The Open Road

I went on a bicycle ride with Mark last weekend. It is the first time that I have ridden a bicycle in over 10 years. It was awesome! I’ve completely forgotten how good it feels to cruise around. My bike is less than ideal. It is a little rusty and not very comfortable but it will work fine until I can save enough to get a more reliable one. I don’t like that my bike has a ton of different speeds and I have to keep shifting on the handles. We rode 5 miles and I could have easily gone much much further if my behind didn’t hurt from my seat. I really want to get a simple cruiser bike with 3 speeds and a really wide seat. Mark has a mountain bike that he is happy with but his behind was a little sore too. He hasn’t been riding for awhile either. It’s funny how we each have very different ideas of what the bicycles should be used for. My suggestion was that we ride our bikes to the grocery store or over to the coffee shop. The closest one being a few miles away. He refused because he “does not want to go grocery shopping when he is all sweaty”. He wants to just go ride around with no particular destination in mind while I want to get from point A to point B. I have a feeling I am going to be riding on my own a lot. While out riding on the trail near our house we discovered some walnut trees and blackberry bushes loaded down with almost ripe fruit. I can’t wait to go back in a couple of weeks to harvest some berries for jam. I clocked how far it would be if I was to ride all the way to work each way. It is exactly 11.6 miles from my driveway to my office. There are 39 stop lights between here and there. I’d like to think that my fat ass could actually make it. I am going to have to test my theory by getting on a bike at the gym and trying to pedal 11.6 miles. I’ll let you know how it goes.