Been awhile

I haven't blogged in awhile. I can't use the excuse that "nothing interesting happened to me". The sign of a good storyteller is able to take an everyday story that could happen to anybody and make it something people will read with excitement.

Like my ride to work. I do my best to ride my bicycle every day, with an exception for rain in the forecast. Even with a helmet, two inch an hour rain stings.  And hail, I've been caught in hail on my bike before. Yet, I still pedal the darned thing to work. Interestingly enough, it takes me 15 minutes in my car with rush hour traffic, but only 20 minutes on my bike.

It's cool in the mornings around here in early spring/late summer. Nothing a light jacket snuggling against my skin doesn't solve. It's so amazingly comfortable and needed! I can feel the kiss of the dawn's chill in passing. Of course, halfway through my ride, that same cotton film against my arm becomes twenty miles of stuffed wool while I'm trying to steer through the Gobi Desert. Obviously, it gets too warm.

So, while I'm riding along on the sidewalk... I should probably stop and explain: that is legal in the city, there are no bike paths and riding on the street is suicide by inattentive driver.

So, while I'm riding along on the sidewalk - the very lumpy, tree root infested sidewalk - I'm sweating like the Mississippi and fighting my jacket. I'm balancing with no hands, backpack wildly swing off of one shoulder while trying to get this thrice cursed, sweak soaked thing off of my other arm! I swear, this thing holds tighter than a clingy ex-boyfriend!

I free one arm. Halfway to bliss! Now, still pedaling with no hands, I transfer the backpack to my other shoulder and attempt to free my other arm from this slippery trap. Meanwhile, the sleeve that's been freed is trailing behind my seat and curls itself around the rear wheel and the chain.

Lurch! RIIIIIIIIP!

And, I walk my bicycle the rest of the way to work. Before I leave for home, I peel out pieces of that beloved jacket that always did such a good job of keeping me warm on my ride to work...

Tomorrow: repeat.