh produce.” It smells like a dentist’s office, which, considering the alternatives, isn’t really a bad thing. I refill my water bottle in the sink then go into the store.

The woman working the cash register is new, so the line is long. I find myself standing head-to-head with the biggest muffins I’ve ever seen. These are big even by Stanton standards. How much batter do they have to pour into the pans in order to get the top to be triple the size and width of the bottom? They’ve had to use a knife to excise individuals. I pull out my cell phone for a picture. Dale and Sean have to see this.



Mike looks over. “My mother told me never to eat anything bigger than my head,” he says. He’s got a sports drink and a banana. What self-control. I tell Murdo about our first foray up to Round Valley two years ago: “Whatever you do,” I’d told people, “don’t eat the whole muffin.” Mike hadn’t listened to me and he paid the price. He wasn’t the only one. “I have no self control,” he says. He sure does right now.

I don’t. I buy my twenty ounces of coffee (my first dose since last Sunday) and rent a forklift to take a chocolate chip muffin outside.

By the counter is a petition to keep Round Valley State Park open. Our governor, in an attempt to get us out of severe debt, has decided to close a handful of popular state parks, saving all of 0.3% of the state’s budget in the process. This is not going down well with the environmental, camping, and hiking sets. The backlash has been strong enough that the governor might be backing down. If you want to add to the din, click here.

Outside I have help with the muffin and listen to John and the Canadian duo tell war stories about hills John dragged them up. Across the road the trees are blooming on the hillside. Cheryl and I have the same thought: we’re remembering our fall foray up here by car, when the leaves were just starting to turn.

I call Jack to check in on him. He has a sore throat and fever today. Cheryl and Dale were right: we can’t catch a break in our house. Jack wants to go see a nurse at a walk-in clinic at a Princeton CVS. I’m calculating time and distance. It’s nearly noon, we have at least twenty-five miles to go, and I still have to bike home after that. The clinic closes at 4 p.m. I pull out my maps and start to figure out the fastest route back that won’t kill us in the process. So many ways home, so many pretty roads, so many surprises I could throw in if I had the time and energy. Which I don’t. Rainbow Hill will have to wait. Pity; I’d love to see the Canadians’ reaction. Joe would outright strangle me, though. I’m better off in the lowlands today.

As we get our gloves and helmets back on, Drew says he’s in a bit of hot water. “We have a thirteen-month old at home,” he explains.

“You fool,” I tell him.

“I told my wife I’d be home by one o’clock.”

“That ain’t happening.” It’s already past noon. As fast as he is, there’s just no way.

The route home from Stanton starts with a screaming downhill, but today a fierce headwind is pushing us back. I wait for the coffee to kick in as we cruise along Pleasant Run Road, following the stream. I’m breaking the unspoken rule of not repeating roads by turning back the way we came, but things look and feel different on the way home. Most noticeable is the amount of coasting we’re doing. It’s not so obvious on the way up that the flat roads around here aren’t really flat at all.

The rollers start as we get closer to the Sourlands. Fully caffeinated and sugared up, we’re riding in a group three-deep and chatty. From the back the Canadians burst through, in full sprint, towards the next roller. “You snooze, you lose, Danek!”

John looks up and says to us, “Sure, after they’ve been drafting off me. You know, it’s a hollow victory if I’m not chasing them.” I’m laughing too hard to be annoyed at their behavior. They remind me of Thing One and Thing Two from The Cat in the Hat. “There they go,” I say, “The Montreal Mayhem.”

As we come back to Cider Mill Road, the cows that were at the edge of the pasture have moved off to the middle. “I wonder if you can tell time by cow movements in a pasture,” I muse.

Cheryl, having missed the “I wonder,” says, “Really?” That would be pretty cool, though: We’re late. The cows are in the back forty already.

We go up the Sourlands sideways to keep Joe’s back from mutiny. The cows that live on the farm bisecting Orchard Road are nowhere to be seen today. Too bad. Today’s ride could use a cattle crossing.

John notices that my saddle might be a little low. I agree. “I’ve been feeling a bit Sluggish.” Even one millimeter in height can make a lot of difference in power.

I lead us all the way down Linvale to where it intersects with Route 31, one of the no-no roads that might as well be a river. Joe wants to get home, so he says he’s going to take 31 all the way into Pennington. He assures me it’s safe.

We go straight, up the same ridge that Poor Farm reaches, only this isn’t nearly as steep. We get to dive-bomb down the other side, too. My plan is to cross 31 and take the back roads into town, but as we approach the intersection, Joe whizzes by.

The Mayhem look at John, and John at the Mayhem. John shouts something and they turn onto 31 as a unit. I should be pissed off for letting pace-pushers take control of my ride, but I’m not. I’m laughing instead. Now we’re shifting into high gear in hot pursuit of Joe. Chris and Mike fly past me. The Mayhem catches Joe far ahead of us.

Mike gets caught at the light with me and Cheryl. We take the back roads into Pennington. “Well, they dropped the leader,” I say. I should be hopping mad by now. I’m not.

When we regroup in the parking lot, I make sure to let Murdo know that I don’t normally tolerate this sort of behavior. “But you two are so funny.” He apologizes, even though there’s no need. He tells me to warn him next time. I say I will and tell him that my rides are meant for people moving up to the B level and that I’ve had riders pull into the parking lot, see who’s there, and turn around again, intimidated. I don’t ever want that to happen again. It might have already; we lost Jerry pretty early.

Cheryl and I ride home. I get back in time to shower and take Jack to the CVS. He finishes up with the nurse (he’s got a virus) in time for us to get to the Spring Fling ten minutes after the party has officially begun.

I see a lot of people I haven’t seen since I stopped riding in Cranbury. I have to apologize to Larry. I miss riding with him. I find Hilda and ask her if she wants to ride with us to New Egypt tomorrow. She says she does and I’m psyched.

Bob and Norene show up. It’s a full ten minutes before I remember that she’s wearing a wig. She’s come out of chemo with flying colors.

Mike B. has managed to drag himself out of his house. I send him to Jack so they can be sick together.

Cheryl finds me in the crowd. “Jerry’s here,” she says. “He told me he felt his heart murmur at the top of Rileyville so he went and did his own thing. He went fifty miles.”

“Holy cow.”

“I told him he should have told one of us what was going on. He says he’s sorry.”

I look over the crowd but I don’t see him.

Michael H., our new Club President, calls everyone to attention. He welcomes us and does the usual Presidential thing, and then it’s Larry’s turn to hand out the ride leader jerseys. This can be tedious if you don’t know who any of the ride leaders are. Jack, standing against the back wall, is probably bored out of his skull. Larry introduces me as Our Lady of Perpetual Headwinds. People who don’t know me must be very confused right now.

This year the party is being catered. I’m hungry, but there’s nothing left that resembles food as far as my veggie brain is concerned. It’s just as well.

Bob wants to go to Tiger Noodle for dinner. Jack is so out of it that he’s reading in the car by the time we’re ready to go at 6 p.m. We wind up at Ya-Ya Noodle, Tiger’s sister restaurant, instead, since Tiger is in Princeton, which is mired in Communiversity crowds today. Hank, Terry M., Michael, Carol, and Terry S. are already there at their own round table. We get a small table next to theirs. After most of their crowd has left, Michael and Terry S. pull chairs up to our table and we chatter away until 9 p.m.

At home I raise my seat by a millimeter or so, get my water bottles ready, send around an email for tomorrow’s impromptu Not Cranbury ride, and collapse into bed with Jack and the cats. I’ll figure out the route to New Egypt tomorrow.

The alarm goes off at 7:30, and Cheryl calls seconds later. “The roads are wet,” she says. It’s off to the gym for more of that Spinning Chris loves so much.

Next Saturday is our big trip to Pluckemin for non-stop scenery, a couple of monster hills, and the Best Downhill Ever. What are the odds I catch Jack’s virus on Friday?

Interlude: They Say the Third Time's a Charm

(photo credit: http://www.eyedoctom.com/eyedoctom/EyeInfo/CornealAbrasion.asp)



21 to 27 April 2008

So, as I was saying, I was good until Monday afternoon. I was at work, figuring that if I’d actually re-scratched my cornea there’s no way I could have labeled sixty tiny centrifuge tubes in preparation for tomorrow’s experiment. On the other hand, if I weren’t concerned that I might have scratched it, I wouldn’t have labeled them a day in advance, in anticipation of impending extreme light-sensitivity.

The light sensitivity started around 2 p.m. By the time I got to the gym to lift weights, I was into the extreme tears phase. Wednesday had me back at Scheie Eye Institute for my third recurrence of recurrent corneal abrasion. So much for dodging a bullet.

Let me back up a little bit and explain this whole thing. If you’re oogy about eyeballs or if foul language offends you, read no further. Corneal abrasion comes with lots of both.

What happens is that some lucky people like me sustain a corneal scratch some time in our lives. The scratch heals, but the layer of cells over the cornea (the epithelium) is never quite as good as new. An untold number of years later (twenty-one for me) the spot that healed comes unglued. Over and over again.

The typical situation goes like this: Everyone’s eyes dry out a little at night. Combine this with seasonal allergies – including swollen eyelids – and a reason to wake up in the middle of the night – to pee, to cough, to make way for a cat, whatever – and all hell breaks loose. The swollen eyelids stick to the epithelium over the cornea, get a hold of the old wound site, and rip the wound open again.

This hurts like a sonofabitch.

Like road rash in salt water. For days.

What happens next, besides a good case of denial, is a free pass of a few hours to a day or so, when the flap of epithelium that tore might lie down over the cut and start to heal, loosely. If you’re lucky, things heal and you never know anything is wrong. Looking back, I think his happened to me at least three times last spring before things got bad in June. If you’re not lucky, the free pass goes away.

You start to notice that things are too bright. You pull down the shades, cut the brightness on your computer screen, and pull out the sunglasses. You look in the mirror and things seem a little watery. Your eye sort of hurts, especially when you blink. Things are only going to get worse from here, so if you haven’t already seen an eye doctor, you need to go right now.

By the time your name gets called at the Scheie Eye Institute, you’re holding a bandana on your cheek to catch the waterfall coming out of your eye. You can’t read for more than thirty seconds, so you’re sitting with your head back and your eyes closed. When your name gets called you open your eyes too quickly and FUCK that hurts!

Then you get an hour of bliss when the doctors put the numbing drops in. You want to take the whole bottle home, but they won’t let you. It impedes the healing process. Rats. They put fluorescein dye in your eye. The world out of your bad eye turns orange-yellow. The doctors flip on a blue filter and look in your eye. Where the cut is, they see green.

The first few times that corneal abrasion recurs, the doctors will probably let the flap of loose epithelium sit back down over the cut and heal. But the risk of the flap coming loose is always there. The surface isn’t smooth like it should be. It’s sticking up there, waiting to be pulled open again. The third time around, the doctors go for a more extreme treatment.

More numbing drops, a cotton swab, and the flap gets peeled off completely. A fresh wound, bigger, and it’s going to hurt like hell when the drops wear off. But this will make things heal more quickly, and, more importantly and hopefully, more smoothly. A good doctor will show mercy at this point, close your eye, and put a patch over it for a day. This is instantly more comfortable, because when your eye is open hurts like hell each and every time you blink, as your swollen eyelid rubs against the cut.

Congratulations. You’re a pirate for a day.

You ride the pain-free wave for about an hour, at which point your good eye is getting tired putting in overtime for no extra pay. You sit down to close your eyes for a few minutes.

MOTHERFUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You’ve just learned the hard way that, since your eyes track together, and since they roll up a little when you close your eyes, the crater in your eye is rubbing against your eyelid as your eye ever so slightly moves. You learn to dig your fingernails into your palm whenever you do more than blink.

A few hours go by before you realize that your good eyelid is at half-mast. You can no longer keep it open any further, nor can you look anywhere but down. It’s time to go to bed, and if you can’t, you need to stand up and walk around, focusing on nothing in particular. You can take a short nap if you want to, and you’ll want to because you’ll be exhausted. Just remember to get your fingernails next to your palm before you close your eyes. Tylenol might help a little here. It’s tough to tell.

Climbing into bed for the night feels good. The next morning you’ll notice that closing your good eye doesn’t hurt the bad one so much anymore. You won’t have to punch out the doctor after all. But your good eye still won’t open all the way. All you can do is count the hours until the patch comes off.

When it does, you know that the worst two days of this episode are over. But you can’t see more than colored blobs out of your bad eye. Your now have corneal edema – swelling of the cornea – and it’s going to take more than a few days to come down. You’re put on a regimen of antibiotic ointment to keep infection away and hypertonicity ointment to bring the swelling down. You’re binocular again, but half your vision is through a thick piece of clear Jell-O.

Knowing the worst is over, you can now entertain yourself as the swelling gradually disappears and the Jell-O gets thinner. On the first day you see a blob on the wall where the clock is supposed to be. By that evening you might notice that the blob might read 7 p.m. The next morning you can definitely tell the time, but not to the minute. By the evening, the second hand comes back. I like doing the shampoo bottle test in the shower. The first day the bottle is a white blob. At the end of the second day, if I get right up to it, I can read the fine print on the label. A day later I can step halfway back in the tub before the words blur in the Jell-O.

Two days after the patch comes off you can ride your bike again, even if you have to follow the double white line on the side of the road. Cloudiness and dark sunglasses help, even though you haven’t been light sensitive since the evening after the patch came off. The shades just eliminate the glare that seems to bounce off the Jell-O.

You find it amusing that you see as well at a distance out of your bad eye as Jack sees with his glasses on. You get to feel smug for having good vision.

Around the same time you’ll find you’re not squinting at your computer screen. You haven’t had to enlarge the text for a couple of days now. You don’t even notice the Jell-O unless you close your good eye. Even then, you can read the words on your screen with your bad eye, if you get all up close to the screen and stuff. OK, so you’re not completely healed. Stop with the testing and just ignore it. By the time you go back for your final visit to the eye doctor your vision will be almost normal.

Now all you have to do is keep up with the hypertonicity ointment, wear eye protection when you do yard work, and hope your eyes don’t crust over again at night, ever.

Because the next time this happens, the doctors are going to perform what they like to call a “procedure:” stromal puncture. They’re going to make tiny cuts with a needle, through the epithelium, down into the cornea, to create scar tissue at the wound site. They’re going to want to do this while you’re suffering through your next abrasion. Scar tissue, they say, will form at the injury site, and the scar tissue will hold the epithelium down much better than the epithelium has been doing by itself.

But you’re not going to let this happen again, are you? Because the crater has healed over smoothly this time, right? (I’ll know on Wednesday.)

OK, time to go put more Muro128 in my eye. All hail the mighty hypertonicity goop!

Bronchitis, Belmar, and Dodging Bullets

19 April 2008

Maybe I never really got over the virus I brought home from Portland. Maybe it was because the next weekend I went all-out in a rainy morning Spinning class and then followed the Joes for 50 miles up Route 29 that afternoon (stupid, stupid, stupid – Jack was out of town and therefore unable to inject a dose of rationality). Or maybe it was just dumb luck that a few days later I woke up, with a fever, coughing wrong-colored gobs. Whatever the reason, three feverish days, a chest x-ray, and a viral diagnosis later saw me in no condition to lead a bike ride into the Sourlands.

Thanks go to Cheryl for leading my ride that day. I was so out of it that when she called me the next day to see how I was and to report on the mayhem that was the Sunday Cranbury ride – business as usual – I’d forgotten what she’d done the day before.

By the weekend of April 19 I seemed to have my lungs back, so I went with the Joes and the Mikes for a metric to Belmar. Mike B. picked me up at home and we had a good, long chance to talk for the first time in a long time.

The Joes sure do love their Belmar ride; I’ve been on a few, and it’s never the same route twice. I’ve never really liked Belmar. It lacks the charm of Cape May and the nudity of Sandy Hook. But it is the easiest spot of ocean to get to from where we all live. I’ve learned by now to pack my own lunch because the Joes don’t stop at the sandwich shop at the edge of the old rail line bike trail.

The weather was a slice of perfect summer: no humidity, clear skies, and temperatures nearing eighty degrees. I was in full summer regalia for the first time since, probably, September. We started off from Etra Park near Hightstown, into the wind. I immediately started coughing. Big Joe, of course, feigned annoyance. I made a mental note to get up behind him every time another coughing fit came on, just to be sure he’d hear me.

We were flying along in a good pace line for a while before I noticed that there seemed to be more traffic than usual, but I figured the guys knew where they were going. It wasn’t until we came upon a four-way, four-lane intersection that Big Joe declared, “This sucks.” We pulled into a driveway and Little Joe pulled out a map. It looked like we’d be stuck here until we passed Route 9. Mike B. said, “Let’s go back to Etra Park and start over.” I probably coughed again.

It wasn’t all bad: I did see a sign that pointed to Manasquan and Matawan both. Two more for the Garden State Stomp, but I didn’t get a picture. I’m sure I’ll never be by there again on purpose. Oh well.

Mike M., 25 pounds lighter (“I stopped drinking so much beer.”) was having a grand old time pulling the rest of us. Mike B., having covered too much distance during the week, wasn’t feeling his best. Three days later he’d come down with a bacterial respiratory infection and a fever to call his very own. I was in the back, trying to regulate my breathing in between coughing fits. Three days later I’d be wearing an eye patch, but that’s another blog entry.

We stopped one more time so the Joes could check Little Joe’s map. The Joes, lost! Who’d a thunk it? There was a very little, very old graveyard by the road. I thought I took a picture of it, but apparently I only thought I did.




As we approached Spring Lake we could feel the temperature drop by what must have been ten degrees. On the boardwalk was a long-distance relay race. I looked at the monster mansions facing the sea, wondering if any were foreclosed. The brick gate at the edge of town, where Belmar begins, was half torn down, undergoing repair. The line at Dunkin Donuts was, as ever, long, and they were out of muffins, but I did get a giant iced coffee and a bagel (good and mushy inside).

The guys ate their sandwiches and I worked on the bagel crust and a trail mix bar. Big Joe and Mike B. helped devour the bagel guts. Before we left I poured the remains of my coffee into my water bottle and asked if the guys minded if I got a few shots of the shore. “Sure, Tom,” Big Joe said. Tom’s photos are far too good for me to have taken offense at this, but it was a worthy pot-shot all the same. If you aren’t a target for Joe, you’re nobody. If he directs a “Fuck you” at you, you know you’re in good with him.





We had a tailwind on the way back. This never happens.

Mike M. was hauling beer-free ass down the road. I tucked in behind Big Joe, coughing without breathing and trying to breathe without coughing. Mike B. stayed behind me, out of sympathy or exhaustion, I’m not sure which. Little Joe suggested another rest stop at the Sunrise Deli at the edge of Turkey Swamp.




A few miles from the park, the Mikes and Little Joe took off, leaving me and Big Joe to grumble in peace. I felt pretty bad when I got back to the parking lot, but I was so close to seventy miles that I circled the lot a few times to get the round number. After this much pain, I needed that “70.0” to justify it. I felt like barfing as I climbed into Mike’s Jeep. What a way to train for a century, I thought. One week off, one week on. This can’t work.

When we got home I invited Mike into our screened porch in back of the house, where I knew by the hour that Jack would just be pouring his afternoon tea. Mike collapsed into one of our cushioned chair and I brought us water. Neither of us felt like moving. Jack, having caught a bit of my virus, but without the lung goop, wasn’t full of energy either, so the three of us talked about Shakespeare plays for a while. Mike finally mustered the energy to lift himself up and went home. I fell asleep for twenty minutes right where I was, then stumbled upstairs to take a shower and soak my legs.

Jack and I went to sleep early. If my legs felt good in the morning, I’d go over to Bob Parson’s hilly ride. As one of the Anchor House crowd, he’s into going vertical, but I like him and the people he rides with, like Michael H. and Barbara, so I’m willing to be intimidated every now and then. I fell asleep hoping to make it to the morning without coughing.

I got as far as 4:11 a.m. when I felt a tickle in my throat. I sat up and could tell that my eyes had crusted over during the night, as they’d been doing for the past three days. I knew I was in danger of re-injuring my cornea; this is how recurrent corneal abrasion happens, textbook. I opened my left eye, then, very carefully, slowly, tried to open the right one.

FUCK! No. I did not just scratch my cornea. I did not. It’s just sore, that’s all. I stumbled into the bathroom. Both eyes were red. Must be allergies, that’s all. I put the requisite medicine in my right eye and refused to open it again until the alarm went off at 8 a.m.

When I sat up again, it seemed I’d dodged a bullet. I put more medicine in and got dressed for the ride.

It was cloudy and a good deal cooler than the day before, but Bob got a good size crowd. He was merciful and didn’t send us up Poor Farm. Perhaps my quiet chants of “Woosamonsa, Woosamonsa” helped influence his decision to go up Woosamonsa instead.

At the rest stop in Sergeantsville I checked my eye. It didn’t look red and only felt a bit off. I told Barbara that it “feels like it’s gonna blow.” But for the rest of that day, and halfway through the next, it didn’t.

Mike B. says, "It's spring!"

One of the perks of working from home is getting pictures like this one from just outside Mike B's front door:





The best I can do is this, taken with my cell phone as I look outside the window of the lab:



That's a tulip poplar putting out new leaves, and behind it is the back end of The Quad, a huge, old dorm building at Penn.

Interlude: Snot Blogging

13 April 2008

I woke up on Wednesday and coughed up a fluorescent glob. From there it went to a fever, a visit to the doctor, a chest x-ray, a steroid inhaler, and a handful of days spent at home doing nothing but fevering and coughing.

Thanks go to Cheryl for leading my ride for me, and for those of you who sent good wishes. I'm feeling much better.

Now Jack has it, but not nearly as bad.

In lieu of a biking photo, here's one I took as I walked into Philadelphia's 30th Street Station on Tuesday afternoon. The columns are the train station; the glass building is the Cira Centre, which lights up at night with multicolored LEDs.

Guest Blogging: Mike B's Adventure

My rides are normally very uneventful, well not today.

First I was pulled over by the Lawrenceville police on Pennington - Lawrenceville Rd. Apparently I matched the description of a missing person. After a couple of questions they let me go. It was all very strange. A little later when I was passing through Pennington I think I saw the man they were looking for, he was dressed just like me and had a similar bike.

If that was not enough excitement, while I was riding up Pleasant Valley – Harbourton Rd this dog starts running down his lawn after me. I figured it would stop at the curve but it just continued running into the street and after my feet. I rode as fast as I could and some how I beat him out going up the hill. I really thought that I was toast this time.

For the rest of the ride I kept waiting to see what would happen next. Luckily I made it back in one piece.

Andy Does Bar Tricks

2 April 2008

Tonight was Jeff's first Wednesday night ride of the season. I had the day off so I actually made it to Washington Crossing by 6 p.m. This will never happen again. It was a short, beautiful ride.

We went to dinner at It's Nuts, which looks like a cheesy 1950's diner from the outside and a pizzaria on the inside. The food is a combination of faux lowbrow pizza and faux highbrow cuisine (goat cheese, arugula, you get the idea).

Andy entertained us:

Interlude: They Didn't Have Linguini

In a hotel bar in Portland the subject of Arlo Guthrie's storytelling came up. Jack and I quoted lines from "The Story of Reuben Clamzo and His Strange Daughter in the Key of A," but there's nothing like hearing the real thing.

If you can find the album "One Night," it's on there. iTunes has it, too, if you search for the word "clamzo."

Meanwhile, you can read the story here.

If you have a drink in your hands, put it down before you read the words. Trust me.

But you should really listen to it. All 17 minutes and 33 seconds of it.