Posting a crooked number

This cannot last forever. In fact, conditions late this afternoon are starting to make a change, probably to something closer to the average. But in the meantime, it was mid-60s and sunny again today. I decided to ride my bicycle.

It was windy today and as I headed down towards the big city the wind which was advertised as SSE seemed to me to be most punitive when I was heading east, more an ESE than SSE. I thought about it for the couple of miles before I had to make a route decision and eventually headed off to ride the Capitol loop in reverse, something I very, very rarely do. This led me into the east wind early in the ride when I was strongest and minimized the amount of riding I had to do while pointed in a southerly direction. There is a reason why I don't do this more often though and it is the ride on John Ireland Boulevard from the Capitol up Cathedral Hill to the big church. The traffic is heavy, the part of the pavement where bicycles should ride is not well marked and did I mention that it is a hill?

This is a picture that I took today. It is, according to that plaque, "Monument to the Living" by Rodger M. Brodin, subtitled "Why do you forget us?" and "Presented by and for the Veterans of Minnesota, Dedicated May 22, 1982".It claims to be a monument for all veterans but the costume is pure Vietnam, from the boonie hat, to the jungle boots and fatigues, all the way to the M-16 slung grunt style over his right shoulder. It also features the plaintive cry of the many Vietnam vets circa 1982 who felt under appreciated, why do you forget us. In fact, I was present at that dedication and at that time this statue was recognized as a de facto Vietnam veterans monument. It retained that status until the dedication of what is now the recognized Vietnam memorial. The why do you forget us thing might have some validity as this statue is not really on the Capitol mall, it is more stuck back on a patch of grass next to the parking lot for the Veterans' Service Building. But that's OK, I remember thinking at the time that as art this thing is pretty good welding.

A bit earlier in the ride I passed this construction site.I am not positive but since that is the site of the former Como pool I suspect that the construction is for the new Como pool.

Baseball slang refers to an inning in which a team scores something other than 0 or 1 run as "posting a crooked number" on the scoreboard. Today I posted a crooked number.

My usual ride is 26 miles. The reasons for this are a couple but pretty easily understood. I want to average 25 miles per ride for all rides taken during the year. The best way to make that happen is to generally ride more than 25, 26 is more than 25. I also don't want to ride 25 or 27 as I prefer that every ride end in an even number of miles. I do this to avoid even the slightest possibility of arriving home at the end of an odd number of miles ride to discover that one or another of the totals that I keep track of has settled upon that dreadfully unlucky number. Triskaidekaphobia. As a result of all those 26s I am quite familiar with the multiplication tables for 26, at least through the number 15 or so.

I noticed when looking at numbers at the end of last month that if I rode the regular 26 milers but added just 2 miles to one of those rides, which I did, riding 28 miles on November 1, that sometime during the month I would arrive back at my garage to find this:20,000 miles on one bicycle. I have known all along that this was within the realm of possibility but I always expected if I did manage to get there this year that it would be on a grey and ugly day, cold, probably windy, conditions more likely for November. Instead? 64, sunny, very, very pleasant. By the way, portrait setting, macro activated. My feet in bicycle shoes for authenticity.

Let's see a show of hands from those with 20,000 miles ridden TOTAL on any number of bicycles during their lifetime. OK, I see one hand over there.

How about 10,000 miles? Now I see another one pretty close to here. You over there, raising both hands is just showing off. And if you think showing off is what I am now doing, well, this is MY blog, I believe showing off is what I do here.

OK then, how about even 2,000 hours (2,000 times 10 miles per hour equals 20,000) engaged in any single human powered activity during their lifetime. OK, I see another one for that.

Not too many of us though.

That bicycle will now be retired, the next time I am able to ride I will be riding NewLOOK.

I sense something

Today was a nice day for September which means that it was a very nice day for October. Which means it was probably somewhat off the charts for November 9. Before heading off to work TOPWLH remarked that it looked like a good day to be retired. She was right.

I didn't even get out of the driveway before social interactions began to occur. My bicycling neighbor was just finishing his ride as I prepared to begin mine. He has a new bicycle and he stopped to let me have a look. It is a Ridley with SRAM, Mavic wheels, quite a nice bike.

Here is a picture I got yesterday of the Minnesota Korean War Veterans Memorial.I like the way the figure and the piece it appears to have been cut from line up with the Capitol. As with yesterday's WWII memorial, it was serene, an appropriate spot for some quiet reflection.

But what about today? The wind was from the south, I headed down into the big city. I rode towards the confluence of the two big rivers. When last seen by me this area was in heavy flood. The water is still quite high, particularly for this time of year, but it should be apparent that the rivers are back inside their banks.Just as I was preparing to mount up for a return home a fellow citizen and a bald eagle showed up and proceeded to entertain. The eagle did its part by soaring over the river valley, no doubt looking for some lunch. The fellow citizen did his part by being extravagantly over enthusiastic about the appearance of our national symbol. Ben Franklin, of course, thought it should be the wild turkey, but I digress.

The big bird soared over the confluence overlook where I was still standing and appeared to possibly be in the mood for a photo. I was unprepared and by the time I had resecured my bicycle and extracted the camera from my jersey pocket the photo opportunity had passed.

The eagle did NOT consent to an interview following the event and I'm not sure how useful that would have been anyway, since I do not speak Eagle so I cannot state positively for the eagle but for the fellow citizen and myself I can quite comfortably assert that a good time was had by both.

When I got home it was 66 and sunny, what's not to like?

Standard time miles

As noted recently in the comments, the daily sunset is now before 5pm. Well, as of tomorrow morning, the daily sunrise is after 7am. The fact that all of this disturbs me a lot more than it disturbs some people is not news to those who know me. I loathe the loss of daylight. I glory in January which despite its almost always frigid temperatures and massive snowfall amounts also brings the beginning of the return of light. Meanwhile, six more weeks until the winter solstice, this is going to get worse.

Actually, the sunrise has been after 7am almost every day since September 23. However, all of that was with the magic of daylight savings time. That extra hour in the evening is now gone and joining it on the sidelines is anything vaguely resembling daylight in the morning. It is dark, my friends, it is dark.

But today was warm, really warm. I actually had some trouble getting out of the house as it took me a while to reconstruct what the appropriate riding costume is for 60 degrees. That worked itself out in due time and obviously 60 in November presents extremely rideable conditions. I rode, marking the first time this year I have ridden during Central Standard Time. I checked the bike log (again, one of the reasons for keeping a log) and discovered that my very first ride this year was on March 14 which is noted in the log as the first day of DST.

I rode the Capitol Loop and got a picture appropriate to the coming Veterans Day holiday. Here is the State of Minnesota World War II Veterans Memorial, a plaza in front of the Veterans Memorial Service Building (itself a memorial to all Minnesota Veterans of all wars) and also occupying a place of prominence in the Capitol approach area.It is very nice and today was quite serene. Thursday there will be a band, politicians and speeches. Today was probably nicer.

I have mentioned that I thought that the harvesting technique used this year in the local corn field would not lend itself to what has been the practice over the past several spring planting seasons of minimum tillage. As I approached home today I found out that I was right. The use of a plow is maximum tillage and today the plow was in the field.I have not fallen off my bicycle yet this year but I did lean it against a STOP sign while I was taking this picture. The wind blew it over. While it is true that I myself did not go down, allowing this indignity to my bicycle hurts my pride nearly as much as actually falling off would. That is no way to treat a nice bicycle. I am chastened.

You're just a kid

I had an excellent reason for skipping bicycling on a day in November spectacularly suited for that mostly non-November activity. As excellently reported elsewhere on the internet (and also the place where I stole this picture) I instead had that rarest of opportunities, the opportunity to attend a 90th birthday party.For all (including me) who are complaining about the effects of aging, be aware that every time I start up with any of that in his presence Bud just looks at me and reminds me that I am "just a kid". Well, compared to him most anyone is just that, a kid. Congratulations well earned I should say.

A good time was had by all.

I have some stuff of my own from my most recent bicycle trip to Minneapolis. Good stuff too, I think. I took the pictures then but saved them knowing that posting every day in National Blog Every Day of the Month Month would lead to days when I was short of material.

The city of Minneapolis has added an extremely welcome bike lane on the Franklin Avenue bridge.They have also taken a further step in advancing bicycle safety at a heavily bicycle used intersection at the west, or campus, end of the bridge. They have marked a bicycle box on the street at one of the most dangerous spots in the intersection. The bicycle box is an innovation taking hold in Portland, Oregon, but clearly there is going to have to be a little more raising of general awareness before it works here. The idea is for the cars to stay out of the box.We will advance by taking tiny little steps.

Badgers 5, Gophers nil

Hockey wasn't very entertaining for us today.

TOPWLH had driven to the event separately and had to leave immediately after the game to attend a social and/or cultural event. That means she went to a concert with some friends. There are a limited number of artists whose live performances I will attend and the one on tonight's bill was not one of them.

So while GRider ran off barely before the echoes of the final horn had died in the building, I followed the usual protocol of hanging around for a few minutes, waiting for the teams to leave the ice and for the announcement of the three stars of the game.

In a 5-0 game all of the stars of the game play for the team that had 5. So that wasn't very entertaining either.

But all was not lost, even after all that.

At the conclusion of all of the actual game activities, the Gopher Sports promotion department conducted chuck-a-puck. Today's prize was a $50 gift card for Punch Pizza. We don't care much about the prizes but we always participate just for the joy of chucking a foam rubber puck out onto the ice in concert with a couple hundred other people doing the same thing. Chuck-a-puck is a happening.

As is our standard procedure, my usual chucking partner had selected pucks for both of us. But as she was not in the building for the event, I had to chuck both hers and my foam rubber pucks.

Hers went wide.

Mine was better.

Temperature rule ignored

Today dawned pretty chilly but forecasters predicted that the afternoon temperatures would reach to near the average for the day. Which unfortunately is now only 46.

Brrrr.

But the winds died down quite a bit from yesterday, the sun was out, it looked pretty. I have the gear. Further I am not likely to get a chance to ride either of the next two days despite predictions of above average temperatures. Today I needed to ride.

Yesterday was the so cold that it hurts kind of cold. Today was only just really cold. The wind was mostly north, a little west and much reduced from yesterday's punitive blasts. Costume adjustments included heavier weight wool socks, a vest underneath the heavier jacket, fleece beanie underneath the balaclava, and the two layer inside layer wool mittens. And the balaclava, which stayed up for about 95 percent of the ride. I pulled it down at stoplights, I have to or my glasses fog up, and I pulled it down to get a drink of water. I had it down for maybe a mile after the temperatures warmed and when I was riding with the wind on the way home. Other than that, pulled up covering my nose and cheekbones. There is a lot of heat escaping out of the respiratory vent there on the front of the human face, the balaclava does a good job of capturing and retaining that heat.

How was it? Cold. But only cold, not painfully cold. What parts of my body were cold? Pretty much all of them. But which were uncomfortably cold? Nothing was terribly uncomfortable, the worst was the usual suspects, toes and thumbs. Fingers are OK bundled together inside the mittens, the thumbs are still hanging out on their own, and in the most common of the hand positions on the bars for me (on the hoods) the thumbs lead into the wind. They get cold.

Today's picture is on Priscilla Avenue near Raymond in Saint Anthony Park. I just happened to turn onto the street and I thought that the light through all of the oak trees on that street made a really nice display.But wait you say, isn't that street south from where you live? And didn't you say the wind was from the north? Both true. I wanted to ride a bit to get warmed up before I turned to face the north wind. I started out by going west into the wind because I can do that easily, west from my house is downhill. I rode down past the golf courses and caught Larpenteur coming back. It is slightly uphill but with a good tailing wind it was pretty easy.

Then I wanted to dip just a bit farther south to get a look at this:See, I told you it was cold. There is also bicycling content there, something I never noticed before. The street is named for Tour de France commentator Phil Liggett. Maybe.

Priscilla Street is just out the other side of the Fairgrounds, an easy loop.

In other meteorologic news here is what the morning newspaper reports for available sunshine as of today:

Sunrise 7:56am.

Sunset 5:55 pm.

Yes indeedy, only 9 hours and 59 minutes of day. *sigh* And it is still getting worse.

In Nantes this evening FC Nantes has broken its string of 4 consecutive draws, a good thing, and has kept alive its streak of games without a loss, also a good thing, by scoring a 2-1 victory over hapless Nimes Olympique. FC Nantes rises to 7th in the table. They remain outside the inner circle but at least they are hanging around within range of the top three. About one third of the season has gone by, there is much football remaining to be played.

An ill wind blows harder

The sun is out and through the front window it appears to be a rideable day. But I went out this morning on some errands and discovered it to be about 10 degrees colder today than yesterday. I quickly decided that about 10 degrees colder than yesterday is too cold to ride.

I wanted to do something so after lunch I set out on a neighborhood walk. I was walking along feeling a bit sheepish to not be riding as it seemed kinda OK. As we all know, one of the main benefits of bicycling is that you can cover a lot more ground on a bicycle. For example, here is the corn field that I pass on nearly every ride before I am even the slightest bit warmed up. Today that was pretty much the turn around point of my walk.They have done some additional processing of the corn plant residue, some sort of chopping I think. I didn't see it. But the result is that the geese have moved in and are heavily involved in gleaning whatever geese edible materials remain.

OK, I didn't stop at the usual photo opportunity spot for the corn field. That spot is only 0.38 miles from my garage door and that wouldn't be enough walking to qualify as exercise. I walked out to near the center of the plot and milled around a bit, looking at this and that, things I see from the road but don't often see up close.

I think I got my two miles in.

The way home was into the north wind. I no longer felt sheepish about not riding my bicycle. TOO COLD. In fact, the whole walking into the north wind experience sent me to the store again, this time looking for a better hat for walking, something that covers the ears.

One final election thought. The people have spoken. On with the show.