I went for an amazingly nice (if lonely; I have no biking buddies here ) 62-mile loop around the Wachusett Reservoir, to Holden, down to Shrewsbury, and back to Malrborough through Westborough. Left at 6:30 am, and it was a mere 56 degrees outside -- I was positively cold without my arm warmers for the first hour or so! Fall's a-comin'. New England has been beautiful the last few weeks; trees are changing colors, the temperature's remained moderate, we've finally ditched those thunderstorms. If only it was like this all the time!

I say "amazingly nice" because I had the horrific experience of riding over freshly-scraped, pre-repaving road. The road crew must've gotten it ready to repave on Friday, and just left it over the weekend. OUCH!! My hands, wrists, butt, knees...everything hurt. Felt like my skin was going to jitter right off. A couple miles of that (I think; I kept my eyes on the road, trying not to fall or get a tire stuck in one of those grooves) made me practically weep with gratitude when I got back to normal paving. Guess I'm not cut out to operate a jackhammer!