The Game

September 01, 2024

The Game

There i was chasing coyote on down the road, not consciously mind you, he just happened to have jumped out from some shady spot up ahead and started running the same direction. Anyway, i don't think he was really into the chase because soon enough he veered to the right, gave an easy as you please leap between some shrubs, right up and over a six-foot high chainlink fence topped by barbed wire. Just like that. Just as easy as you or i would step over a little branch across our path. It was nothing to him. I knew he hadn't gone very far after his great escape, so i stopped where he disappeared. I was sure he could see me, but i couldn't see anything of him. A little game commenced to see which of us had the more patience; it certainly was not the birds over on the other side of that fence, they were raising a mighty ruckus of warning calls. But i kept still. The wait wasn't particularly long, less than a minute i'd guess, and i began to hear a little rustling - coyote slowing moving away through the leaves. Flush with my great victory, i too decided it was time to continue on.

Next i came upon a fellow rider i knew, stopped at the midway bridge, taking the opportunity to catch a little sun before the day grew too oppressively hot. I was much chagrined by his news of seeing another rattler on the trails, when here i still have not seen a single one all year. With the temperature rising as we stood there, a mutual decision was made to get moving (in the meantime forgetting to ask if he ever had any ancestors who used the name Mure). I still had to get up and over the dam after all, something more than just another basic wash loop. It was during the "up" part of that when i startled red-tail hawk from his shady spot up ahead. Fortunately he wheeled around once or twice before sailing off into the distance, enough time to snap a couple photos.

All that time, and more, i'd been trying to think of a way to work an old post into a new post, you know, one i started writing some longish time ago, stopped, forgot about, and then (when looking back through some old drafts) forgot where i was going with it (heck, how long has it even been since last i was riding with the local bunch, any local bunch?):

I tell ya, I didn't know what was goin' on. Maybe the air was heavy, or thick, and I just couldn't slice through it at all. Nothin' seemed to work at getting me through it faster than I imagined I should be getting' through it. I tried it after shifting up, an' I tried it after shifting down. It was no good either way. There just was no speed to be found. I hit on the idea that maybe it was my legs; you know I hadn't scraped a razor along 'em in a good two weeks, so they were kind of prickly like. I thought to try an experiment, you know, just to see if maybe that was what might have made a difference. So I shaved on one leg, but you know what, the shaven one didn't spin any faster than the other one, nor did the unshaven one spin any slower than the smooth one. Man, some dude in the local bunch asked me what I'd been smokin' to think that was any kind of valid experiment.

Yeah, that's it, and since i don't see a clear end, and would rather not waste what was started, that's all it is every going to be. Maybe.

There was certainly a clear end to the ride though - it was still getting hotter, one little short-cut i favor had become extremely and quite unexpectedly rutted, nearly sending me over the bars, but other than that, the rest of the ride was pretty tame. The Great White of the Wash is high and dry, the sky is brilliantly blue, the clouds are puffy, Mount Baldy is as dominant as ever, and the rabbit brush is starting to show its color. September is here, and that mean...

An extra day this weekend - Up those who labor night or day!