"This thou perceiv'st, which makes they love more strong/To love that well which thou must leave ere long." William Shakespeare       When I wake up, I decide to ride and enjoy the last of the unseasonable warmth and the last of autumn's dance.  How I love the colors of her skirt as she swirls doing a suggestive strip tease, bathed in sunlight or shade, delighting the eye and the soul. How I love the crackling and rustling noises that serenade and tease my ears as I pass woodlands and cornfields and the sweeping vistas of freshly harvested fields, withered and spent, tuck ..read more

"The best portion of a man's life, his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and love." William Wordsworth  As the Medora Century approaches, watching the weather is an exercise in futility and frustration with the prediction changing every few hours.   So I decide to just wait until the morning of the ride.  The morning of the ride the wind prediction is down to twelve miles with higher gusts (27) out of the west.  This is promising as while there will be wind on the way out, there should be some tail wind on the return, always my preference.  Also, it is n ..read more

  "Nevertheless, I will tell you that you will awake one day to find that your life has rushed by at a speed at once impossible  and cruel.  The most intense moments will seem to have occurred only yesterday and  nothing will have erased the pain and pleasure,  the impossible intensity of love and its dog leaping happiness, the bleak blackness of passions unrequited, or unexpressed, or unresolved." Meg Rosoff Wise words, those of Ms. Rosoff, and they play a part in my decision to attend the next century despite the abrupt changes in weather, the distance to the start ..read more

"Sensitive people feel so deeply they often have to retreat from the world, in order to dig beneath the layers of pain to find their faith and courage." Shannon Alder   I am worried that I will not be able to go on my planned vacation to Yellowstone with my daughter for I have been ill.  Fever and an attack on my lungs by some passing virus that thought I needed a spanking.  COVID tests negative.  But my fever breaks and while I am far from recovered, I am able to go and to not worry about infecting her or other passengers.  I have never been to this park and it gives ..read more

"God give me hills to climb, And strength for climbing!" Arthur Guitermen    It is going to be a great day for a ride.  The weather has turned unseasonable cool,  the skies are overcast, but it is still warm enough for just shorts and a jersey.  The course is one I have not ridden for a few years, a course I  put together in honor of an old friend, Steve Montgomery, who wanted a ride that went through Bethlehem but where lunch was at LeRoy's in Lexington.  Unfortunately, he no longer rides, but  this route will always bring him back to my mind. Of course ..read more

"A goal without a plan is just a wish." Antoine de Saint-Exupery  It has been a steamy hot, humid week, filled with ragweed, so once again I steal out of the house quite early to get a ride in before it becomes miserably tropical.  Today I pick the Surly though I have no intention of seeking gravel.  What makes us pick a certain bike on a certain day?  Sometimes it is the route we intend to take, and sometimes it is just as if that bike calls to us.  Sometimes we find we have picked the right bike for the path we find ourselves on, and other times we think another w ..read more

On the Loss of Victor R. Smith: And so it is, with the loss of my last brother, Victor Smith, two days ago, I become an only child that once had four siblings. I suppose, being an orphan as well, with both parents deceased, this does not count. I certainly did not expect his loss, or at least not this soon, and I struggle. I find this odd because of all my siblings, we probably were the least close. We didn't hate each other and weren't angry with each other, but we were just very, very different sharing little in the way of interests though he did begin riding a bicycle a bit a few years ba ..read more

"Solitude is a breeding ground  for idiosyncrasy, and I relish that about it,  the way it liberates whim." Caroline Knapp I belong to two bicycle clubs, and both have rides that interest me today, but a part of me urges me to decline both and do a gentle, easy, meandering type ride with no demands upon pace or conversation.  To soak in the summer that is relentlessly passing. To go at my own pace with no thought to others.  For these are the types of rides that often renew my love of cycling.  The decision is easy when Mike posts a difficult ride.  The other ride ..read more

"Rain is grace; rain is the sky descending to the earth; without rain, there would be no life." John Updike   I check a few times to see if the century is canceled due to the prediction for rain and possible storms, but it is not.  So I pack my things, double checking for rain gear, a rain cap and a waterproof phone case.  Then I head out.  I decide not to pack my rain jacket as the rain is not supposed to arrive until the afternoon and it should be hot by them.  I do pack a small, disposable poncho, something I try to carry during the summer when storms can pop up sud ..read more

"I am cruel thirsty this hot weather..... Nothing makes me so  excessively peevish as  hot weather." Jonathan Swift  The strange weather this year continues.  Suddenly it is July and it is hot.  The bouts of colder weather have not allowed my body to adapt, and I suffer.  This is particularly so because of the high dew point from all the rain and storm activity here recently.  Or in other words, it is humid.  It is the kind of humid that often, particularly during climbs when speed is lower, ones skin glows from sweat that the body has produced to try t ..read more