72nd ride of 2017 - Wednesday, 5/31/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 1144.2

This morning's ride was excellent. It was my longest so far in 2017 -- 5 round trips to Marsh Park (42.3 miles), and I began at 5:45 under clear 53° skies. and by the time I finished, 5:30 later, the sunshine was bright and the temperature had climbed to 68*.

As you can see from the chart below, taken from the website of the PALM (Pedal Across Lower Michigan) ride that I'm doing June 24-30, my task that week will be quite simple ... 5 consecutive days of rides about like today or slightly longer, and then one "blow off" final day of only 31 miles.

I am still debating within myself whether or not to try to bring my laptop. I certainly could carry it in the bag on my trike shown in the following picture.

However, I am quite unsure about the prospects for charging it and for accessing the Internet with WiFi along the way. And the biggest concern is its safety—if I were to be struck by a car, it is likely that the laptop would be destroyed. (However, I'd have much bigger fish to fry in such an eventuality ... if a car were to hit me, there is a strong probability that I would be fatally injured. But if that happened, I wouldn't be worried about the laptop! 😇) My cycling mentor, Doug, who has done PALM numerous times before, says there is a high chance I could get one of the SAG vehicles (Support and Gear) to transport it for me from site to site. But I'm still undecided about whether it might not just be easier and better to leave it at home, and rely on my iPhone for the week.

71st ride of 2017 - Monday, 5/29/2017 (Memorial Day)

Total mileage for 2017: 1101.9

This morning's ride was unusual—but then, it seems as if the majority of my rides have some peculiarity to them. 😇 I left at 6 a.m. in hopes of doing several round trips to the park, but was prepared to change plans on the fly once I heard by text what the morning's plans entailed. Christy, Izzy, and Danny were planning to go to the 10 a.m. Memorial Day parade in Dexter, and invited us to join them. However, I told her that Michelle was planning to attend a 10 a.m. Bible study with friends, so unless they could pick me up, I'd have to decline.

On the way back from the park, she replied that they'd be happy to pick me up at 9:15, so I planned accordingly. Then, however, minutes later, Michelle said that she was still not feeling well, and she encouraged me to take the car for the day. Christy and I then made plans to meet in Dexter.

MapMyRide was not working right, either. The voice was not sounding to call off my miles, and I found that lack most disturbing, having gotten used to it. Otherwise it was working fine, but I once again forgot to resume it after pausing at the park. So, given the lack of voice, once I got home I deleted it, and then reloaded it from the App Store. I was able to figure that I had done the 10-mile ride (a single round trip, which put me over the 1100-mile mark for the year) in 1:10, with a starting temperature of 55°, and 58° when I finished.

70th ride of 2017 - Saturday, 5/27/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 1091.9

This morning's ride was a trial in several respects. I checked the sunrise time, and it was 6:04 (earlier than I had expected), so I began my ride just before 6:00. It was cool, at 57°, but that made my hoodie feel just right. However, by the time I finished, at almost 11:30, it was up to 71*, and the hoodie was quite unnecessary.

Building up my stamina for the PALM (Pedal Across Lower Michigan) ride that I'm doing in late June, I had hoped to do five or even six round trips to Marsh Park today. But my early start evidently made my head a little foggy; when I was at the park for the fourth time, I paused MapMyRide, but then forgot to restart it when I began riding again. When I noticed this near the end of the fourth round trip, I headed back down the trail, but then before too long I decided I'd better cut it short, so I headed home, and with a combination of my partial route recorded on my phone, plus the Gmaps pedometer that I used to use last year, I was able to determine that I rode 38.8 miles (my longest ride so far of 2017) in 2:48.

69th ride of 2017 - Friday, 5/26/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 1053.1

This morning's ride was cooler than expected. Even though when I started at 11:00 it was 60°—indescribably more tolerable than my rides back in January and February—and was 64° when I finished, I was thankful I had worn a sweater (the same green one soaked by yesterday's ride, but now all dried and warmed).

I had figured to do a longer ride of perhaps four round trips to Marsh Park (34 miles), but while riding the first one, I felt a compositional idea calling to me, and had to get back to get it started. In our church handbell choir we are currently playing Calypso on He Leadeth Me (arr. Tammy Waldrop)... underlaying the traditional hymn tune with a calypso beat that is quite infectious. I want to do something similar with the traditional hymn tune Fairest Lord Jesus (AKA Beautiful Savior).

68th ride of 2017 - Thursday, 5/25/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 1042.0

Well, weather.com lied this morning.😃 After I was unable to ride yesterday because of daylong rain, I was eager to get back out there today. And they called for a cloudy morning, with showers beginning about noon. But I started just past 8:00 and rode most of my ride in rain. It was light, to be sure, but nevertheless enough so that it quickly turned my glasses into twin prisms, and rendered the sweater I wore (inexplicably, a green one) a sopping mass weighing me down. So, accordingly, I limited myself to consecutive round trips to Marsh Park, completing the 18.1 miles in a slow time of 2:12.

67th ride of 2017 - Tuesday, 5/23/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 1023.9

Today I was lazy and tired, and as a result, I settled for a fairly short ride (13.9 miles in 1:42), doing a single round trip to Saline (Woodland and Ann Arbor-Saline Road), with a loop around Saline High School on the way home, by turning from Woodland onto Industrial, then taking Campus Drive around the school). I rode in perfect comfort with shorts and a short sleeve shirt, as it was 63° when I began, at 10:30, and 71° when I finished.

66th ride of 2017 - Monday, 5/22/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 1010.0

Today is the day that Michelle and I celebrate as Life Day. The accident that so totally upended and transformed my life occurred on May 22, 1993—24 whole years ago, in a different century and millennium.  The following picture ran in the next day's newspaper ... I saw it several months later, after I had come out of my two-month coma.

On top of it being Life Day, there was a good cooling breeze going (15 mph from the west southwest), and a plethora of projects I wanted to tackle awaited me. Accordingly, I cut myself a large amount of slack today, and just did one easy, slow round trip to Marsh Park, completing the 10 miles in 1:15. Happily, I enjoyed ample sunshine; it was 54° when I began (at 10:15), and 60° when I finished.

65th ride of 2017 - Saturday, 5/20/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 1000.0

This morning I rode consecutive round trips to Marsh Park, and then added three concluding laps inside our condominium complex in order to tack on enough miles to allow me to reach my first big milestone of the year—1000 miles.

It was a sunny but cool ride—51° when I began, at 8:00, but up to 59° when I finished, 2:26 later. My hoodie (paired with shorts) felt great. I needed to ride early today because we are leaving shortly after noon to drive to Indiana for the wedding of my nephew Ben. (He is shown here, at about 6 months, reaching out toward me on one of my earliest outings from St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in the late summer or early fall of 1993.)

64th ride of 2017 - Friday. 5/19/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 980.5

I sure am glad I wore a long sleeve tee for my ride this morning, as it has cooled off markedly since the summery temperatures we enjoyed earlier in the week (even as recently as yesterday). When I began at 8:30, it was a brisk 48°, though by the time I finished at about 1:30, it had skyrocketed to 54°!

Today I just made up my mind to go for distance, and ended up doing my first ride of four consecutive round trips to Marsh Park since July 9 last summer. This journey of 34.6 miles took me 3:58. (MapMyRide photo below.) And now, it appears as if my hope for making 1000 miles this weekend will happen after all. I can make it tomorrow morning before we leave for Ben's wedding, if I get my lazy self out of bed at an early hour and get going.

63rd ride of 2017 - Thursday, 5/18/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 945.9

This morning it was already windy when I rode at 9:00 (18 mph), and the wind strength was forecast to gather all morning, with gusts in excess of 50 mph arriving by early afternoon! Accordingly, I was glad to ride early, and kept it short—even though I knew that holding myself to a single round trip to Marsh Park today was very likely signing the death warrant to my hopes of making 1000 miles this weekend. (We are going out of state for a large chunk of it, to attend my nephew's wedding in Indiana.)

Other than the wind, though, it was another spectacular morning for a ride today—72° when I started, 76° when I finished, and sunny throughout,

62nd ride of 2017 - Wednesday, 5/17/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 935.8

As the local meteorologists have been saying, we seem to have skipped spring and gone straight to summer! When I began my ride a bit past 9:00 this morning, it was 71*, and when I finished a little before 1:00, it had climbed to 83°, continually sunny, and with a pretty significant wind (20 mph from the southwest). I rode three consecutive round trips to Marsh Park, for a gain of 26.5 miles in 3:05.

60th ride of 2017 - Monday, 5/15/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 909.4

I have been remiss in recent days, not having ridden since Thursday. So it was a delight to get out today, on another glorious spring day—sunny and 64° when I left at noon, and up to 70° when I finished. Friday I had an extremely busy day with errands, and decided I'd just have to take it as a rest day. Then Saturday, Michelle and I spent the day in Lansing, at our grandchildren's soccer games, lunching with her parents to celebrate Mother's Day, and going to the Lansing Children's Choir concert of our niece, Lauren. Yesterday I had to be at church early (7:00 a.m.) to warm up with our handbell choir and play at the 8:00 and 9:00 services, and then afterwards we met Christy at IKEA in Canton, where Michelle and Christy shopped, while I composed at a table in the cafe. By the time we got home, I wanted to watch the Tigers' game in California, and then afterwards it was too late.

Today I rode consecutive round trips to Marsh Park, and exceeded the 900-mile mark for the year with this 18.2 miles (in 2:01)—a milestone I reached last year on May 21. I had planned to ride farther, but the call of composition was too compelling, as I'm making excellent headway on a piece I'm writing for the children's choir at Emerson (a setting of a favorite Dr. Seuss text).

Today's ride also included one very minor calamity. On my first time back from the park, as I rumbled across one of the wooden boardwalks alongside Textile Rd., my plastic water bottle shook free from its cage, fell to the surface, and rolled over to the side and off the boardwalk and down several feet. By the time I could get stopped and go back to look for it, I could not find it ... and even if I had seen it, probably could not have reached it anyway. But a replacement tomorrow is fairly inexpensive.

59th ride of 2017 - Thursday, 5/11/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 891.2

Today I went out at 8 a.m., wanting to get my ride completed early, As a last-minute thought, I decided to throw on a jacket ... and ended up being terribly glad that I did. When I began, it was 47°, and by the time I finished 3+ hours later, it had heated up to 53°, so it would have been a pretty miserable ride without the coat.

I did three consecutive round trips to Marsh Park, racking up 26.1 miles in 3:03 As I was nearing home at the conclusion of the ride, I was cheered to spot this colorful evidence of spring, despite the nip in the air!

58th ride of 2017 - Wednesday, 5/10/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 865.1

This morning I went to Dexter to ride again, and I am such a morning geek I asked Michelle if she would be comfortable with me loading the trike on before we took her to school, so I could just go over to Dexter from Emerson. She was fine with that, and this approach enabled me to start my ride at 8:20—still later than I would, ideally, but much better than starting it mid- or late morning. At that hour it was partly cloudy and 49°, so that the hoodie I wore felt just right!

I rode consecutive round trips from Hudson Mills Metropark to the village of Dexter, via the West River Trail, and this gave me a nice ride of 24.5 miles, in 2:43. By the time I was done it had heated up to 62°, and the hoodie was quite superfluous, but, practicing propriety, I kept it on anyway. 

In the picture below are the spinners that I fly from the back of my trike for visibility. I was riding with two at the time of that picture, but have since cut back to using a single one, as the pair kept getting tangled over one another.  They spin in the breeze, and have drawn quite a bit of appreciative comment. My favorite was when we asked my then three-year-old grandson Danny last summer what they reminded him of, and he said, "Tornadoes!" Today, it gained a new name, however, when a man rode by and told me, "I like your whirl!ygig!"



Also, following my ride today I went to Wheels in Motion and had them put on a new mirror for me. I tipped over during a ride back in February, and when the mirror struck the ground it broke. About three weeks ago I finally went over and picked up a mirror that you mounted on your helmet, because I had no way to transport the trike. But since I now do, thanks to Michelle's dexterity and perspicacity in assembling the rack, I was able to drive it over today and have them put on this mirror, which should make my rides considerably safer and more comfortable.

57th ride of 2017 - Tuesday, 5/9/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 840.6

Today was such a glorious day that I packed up the trike and took it to Hudson Mills Metropark in Dexter, where I rode a round trip on the West River Trail between there and the village, completing 13,7 miles in 1:31. When I left, about noon, it was 56° and sunny, and climbed to 59* by the time I finished. Also notable was the fact that today i exceeded 100 hours of elapsed riding time for the year.

Today's Obstacle du Jour, however, was the fact that, after I packed up and drove to Dexter this morning, and parked where I usually do, I got out of the car and discovered that I had forgotten to put on my special cycling shoes with cleats on the bottom that hook into the pedals. Sighing, I set off to return home and get them. This meant a wasted round trip of nearly 45 minutes, but everything went OK. It did reduce my original plans, though, to try and do two round trips, but I'll just save that for next time!

56th ride of 2017 - Monday, 5/8/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 835.4

I was last able to ride a week ago today, the layoff being caused first by inclement weather (it rained almost all of last week), and then by mechanical issues. Saturday morning I was just beginning my ride, and got a few hundred yards away from home, starting down the hill toward Oak Valley, when the plastic tube through which the chain passes became detached, migrated forward, and got caught in the derailleur and all chewed up. This allowed me to ride no further, so I had to stop and walk the trike back up the hill and home to our garage. I texted my cycling mentor, Doug Tidd, who came over and looked it over, determining that a trip back to the dealer in Dearborn would be necessary.

I couldn't go that day because of plans Michelle and I had to go out of town (to the party for the 14th birthday of our niece Lauren), and they are closed on Sunday, so I had to wait to take it this morning—a venture that was only possible because of Michelle's kind recent assembly of the rack to transport it on our car.

Anyway, after this extended layoff, I thought it prudent to break back in easily, so I just did a piddly little ride, short and slow—a route past our former church, Westminster Presbyterian (all on sidewalks, of course), late this afternoon after we got Michelle home from school. This was a ride that measured only 5.2 miles, in a slow time of 44 minutes. But at least I was rewarded with gorgeous weather conditions (58° and bright sunshine).

A frustrating interruption

I last rode my trike on Monday, May 1—one week ago tomorrow. It seems longer, however. All last week I was kept from it by weather, and then yesterday (Saturday) morning when I went out to ride under a beautiful cloudless sky, I got a few hundred yards (just headed down the hill toward Oak Valley) when I rode under an overhanging tree, and it snatched my flag ("spinner") out. I stopped to get it, and when I sat back down, I heard a disquieting SNAP, and I then found that the pedals would turn freely, but the chain no longer engaged the gears, so the trike would not move. I spent several minutes puzzling over it, but eventually, after I could figure nothing out, I walked it back to our garage and texted my friend and cycling mentor Doug Tidd.

When Doug came over, he discovered several problems, and finally concluded that I needed to return it to the dealer, Jack's Bicycle in Dearborn, for service. So that's on the agenda for tomorrow. I'd love it if it could be fixed tomorrow and I could then do a ride in the evening—but I'm not counting on it.

55th ride of 2017 - Monday, 5/1/2017

Total mileage for 2017: 821.7

Overjoyed with the freedom afforded to me by once again having a rack to transport my trike so that I needn't just ride near home, I went to Hudson Mills Metropark at Dexter today to ride. Admittedly, there was a bit of nostalgia factoring in, as this was where I did my very first trike ride, on the afternoon of Saturday, May 2, 2015, after Michelle and I picked it up from the dealer. She got this picture of me as I was just setting out that day.

However, the ride was not quite carefree. As I was starting out today (within the first mile), I came upon an older woman (probably 75 or 80-ish, and quite crabby, as it turned out), walking her dog. I slowed and pulled carefully around them, but she nevertheless let loose an unintelligible diatribe, concluding by spitting out quite derisively, "FELLA!" Sighing, I stopped my trike, unclipped my feet from the pedals, and slowly and laboriously got up to walk back to her and apologize for whatever offense I had committed. I showed her my card, but reading it seemed to make little difference, as she told me, heatedly, "When you pass you're supposed to call out "On your left!" or "On your ride!" So I told her sorry as best I could, and she went on ahead, looking over her shoulder. Once I was ready to ride again, and caught up to her, I choked out as best I could, "On your left!", hoping that that satisfied her.

I had wanted to do two round trips between the park and the village of Dexter today via a nice paved trail that runs the approximately 5-mile length. But this little contretemps had cost me enough time that I could not afford to do that long a ride and still make it back in time to do some cooking I wanted to do (tonight's dinner—Cream of Broccoli soup). As well, my confrontation with her occurred right near the spur I have to take from the trail within the park to get out to the trail to Dexter. I missed that spur, and so went another lap in the park before setting out for town (about an additional 3 miles). So, given these delays, I held myself to a single round trip to Dexter, riding the 15 miles in 1:52, on an absolutely glorious spring day! When I began, at 11:00 a.m., it was in the upper fifties, and when I finished it was 65°, mostly sunny throughout, and with not too much wind early, but it had picked up quite significantly by the time I was done.

On the way home, I was quite thirsty, and since i have to pass right by the Dexter Dairy Queen, I decided to stop in for a treat. I asked the girl at the window, "Small cone, please." (I know, it doesn't make a lot of sense when I was thirsty, but it was good, anyway!) She asked, "You want vanilla?" So I asked, "What else you got?" (Yes, I'm ashamed to admit that I said "got" rather than the more grammatically correct "do you have?" In my defense, though, I'll plead the relative ease for me of pronouncing the "g" phoneme as opposed to the more difficult, aspirated "h.") Upon learning that they also had chocolate and twist, I asked for a small twist, and sat down in the sunshine to eat it before driving home.