Ice out

Several really nice things happened on today's ride.

First, street sweeping has begun early. Partly it is the suddenly warm weather but I think also we had a pretty mild winter. There wasn't much snow until pretty late in the season so there wasn't as much sand and salt put down on the roads as there is in a more severe winter. Street sweeping is extremely important to me as once the streets are swept I start riding my road bike (which is more fun to ride). The street in front of my house is one of the streets which has already been swept.

Second, I had a moment of real communication. I live near the university. University married student housing is located along one of my primary riding routes. There are lots of foreign students in married student housing, many with rudimentary English skills. So I was riding and I met an Asian woman riding on the wrong side of the road. I think Chinese although I am not sure and that detail matters not to the story. But as evidenced by her clothing and bicycle I am fairly certain that she was foreign. Wrong clothes to be middle aged American, and further American women of that age are very seldom on a bicycle at all, certainly not the one she was on. I made no comment to her, not expecting that she would understand anyway, but as always when I meet a person riding towards me on my side of the road I keep to the extreme right. If someone is going to have to ride out into traffic it isn't going to be me. I get right over to the curb and nearly without exception the oncoming rider realizes and does what they are supposed to, keep to the right. So we had this little interaction and I went on about my ride. More on that later.

Thirdly, I met another guy who thinks I live in his neighborhood because he sees me riding where he lives all the time. A youngish fellow with a Discovery jersey and a nice old steel bike caught up with me on the approach to the Pelham Avenue bridge. He lives in Saint Anthony Park. So we had a nice if brief chat about how I head south through the Park when the wind is out of the south. I always head out into the wind so as to have a tail wind on the way home when I am less energetic. Anyway, our conversation was brief as he was much stronger than I and I pulled in behind him so he didn't feel obligated to continue the conversation. He quickly left me in his dust. Hey, I don't mind. The young are much stronger than I am. While on the Ride Across Minnesota two years ago I met a guy from Shoreview who thought I lived in his neighborhood because he sees me riding where he lives all the time. Shoreview is where I ride when the wind is out of the north.

Fourth, I was taking a drink of water near the river when one of a group of young men who had jogged to the river and were doing group calisthenics commented to me, "cool bike". Well, who doesn't like to hear that? I said "thank you" and rode on.

On the way home I rode past Lake Como again.
This is pretty much the same vantage point as last week's photo but as you can see, the ice is completely out. Spring has arrived.
And this pretty much proves it. A baseball team was taking some hits at Saint Thomas. Ah, the ping of ball on aluminum bat, a certain sign of amateur baseball. By their general appearance and costuming I took this group to be high schoolers. The college team I am sure has been practicing for a while and may even have taken a spring break southern tour. Also, the college team by this time is more uniformly attired. And finally, on a day this nice they would want to be playing a game somewhere. I just don't think this was the college team.

And then the capper. On the way home I swung back onto the same street where I had earlier encountered the Asian woman. As I topped a small rise I observed that she was there again, and again riding towards me, apparently on her way home. Only this time she was riding on the right. This pleased me and I broke into a smile. When I glanced at her I was a bit surprised to see that she was smiling broadly at me, nearly as happy as I about having had a little moment of non-verbal communication. It was very nice.

Today's weather report: 81, an all time record high for this date. Sunny, light south wind, very nice.