Assoverteakettle

Friday night Robin and I had a wonderful evening with friends. We strolled through the botanical gardens, taking in the Christmas lights amidst the distant strains of classic songs, performed by a small combo. My oldest daughter (Mia) and family came and we watched our grandson run and play with other kids.

Saturday morning at 6, Robin and I met (Al)Bert and ran my old "mega-loop" course for 22.3 miles at 8:05 avg. It felt like work and I had hoped that the final miles would not have felt so much like the wall was nigh. We went our for breakfast afterward and enjoyed a history lesson from Bert about the Christmas traditions of his native Holland.

I got up early this morning and on an impulse, threw Robin's bike in the back of my truck and drove to my old groups' meeting spot to surprise the old boys and chaperone their 13 miler.

It was good to shoot the shit with them again. Very relaxing and pain free to be on the bike at the 10mm shuffling pace. Good thing we were traveling slowly. Around mile 12 the front tire schlunked right into a storm drain grate, as perfectly as you could drop a coin into a slot machine and I went right over the handle bars. I couldn't get my left damned foot out of the stirrup to catch myself before it was too late. A few scrapes but no real bloodletting. I thought I had broken my left pinky toe (the private) and his roommate (the Sergeant) but the pain subsided pretty quickly. We all had a good laugh and we started reminiscing about all the times we have busted our asses during our runs over the last several years.

The tire rim was bent but usuable and I was serenadeed for the last 8 miles back to my truck by the "skrick-skrick" of the rim hitting the right side brake pad.

On the way back I thought about something my Dad used to say to my Mom when she would accuse him of not being enthusiastic about a situation or idea that she felt was important.

"What do you want? . . . for me to do a flip and fart my socks off?" He'd ask.

I pictured myself flying over the handle bars of my wife's baby blue bike and farting my socks off.

In the afternoon, before the Bucs rolled over in San Fransisco (for the 10th time in 11 trips there), I drove to the bike shop and bought a new rim.

All is well.