Ooh, those muscles are long-forgotten...

[jducoeur]

So I went down to the shop and picked up my new bike this afternoon, now that the sticker shock has decayed to a dull pain after two years of dithering. It's quite nice, although I'm going to have to get used to the new index-shifter technology. And we need to figure out exactly where we're going to keep it -- the house continues to burst at the seams. But biking has always been my single favorite form of exercise, and I've missed it.

I got back home at 5ish, and said to myself, "Self, I've got some time before Council. It's only two or three miles to work, which is just a trifle compared to the 15 miles a day I used to do. I'll just bop over to work, work for a while more, and then come home to rendezvous with msmemory for Council."

Well, by the time I got to work, I whapped myself metaphorically on the head and said, "Self, I was doing 15 miles a day twenty years ago, and I am now Horribly Out Of Shape. 2-3 miles each way is not a trifle any more. Those cute little hills aren't nearly as shallow as they look. You are, in fact, an overconfident nitwit. A satisfied nitwit, yes, but a nitwit nonetheless. And you smell."

It's really not too bad -- my legs have advanced from Jello to Galvanized Rubber since 6pm. And with time and practice, the ride to work will get to the point of being pretty easy. For the time being, though, I think I can discard my previous assumptions about needing to keep jogging so that I will get enough exercise over and above biking to work...