Monday Extra: Climbing Monster. Now with fewer puns.

Barry knows full well how much I despise puns.  My last post grated against my soul, but it was late Thursday evening and I was sitting beside a pool on a beautiful evening, typing away at my laptop.  When I got the idea to make a stupid pun, I laughed.  Not at the pun, but at how awful a thing that was to do to the people nice enough to read these ramblings.  I thought of it as sort of a "No Soap, Radio" at the time.  Now I'm just sorry.  It won't happen again (it will).

So here's a makeup post:

Two (2) Friday's ago, Spence informed me that a bunch of them were meeting Saturday morning at the Flying J. We (the family) were taking a plane to Orlando that morning, so I said, "I'll be out of town.  Next time."

The thing here is I am happy Spence has been giving me a heads up on rides lately. After we got into town, I got a message that he was going to do the Bike Masters ride.  I figured I'd better go. I don't think I would have ridden at all since a week of eating restaurant (mostly buffets) food after about 3 weeks of injury related inactivity left me feeling a bit sluggish.

 When I pulled into Bike Masters parking lot, there were maybe 30 people there.  Maybe more.   I got out of the car and started getting ready.   "Do we have any new people here today,"  somebody shouted.  I ignored it.  I just kind of wanted to slip into the ride without any sort of "My name is Fred and I'm an alcoholic."

After nobody confessed to being "a new person,"  - I mean, if anything, I'm an old person - somebody called me out specifically.  All eyes were on me.  I glanced over to Spence, who seemed to be enjoying this.

"I'm Fred in name and title,"  I said to a huge uproar of silence.  There are more crickets out there than you'd think. So we got rolling and after about 45 minutes or so, somebody came up to me and said, "So you're Fred, Huh?"

 "In name and t.., er. Yes I am."

At this point, I don't remember the name this person invoked because I was shocked by the content of the rest of the sentence:

" [Forgotten Name] says you're a climbing monster."

"You take that back, mister!" I snapped, figuring this guy was making fun of my poor fitness and slow, up the hill advancing technique.

"No really.  I thought you looked big for a climber, but after that last hill, I saw what [ Forgotten Name ] was talking about."

"Perception is a funny thing," was all I could muster.

Observation(s) about 4 weeks off the bike:  It makes you slow.