riding into the heat of july

[Geonz]

Abnormally cool here, too. We're on four day workweeks for the summer so I could sneak out 8:00 for a 30 mile exploration on Friday for today's ride... and see construction that didn't apply today (don't know if we went past it or if they finished it Friday or...??) ... and then took my new cargo bike to the bike shop for its 30-day checkup (cables tightened, etc, and a little cleaning). Then took my Gazelle the 1.5 miles over to The Bike Project to discern that yes, the bike shop had been correct and it was time to retire it (part of the reason I got the new cargo bike). Too many places with deep rust in that frame... (it got me back home, just fine, but James agreed with the bike shop guy: "You have to stop riding this bike.")
Oh, but there was still a little shopping to do... so a 4-bike 47-mile day :-)

Saturday I led my "Level 1 Saunter" ride in the cool air and ... did an extra loop because otherwise I'd have had to try to do something productive. That and an errand run got me 47 miles, too
Sunday was the "Rain. All day." Still rode to church and then in a pause in the precipitation (the heavy rain was a little to the south)... ducked out to investigate a new brewery and tap room which is, in fact, accessible with a multi-use path, *and* theyhave decent bike parking! So... a 12 mile day...

Today we had our annual "perimeter" ride and ... we didn't take the short cut I usually do (mainly because the route determiner has a much higher tolerance for traffic and his route is on Leverett Road which is fast and busy) because it hadn't gone through on Friday's exploration... and Leverett Road wasn't busy at all!
... because *it* was closed. So we added 5 miles and finished at 45.6 miles -- so I rode a little longer way home to take it to 63.
It's the first metric I've done in over a year and yea, every year I get, you know, older... so it feels *very* good to only have a bit of an ache in my left shoulder (and a need for a hot shower since the rain held off for all but that extra 10 miles at the end...)
Lots of things have to "work out" to get in a 1000 mile month (esp. since I'll have a weekend of traveling), but, maybe... except like Helene , I come apart with heat, and ... I'm not going to be a slave to numbers. "No pain, sounds good!"