No Good Deed

I don't know what I did to deserve last week, but it must have been bad. On Sunday we had a nice time with Halloween activities, sliding candy down the "candy chute" and visiting with neighbors and eating and drinking stuff that's bad for you. Next door the neighbors were projecting the Saints game onto the side of our house, and everything kind of stopped for the final three minutes of the game as everybody gathered around to see the outcome. Monday was my usual easy morning ride and then the usual ride to work.

Projecting the Saints game onto the house.

I was scheduled for Jury Duty in criminal court down at "Tulane and Broad" for Tuesday morning and that meant that I'd have to miss the morning ride. Still, I was holding out some hope that I wouldn't actually end up on a jury like I did the last time. So I rode down to the courthouse and walked into the basement where the jury duty room is. It's a dingy, crowded room packed with people who would rather not be there. After filling out the form and signing in I sat there for maybe only an hour before they called something like 57 people, including me, up to Section K. My number was something like 39 so I wasn't in the first group that was questioned, but they were going to need a full jury plus alternates and I wasn't liking the odds. As usual people came up with all sorts of excuses for not being able to serve on a jury, and one potential juror who was an ER doctor did not hide his disdain for the crowed conditions and likelihood of spreading COVID around. He got off too, along with the Jehovah's Witness and the people with childcare issues and the ones who had problems with gay people or the lack of solid evidence etc., etc. So after a break for lunch they started going through the rest of us. I was never asked any direct questions or anything, but in the end I was selected as one of the 14. I didn't get out of there until about 6:30 that evening, so basically spent 8 hours in the courtroom. I didn't have to report until 9:30 the next morning, so at least I got to do WeMoRi. 

Things just went downhill after that. The trial was basically a domestic dispute where one person claimed she was attacked with a knife by the other person who was breaking up with her despite the only injuries looking like maybe fingernail scratches and there being no knife in evidence and two completely different stories about what happened. It was actually hard to imagine how something like that got to the point of a jury trial. Both people worked for the Sheriff's office. Around 6 or so the judge ordered pizzas for us once the lawyers were finished trying to manipulate us, after which we crammed back into the tiny jury room. Everybody looked at each other and said, "Do you think there was really a knife involved here?" The resounding answer was "No way." It took about fifteen minutes to arrive at a consensus of not guilty, but by then it was maybe 7:30 or so. It was a pain but I left thinking that I'd at least done my good deed for the week.

Thursday it was six people at a table for four in the crosswind.

The next morning I went out to the 6 am levee ride where we battled a stiff crosswind the whole way. The group was eventually whittled down to six, but on the narrow bike path with a crosswind like that only three riders get a draft, so after taking a pull you essentially had to take another pull at the back just to keep from being dropped. I was already feeling a little scratchy throat that I was trying to ignore, but by the end of the day I knew I was in for a head cold, or maybe COVID. I thought to myself, "Well, no good deed goes unpunished." Sure enough, that night I could barely breathe through my nose and resorted to Sudafed and Advil, which helped a little but not really enough. The next morning I figured I'd better just work from home since my nose was running like an open faucet. That night was marginally better, which is to say I maybe got in a few hours of sleep propped up in the bed in the back room where I was watching episodes of Super Girl until around 1 am. It was no fun.

I had been registered for the annual Tour da' Parish Saturday morning, but clearly that wasn't going to happen for me. I think the average speed of the lead group was a bit over 25 mph for the 50 miles despite the wind, so it was just as well I'd skipped it. 

By Sunday morning I was feeling a lot better but it was cold and windy in the morning and I figured I may as well skip the Giro and instead try and go out later when it had warmed up, which turned out to be around 10:00. By then it was considerably warmer, but I wore a base layer and arm-warmers anyway. I ran into Steve out on the levee and we rode out to the Spillway together. Other than a bit of significant wind, the weather was great and I was glad to be back on the bike and feeling normal again. Anyway, I'm glad that week's over.

This morning it was in the low 50s and for the first time this fall I dug out a nice cozy pair of bib knickers and a long-sleeve jersey for an easy Monday ride on the levee. The wind had finally died down and it was nice to have some sunlight since we'd ditched daylight saving time on Sunday. That should make the morning rides a lot less stressful for a month of so until the shorter days put us back in the dark.