I started this week by thinking that I'd try to manage one or two bike rides during the week in addition to my normal weekend rides. The rides would need to be before work, and since I'm already heading in to work later than normal, I thought I'd need to get up earlier in order to keep about the same start time at the office. I set the alarm for 6 o'clock Tuesday morning, hoping to get a ride in before work. Unfortunately it turned out that I still needed that extra hour and a half for sleeping, so the morning rides just didn't happen this week. I am still walking on the days when I don't ride - 25 to 30 minutes before work, 15 to 20 minutes at lunchtime, and 30 to 40 minutes after dinner. At least that's some exercise even though it's not my preferred cycling. I guess I was dreaming, thinking that I was ready to add some weekday rides. Sometimes I think I'm accepting my slow recovery, but more often than not I know that I'm not. Yes, I'm doing well all things considered - but I want to be doing more now. OK, I know it's still going to be a slow trip back! You'd think I'd be used to this by now, wouldn't you?
It was another week with some not enough sleep nights. Tuesday and Thursday nights were both 5-hour sleep nights, definitely not enough for my body which still seems to want a minimum of 9 hours - even though 8 is a lot more normal for me and much more achievable right now. Wednesday? Well, I gave up much faster this week and took a sleeping pill. So I had two bad sleep nights sandwiched around a good sleep night. Saturday night was one more example of what I would consider a non-optimal night of sleep. I fell asleep at 10:30 but woke up at 12:30 and was awake for the next two hours before I managed to get another 5 hours of sleep, 7 1/2 hours total. I wonder how I can get my body to stop this nonsense; it's certainly not listening to me!
Saturday, August 14th was a beautiful day for biking
Saturday was a 20-something mile day (26 actually), and I have to say it was a beautiful day for cycling. I'm amazed that I'm able to do so many relatively short rides that are not repeating the same territory on each ride. Although I usually head out and return on the same roads, the bulk of each ride wanders different roads. Not every time of course, but at least I'm not repeating the same route each time I go out. I saw quite a few other cyclists on Saturday, many of whom were on a club ride that happened to coincide with part of my route. At one point a woman came up behind me and let me know that I was about to miss a turn. I laughed and told her that I was out on my own, not out with a group, and that I was planning to go straight - and it turned out that she was on her own too. Funny...
The sun was a part of my ride; it didn't disappear until later in the day, a signal of the storm to come.
Yet another quiet road. And yes, this is normal on many of the back roads around here.
Beautiful wildflowers along the edge of the North Andover town water supply
And Sunday unfortunately was a non-biking day
I didn't plan it that way although it turned out to be one of my dizzy days, so maybe I should be glad the weather didn't cooperate and produce a good riding day. Hurricane Charley managed to turn into a tropical storm before it hit New England, but it still brought a very gray, cool day along with light rain for most of the day. The forecast was for the storm to pass through with clearing in the afternoon, but that didn't happen. I took a walk in the rain this morning but my after-dinner walk was under still gray but dry skies.
