I have to retract an earlier remark: I’m no longer the only member of my cycling group to sign up for El Tour de Tucson . . . my friend Darrell’s joining me for the 35-mile event tomorrow. Good, now there’s two of us who won’t get any sleep tonight!
Why am I freaking over this silly ride? Because El Tour veterans tell me it’s a madhouse, with hoards of inexperienced riders weaving to and fro, stopping inexplicably, and variously doing whatever they can to bring other riders down. The whole deal’s starting to sound like a motorcycle toy run!
I’m going to ride my hybrid tomorrow, mainly because I’m not yet comfortable on the new road bike. If I’m going to drop a bike, I’d rather drop one that’s already scratched up. Darrell’s riding a hybrid too, so we’ll have an easier time sticking together. Oh, did I mention there’s a bike hash Sunday? Truly, this is shaping up to be a lost weekend. No wonder Donna’s concerned about finding time to plan Thanksgiving dinner and get the house whipped into shape before the kids come on Wednesday!
In other consumer news, we decided to kick Osama’s ass by getting a high-definition plasma TV for Christmas. With kids and grandkids coming for Thanksgiving, it made a sort of spendthrift sense to buy it now, so we did . . . and now the family room and living room are littered with old TV and stereo equipment, disconnected and stacked on every flat surface, and the new (huge!) TV stuff half-installed, with loops of wire and cable everywhere.
I used to love installing TV and stereo equipment. Now I dread it. We’re this close to calling Comp USA and paying them to set up the new HD TV for us. But we’re going to save the job of reconnecting and reinstalling the old TV and stereo stuff for our son Gregory, hoping he’s still young enough to get some pleasure out of the task. It’ll be a test . . . a test to see if we raised him right!