Absolutely Exercise

Sunday ride : My schedule for July was twenty-eight days of riding and three days of rest. Blocks of riding were to be between seven and ten days. Today, to accommodate a scheduling snafu for a routine medical test tomorrow, was my eleventh day in a row. I could feel it, but now I am a hundred miles ahead, not a thousand miles behind.

Saturday ride : The subject of the headline photo is not the sort of thing you want to see when parched, weary, and waterless. To compensate, I started making up a country blues song in my head, entitled Empty Bottle Blues . After successfully completing two lines, I thought, ' What a brilliant title. Damn! Surely, there must already be a song with that title .' Why yes, there is!

Friday ride : Operations were in full swing at the Copper Rock golf course by the time I arrived at first light. The immediate lee side of a high ridge is not the best place for viewing sunrises, but there was a fair showing from the golf course service roads this morning.

Thursday ride : The air was clearer today with some dark & light yin-yang cloud effects. I was to see more of the dark side and lighter side later on my ride. Can bringing a dinosaur to the party ever end well? She's the kind of smarty who breaks up every party , as the song goes. Being a sausage dog in that neighborhood must be a risky gig.

Wednesday ride : The wildfires in the area have created air pollution around the valley. I was hoping for a spectacularly fiery dawn, but when it came it rose wearily and reluctantly above the smog with very little drama. I had anticipated an amazing sunrise so that I could headline this entry with: Smoke on the water, fire in the sky . I have the eponymous  track playing in the background from Deep Purple on the 1972 Machine Head album. Beethoven would surely roll over if he knew the main riff was based on his fifth symphony. The Utah paddy fields are not really up to Lake Geneva standard either, but come on, use your imagination!

Tuesday ride : Before it was fully light, I passed a pair of hawks sitting quietly atop a utility pole. Later, I passed a pair in full sunlight and they were having what seemed like a domestic dispute. Forgive me if I have anthropomorphized inappropriately. The hawk on the left in the headline photo was vocalizing loudly at the one on the right, who seemed unmoved except to recoil when the kvetcher flounced off to the next pole in line. I hope they made it up.

Moday ride : The second cut of alfalfa hereabouts is being bailed. Like most things, there is more to it than one might at first assume. Reading that Wikipedia link, I was struck by the information that the plant exhibits an autotoxicity phenomenon. There is so much to learn and so little time remaining. The development of crop rotation , the solution to the autotoxicity issue, has been known for at least 6,000 years. That must have been hard-won knowledge. Observing the Sabbath of the Land ( schmita ) year must have been even harder in times of scarcity.

Sunday ride : Yesterday, a hawk flew away before I managed to take a photo. Today there was an avian airshow at the same utility pole. The small birds did not seem afraid of the hawks and were more intent on squabbling among themselves. There was not much human activity early on this Sunday morning, but plenty of birds and as the light came up a coyote loped along the road in front of me before making a sharp right turn up a side track.

Saturday ride : After a restful night, I awoke feeling… exhausted and aching all over? It's not supposed to work like that. Oh my mama told me / There'll be days like this —she just didn't say there would be so many. The thought of the industrial-grade chip and seal on my regular route filled me with dread. I stayed on the smoothest asphalt available en route and rode out and back until I had done as much as fell just short of too much and then I headed home.

Friday ride : As I pedaled along this morning at sunup, I thought I was singing the first line of a hymn remembered from long ago. Sort of—I had mashed together two hymns, one by John Keble and the other by Thomas Ken , to make a cringeworthy truism. It has always struck me as odd that when I sing in my head I have perfect pitch and mellifluous delivery and it's only when I sing out loud that it sounds abominable. Ah, you don't know what you're missing!