Tush training

Getting back into riding shape involves more than building up endurance in my legs and hands and arms and lungs. The part that's in contact with the saddle also gets soft with disuse and requires toughening up. Bag Balm* helps. A lot.

*Bag Balm: A thick, viscous ointment which comes in a square, green tin and whose primary ingredient is essentially Vaseline. It's manufactured by the Dairy Association Co., Inc. (since 1899!), in Lyndonville, Vt., to "help keep dairy cows from becoming chapped from the harsh Vermont environment." The instructions read, in part: "After each milking, apply thoroughly and allow coating to remain on surface." It's equally good as a tush protectant. Ask any long-distance cyclist.

Doin' the overcommitment tango

I've got way too much to do for too many projects. I'd like to say I don't know how I manage to find myself in this predicament, but it happens too often for me to play the innocent. I don't think ahead, I don't say "no" often enough, and I fail to ask for details when someone says, "Oh, this won't take a lot of your time" or "This will be fun!" Uh-huh.

So I said yes to being in the Purim spiel. Fun, sure, but I should have considered I'd need to go to rehearsals as well as show up for the performance. And nobody mentioned the need for getting costume and props together until after I'd agreed to be a serving girl/assassin/woman in the crowd, and that I had to write my lines on 3x5 cards because it's likely I won't remember them so need something to prompt me besides an 8-1/2x11 script. The show is this Saturday evening, and though it is, indeed, fun (most of the time), I'll be glad when it's over, and I can get on with all the other stuff I've committed to, like getting all the Davis Double Century registration information up on the Web site so riders can actually sign up, working with the bike club's Web guy on the site's redesign, working three mornings a week, preparing my friend Lisa's manuscript for self-publishing, and oh yeah, getting on my bicycle and riding so I can make that 500-miles-in-March goal. This doesn't even take into account errands, laundry, getting my bike repaired, all the usual "gotta-get-those-things-done-soon" stuff.

I realize that for many people (you know who you are, Pica), this list will seem paltry. But the fact remains that I really don't like having so many things to do. Or, rather, I do like having lots of things to do, but I don't want any of them to be tied to specific times, dates and places. Having something on the calendar that requires my presence makes me nervous and looking for a way to get out of it. Most of the time, though, I can't bow out gracefully, so I go reluctantly, and then have a perfectly fine time once I'm there. So it's not the thing, itself, that I dislike, just that it's scheduled. Ad hoc is my friend.

Après moi, le déluge

I was awake and up at 5 a.m., and by 7, it wasn't raining. So, since I'm behind on my daily quota of miles (a paltry total of 3 since March 1), I decided to head out for a quick 15 or so on the Tour de Trash. Wind from the south was muscular, and the sky had plenty of clouds, but nothing dire-looking, so riding north up to Rd. 29 was a literal breeze. A bit more strenuous once I turned east on the dump road, but the sun was shining through the clouds ahead of me, and I stopped several times to watch a couple of raptors hanging around the slough (a kite, I think, and what I hoped was an osprey but was probably just a redtail). Discussed the news of the day with a couple of young bovines . . .


and goggled at the swarm of gulls roiling above the landfill, giving it the appearance of an enormous disturbed anthill.


Then I looked in my rearview mirror . . .


OMG! Quick! Ride! Ride fast! You're still 7 miles from home!

I almost made it. If I lived east of the dump instead of west, I might have outrun it, but as I had to ride into that dark maw, I started getting wet about 2 miles from home. Luckily, the real downpour didn't start until I was safely in the house. (I tried to get a picture of that, too, but it's hard to take a photo of rain.) (It's pouring again—hard— as I write this. 9 hours later.) So I got my 14 miles, getting only a little wet, and even survived being chased by a couple of dogs—naturally, I was riding into the teeth of the wind at that point and wasn't able to outrun the black one, who nipped my right shoe befoe heading back to his lair. I really do not like dogs.

Oh, and somewhere out there on the road, my cyclometer turned over 7,000 miles. I was so focused on getting home, I didn't even notice and so missed the fist-pumping opportunity.

It is dumping out there. Mr. Noah, call your office . . .

Marching on

March means March Madness—not the NCAA basketball kind, the bicycling kind, in which Davis Bike Club members pledge to ride a whole lot of miles in one month, the total miles ridden translating into a penny per mile to purchase helmets for kids whose families don't have the money to buy them themselves. This year, I expect there will be more kids needing them.

In any event, I've committed to ride 500 miles this March. Seeing as how I've been on my road bike exactly four times since the beginning of 2009, racking up a whopping 83 miles in toto, I will be challenged to make it. As incentive, I've signed up (and paid for. so I can't back out) a four-day tour beginning Sunday, the 29th. There will be hills, so I'll have to train. Hope the rain stops pretty soon, otherwise I could be in the same fix these guys were in a couple of weeks ago . . .

Amgen Tour of California riders crossing Stevenson's Bridge in the rain
Feb. 15, 2009