(no subject)

[stormdog]

I'm feeling really good today. My time with the therapist today was really positive. Afterward, I went for a ride to the Botanic Gardens. Once there, I decided to continue north on the Skokie Valley Trail. I was going to do the whole ten miles, but stopped, feeling a bit worn out, after 6. Gatorade perked me up, and then I bumped into an interesting guy at the north end of the gardens. He was looking for the North Branch Trail. I rode with him to its start at the south end of the gardens, and was having an enjoyable enough conversation that I went with him all the back to Church street, even though our pace together was around 12mph instead of my usual 17 or 18. We talked about school, bike travel, our mutual anger at the health care system in the US, the ways that capitalism creates horrifying systemic inequalities, and other things. We exchanged email addresses; maybe I'll have a riding companion.

At 44 miles plus, it was my longest ride since wrist surgery in January. To my immense joy, I do not feel even a hint of the crippling wrist pain that I felt the last time I did a near 50 mile ride. I have to be careful to keep moving my wrist around and putting what I suspect is an errant tendon or something back in place. Otherwise pain starts creeping in. But I can live with that. I feel such joy thinking that I can do some real long-distance touring some day.

I went to Jewel to trade in my winning Monopoly tickets for $25, then used the money to buy a couple of inner tubes at the Recyclery. I was hoping to get a front fender to replace my broken one, but they didn't have any used ones that would fit.