Infestation news

The day dawned grey and gloomy with a mist hanging in the air. It misted enough to make the driveway damp but it never actually rained and the street never actually got wet, only damp. On a day when the morning low was higher than the average high for the day, bicycling seemed likely if the sun would just be strong enough to dry the mist. It was. The temperature in our front yard is currently 56, a full 20 degrees above the average. Even with the overcast I am going to have to put this one down as a pretty nice day.

A new infestation of the Emerald ash borer pest has been reported by the daily press. It is a bit depressing to think that very shortly these things will not be newsworthy in the slightest. But it is still interesting enough to a large enough group of people to have to location reported. I went looking for the new spot. Here it is on the Farm campus near the Saint Paul Student Center.There's that tree there and then one down the hill a bit near the Fairgrounds. The location is only about a block and a half from the big metal cows which means, yes, the new infestation is more than a mile closer to our ash trees than the previous infestation. But who knows?

This afternoon in France FC Nantes traveled to Concarneau for its opening game in this year's Coupe de France. The opponent, US Concarneau is a CFA 2 team, the fifth level of French football. Conditions were reported to be rainy, cold and windy, the weather that an underdog always wishes for. Concarneau 3, Nantes 0, an embarrassment. What once seemed like a promising season with another return to Ligue 1 now reels rapidly towards disintegration.

Another nice October day

It was about 56 when I started today. I have been a little surprised every day here in this heat wave when I start out. Even with the balmy temperatures and the sun shining it just never seems quite as warm on the bicycle as it looks out the window. This is not a complaint, it was really nice today.

I rode out to Lake Vadnais. I have ridden there many, many times over the past several years. Earlier this year I for the first time ever encountered a boat on the waters of the lake. Nothing is ever unique I guess, today I saw it again, a boat on Lake Vadnais.It was another beautiful light day. These ducks came in close to shore to let me have a good look at the green head of the male.There was a guy in town who was quite a bit older than me and who biked quite a few more miles than me. His obituary is in the Strib today and includes this information:

"At age 78, Schultz rode more than 5,000 miles, and he was on track to do the same this year when he died unexpectedly earlier this month."

Good on you Herb Schultz, RIP.

This evening in France FC Nantes suffered a home defeat to Guingamp. FC Nantes falls to fourth in the table, outside the promotion zone for the first time in many weeks.

Standard time, November miles

As I considered my options at about 11am this morning I noticed that the promise of all of the weather predictors was for a temperature of about 49. The sun was out and a review of the weather log in the daily newspaper revealed that 49 is the average high temperature for this date. The day looked pretty, it promised to be at least average temperature, out I went.

It was windy. But it was a nice day for November, way nicer than about 2/3 of the days in October. It was windy and windy is hard work for a bicyclist but I pronounce it good, I had fun.

The wind was from the northwest, mostly from the west and so in the first half of the ride I tried to get a little further west than I usually do. The last time a similar wind event occurred I rode through the campus of Northwestern College, a place I had never ridden before. The skies that day were heavily overcast but Northwestern turns out to be located in a very pretty spot and I promised myself I would be back when the sun was out to get some sort of photo.

Northwestern features the imposing figure of Billy Graham as a former president. The college was located in Minneapolis when Mr. Graham was president. At a later point in time the college moved to Roseville, to the former archdiocese of Saint Paul campus of Nazareth Hall. The current location is perched on the west shore of Lake Johanna. I was on campus once long ago when the older Pelzer daughter got married, Uncle Al was there. I had not been there since or ever in the daylight. It is a pretty spot.In view of yesterday's post, it is perhaps pertinent to point out the wooden cross which the college has erected on the lake shore. I suspect that this idyllic spot probably constitutes some sort of gate to heaven (French translation requested) for the on campus faithful.

I saw only four other bicyclists while I was riding today. The first two were female college students arriving on campus as I was leaving Northwestern. I know that the college has some student housing across Snelling Avenue and I suspect that these two were bicycle commuters, having ridden perhaps as much as three or four blocks. I identify them as college students and not as serious bicyclists based on their costumes and demeanors. This is a differentiation which was easy to make on a windy November 2. The other two were less than 10 years old, brothers I think, on the smallest size bicycle (but with the training wheels removed). The two of them were making circles in the driveway of their house. Of course, much of what I do can and is by some identified as just riding in circles as well. However the circles I ride are a fair amount larger than the circles those two boys were making in the driveway.

Based on the evidence I pronounce myself to have been the only bicyclist out there yet again today.

Today is the first week day of standard time, a day when in my previous life bicycling was not possible. As I rode today I pondered what the change to standard time used to mean to me and what it means now. Previously the change of time was of huge significance. The more I thought the more obvious it became that the time change now means pretty much nothing at all. It was a nice day, I went for a ride. It was dark when I got up, it will be dark when I go to bed. The hands on the clock now provide only a reference point. The clock no longer dictates where I must be when the sun it out. This is pretty much what I wanted, this is pretty much why I wanted to stop going to work, not to be too dramatic or anything, I am free. And it is good.

This evening in France, the arch nemesis of FC Nantes, Le Havre, has once again heaped ignominy upon les Canaris, pummeling the Nantais visitors to the northern city by a humiliating 4-0. FC Nantes continues down an unsatisfying road, falling to third in the table as Le Havre rises to second.

I remembered how to ride a bicycle

I have just gotten back on my bicycle after not having turned a single pedal stroke for four days. I checked the log, and except for one six day stretch in late March, four is the most consecutive days off the bicycle since the first ride of the year in early March. And that March six day deal, for one of the days the log contains the terse note: "Snow", so arguably that was pre-season riding anyway.

I was confident that I was going to get in a ride today, so confident that I was a bit lax in keeping track of the weather radar. I WAS monitoring the temperature, waiting patiently for something over 50. Just before noon I looked a the radar and discovered, horrors, that the entire western half of the state seemed to be experiencing rain. I rushed to check the living room thermometer and decided that anything that rounds to 50 was close enough. I hurried through lunch and began preparations to ride.

Layering gets easier as you go along. Today I had the proper gloves and I also added my summer weight helmet liner underneath the heavier ear flap helmet liner. The gloves were my good ones which keep my fingers warm and the two layers on my head gave me on that major location for heat loss as many layers as I had on nearly everywhere else. Bingo, warm enough.

I got out to ride barely in time. As I sit at the computer now it is raining and has been raining for a couple of hours. I rode with gradually gathering clouds but finished before it was much more than beginning to be threatening. Now it is wet again.

Much like my sibling in Michigan, I assumed based on the large number of miles ridden in September that a record or near record year was in the making. For the past couple of months I have tried to keep my average miles ridden per day for total days of the month (as opposed to days with a ride during the month) over 20. With 30 days in a month that makes a 600 mile month.

With today's ride I raised my average for this month all the way up to 5.2 miles ridden for each day of October.

*sigh*

We have in our yard one of the many species that are referred to as "Burning Bush" due to the fact that the leaves turn red in the fall. Ours is just starting to the change.I rode around the neighborhood a bit making sure that I was properly layered and then started out towards the north. I passed the corn field and found nearly all of the corn gone replaced by dozens of geese. Here is the view from pretty much the same spot from which living plants have been photographed for the past approximately four and a half months.It is always a bit of a shock.

There is still a tiny bit of corn standing down at the other end of the field and these guys are up to something.They don't look like students, they must be faculty and staff. They are gathering complete corn plants. If you check the harvest photo from last week you can see that the main harvest was a silage chop. I don't know what these guys are up to but I suspect a teaching moment of some kind.

This evening in France, Tours 1-1 Nantes. FC Nantes remains firmly in second place in the Ligue 2 table.

A fan video

There won't be any bicycle ride here today. It is cold and tres windy.

This gives me even more time than usual to root around on the internet and today I found on the French language site PresseOcean.fr a fan video of the FC Nantes goal. Here it is:

As reported by PresseOcean:

"Huit secondes pour l'éternité

Deux passes, une frappe, une bévue et un but, le tout en 8 secondes. Et voilà Mareval entré dans la légende."

Eight seconds for eternity.
Two passes, one kick, one mistake and one goal, all in 8 seconds. And voila, Mareval goes down in history.

Here is a link to the more mainstream video taken from the television broadcast of the game. Incredible indeed.

AFTERNOON EDIT: What do you know about that? A copyright claim of all things. Well, personally I support free enterprise and if the person who took that video is trying to reap financial benefit from copyright and sale of rights to the video I support him (when and if you see the video you will agree that it is probably a "he", and quite possibly a fairly drunken "he" at that). TOPWLH and I have seen the video, it is way more fun than the TV view. I will continue to scour the net to try to make a view of this goal available here.

Since I am already making an edit, here is a bit more. There won't be any bicycle ride here today because of the big wind. Here is what we have in our yard so far, a medium size branch down off the cottonwood tree.We're having some fun now, eh?

Nicollet Island

We had actual rain yesterday, the first significant rain of the month. I got out for a short walk but honestly probably came up a bit short on that one hour outside every day for a year promise. It was raining.

I am still committed to the idea and intend to get out for an hour on days when it is snowing or when it is cold. But rain? Rain is so . . . wet.

And now the temperatures are threatening to return to normal. Just as we get used to the idea of endless August it appears that October will arrive on schedule. Our overnight low was in the low 50s.

But today was NICE. After a cool start the temperature reached 76 on the thermometer in our front yard at 3:30 as I returned from a nice ride.

I was a little uncertain of wind direction as I started. I knew it was south but southwest or southeast still seemed up for grabs so I took that loop through the Fairgrounds that I have been riding a lot of late, testing the wind in the various directions. It was a fabulous day at the Fairgrounds as there are TWO big events going on over there.

At the northeast corner of the grounds there was some sort of dog show. It was a big enough deal that there was a fair food shack open.

I took this picture of the wind turbine blade that has been pictured here before. I think that the fabulous blue sky behind the blade makes that a good picture without there having to be more content. But that isn't even the real reason why I took the picture.

Nope, that picture is to prove that even as late as today, September 26, it is still possible to purchase sausage on a stick at the Fairgrounds. You might have to zoom in on the photo but you should be able to tell that that stand is open and that there on the white portion of the above the window sign, towards the right appears: "Corn dogs". Sausage on a stick.

At the opposite corner of the grounds there is a big horse show. They have lots of horse shows over there. I ride there a lot, I see it all the time. This one, however, must be one of the largest shows that they have. The parking lots over there are all full of cars and trucks with horse trailers. Here is a trailer preparing to perform its intended task, transporting horses.
Eventually I decided the wind was more southwest than southeast and so I rode a more westerly route, down through the campus. I didn't want to ride the Stone Arch Bridge which is often my choice when headed over there. It was too nice a day, the bridge promised to be overrun by pedestrians.

Instead I detoured down Main Street and eventually crossed the bridge to Nicollet Island. I was absolutely positive that I had never ridden there on my bicycle. After having ridden there today I was struck by the thought that I may never have been there at all. It was a nice scenic ride around the island on the brick street. I have pictured the Grain Belt Beer sign before. Here it is from behind, photo taken from the parking lot of De la Salle High School.I have settled on the Intercampus Transitway as the only route that I am comfortable with for crossing the railroad tracks that I cross using the Dead Man's Curve passage when it is available. I came back from my ride today along that route. At the north end the transitway sort of dumps you onto the Fairgrounds. You could turn right on Como but it just feels more natural to ride to the end of transitway and cut through the Fairgrounds parking lots and circle back inside the Fairgrounds towards a favorable spot for a Snelling Avenue crossing.

I was in the process of doing just that when I spotted a really nice old car from a distance of a couple of blocks. I thought to myself that the car was on the Fairgrounds on the wrong weekend, that that street rod event was at the beginning of the summer. But it was a really nice looking old car so I turned where I had last seen it and tried to catch up. I lost the trail but cutting back through the grounds spotted the car again. The driver seemed to be on a sight seeing tour of the grounds and was driving slowly so I was able to close up a bit. Eventually I was able to draw alongside and confirm that it was a really nice old Oldsmobile 98. I at first guessed to myself 1957 and got ahead of the classic car so that I could turn around with favorable sun direction and get a photo of the car as he passed.The driver slowed to, I thought, allow me to get the picture, a driver proud of his car.

"A '57?", I inquired.

"56", he replied, "Don't I know you?"

"Larrie?", I asked.

So last week I rode through our old neighborhood and talked to Maurice who now lives in Larrie and Kathy's old house. Today I ran into Larrie himself. Larrie confirms that it is a 56 Oldsmobile 98, a beauty, Larrie's deceased father's car, and Larrie had his mother out for a ride in it on a beautiful fall day. Larrie's father was superintendent of the Fair is what I believe he said and he and his mother were out checking out the sights. To make the whole thing even more interesting just about a week ago TOPWLH and I ran into Kathy in the grocery store.

You can leave the old neighborhood but apparently the old neighborhood never leaves you.

This evening in Nantes, FC Nantes improved to four wins in four starts at home with a 2-1 victory over Nimes. Nantes set an all time Ligue 2 record for fastest goal at the start of a game when defender Remi Maréval scored after just 10 seconds of play. Those familiar with football will know that the opening kickoff must travel forward. The usual procedure at the upper levels of the sport is for one player to roll the ball forward for one circumference of the ball after which another player plays the ball back to his teammates to maintain possession. It is one of the set plays used fairly often at that point to have that player send a long kick towards goal while the forwards move in to try to use field position to gain an advantage. Today the ball was played back to Maréval and he launched one towards goal from 60 meters away. The ball somehow eluded the keeper and went into the net.

Nantes again assumes first place in the table based on goal differential over Caen. Just as last week Nantes must await the result of Caen's game to determine if they are truly in first place. Caen, as they did last week, play on Monday night.

Light northeast wind

Today a light northeast wind and warm morning temperatures led me back to a very familiar ride, the 8 lakes tour. I checked my bike log. I don't always note destinations in the notes section (it is a spreadsheet and I try to keep notes brief) but I am pretty sure that it has been over three weeks since I rode to Lake Vadnais.

Did I note any changes? Well, it is still a very pretty ride. The lakes are scenic and the glacial terrain which produced the lakes is always a nice challenging ride. Here is one change though, a big willow tree has either fallen into the lake or has been cut down and fallen into the lake. In either case a new big bare spot on the shoreline has been created. Soon it will be someone's favorite fishing spot.Quite a bit of the tree is still in the lake so if anyone over in Saint Paul notices that the water tastes like willow, I know the reason why.

It isn't really fall out there yet but it pretty clearly isn't summer anymore either. The leaves on the trees are starting to trend ever so slightly to the yellow side of the spectrum. Here is a view of the north shore of the lake from just north of the mid-lake parking area.Vadnais was pretty today.

This evening in Corsica FC Nantes continued its recent run of successes by securing another away point with a 1-1 draw against SC Bastia. Bastia is a town on the island of Corsica. Even though Corsica is much closer to the Italian than to the French mainland, Corsica is part of France. Corsica was the birthplace of Napoleon and it was once briefly an independent republic but has been part of France since 1768.

For today's football match there was no video stream that I could find so I followed the game on the Live Update at the FC Nantes website. My French reading vocabulary, particularly as relates to football, continues to expand albeit slowly. My interpretation of the live update is that Nantes dominated the game and had many better scoring opportunities and some will be disappointed that they did not come away with a victory. However, the conventional wisdom in European football is that any away point is a good point. Nantes rises to first in the table pending the outcome of Caen's game on Monday night.

You are here

Whoa, another one, a really, really nice day. I rode in the morning establishing once again that Monday morning is THE best morning. Here it is, the middle of September and I rode today, in fact, rode IN THE MORNING today and still was out there is my summer costume. Sleeveless jersey, no base layer, no change in dress at all from the middle of July. It was 72 when I started, not much warmer than that when I finished, but it was a spectacularly nice day for a ride.

There was virtually NO wind at the start. I very strongly considered just going ahead and riding to the north, it has been so long since I have seen my regular haunts in that direction. A light breeze appeared before I reached the point where I would have to commit to north or south and it was from the southwest. I committed to a ride to the south. I headed out, yet again, past the Fairgrounds. This ended up being a very good decision as on the way back the wind had freshened enough that I was glad to be riding with the wind at my back and not on my front.

Today I rode down to the U campus to see what it looks like over there with school in session. I wanted plenty of west in my ride so I nipped across the Franklin Avenue bridge and found the midtown bicycle path.

I wanted to see where that thing goes so I rode a little farther than I wanted to seeking the end. You don't actually come to an end, you come to a change in striping on the pavement. When you are on the Minneapolis path there are three lanes, one pedestrian and one each direction for bicycles. When you leave the Minneapolis path there is only a single stripe separating right from left.

I recognized that something had happened and stopped at an information kiosk to try to figure out what was going on.

I was HERE.Who doesn't love a sign that informs you that "You Are Here"?

I turned around there. I rode out to the street trying to gather some more in person visual evidence of where I was and found myself next to the Minnekhada Country Club at France Avenue and Excelsior Boulevard, way, way farther west than I am used to being. I started back.

A little bit after that I rode the wrong way down a one way street to try to get this photo. It is a lake never previously featured on THIS bicycle blog, Lake Calhoun.I got home in time to watch the live stream from France of Monday Night Football. Tonight's game was Strasbourg at Nantes. Nantes did not play last week as all leagues world wide were suspended for national team play, World Cup Qualifying. France tied Romania 1-1 in Paris and tied Serbia 1-1 in Belgrade.

During the time off Nantes suffered what may or may not be a significant blow when Croatian forward Ivan Klasnic left the team (translation: was sold) to Bolton of the English Premier League. Klasnic was leading Ligue 2 in scoring at the time of his departure.

But tonight FC Nantes improved their home record to three wins in three starts with a 2-1 victory over Strasbourg. I had a little trouble locating the stream and didn't go live until the 6th minute of the game. Strasbourg already led 1-0 at that point, having scored (according to the FC Nantes website) on their first penetration into the FC Nantes end of the field. No matter, FC Nantes was much, much the better side thereafter. Le Canaris scored twice before the half to lead 2-1 and that was enough. Final score: Nantes 2:1 Strasbourg. FC Nantes rises to second place in the league table, one point adrift of Ligue 2 leader SM Caen.

After the football I watched, first on the same Eurosport stream where I was watching the football, but eventually on good old American over the air TV, the US Tennis Open. I am happy to report that several days ago I predicted the result.

As I said at that time, four words: Juan Martin del Potro!

Someone else's milestone, part deux

I finished up the month with a two hour bicycle ride. This allowed me to achieve a milestone of sorts by having more miles ridden on my bicycle in Minnesota for the month of August than miles ridden on my bicycle in Michigan for that same period. By two miles. OK, even I concede that that isn't much of a milestone. I note that for this year I am 26 miles behind the total that I had by the end of August 2008. This is OK, as I am still plenty ahead of where I need to be to be able to expect to reach my year end goal and further last September I had an all time low for September in the midst of if I recall correctly, the rainiest September on record for this reporting station. I hope this means that September 2009 will be a month with plenty enough miles to move my 2009 total back ahead of 2008.

My milestone is pretty puny today however when compared to this.Here is a semi-official announcement from the USTA Northern Section website. A trip to the national tournament is way cool, official blog-u-lations to TT. I suspect by now he has obtained a better photo but this is the only one I could get off the USTA Northern Section website so this is the one I have to use.

Of course, there is still plenty to aspire to. The record compiled by Dodo Cheney and her many national championships is still out there, Dodo has set the bar pretty high. The linked article is dated 2004 and credits Mrs. Cheney with 347 championships, I found another link from July 2009 which credits her with 382.

This evening in France: Brest 1:2 Nantes. Nantes gets their first road victory of the season and moves into third place, tied on points but ahead in goal differential. I thought Brest was off side on their goal, a view supported by the replay.

I love my thumb levers

I have a really nice bicycle in Michigan. On every trip there I am always a little bit surprised by what a nice bicycle it really is. It serves me extremely well. There is just the one thing about it that in a perfect world I would change. I request forbearance from any bicycle geeks in attendance but on the other hand I know that they will understand when I say that my Michigan bicycle has components manufactured by a manufacturer of fishing equipment. The bicycle that I love the most, the one that I ride when I ride from my garage at home has components manufactured by Campagnolo. Any others in attendance who, like me, love our thumb levers know just exactly what it is that I mean. I love my thumb levers.This photo is another foray by moi into the world of on the bicycle one handed digital photography. It is worth noting, however, that the speedometer function of my bicycle computer is visible and I clearly wasn't going very fast.

It rained quite a bit yesterday and continued overnight. It was dry enough this afternoon but not really warm enough for August. I just pretended that it was September. I put on my jacket and went for a ride. This is the prettiest lake I saw.Compared to other photos posted recently which feature a lake this one is pretty lame. I mean, you can see the opposite shore. What's the deal on that?

We miss you Lake Michigan.

What do you think of this?I arrived home from my ride to discover that TOPWLH had been on an inspection tour of the back yard. Those are apples off our apple tree. They are not big apples but the truth is the tree is a Minnesota variety (Beacon) which doesn't produce those big Washington state sort of apples. Those are actually pretty nice Beacons (retirement jewelry for scale). TOPWLH reports that there are probably at least a dozen more still on the tree and that there were also several on the ground. All previous comments about never getting any fruit from the apple tree are hereby revoked.

This evening in France: Nantes 5, Istres 0.

This whole watching the game on steaming video is a much, much more rewarding experience than trying to keep up with the team from text updates (in French) on the team website. The net stream picture quality is obviously not network HD quality but I can actually SEE the game.

Today's game result is HUGE for the team. The team website headline is that the team affirms its ambitions. Midfielder Djamel Abdoun looked this evening like the Ligue 2 equivalent of current FIFA world player of the year Cristiano Ronaldo. The first half ended with Nantes leading 1-0. Abdoun scored the second goal with a play that greatly resembled many of the goals produced last year for Manchester United by Ronaldo. On a free kick from about 30 yards, Abdoun curled the ball around the wall and inside the far post to completely defeat the Istres keeper, a wonderful goal. Then on the third goal he again channeled Ronaldo with a series of high speed step over moves which freed him to cross the ball into the box where both of his strikers had arrived with only one defender to mark the two of them. The defender was in position to do what he could but he wasn't able to prevent an easy header from 5 yards out by Ténéma N'Diaye to put the game completely out of reach. FC Nantes advances to fourth in the table, on the outskirts of the top three promotion zone.

It is obviously very, very early in the season but Nantes is again raising the hopes of its fans for a return to the top league in France.

Bad influence

On her last full day on the mountain MySU continues to prove herself to be a bad influence on all of the young people she comes into contact with. Here she persists in convincing one of those youngsters that it is OK to HAVE FUN!There was early morning rain yesterday and we went to the mall. MySU counted 32 closed stores in the mall. There were more stores out of business than stores still trying to sell stuff. This meant that the mall had limited entertainment value so we headed to the giant Meijer's store nearby. Entertainment was slightly better there. I fired this one of the parking lot while we were pulling out.Other stores say they have lower prices. Sounds like they have baloney on special this week.

And on our last night our last sunset.This evening in France: Vannes 1, Nantes 1.

A live stream

Today's ride took us towards the head of the inland lake, up near the point where it is still a river. We rode around Windmill Island and on the way out I got this shot of what I take to be a great blue heron.I also attempted another on the bicycle one handed digital photo. I am starting to get the technique perfected and am now prepared to offer a few tips. First, when withdrawing the camera from your pocket, do so by slipping your hand through the loop of the wrist strap. This avoids the catastrophic camera drop that I nearly experienced yesterday.

OK, on with the show. The middle rider in the peloton complained about the last picture. Apparently she felt that the angle caused some sort of distortion, that the image somehow did not accurately reflect the size of . . . well, she said there was some distortion.

I tried again, this time from closer.I just don't know what distortion she might have been complaining about.

Later on we were riding a loop near the barn when she caught me unawares, sprinting by before I realized that it was a race and nabbing some spotty jersey points. Well, I have now been subjected to the same bitter medicine which I previously projected onto Voeckler. It is bitter, it is bitter. Her excuse was she had to do it, that she had previously been the only one who was pointless.

Pointless, hmmm. Where shall I go with this? Hmmmm. I guess I will leave it alone. We rode on and forewarned I was able to hold her at bay in the final climb of the day with double points on the line. I continue to build my lead in the competition.

This evening in France: Nantes 3, Clermont 2 in the first home game of the year for Nantes.

An amazing thing has occurred. Being retired meant that I had some extra time to search around on the internet and I discovered a website that was live streaming the game. This is my third season as a full time fan of this team and today for the first time I saw, actually saw them play live. When Klasnic headed in the ball for the go ahead goal I was able to throw my arms in the air in just the same way as those in attendance in Nantes. Allez Nantes. I am fulfilled, I am jaune et vert.

Her last full day

Big storms blew through western Michigan last night, the nearby town of Fruitport apparently even made the national news. That town had hundreds of trees down including quite a few on houses including one house that, if I saw CNN correctly, had four trees on it.

It rained here but we were mostly off the south end of the biggest storms and the storms mostly served to clear out the humidity of the last couple of days. After two days off bicycling resumed.

Today is Wireless's last full day here so she joined in for a late morning ride. Here we are at the Bay House for a turn around. The boat company international sales coordinator noted that the neighbors have "one of my boats."We rode on down to the state park, bicycles admitted without charge. A photo very similar to this one has already been posted elsewhere on the internet, but I was there too, this is the one I took: Wireless at Big Red.I rode again this afternoon down to Cross Country Cycle, the local bicycle shop of choice where my spousal unit rented an extremely nice carbon, or as Bike Snob NYC would say, crabon, bicycle so that she can start to join in in the cycling.

I had already cycled and re-cycled, I was not feeling in the slightest bit under exercised but it was her last full day here so I joined Wireless and SU for the walk to the Tunnel Park and for my first time this trip even made the trek to the top of the dune. SU knows the number of steps, ask her.There wasn't a particularly photogenic sunset this evening. Even though I took several photos (it is just memory) I decided that none of them particularly merited a posting.

We got this picture instead. This one is better.Today in France, Caen 1, Nantes 0.

The blueberries are very good.

The regular ride leader was available today so she and I set out for a tour de blueberry fields. The primary crop locally IS blueberries as clearly the local sandy soil is well suited to the commercial production of blueberries. There are several operations within easy bicycling distance, including our personal favorite and the blueberry brand heartily endorsed by all of us here, Bowerman's.

On the other hand, sandy soil makes corn cultivation problematic, the corn certainly doesn't do as well as the corn that Mrs. Smith and I are used to reviewing.This photo was taken quite close to the street entrance to a local golf course named "Legends of Macatawa". That's another of the legends of Macatawa for scale.

A fair percentage of the fans of this bicycle blog are present at this moment in this house and their reaction to yesterday's "nude descending a staircase" was almost shockingly uniform and completely unanimous.

So today's photo is "dude descending a staircase".Interesting tidbits include that yesterday's photo included Wireless on the deck at the top of the stairs reading a book with her back to the lake. Today's photo was taken by Wireless and includes the non-nude person on the deck at the top of the stairs reading a book with her back to the lake. The photo is fairly obviously posed as you may be able to note the dude's retirement jewelry on his left wrist and he is not nearly at the stage yet where he will be wearing that to the beach.

It looks like rain but Voeckler wanted a bit of exercise and I am always up for re-cycling so we set out to try to get in a few miles in Waukazoo Woods. At an elapsed distance of only about three miles we both noticed a few drops of water on our faces and quickly concurred that we should bolt for the barn.

I was hammering along, not exactly at full sprint as I was trying to gauge the effort necessary to make it back to shelter while riding at maximum output for that distance. I wasn't at full out effort but I did think I was riding pretty fast. Voeckler, in what I am certain was intended as an effort at assistance, chirped from behind me, "We can ride faster if you want to." Well.

The second result of the change of courses for today's ride was that we approached the bottom of the dune from the opposite direction, necessitating a 180 degree turn just as the hill begins. This completely ruled out the possibility of the surprise long sprint and besides, if you try it every time, it isn't going to be a surprise very many times.

I hit the incline in the lead but Voeckler quickly and effortlessly dusted me off, easily taking the spotty jersey points at the top of the hill and riding away to an easy victory on the downhill finish. *sigh* But we had fun and considering the short duration of our effort we both pronounced ourselves to be adequately worked out.

I choose to be optimistic about the news this afternoon from France. Eighteen of the twenty teams in Ligue 2 got the new season underway. By not playing (Nantes at Caen on Monday night football on France 3), Nantes has risen from a tie for last place in the Ligue (although also admittedly slipping from a tie for first place) and currently stand tied for 12th. Nine games were played, seven teams won, all of them are awarded three points and move ahead of Nantes. The other two games ended in ties and those teams each receive one point to also move ahead of les Canaris.

Nantes is even on points with all of the teams that lost today but is ahead of all of them in the table based on goal differential. Due to goal differentials, Nantes can only move back to first place by winning by three goals on Monday.

Does this constitute a mash?

It's a very unusual day for August 1. The mercury is struggling to reach 70 while the wind continues to howl. I have other obligations later today so if I was going to ride I had to suck it up and head out into the cold.

I often say that bicycling in Minnesota is dependent on road conditions, that the weather shouldn't keep me off my bike. I have the gear, it's just a matter of proper layering. Today I went with a tee-shirt over my jersey, arm warmers, a light jacket and a light helmet liner. I thought seriously about tights but eventually I opted for bare legs. That turned out to be a good decision but more on that a bit later.

I rode out to Lake Vadnais. The ride today went a bit better than the one after work yesterday, I felt a lot better. On the way out the gear felt about right but after reaching the turn back point and beginning to ride with the wind instead of into it I began looking for a spot to stop and remove a couple of layers. I stopped just after the parking lot at Vadnais and pared down to a more summer like costume. I took this picture while I was stopped, hoping to illustrate how fall like the day was and also to show the new road up the hill on the far side of the lake.I was on my way home, making the short jog that I take on Victoria heading towards Woodhill Drive for the trek up and over the hill by County Cycles. As I approached Woodhill I noticed a woman sitting on the bench at the corner waiting for the bus. She was not young but she was a lot younger than I am (an accomplishment which is not too difficult to attain), she was wearing I guess you call them scrubs and appeared to be an employee of the senior facility located at that corner. I was hoping to turn left off Victoria onto Woodhill so I was riding slowly waiting for traffic to clear. As luck would have it I had to wait a bit for a couple of cars but as is my custom I just continued to ride the direction I was heading, waiting for the gap. This meant that I rode away from the bus stop bench, exposing my back, increasingly by far my good side, to the waiting woman. I circled back as soon as possible and rode up to Woodhill and made a right and started up the hill.

She called something out to me that I admit left me momentarily without a response. Here is what she said:

"You have beautiful legs."

Every now and again I get some sort of comment from another bicyclist, the occasional "Good legs" when some one pulls up behind me as we wait at a stop light. It is extremely rare to get this kind of response from a just casually observing pedestrian.

I recovered my composure enough to say thank you and that I work hard, which absolutely I do do. She added some additional comment which I was now too far away to understand, the words being garbled by the wind.

Opting to ride bare legged today was a really good decision.

Ominous news today from France. FC Nantes played the first game of the new season. Ligue 2 games begin next weekend but today Nantes played at Troyes in the first round of la Coupe de la Ligue. When Nantes was initially relegated to Ligue 2 following the 2006-07 season, Troyes was one of the teams that came down with them. When Nantes returned to Ligue 1 Troyes slipped quickly to mid table in Ligue 2. Last season Nantes was again relegated to Ligue 2 but Troyes has fallen on even worse times, being relegated out of Ligue 2 to level 3, to the only semi-professional Championnat de France National. Today's game was the opening match of the League Cup, a competition only open to professional teams, a status which Troyes will be in danger of losing if they cannot rise out of the Championnat.

Nantes was drubbed 4-0. This could get ugly.

Another beautiful morning

Here is a picture of the person who validates my credentials for yesterday's holiday.She bought me that scarf as my holiday gift. It is an FC Nantes fan scarf, not readily available on this side of the Atlantic. She recognized that the one that I had was getting pretty ratty. She is a most excellent dafter.

I had a couple of nice morning rides over the weekend and briefly deluded myself into believing that weekend mornings were a really mellow time to ride. Today reestablished very clearly that Monday morning is a much superior time frame for being out in public. There just aren't very many other civilians around.

This is the first one of these I have seen in person, it is an ash borer trap, hanging in an ash tree near Jefferson on the River Road in Saint Paul.This is a bit troubling because this location is about 3 miles south as the crow, or perhaps, as the beetle flies from the primary infestation site. The tree looks diseased and the whole depressing affair makes it appear that the bugs have already appeared over a fairly wide range.

I rode across the Mississippi over to Minnehaha Falls. There was a very small crowd gathered, a shame as the Falls are looking particularly scenic right now.I rode back on what is for me the seldom ridden Minneapolis side of the river. This is actually a nice diversion for the out and back route as it means that both directions are ridden on the riverbank side of the street. The riverbank side is more scenic.

My main impression of riding the Minneapolis side today is that the pavement is in a bit worse condition over there than it is in Saint Paul.

While on the Minneapolis River Road I rode past the spot where in 1972 on my Schwinn Varsity I passed a car. Obviously I don't pass motor vehicles very often. But a bit earlier I had come up behind one of those new motor bikes that have been in the news of late. I was initially a bit irritated as the operator was outside the white lines on the street, in the area of pavement which bicyclists generally believe belongs to us. But it worked out OK, as I say I came up behind him. He was an older gentleman (at least 60) and he was noodling along at perhaps 10 miles per hour. This was probably a wise choice on his part as he was not wearing any helmet or other protective gear. As fate would have it, the stretch of pavement where the encounter occurred was a downhill tailwind section for me. I gave him a "Howdy" and blew on past. Obviously I don't pass motor vehicles very often.

I rode through the fairgrounds and did not see any of the old cars around. The temporary food stands (mostly trailers) were mostly still there with people cleaning up in preparation for moving the trailers back to their storage area until they are needed again. There were also lots of exhibition tents with workers in the process of taking them down. The old cars are gone and there are already several horse trailers in the parking lot as the more regular users of the grounds move back in. I bet there is a horse show there this weekend.

Two door or four door?1957 Ford Fairlane, black and red.

Cool and blue

It was pretty windy at Vadnais today so we didn't linger long. We took about enough time for a hurried photo and then started back.It's a little bit too bad because the lake was really blue and really pretty today.

As soon as we started to ride again the wind which was so onerous at Vadnais was behind us and conditions quickly became more tolerable. We stopped at the foot of the lake upon seeing some unusual visitors in the shallows. I have seen swans there before but only in the fall.TOPWLH wanted to label this as a Great Blue Heron but I don't think so.I don't have any idea why I know this but I was pretty sure that there is a Great Blue Heron and then there is a Blue Heron. Wikipedia reports that it is actually called a Little Blue Heron. I like plain Blue Heron better than Little Blue Heron and am going to continue to refer to this bird as a Blue Heron.

The ride home went well enough (with both riders feeling pretty strong most of the time) that we arrived at the corn field without any need to practice looking knackered.It is a nice enough looking day out there but as of the completion of the ride 70 degrees it has still not been.

Cool and blue.

Today in Ligue 1 FC Nantes has defeated Auxerre 2-1. However Caen has lost by only 1-0 to league champions Bordeaux, failing to provide the change in goal differential that Nantes needed to avoid relegation. Furthermore, Saint Etienne has won. Nantes finishes tied on points with Caen but finishes 19th on goal differential. The season is over, relegation is official. *sigh* It is much harder to follow a team in Ligue 2. Ligue 1 has English language coverage. I intend to remain loyal to Nantes but may have to also adopt a Ligue 1 team. In England today Chelsea has won the FA Cup by defeating Everton 2-1.

Relegated

Today's schedule seemed completely devoid of hooding so the hooder and I were available for a bicycle ride. We hung around long enough to make selections in the family Indianapolis 500 pool and to see the first two crashes. Then we rode off into what was well on its way to being a spectacular day in Minnesota.

We rode to Vadnais, a long ride for the undertrained hooder. She was holding up fairly well when we stopped at the lake but in perhaps a foreshadowing of things to come she declined to move out of the shade for a photo.Vadnais was its usual summer spectacular.

The corn is off to a good start. The hooder is practicing her "I am knackered" look.
We got home in time to see the last 20 or so laps of the race, long enough to see the hooder's first choice, pole sitter Helio Castroneves cross the line first. It was a satisfying result for all fans everywhere of fence climbing.

The news from France is not good. Yesterday's game in round 37 of 38 in France's Ligue 1 produced this score: Souchaux 2:1 Nantes. The outcome means that FC Nantes faces with near certainty relegation back to Ligue 2 for next season. As reported by Presse Ocean: Salut les amis! "Cette fois, c'est bel et bien fini: le FCN, vaincu à Sochaux, évoluera la saison prochaine en L2. Quel gâchis!"

There is still a mathematical possibility of survival but to stay up Nantes must win next week while Saint Etienne and Caen both lose. Furthermore Caen must lose by a wildly improbable margin large enough for Nantes to overcome a current minus 16 in the first tie-breaker, goal differential. So Nantes must win by say 3-0 while Caen loses 0-14. Wildly improbable.

Photo from FC Nantes website:Il faudrait un miracle... One would need a miracle.

Maybe a bit less adrenaline

Last Saturday we had five rabbits and a cardinal all in our yard at once. No such wildlife infestation was evident today but TOPWLH does have an interesting story about squirrels that everyone must try and get her to tell.

What I did find in the back yard was another sign of spring, the first sign in our yard of the new growing season, buds on the bush next to the deck.I noticed that my 10 percent post from last year included the description of ice out at Lake Vadnais. I felt sooo good yesterday that I decided to institute another part of the mid season training regimen, the long ride on Saturday. I set off for Lake Vadnais.

Today was several degrees cooler than yesterday and we all know that riding is harder when it is cooler. Then also I may have been a tiny bit pumped yesterday to get out on my nice bike. The long ride was a hard ride. I lost about a half of one of those two mph I was bragging about yesterday. But it also could be related to the fact that I DID get in the longest ride yet this season, hitting 30 miles for the first time.

The ice is completely out at Vadnais so I missed that this year. But I got this photo of some insane pussy willow looking bush in full dress at the edge of the lake.Other information: The A&W on Rice Street is open. Oh, and Rice Street is a state highway. City streets were the first ones swept, followed by county highways, but the state highways are still unswept. Rice Street is a mess.

Nice looked to be the ideal opponents for FC Nantes at this stage of the season. Nice is mid-table and have little to play for in the last six weeks of the season. Nice is well safe from relegation but also now too far off the top seven places to mount a challenge for a finish in the places which enter those teams in prestigious and potentially lucrative European competitions next season. Les Canaris were of course desperate for a victory after slipping into the relegation zone last weekend.

And at this evening's match at the Stade de la Beaujoire in Nantes the home team was able to make the most of their opportunity, winning 2-0. Nantes vaults out of "la zone de relégation" to stand once again 16th of the 20 Ligue 1 teams. Both Caen and Souchaux were losers today and both slipped behind Nantes, Caen assuming the spot in the drop zone.

Serendipity

This is a ride I intend to do every year but often do not. Lots of factors have to line up before I can ride the dirt trail across the Grass Lake park.I can't get out there early in the year as the shaded areas of the trail through the woods are very late to give up snow coverage. And then when the snow and ice finally does melt the road can be very muddy. Additionally, this is a longish ride, I can't do it until some level of fitness returns. And usually about the time I am fit enough to make the ride the streets get swept and I am on the other bike. I won't ride my other bike through here. Not only is this route a dirt road but there are also a couple of sections of the road that have pretty loose gravel.

Today the pieces all fell into place for the ride.

Speaking of sweeping, I discovered today that another big stretch of Hamline has been swept, the entire portion north of County Road B2. That includes the section pictured second in the recent post about dirt on the road. The remaining unswept portion is the overpass over 36 and the couple of blocks leading up to the overpass from both sides. Those stretches are still very messy. The bike change is close, but it isn't here quite yet.

Today made seven straight days with a ride, obviously a first for that this year. Seven rides, 166 miles, 100 miles for the last four days. Right, now I feel completely used up, I am tired.

With all my hand wringing about the fate of FC Nantes I have neglected to report the other news from French football. This past weekend Lyon scored late to rescue a 2-2 tie with Monaco but when Marseille thumped Grenoble 4-1 Marseille moved top of the table. With 7 to play Marseille is poised to perhaps deny the 7 time champions their 8th straight title. A further problem for Lyon is that Bordeaux has risen to third, one point behind Lyon and only 2 down to Marseille. Lyon travels to Bordeaux this weekend for what commentators are referring to as a championship 6 pointer. A loss for Lyon would also move Bordeaux ahead of the defenders and would make it quite likely that Lyon could find themselves at the end of the season on the outside looking in for the first time in 8 years.