Epic?

The Epic Lie Ride


Today I was riding with a racing rain stripe down my back.

It all started with an invitation to a ride. Was I physically ready to go on a group ride? Of course, not! What are you thinking? But the ride was supposed to be "short and slow" (kind of like me), so I decided to go along.

I was standing in my driveway trying to remember how to put the bike rack on the car when the sprinkle, which has dwindled to nearly nothing, suddenly turned into a full fledged rainstorm. But it wasn't raining where we were going to ride. But we were told it wasn't raining where we were going to ride, so I stood in the pouring rain and put bike on the rack (earning a very admiring incredulous look from a guy driving past me.

Sure enough, it actually was raining where we were going to ride, but we rode anyway. We are hardcore slow and out of shape and didn't want to pass up the chance to ride.

The conditions for the ride were laid out ahead of time: it would be slow, 20 miles and flat. It was actually 25 miles, and it wasn't flat, but it was definitely slow. The original list of riders got trimmed down to just the 3 most determined craziest, and off we went.

Actually, it was a great ride. No, wait. That part's true. Actually it was a great ride. I got to catch up with some people I hadn't seen for a long time, we chatted, we got our blood flowing, we got cold, we got wet, we got miles. We just didn't get them very rapidly.

Things we talk about on rides:

• dogs
• belief that not every single detail of someone else's dog story is competely accurate
• rain
• anatomy
• pain
• bikes
• people who aren't on the ride
• liguistics
• religion
• politics
• scatological references
• riding technique
• hills
• wind
• technology
• how great it is to be riding
• lies we will tell to other people about the ride they missed
• chemistry
• family life

And so on.

Come with us next time.

It'll be epic.

Really.