1. Starting at 10 am, prepare yourself for a 50 mile ride: get your frozen water bottles, sunscreen, and fig newtons, and put them in the car.
2. Search for your favorite Terry cycling tank for about 45 minutes: in the hamper, laundry room, where you keep your swim stuff and where you keep your running stuff, under the bed, in the closest, finally finding it exactly where it was supposed to be in the first place, with your cycling stuff. Go figure.
3. Get your training wheels so that you can use them instead of your race wheels. Except...one of your training wheels is flat.
4. Utter your favorite curse words.
5. Since you don't feel all that confident fixing a flat right before a 50 miler, take it down to the bike shop and ask them to throw a new tube on there. You might even get a couple gels while you're there. Except...you don't have the checkbook.
6. Utter your favorite curse words.
7. Drive back home to get the checkbook. Which cannot be found. On the way out, notice grab your helmet.
8. Return to the bike shop and dig through your wallet to get a couple gels and pay for a new tube.
9. Drive self, gear and bike down to the little park by the bike path.
10. Put training wheels on bike, bottles in bottle cages, and spray self with sun screen.
11. Try to ignore the van full of men in orange jumpsuits that are lunching, staring at you. Put away the thoughts that there's nobody else but you around...just you, and a panel van full of men doing community service.
12. There! You're ready to go. Except...you've left your bike shoes at home.
13. Utter your favorite curse words.
14. Take the bottles back off your flatwing, take the front wheel back off the bike, and put everything back in the car and drive back home, leaning forward so as not
to get the wet sunscreen all over the car seat.
15. Get bike shoes, and decide to go back to a different parking spot. One not so full of guys in orange jumpsuits.
16. Drive down to a different park by the bike path, and begin your ride at noon.
17. Except...at mile 30, you notice ugly black clouds have now taken over the sky. Call Pirate at work and ask her what the Doppler radar looks like.
18. Based on Pirate's recommendation, turn the bike around, spending the last 10 miles of the ride heading into a stiff wind and watching the "average" speed on your Garmin drop precipitously.
19. Utter your favorite curse words.
20. Go home and take a nap.
Now, wasn't that easy?
...
2. Search for your favorite Terry cycling tank for about 45 minutes: in the hamper, laundry room, where you keep your swim stuff and where you keep your running stuff, under the bed, in the closest, finally finding it exactly where it was supposed to be in the first place, with your cycling stuff. Go figure.
3. Get your training wheels so that you can use them instead of your race wheels. Except...one of your training wheels is flat.
4. Utter your favorite curse words.
5. Since you don't feel all that confident fixing a flat right before a 50 miler, take it down to the bike shop and ask them to throw a new tube on there. You might even get a couple gels while you're there. Except...you don't have the checkbook.
6. Utter your favorite curse words.7. Drive back home to get the checkbook. Which cannot be found. On the way out, notice grab your helmet.
8. Return to the bike shop and dig through your wallet to get a couple gels and pay for a new tube.
9. Drive self, gear and bike down to the little park by the bike path.
10. Put training wheels on bike, bottles in bottle cages, and spray self with sun screen.11. Try to ignore the van full of men in orange jumpsuits that are lunching, staring at you. Put away the thoughts that there's nobody else but you around...just you, and a panel van full of men doing community service.
12. There! You're ready to go. Except...you've left your bike shoes at home.
13. Utter your favorite curse words.
14. Take the bottles back off your flatwing, take the front wheel back off the bike, and put everything back in the car and drive back home, leaning forward so as not
to get the wet sunscreen all over the car seat.15. Get bike shoes, and decide to go back to a different parking spot. One not so full of guys in orange jumpsuits.
16. Drive down to a different park by the bike path, and begin your ride at noon.
17. Except...at mile 30, you notice ugly black clouds have now taken over the sky. Call Pirate at work and ask her what the Doppler radar looks like.
18. Based on Pirate's recommendation, turn the bike around, spending the last 10 miles of the ride heading into a stiff wind and watching the "average" speed on your Garmin drop precipitously.
19. Utter your favorite curse words.
20. Go home and take a nap.
Now, wasn't that easy?
...
