I had just turned into the cul-de-sac when it started raining.
My timing couldn’t have been better. I had left El Rancho Pendejo 90 minutes earlier for a brisk morning march along various foothills trails, because the weather wizards were predicting thundershowers. And when I turned around, up by Embudo Dam, I saw that they did not lie.
The Sandman cometh.
So I cranked up the pace a bit as the skies darkened, and then darkened some more. The wind sprang up, as it will, out of the north. Onward.
Finally, just past Candelaria on Trail 365, I broke into a run. Or what I call a run, anyway. A runner might disagree, or perhaps just laugh out loud.
And then, boom, just as I got home, the skies opened up and pissed rain … for a solid minute. Maybe two.
Oh, well. In the desert, two minutes of rain is better than none.
Well, it was pretty easy to do the ol’ social distancing today.
The fog crept down the foothills like something out of a Sherlock Holmes movie, followed by the rain, and finally, the snow.
A fan. I’m not a fan of this fan, either.
Well, it was “snow” only in the sense that it involved fat white flakes falling, but nothing stuck around long enough to be shoveled. It certainly wouldn’t have kept a Belgian off the bike. I don’t think anything can.
But it did the trick for me. I rode the trainer for 45 minutes, which I hate, and then did a little light resistance training, which also, too, and likewise.
Still, anything beats watching our national “leadership” act more like Al Capone than Al Schweitzer. These pendejos couldn’t organize a beer run for a frat house if the liquor store were downstairs.
We have a new review bike at El Rancho Pendejo, a Cannondale Topstone 105, but the weather is proving uncooperative as regards its maiden cruise.
The birds were pissed that their feeders were empty, so I had to trot out in the rain to resupply the chirpy little commies. From each according to his abilities, etc.
What a good thing that I whipped up a vast tureen of posole before this wee November squall rumbled through town.
As the cool drizzle quietly flogs the last of the leaves off the backyard maple under leaden skies, it’s looking like your basic one-pot day, meal-wise.
Cook the oatmeal, have breakfast, wash the pot.
Hm. Still raining.
Reheat the posole, have lunch, wash the pot.
JFC. Still raining.
And dinner? I may outsource that one, if only because I’m out of posole, and who wants oatmeal for dinner?
Anyway, even a one-quart saucepan needs a break now and then.
Mr. Coffee passed away this morning. He left two survivors, one of whom got a cup of marginally drinkable java.
Did Monday come early?
The coffeemaker croaked before I could get my morning fix, compelling me to brew java The Cowboy Way (via pour-over into a Thermos). And our Sunday bike ride looks to be rained out.
Ah, well. They still sell slave-made coffeemakers here in the Land of the Free. And rain is good for the vegetation.
Speaking of vegetables, with any luck at all the rain will continue through tomorrow’s Two Minutes Hate, so Ginger Hitler’s Red Caps can get their bodies washed along with their brains, if any. No amount of rain could wash the dumb off they ass, though.
Look what snuck over the Sandias when the weatherperson wasn’t paying attention.
The weatherman must have missed a memo while compiling today’s forecast.
That “20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms after noon” turned out to be 100 percent, and by 7 a.m., too.
It reminded me of the Yiddish proverb, “Man plans, God laughs.”
Last week I logged nearly 150 miles on the bike, and come Sunday evening the legs were lobbying for a bit of R&R. So although Monday was a beautiful day for the old bikey ridey, I checked the forecast for the rest of the week and said, “OK, I’ll take today off. Haul the glass to the recycler, put a new chain and cassette on the Voodoo Nakisi, whip up a bowl of hummus. And tomorrow I’ll do a nice, long ride.”
Get bulletproof backpacks on the cats? Dream on. I can’t even get them to stop napping in front of a window. Worse than sitting with your back to a door.
Ho, ho, etc.
Tuesday dawned warmish, bleak and breezy, and soon I had to close all the doors and windows I had just opened because the vertical blinds were clattering like skeletons dancing the Charleston.
It was the flip side of Sunday, when, after Saturday’s deluge, I added fenders to Herself’s bike and a rack trunk full of rain gear to my own.
Naturally, the only water we saw on our ride was confined neatly to roadside puddles and ditches.
Man plans, etc.
Dark mornings breed dark thoughts, especially for a lifelong news addict. For example, did you know that the hot back-to-school item is a bulletproof backpack?
Look for them at big-box retailers everywhere. I recommend shopping online until you get one, and maybe even afterward. See if you can find a new congressperson while you’re at it, one of those action figures, not the kind that just sits there between massacres, cashing checks while the NRA pulls its string.
“Thoughts and prayers … thoughts and prayers. …”
Speaking of which, I could use a few of those myself. The sun has finally made an appearance, and even though I don’t have my bulletproof backpack yet, I’m going out for a ride.