So, we met up with an abbreviated crew this morning for the Christmas Eve Day Dirt Road Epic. Noticeably absent was the rides original organizer, Paul, who apparently got his days mixed up and despite telling everyone that the ride would be today, did the ride yesterday. Bad form. So Jeff, Todd, Chuck, Max, Eric Sandifer and I met up at the Hard and Flossie Clark Park at the overcast grey time of 8 am. Despite the forecasts and predictions to the contrary, the weather could best be summed up with one word: effin' cold. We bundled up and took off for what we intended to be a 3+ hour dirt road ride.
Within 10 minutes of riding, my hands were essentially useless blocks of wood. Then it started to rain. You know it is bad when within the first 10 minutes of a ride you start figuring out where it ranks in the pantheon of stupid crap you have done in your life. This ride was headed for my top ten and we hadn't even really begun. I pulled up beside Jeff and just gave him a look like, "we aren't seriously gonna push through this are we?" We had gone from cold to wet and cold pretty darn quickly and everyone was pretty eager when a reroute was suggested.
We turned onto Johns River Rd. and started heading back to the car, but we were hell bent to maintain our new tradition of mid ride tea time. We pulled over at the coffee cup house (a house completely covered in coffee cups in case you were wondering) and began pulling out our tea time fixin's. Todd, incensed by my act of one-upsmanship at the last tea, pulled out all the stops as he layed a lace napkin out on the ground and proceeded to light candles and place them on the cloth. Tea, cookies, chocolate and ritz crackers with peanut butter dipped in white chocolate (hey, we were burning LOTS of calories just maintaining normal body temperature) were layed out and tea was poured into everyone's cups. Civility was rampant. Not to be outdone, I have a big surprise for the next epic ride tea service.
Merry Christmas and Happy Sir Isaac Newton's Birthday! No epic ride tomorrow, but lots of mtn. biking this weekend! Owen will be tearing up the greenway on his new Hotrock once he wakes up and sees it under the tree! Is the world ready for him to be on a bike with pedals?
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