I Ain't No Wimp

If you ever see me driving around - driving as in motor vehicle - during these hot days of summer, I will have my driver-side window down, and the passenger-side window cracked. I don't do this because the ac is on the fritz. I don't do it because running the ac is bad for the environment, or because it puts extra strain on the engine. I don't do it to feel the wind in my hair, or to share my music with the nearby world. I don't do it because I am trying to get some freakin' yellow jacket the heck out of the cab, because I have a special affinity for the heat, or because I am attempting to speed up the acclimation process. While each of those may have been true at some point in time, is true now, or could, possibly, maybe, probably be true in the future, the main reason, the one that remains constant year after year, is the "wimp factor," plain and simple. 

I ain't no wimp.

Say it. Say it out loud.

I ain't no wimp. It is like a mantra, a new motto, if you are in to such things it can even be used as a chant - ommmmmm, i ain't no wimmmmmmp, ommmmmmm. You do have to use the contraction and slang, though; proper grammar - I am not a wimp - just ain't the same, and sort of makes you sound insincere, like R. M. Nixon invoking, "I am not a crook."

What I am is a bicyclist, and as everyone knows, a bicyclist ain't no wimp. Do you think those folks who shuttle their little ones to school every morning, drive to the grocery, the post office, soccer practice, the tooth doctor, the cardiologist, the dietician, the concert in the park, the mailbox (seriously, I still cannot believe I see people around here doing just that), could do any of that stuff by bike? Sure they could, but just answer no - for the sake of argument. Could they just take a leisurely spin, either solo, or with their friends on the weekend with their tongues dragging the ground and sweat pouring out of their gaping pores, fighting the double-whammy of sun beating down and headwind pushing against your forward movement, and tarmac so hot you half expect your tires and the wheels to which they are attached to come to a complete and sticky stop at any second? Wwwhhhheeeeeew (I am really not sure how to spell that sound). Hell no. Why not? I'll tell you why not:  They are wimps. Plain and simple.

Yeah, thankfully, I ain't no wimp, and because of that, I had a pretty fine weekend, heat and all. I got to see Jenna and Jeff today, not once, but twice, and then a little while after we passed each other the first time, along came Dean, and Glenn. Then there were all those folks sitting around in the shade of Chalan Rest Stop. None of them are wimps either. I can tell a wimp from a non-wimp, you know the old saying - it takes one to know one.

I always hate naming names on long ride days like today for fear of forgetting to mention someone, but, you know, it was hot, and I was big-gear pushing, and my brain was cooking, and... I think it was Dean and Glenn. And later my windows were down, and it was still hot. But hey, I ain't no wimp.

A good weekend will always give you something to write about, in a tongue-in-cheek, partly serious (but which part) kind of way - even if you don't write about yours, I hope it was just as good.

the river was bounding over the big cascade again today (seems like it has been doing so for weeks, if not months now) my timing was even perfect enough to catch the Gold Line heading to Azusa

head of the river - usually the water gets siphoned off just below the dam, but today they were letting it come down the channel. about noon this is how far its flow had reached, backing up against the weir, but just one little fall at the far side.

two weir's further upriver, at the crossing of the 605, bigger falling water

and another weir beyond that, enough echoing off the concrete wall to make it sound like a jet airplane

at Chalan Rest Stop I paid my IOU