Smiles As Big As Slices of Cantaloupe

 It was Saturday and another chance ride to explore roads less traveled by. 10 of us embarked on this journey. It's safe to assume we all had some smiles along the way. Smiles like this.

Special thanks to Julie and Jon for organizing and thinking of bringing a knife to slice the cantaloupe.

I was worried a stuffy nose and cough would force rain on my parade. Visions of me waiting for Tim to bring the car danced in my head. Thanks to the good energy of my friends, caffeine for energy and ibuprofen for the throat and cough pain I actually felt better as the day rolled on.

 At mile 100, I stepped on the gas. It was going to be my victory dance in celebration of beating the common cold. I couldn't loose because it was all down hill.

 I forgot about the how tight the first corner of the Highland Valley Road descent was and how fast it would come at me. Ssuddenly, I found myself going way too fast in the direction the road was no longer going. There was no way I could make the corner. I touched the brakes. They locked. I (involuntarily) skidded my back tire like a mountain bike. I got it back. I felt the bike fishtail back and forth a couple of times. I unclipped my foot preparing for the worst. The side of the road was approaching and things were not looking good. Just in the nick of time the bike slowed down and I found myself balanced again and able to steer around the corner. Yikes, that was lucky! I felt very blessed and slightly nauseous.

My apologies to those who had to watch. I think for most people something like that is uncomfortable to watch. My husband doesn't seem to be to rattled by my misstep. Currently the Tour De France is on. Crashes from years past are being highlighted. Every few minutes Tim alerts me when a tour rider loses control of his bike. He states with "That's exactly what you did!" There is pride in his voice. Every cyclist want to hear they emulate the tour in some way. Not quite the image I was dreaming up. I was thinking more for the hands in a "V" finish. I guess I'll have to settle for being loved as I am: the character narrowly averting disaster.