Riding Weather

As usual, I rolled out in the dark feeling somewhat cold and stiff. The thermometer hadn't looked much different than yesterday, and for that matter neither did my wardrobe, but for some reason I just felt a little colder. I knew it wouldn't last, though. The forecast was calling for a high of around 70F and sunny skies, so it was really all just a matter of time.

Today was the last 6:15 ride before we switch back to normal time, so that took a little bit of the sting out of the first twenty minutes of darkness. I think I spent the first eight or nine miles at the front, or off the front, as the rest of the group took it easy until they could see what was coming at them, but for me the nearly total absence of wind made it feel easy to roll through the blackness at, I don't know, 20 mph? It was too dark to see the speedometer, of course, but I doubt I cracked 21 before I felt the presence of the group behind me. There had been a report of an early morning explosion at one of the grain elevators in Destrehan, a couple of miles before our turnaround point, so we were not too surprised when we saw an officer running up the levee telling us we had to turn around. We'd been kind of hoping to see how bad the damage was, but they had the road blocked off well ahead of the site, so we didn't get to check it out.

So we turned around like nice lemmings and headed back down the river with the sun just coming over the horizon. We started back slowly at first, and then gradually faster and faster until finally near the end Donald took a flyer with Russell in pursuit. I was tempted to go after them myself, because by then it was almost perfect riding weather. So perfect, in fact, that an hour or so later on my way to work I couldn't resist stopping at the local Starbucks and sitting at one of the tables on the front deck where I checked my email and chatted with Big Richard who stopped by while waiting for his laundry to be ready down the street. Since I couldn't figure out a way to get away with spending the whole day sitting there on Maple Street, I finally rode the rest of the way to work.