Spring is finally here?

Well gang, that was a bit of time between posts wasn’t it? Too much work and less than ideal weather have been conspiring to hold down my mileage so far this year. Oy. Next weekend is our annual Kickapoo Valley Reserve training weekend. Showing up to ride in those hills with only about 300 miles in may very well kill me. Communications are sketchy at best up there, so don’t expect any blog updates during the weekend. Post-weekend I’ll try to get some thoughts, and hopefully photos, published.

I managed to get out on my fixed gear for about an hour and a quarter today. First ride in short sleeves! Woo-hoo! I also had a pleasant verbal exchange with a couple of gap-toothed mouth-breathers (GTMBs) in a sh*t brown-colored Ford F350.

Seems GTMB #1 had an issue that I wasn’t in the bike lane on Hwy 113 south from Waunakee. For those of you not familiar with the intersection, it’s not a bike lane, it’s a dedicated right turn lane. He suggested that I should use that. I replied that it wasn’t a bike lane, and that state law allowed me to be in the traffic lane. He then asked if I thought I was “special” (I do - how did he know?) I said no and suggested that he look-up state laws about bikes (that may have been asking too much of him - there was no proof that he was literate.) GTMB #2 didn’t say anything the entire time. Might have been embarrassed, but who knows? It should be noted that he was in the left lane next to me - I was not impeding his travel, but my mere presence (and in pedal-fairy shiny pants to boot!) must have offended him so much that he just had to speak out.

The light changed and as he rolled off, he asked me to thank my mother for him. Must have been a long drive to Iowa for him for whatever. What a nice, polite gentleman.

Ah, Spring. When grass starts turning green, flowers start blooming and the mouth-breathing morons come out of their winter hibernation. Be careful out there gang.