Halloween is coming up, so a Monster is fitting, right?
Try bicycling monster! To the tune of 12.5 miles. And that's just today.
Last week Haley called from school and said she forgot her lunch and her basketball clothes. I jokingly said to Mike, "We should ride over to the school to give it to her." I never should have said that to the guy who owns 5 bikes and loves to read Bicycling Magazine and bicycling blogs and books about bicycling. (There are a lot of things he likes to do - Everything doesn't revolve around bikes, but he does like them.) To which he replied, "Hey...that would be fun! It's not that far. Come on. Let's do it."
Wait, what? You're serious???
So we did. And the 5 or 6 miles wasn't that bad. And my bike is really cool too. It helps to have a cool bike.
(I don't really ever ride around in my boots while carrying my purse and leaving my helmet hanging from the handlebars. I was just posing for a picture.)
Over the weekend we just hung out. Hit a few garage sales and bummed around. Monday was catch up on laundry time. Then came Tuesday.
"Hey, weren't we talking about riding to go get coffee?" So we did. We rode to get coffee. And a scone. Then we slowly rode through town and back home. And people looked at us. Because we have cool bikes. And probably because NOBODY else rides bikes in this town. Ok. I've seen two guys.
A cappuccino bicycle cart - How cool is that?!
Today we decided to go out again. We had a bunch of errands to run. How about saving some money on gas by riding bikes?! (We drive a Suburban and a gas guzzling Ford Windstar.) We drove to the school again, cuz, yep. Haley forgot her clothes! We went to the post office, got sandwiches at the deli and ate them in the park.
We rode to the watch repairman's house (his business is in his home) -
Wait, stop here. This was interesting. We had a 1:00 appointment with this guy and we pulled up to the house at 1:15. He had a carport and a dark walk up to the front door. We were a little nervous. He invited us in. More nervous. I thought he might be upset because we were late!
(That's not him, but the guy we went to had just as much stuff on his desk!)
We sat in the kitchen at the table. There were drawers and drawers of watch bits. There were watches for sale. There was a huge wooden desk with all kinds of tools. On the desk was a wooden stand for 8 different syringes! WHAT were they for? I hope it had something to do with watch repair!
Mike was nervous about the bikes so excused himself to go lock them up. The man said, "No need. They're not going anywhere." And then episodes of the X-Files began to race through my head. And I started to wonder why Mike was going to leave me alone with this guy while he went outside to check on the bikes!
Then I noticed that the tv on the table we were sitting at wasn't showing tv. It was showing outside. He had cameras set up around his house so he could see what was going on outside. I looked up and saw a camera mounted by the window above the sink. And a mirror mounted just outside the window.
30 minutes later we had our watches fixed. And they guy turned out to be really nice! Maybe a little paranoid, but still nice.
After that it was to the bike store, to WalMart, then back home. Uphill. Against hurricane force winds. Ok, maybe not, but there WAS wind!
All in all about 12.5 miles. And Mike's already talking about our next "trip".
So the monster I'm creating? I'm not sure if it's Mike. Or me.
Thanks a lot, Bicycling Magazine!
***6 or 12 miles might not seem like much to some, but for someone who doesn't do much more than walk her son to the bus each morning...this is a big deal!
And my rear end hurts!
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