Long Day Off-Bike

"The best laid plans of mice and men..."

This week just hasn't been going according to plan. All I can say for sure at this point is that I am definitely not suffering from overtraining. About the time I should have been 20 miles into a 45 mile ride this morning I was instead rolling the Volvo up to speed on I-10 heading for Baton Rouge. The bottom line: no riding for me today. A hastily arranged 9 am meeting with lawyers to sign some documents, followed by a trip to the court building, a couple of hours checking email at a Barnes and Noble, and then another meeting with lawyers to sign more stuff took me all the way up to 12:30. I left The Wife at the bookstore and headed downtown for my own meeting with the state Facilities Planning and Control folks (FP&C for those in the know) about a state grant we have for the Primate Center. An hour later, as I was getting back into the car in the parking lot, The Wife called. Another meeting with the lawyer. Another signature. All related to the mother-in-law's estate of course, but complicated by nine siblings and at least seven dangerously strong egos.

So finally we are free to head back to NOLA and I decide to go by way of Covington so I can pick up a team jersey and shorts for Brady. Ten miles later and we're sitting on I-12 at a dead stop. There's apparently been a big accident somewhere up ahead and everything is shut down, and we're trapped. My eyes are glazing over. People are driving down the shoulder of the road. We lurch forward a couple of feet at a time, and I'm thinking the whole time about what's going on in the automatic transmission. I hate automatic transmissions, because every time the car stops I can just envison what's going on down there and it isn't pretty. So anyway, the 1-hour trip to Covington took about two and a half hours, but we finally made it home just before dark.

I then decided to take a closer look at that tire from which I'd pulled a roofing nail yesterday morning. I pull the tire and tube off the rim and am shocked to find a big gash in the inner surface of the rim. The nail went right through the rim strip, right througn the aluminum on the inside of the rim, and I can see and feel the bump on the outside, near one of the spokes, where it almost penetrated the other side. Geez, that was a hell of a nail!

So I'm feeling none too confident about this Sunday's Rouge-Roubaix. The weather is looking to be cold in the early morning and the field is looking to be really strong. The "A" race has 75 pre-registered, so I'm sure it'll be close to 100 on race day. Should be interesting. I think my main goal for this one will be survival. Then again, compared to Jill's recent adventure, this will be a walk in the park. If you haven't read Jill's writeups, trust me, you should.