Outdoor Riding has Started Again – and More Good News in the World

Happy Sunday! It’s a pretty good one here as it was, for the first time in 2025, warm enough for me to go for a bike ride outdoors. I know! (I also know there are folks riding long rides in literally any weather. That’s not my thing. But today it was delightful.

I woke up at 5 as part of my new routine. Got ready and was out the door at sunup. For that I was rewarded with this:

Right? I mean check out that mist in the valley there? And the sun reflecting off that? I was also surprised to find myself feeling really fast and strong on my road bike. But good thing I wasn’t going too fast. When I got down into that mist, it was cold enough that there was a frozen puddle at the bottom of the hill that covered the entire path. I walked on the grass around it and was glad I didn’t do the usual zoom down that hill. I saw the water and thought it might still be frozen.

Today I had a goal which was to minimize stopping so there are fewer photos than you might have seen for rides I’ve done before. So let’s see if I manage to meet my goal there.

Once I got off the path I headed north and was still very surprised at all the energy I had. I was also really pleased at the low level of traffic on the roads. Leaving at 7:00 AM on a Sunday clearly makes a difference. In line with that, I rode for another 40 km without a stop and that just a quick stop to wash down a Clif bar with a bit of water.

My end point was about 62 km away in Uxbridge. There I stopped for a quick double espresso and a croissant at a little cafe.

But before I could go inside, the sheltie on the right in the photo needed to extract a bike parking fee of some cuddles. Totally worth it. They were a real sweetie.

The ride to this point had been about 75% feeling strong and 25% (particularly toward the end) where I doubted myself. Here I was at 62 km in and that much to go. But there was one thing I kept in my mind. In another 25 km most of the climbing would be done. I could relax. There was still the challenge of my upper body not being used to long rides but I’d manage. I mean, what was my other option?

Those next 25 km were tricky. I think my legs thought they were done and the coffee was a victory coffee not a “refuelling coffee” as each hill got harder. The bike I have hasn’t got a lot of low gears which I might fix but I might also use it as an excuse to become a better climber. Today it was the latter as I geared down to my lowest gear and slowly and gently climbed at 9 km/hr up some of the bigger hills.

An interesting thing about this trip was that as some of you may know, I am running a Garmin Varia RTL515 light. It looks like a normal taillight but it also runs radar that tells me when someone is approaching from behind and how fast they’re going. While it doesn’t share their heading so you don’t know if they’re a real danger, you can at least know to shoulder check. But what I found was that I could see when people were approaching and exceeding the speed limit I’d do a palm down gesture (like I’ve seen people do in construction sites) to ask them to slow down. About 40% of the time they would But the most effective was when a Tesla was approaching at 90 km/hr in a 60 zone. I happened to be passing a speed limit sign and was able to gesture very vehemently at it. AND THEY SLOWED WAY DOWN! I know one of my coworkers who owns one almost got a huge ticket because without the sound of a roaring engine they can’t tell if they’re speeding.

But at one point I was going a little over 20 km/hr on a road with a 70km/hr speed limit. A few cars passed but then the radar showed a vehicle approaching at 45 km/hr. Too fast for a tractor and why would a car go that slow? A few seconds later I had my answer. A peleton of maybe 20 cyclists zoomed by over 20 km/hr faster than me. Impressive!

by the time I hit 90 km in I was definitely feeling fatigue and also my chain started squeaking indicating that my chain needed oil. I thought it would be fine as I oiled it on the trainer just before I took it off. But no. So I was fighting a dry chain and fatigue. But fortunately I also had a mostly downhill ride. The route was a little different and took me past Musselman’s Lake which is always a nice spot to stop on a ride.

Will you look at that sky today? And by the time I was at this point I no longer needed gloves or a headband to keep my ears from hurting from cold wind. It won’t be long before the jacket comes off I suspect – and then the tights and before long it’ll be hydration and sunscreen I’m thinking of not how not to freeze.

The last of the ride got harder and harder the closer I got. It was a real exercise in pushing through difficulty – which really is most of what training to ride long distances is. Some of it is physical but lots is mental. I did go slower but I didn’t want to completely stop as much as a rest sounded nice. A rest on the side of the road is fine. A hot shower and coffee at home is better.

My bike also got louder and louder. I was so embarrassed. Eventually a very nice cyclist said “Sorry, I don’t mean disrespect but your chain really needs oil!” – apparently some people don’t know this. But really! I thought I was fine and I was until I was as far from home as I could be. But you better believe I’ll be oiling it before the next trip out.

[CW: Skip the next paragraph if you’re upset by people being injured (not me – don’t worry, I’m OK)

There was only one not so great thing that happened literally as I pulled in to our driveway. I got off the bike on the sidewalk and was fishing for my keys in a bike bag when I heard a thump and a scream from around the corner. I leaned the bike against the wall and ran to find a young woman crying and sprawled half on the curb, half in the road with a white SUV stopped behind her. The driver got out and yelled at her in Mandarin and tried to explain to me what happened and how it was her fault. I just got out my phone, called 911 as several cars stopped to make sure help was on the way. Another person came down from our building and also checked in. Eventually the man stopped talking to her though at one point he started to go to move her while I was on the call with 911. A voice I didn’t know I had came out of my mouth saying “Don’t move her!” and he jumped back and the operator reiterated that that was a good thing. I was really happy to find that our EMS is so fast. I hadn’t even finished talking to the 911 operator and they were already pulling up. First a fire truck and then an ambulance. During the interview it turned out that somehow the driver was her boyfriend also which makes it seem even more suspicious and weird. Fortunately he told the first responders this so if there’s something sketchy hopefully it’ll be dealt with appropriately. Once I realized the first responders were there and she was going to be OK (in pain but also in good care and a 5 min ride from the ER) I headed inside.

I’m really good at dealing with stressful situations in the moment but just like when I dealt with Sage having a medical emergency a year or so ago, once I no longer need to be the strong one I melt into a puddle of tears which is what I did when I got in the apartment. Sage was lovely and held me and listened which made me feel much better.

And then I did what my dietitian said to do after a long bike ride like that (where I burned over 3,800 calories but only consumed about 800): Eat lots of carbs immediately! Aye-Aye ma’am! A handful of cookies and a bagel later I hoped in a delightful hot shower.

Good Things in the World:

Well, the first thing that was good was the number of people driving by and even coming out of our building to help make sure that person was OK. In a world so cynical that people believed a hoax about someone being attacked in New York City in the 70s in full daylight with nobody helping or even calling for help – they believed it for years. We can see that this is not true. Everyone nearby offered help or just checked in.

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In surprising news whose outcome is not surprising at all, New Mexico made childcare free and check this out – just having someone to watch the kids means you can get a job and as a result, 120,000 people were lifted out of poverty.

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A TikToker went to a restaurant and saw one of the servers, age 81 struggling to get around. When she talked to her she learned that her social security didn’t cover her living expenses so she couldn’t retire. She started by leaving a large tip but then she took to the video platform, created a GoFundMe and then proceeded to raise over $300,000 to help her retire. When she started she didn’t even know how to make a GoFundMe – what I like about this is that this is another example of one of my favourite things: people seeing that help is needed and realizing that they have the tools to do so themselves. Not all of us can expect to raise $300K in a GoFundMe but there’s almost always something we can do.

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One of the things that countries like the US do is point at developing nations’ performance with CO2 emissions whenever they’re asked why they’re not reducing their own. “We’ll do it after the others do it!” they say, failing to acknowledge that much of why the emissions are there in the first place is that we outsourced our manufacturing there because we didn’t want the emissions and pollution in our own country and we hoped the regulations would be lighter thus making the products manufactured for us that much cheaper.

But despite all this, India has now overtaken Germany as the third largest generator of solar and wind power in the entire world. Your move, Canada. (with all the talk about infrastructure building in the future I’m cautiously optimistic in this respect.)

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You know what’s another very small good thing – for me at least? A big pasta meal for dinner! And now that I’ve taken a break to eat some my day has caught up with me. I’m going to try to stay up at least another couple of hours but it may be a struggle!