Girl's Just Want to Have Fun

First, the setting. I'm sitting on my deck in shorts and a tee shirt. The frogs and peepers in the marsh behind me are singing so loudly, I had trouble hearing the Sox game on the radio. I did yard work for the first time in a year and a half, because I broke my arm just about a year ago and missed a whole year. For those of you who think that might have been a silver lining from last year, I enjoy doing yard work. Yard work brings immediate gratification--the yard is full of dead leaves, a little raking and it looks great.

The first thing I did was dispense of the last little pile of snow that was hanging on in the yard. I tossed it on the driveway and in seconds it melted. Here are the before and after pictures:











But the real purpose of this blog is to talk about the recumbent trikes we bought today. Before I talk about them, props to Ruth for suggesting a recumbent trike. My first image was of Bennett's tricycle, quintuple size. It sounded humiliating. But here's what it looks like:



Hmmm--you'd get a better perspective of it from the side. Anyway, it's a totally fun toy! My motivation for getting it was only about stability--it's very hard to take a spill on. But now I see lots of other advantages--it eliminates all of my sources of pain in riding a bike--there's no strain of the back, shoulders, wrists, or hands, and, maybe best of all, no soreness from the bike seat. I feel like I could go out and ride 50 miles immediately--I always could ride 25 miles with at the beginning of the bike season, so with the combination of having done spinning all winter and eliminating the first sources of pain, 50 seems reasonable. I sure I'll discover what the next sources of pain are, though, so I'm not planning on 50 my first ride out.

I was worried about getting up really steep hills, because you can't stand on the pedals. What you do, though, is push back into the seat to get more leverage. I can't wait to try it. Unfortunately, I have to wait, because the bike shop has to order them. It'll be a 2-3 week wait.

Liz and I both both got them, thanks to the state and federal governments deciding to give us back a huge amount of money--nearly $13k. I don't know why, but I'm not asking any questions. Liz's back has hurt biking, and it aggravates her carpel tunnel syndrome. Also, we figured it would be easier to talk when we bike if we were at the same level. I don't think those arguments would have seemed as strong without the refund, though.

So stay tuned--I'll post pictures as soon as we take our new bikes out for a spin. Thank you, Ruth!!! I'm excited about training outside again.