Riding My Asterisk Off

I live in a small town; if I loop the major roads, I get less than 5 miles in. Some of that is kinda sketchy because of traffic, like every other person who lives here tries to drive on those roads 15 times a day, so I avoid it. Which brings me down to about 3 miles, if I go around in a loop.

Going up and down residential streets, I've found a route of about 5 miles that gets me from home to Starbucks, so on days I don't feel like pushing it, I ride there and stop for tea and then reverse the route to go home. Directly there, it's only 1.6 miles...which is fine if I just want to get out of the house. And on days I don't need a long ride, a sort-of rest day, I'll do that. Right there and back.

Lately, though, I've been riding a 1.6 mile loop from my house which doesn't put me in any real traffic, with only one sometimes-busy road to cross. That's the ride I push it on, keeping an eye on my heart rate and mileage.

I play music, get into a groove, and just go.

Today I headed out and the only thing I was thinking was that I was freaking cold and just wanted to get a few miles in. I stopped at 1.5 miles to stick another knit cap under my blinding orange one, and got back to it, hoping my fingers wouldn't freeze and fall off halfway around the next loop.

It was 45 degrees with a breeze. It totally might have happened.

After I added the 2nd cap, the only thing bothering me were my hands, so I decided to go for 10 miles and suck it up if it started to hurt a little bit.

On my 4th loop as I made my way down a street that's .5 miles into it, I heard a guy who'd been working in his yard yell out, "How many damned times are you going by?"

I raised my hands--5 fingers--though truthfully I was going 6, at least.

Then I wondered if I was annoying people by zipping past their homes and yards.

Then I realized I didn't care.

I ended today with 12.25 miles. Yesterday, 23.25. It'll have to do, since it looks like it's going to rain for the next 4-5 days and I'm a total weenie and don't really want to ride in it, especially if it's also windy.

We need the rain, but man, I am totally bummed out that we're getting so many days in a row of it. Like, I might have to actually do housework or something instead.