The time has come!

Yesterday was an incredibly long day. I finally got to go to class and be a source of information for some undergrads. Did I worry as much as they do? Do I still? Oh man. All we did was go over the syllabus! That is all we did in all of my classes, so nothing changes when you become a doctoral student. Wednesdays are going to be the day for labs...all day! and since they don't start until next week I kinda got today off. So what do you all think I did with today...give you one guess :)! Ok, today's ride was great, funny, odd, beautiful, probably the best one yet. So what was so great about it: (1) I was on really lonely roads first of all, so not too much traffic to deal with on these narrow roads (I was feeling a little more confident with this area when made my plans this morning, which is ironic when you read what happened, :)!), (2) after one of the many step climbs (almost 4500 ft of climbing in 40 miles) there was a great home-made sign that I thought was great for that moment in my day and for this period of my life that made me smile/laugh so I had to take a picture of it,
(3) did I mention the climbing was great? I think I'm feeling much better now, coming into shape I'll say, (4) the road I was on and loving TURNED ITSELF INTO A DIRT ROAD AND I RODE MY ROAD BIKE IN THE DIRT! No really. I was worried that I was lost, but it turns out I had read the map correctly, it just didn't say that the road becomes dirt. But silly thing, there was another cemetery on these dirt roads IN THE MIDDLE OF NO WHERE! If I took a picture of each of the cemeteries I see I might not get any kind of riding in...no seriously, there are people buried on the side of roads, by themselves...Here lies so and so who was scalped by indians at some date...blah blah blah. Glad that doesn't freak me out.



AND (5) I found a great lake. Ok, for my Minnesota friends, it is just a little lake and it is one of a few hundred and not 14,000+ but it was nice to find this little lake with a little town on its shores, with a little beach with a BEACH VOLLEYBALL pit! It might become a place I go when I need to just get away and sit quietly. I just found out that the lake called Lake Wyola is Native American for "quiet waters" . I guess I'm not the only one who thought it would be a nice place to sit back and relax, but at least I have good judgment! :)Well, I found my way home just fine and got a great ride in, but now I wish I had a cyclocross bike...dirt on a road bike is kinda fun! Hopefully next week when school really gets going I'll have more school stories, but for now, RIDE RIDE RIDE! Which is really ok with me before we get a Northeastern Winter! Hope you are all doing well and enjoying the month of September!