85th ride

Today is the day I had planned to do the 42-mile ride to Mom's. But in the wake of last Saturday's problems, I've decided to defer that trip to 2014. With the dream delayed, I decided to do a moderately long (but slow) ride in town. So I planned to ride to and through Gallup Park. But today's ride was replete with adventures, although none of them were so dramatic as last Saturday's.

First off, though I got to Gallup Park OK, I found myself unable to find the path to take me from the front part of the park to its eastern stretches (even though I had done this ride successfully on May 18). So, I turned around and rode the dirt path along the north side of the Huron River to take me out of the park. This was adventure #1

Adventure #2 ensued immediately—I set off on Huron Parkway, heading south (as I thought) toward my home. But instead, I was disoriented and headed north—a mistake I only discovered a little over a mile north, when I reached the intersection with Hubbard on the North Campus of the University of Michigan, near which I used to work. So this was adventure #2.

Adventure #3 could conceivably have been more serious—but God protected me and helped it be OK. After I had crossed Washtenaw Ave., headed south on Huron Parkway, at its intersection with Canterbury, I had a mishap. The rear-view mirror that attaches to my helmet and extends in front of my face is decidedly beneficial overall—but it does have the drawback of obscuring a chunk of my field of vision. I was riding on the sidewalk, which Michelle prefers I do (a practice I had judged safe early on a Saturday morning), and when I saw, too late, a curb cut, although I was not riding fast, I tried to adjust my path to make it but couldn't quite, and clipped a small portion of the curb and went flying into the grass.

I was completely unhurt, but two nearby women runners (who appeared to be in their forties—they probably wondered what the heck such an old geezer was doing out there!) hustled over and, with much solicitude (countless queries of "Are you SURE you're OK, sir?"), assured themselves that I was, in fact, OK to continue on before they left me. One assisted me by retying my shoelace, which had come undone, and the other zipped up the bag on my handlebars from which my keys and cell phone had fallen out when I spilled over onto the ground. Needless to say, I slowed down even further for the remaining 6 miles or so of the ride, and finished the 20.1 miles in a poky 2 hours 13 minutes.