A Little Late

I thought I had plenty of time. It's probably less than a mile from my house to the 5:45 am meeting spot at the end of Nashville Avenue, so when the alarm went off twenty minutes before that I didn't rush. But there was a complication.  It was cold enough (around 40 degrees) that I'd need to make some wardrobe decisions. That always seems to suck up more time than I expect. I decided on a thin short-sleeve base layer, a warm long-sleeve base layer on top of that, a long-sleeve jersey on top of those, and a light vest. Then of course the dog wanted to go out.  By the time I got downstairs it was already 5:41.  I hurriedly put on shoes, then shoe-covers, riding gloves, then long gloves, and stuck my antique winter helmet cover over my nearly new Giro helmet. I rushed outside, turned on the tail and head lights, hit the start button on the Garmin that was still searching for satellites, and took off.  It was 5:45, so I was pretty sure I'd miss whoever was there. I blew past the deserted meeting spot and headed north into the wind scanning the road ahead for blinking red lights.  Nothing there.  I was probably two minutes behind Brian and Rich. Finally, as I rode down Jeff Davis Parkway, I saw a blinking red light in the distance turning left onto Canal. A little while later I turned onto Canal myself and could see that I was catching them, albeit slowly. I was all the way at the cemeteries at the end of Canal Street before I finally made contact.

On this chilly December morning the Tuesday morning ride's turnout was a little bit on the thin side, which was to be expected. I was pretty well dressed, maybe just a bit over-dressed, for the conditions, and it didn't take long for me to unzip the wind vest a few inches, but I never felt the need to pull the zipper down any farther. Like yesterday, the wind was mostly out of the north, so it was going to be an echelon day.  Unfortunately that put a few people into the left lane on Lakeshore Drive, which caused some problems when the drivers rushing to get to work went past. Otherwise, it was a good ride and my toes arrived back home in somewhat better condition than they had the day before.