My weekend started on the bike, sort of, actually I woke early on Saturday and spent a long time searching for one of my fairly new pairs of kermit shorts. Obsessed, I looked everywhere, took out almost every stitch of my clothing out and reorganized it. Hoping beyond hope to find this pair of shorts I wore not more than a 1/2 dozen times. UGGGHHH. We had a track meet to get to and now my long ride had just been significantly shortened and I was still stewing about a pair of shorts. I gathered myself and slipped into my "other" kermit gear and out the door I went, almost, I now had another problem, I couldn't find my HELMET. The clock was ticking away, Chris was already in Cornwall and I was now under a major time crunch so off I went, for a quick paced very hilly hour. I hauled until I came across some road kill that needed to be documented that is, some peeps just outside a school driveway, one apparently already run over. I had already ridden down the hill before I decided this so I turned around and rode back up to take the picture. There were some guys doing some work in the parking lot that couldn't understand what I had found alongside the road. They wondered over just as I was taking off for home. I wonder what they thought when they got there.
I raced home, it was late. We live on a hill, and despite anyway you decide to get there, its a 1/2 mile climb. One side is a manageable grade, maybe 8% with a few short pitches of 12%. Then there is the other side, which starts with some undulations then climbs steeply for a 1/2 mile. I chose to climb the steeper side of our hill where there is a short painful section that is considered steep slope (15-18% grade) that has a hairpin at the end of it before it levels out to a more feasible climb. Despite wanting to give up and walk I came to that decision point where the road pitches sharply up and being clipped in one needs to commit or turn around to unclip or face falling over. I decided to commit, after all I hadn't bailed on that hill once in the past seven years, even at my worst, so I wasn't going to start now. There were some neighborhood kids sitting on the grass at the hairpin, in full view of my climb. I was so winded, pushing hard, my HR maxed out, feeling hypoxic. If you could see their faces, it was like they were watching a very funny movie. When I couldn't say hello, just wave, they roared with laughter.
I rolled into the driveway, wheezing. I hit the shower and headed to watch Chris's track meet. He told us he was running at 1, it was not 1:30, but we decided to go anyway. I am so glad we did, he did not run until 5PM. Kenny and I enjoyed the day sitting in the sun on the ADK chairs outside the school waiting and chatting. My only regret was that I could have spent a longer time on my bike after all, maybe even rode out there from home.
After the meet Kenny and I headed south and east, off to the Clay Art Center to catch the opening of Mark Chatterley's exhibition. I was blown away but the magnitude of the work, it was incredible in both scale and concept. Most of the work reached within a foot of the ceiling. It was much larger than life. We visited with the crowd for a bit then headed for dinner. Chris told Kenny to take me to Pat's Hubba Hubba, which he did. All I have to say is that AL, if you are reading this from Dinkytown, this is possibly your rival in the East. Fourteen dollars bought us 2 Texas burgers (chili, onions and cheese on a burger), french fries, onion rings and 2 pepsi's. There were 4 big guys working behind the counter, and I mean big. Every time they had to change places they had to practically go outside. Choreography at its greatest.
This morning I got up the minute the cat started bugging me to feed her. I immediately put on my gear and put up some oatmeal and coffee. I read a bit while I waited the 30 minutes for the oatmeal to cook and relaxed into the idea that Jon put 2 hours of HARD riding on the table. I was out of the house in short order, and I couldn't tell you where I was headed. I got to the bottom of the hill and all the way into town when I realized that this was not yesterday and my hands felt like ice cubes. I needed to rethink my glove choice. I turned around and remember that hill I described, well I motored up it pissed off that I had been so stupid. At least my legs were fresh and my gloves were in the car not the house. After dawning my gloves I was off and found myself headed towards Brewster. I decided that despite my open mind towards the immigrant population and day laborers I don't like riding up a hill in front of 80 or so of them, especially when they cat call in Spanish at my fat ass struggling to climb a hill.
I finally break free of that experience and head out towards Carmel. I see this guy riding a mtn bike and I blow by him going up this hill. He yells out I got to get me one of those bikes. The next thing I know I was pulling him all over my world for the next thirty minutes. Don't pass an old guy on a mtn bike when you are a fat chick, he will hate it and push you to ride faster until its his turn, then you realize that you have to change your route because he is spent. I ambled a bit more before heading home. I was exhausted by the time I hit the hill, which despite taking the whimpy way felt like a mountain. My only goal for the rest of the day, besides working on my report cards was to not ingest more than I expended. I think I did alright.
With that said, I am back on the bike tomorrow.
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