Cumberland

It's been a tumultuous October for riding, ass several things are holding my riding back:

• logic would say that with a broken car/truck, I would ride more miles, but that's not the case. The logistics of dropping off and picking up and negotiating family activities has made commuting very inconsistent.
• a bum ankle is not a good thing. I can walk and ride, but it's been slow and steady.
• I've had some meetings away from school for Nat'l Boards, so that's gotten me out of my routine as well. I rode one time, but with distance, time and other responsibilities, again it has complicated things as well.
• Children, sports and school activities (theirs and mine) make it complicated too.

Enough complaining! I got in 25m yesterday via an interesting commute to and fro. It rained on me in the morning again, but I was well-prepared and took it in stride. I co-worker passed me about 2m from work and offered a ride in the truck, but I said "no way". I'd rather ride wet than be stuck in the vehicle. The afternoon provided more miles, dry ones, as I headed west via Oak/Virginia. It was first made doubly interesting by a chance and almost unpleasant encounter with a 12-ish yr.old. I was on Oak when he sort of approached from the left while crossing the street. I figured he was just not paying attention and I guess I was slowed some too by both the heavy winds and by the fear of running him over. He got closer and closer and finally I felt a tug on my rear rack; the little shit had come over to pull on my bike! I yelled, "You need to be courteous!". I guess it was the teacher in me, as opposed to random angry white man in an all-black neighborhood. I yelled again, "Be Courteous!" and strangely enough, the little guy sort of stood there, shocked! No harm, no foul, but disconcerting.

I shook it off and continued towards Chickasaw, but bent north along Shawnee but not through it as usual. I moved eastward via Vermont/Madison into downtown. I'm going to do a photo tour on this stretch sometime, as one street spans varied types of housing, 2 elementary schools, and an old brick factory. My primary destination for the afternoon was Cumberland Brewpub on B'town, where I met several former students. They're all mid-20s and we get together for a meal occasionally, and this time we had food of the liquid kind. It's a very good group of solid guys, so after some good banter and a few, I headed home a little tipsy on the trucker. Other than falling over on the side of the road one time, it was a nice afternoon and evening and a good batch of mileage to boot.