Zen bicycling.

Hm. Got on Traveller this morning for a "I need to get used to this again" ride. I'd love to give you the usual stats on speed, distance, etc, but my riding computer seems to be not working.

It's getting power, and cycling through the various categories in scan mode, but when docked to the mount, it isn't receiving any information from the sensor. I checked, and the magnet on the spokes is still active, and from what I can tell the wires are well-seated in the sensor and and the mounting. I'm assuming that something corroded during the long lay-off. Oh, well. I'll see if I can order a new mounting unit. If not, bike computers are fairly cheap.

But I did ride. Did two laps around our neighborhood which is roughly two miles. Everything was smooth, and got into 5th gear (out of six) a few times. The shifting was very smooth, thank you WD-40 and 3-in-1 oil. I'd guess I was averaging about 14mph.

Physically, I'm happy with how I feel after the ride. No obvious pains or strains from suddenly using those muscle groups after such a long lay-off.

I'll probably do another lap later today.

Sailing off into the sunrise.

Because around here, riding off into the sunset results in a flooded engine rather quickly.

kshandra left for That Thing In The Desert last night, after turning our poor PT Cruiser into a TARDIS with a really cool sound system. Seriously, you could not fit one more can of soda in that car.

She almost forgot her critters. That would have been tragic, and I would have had to deal with an angry elephant and tie-dyed teddy bear.

She called from firestrike's place last night, and will call when she hits Reno. This year, rather than shooting a man just to watch him die, she's been told that when she heads out of Reno, she must be trailed by twenty hounds. (50 penguin points to the first person to get both references.)

I miss her already.

Dead from the cute.

I just wandered out in search of chips for my taco feast (denied! All Rite Aid had was the weird flavored ones. Tomorrow I'll ride my bike down to Safeway.) Heading out, I noticed a family loading a U-Haul for a move.

Coming back, there was a little boy outside. Also a large open box of stuffed animals along with other boxes that told me they packed his stuff last. I overheard the following.

Little boy: "Is Oregon a long way away?"

Mom: "Yes, very far."

LB: "How far?"

Mom: "We're going to be driving for two whole days!"

At this, the little boy goes over to a box, gets out some books, and carefully puts them in the box with his stuffed animals.

Ded. Completely ded.

I made this!

OK, I helped.

Hundreds of people welcomed the opening of the Bay Area's newest bridge - the long-awaited $1.2 billion northbound Benicia-Martinez Bridge - by celebrating on both sides of the Carquinez Strait on Saturday and taking an inaugural cruise across the still-pristine concrete span.

Any of you who cross this bridge, I delivered several thousand feet of unistrut, all-thread, and at least a ton of connectors and fasteners (along with the usual support stuff) to the toll plaza.

No, I didn't build it, but I supplied the guys who did. That's my shit you're driving through there.