Category: #bikedc

Top Ten of 2019

The year isn’t over yet so I am assuming nothing particularly notable will happen in the next 10 days. Except for the fact that we will be taking back some daylight from those thieves in the southern hemisphere! Here’s a list of ten notable things that I wrote about in 2019.

  1. Before I left for my bike tour, the Washington Nationals were a complete flop. So disappointing. When I got back they were playing great and having a blast. Baby sharks were busting out all over. I must have gone to 20 games. Many with my daughter. Improbably, with one of the worst bullpens in history, the Nationals won the whole damned thing. Unreal.
  2. My daughter received her masters degree from King’s College in London so we went over the pond to celebrate and play. We visited the Churchill War Rooms, saw Book of Mormon, checked out the Greenwich Observatory and the British Museum, and had breakfast at Dishoom. Twice. (Try the granola with coconut milk yoghurt.)
  3. My son came home from Thailand this fall. So great to see him. He earned his PADI certification this year. When not taking tourists on scuba dives, he works at an Internet-based marketing company.
  4. In April, Dave Salovesh, a dear friend, was killed by an out of control driver in DC. He always seemed to be everywhere. And now he’s nowhere. In death as in life, he brought us together. Too many tears. I can still hear his warm, calming voice in my head. It was a pleasure knowing him.
  5. I rode my bike from Indiana to San Francisco. One day outside Saint Louis, I was scraping Mississippi River mud from my tires and fenders on the side of a highway. Jerry, a retired chef, pulled up in a white pick up and all but ordered me to get off the pavement. Seconds after I did, two cars crashed where I had been standing. Channeling Samuel L. Jackson, Jerry remarked, “That would have fucked you up!” Indeed, it would have. It was a stark reminder that just like Dave I could go at anytime.
  6. The other people who helped me on my trip across the country were amazing.  An especially kind motel owner in Westcliffe, Colorado. Bicycle mechanics. The inspiration of a Buddhist monk in a cowboy hat walking along the highway in the Ozarks. Warmshowers hosts. Mike and Jessie who met me at the ferry terminal and housed, fed, and “watered” me in San Francisco. And a woman giving out cold water out (and letting me use her bathroom) on the side of the road in Kansas. I could not have made it without them. Proving once again, that there is no such thing as a solo bike tour.
  7. Mark and Corey let me join them for the ride across Kansas. You couldn’t find two better people to ride through floods and endless prairie than these two. Corey stopped to take pictures of flowers everyday, and sent one home via his online trip journal to his wife Lynn each night. Mark was the master of logistics. I think the floods near Chanute, Kansas receded when they heard he was coming.
  8. I rode the Nigel Tufnel edition of the 50 States Ride (my 11th time), once again joined by a posse of friends. In reality, I have ridden in 34 states. Maybe I should knock off the other 16. What do you think? I did four other event rides in the fall, three of them with my friend Emilia. Estoy bien.
  9. Several times a year, friends from grad school get together to celebrate birthdays. This year we got into day hiking. I hadn’t done much hiking in the past couple of years. I think I did four or five hikes with them. The hikes were a welcome break from the bicycling grind.
  10. For the second year in a row, I rode over 10,000 miles on my bikes. I cycled through 5 new states (Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Utah, and Nevada). From Pueblo to San Francisco I climbed (and descended) over 150,000 feet. For the first time ever, I walked up hills, mountains really. My legs are still trying to forget. I hope my mind never does.
  11. And, a final extra note to three traveling bloggers, Lily, Jessica, and Brittany. Thanks for keeping me inspired to go somewhere far. The next time I find myself pushing my bike up a mountain, I’ll remember that I could be sipping tea in a cafe somewhere civilized.

The saga continues….

Today I cancelled Monday’s PT appointment. Yesterday I did a two-hour recumbent ride in the basement. My wonky left leg felt fine throughout. When I walked away from the bike, the ache in my leg returned.

I did a very abbreviated PT session, took two Tylenols, and chilled.

Today, my leg felt fine for a few hours after waking. Then, as I was telling Mrs. Rootchopper that my leg felt pretty good, the ache returned.

I went for a 30-mile ride to test out the repairs done on Little Nellie. The shifting works fine in the front. I still get some chain misbehavior in the rear but that’s the norm for this bike. I wonder if there isn’t some kind of flex in the frame caused by the folding mechanism.

In any case, my leg felt absolutely fine for the entire ride. The left knee hurt a little going up hills or grinding big gears. There’s a small painful spot on the outside of my hip, as well. I don’t know if the leg could handle a mountain out west but for present purposes it’s okay. I stopped to shop at a store and within a few minutes my leg was aching again. I think weight bearing is triggering the pain.

When I got home, instead of PT, I did a short version of my old yoga routine. There are over 30 poses involved. I spent about a minute on each. By the end, my leg was very achy.

It has been suggested by several people (my physical therapist and my brother, a retired nurse, who has similar back problems) that this ache is referred pain from a pinched nerve in my lower spine. My lower back doesn’t hurt any more than usual. It’s always stiff thanks to the family genome. I’ve had sciatica in the past as well as a herniated disk. My current symptoms don’t follow the classic knife pain from butt to calf of sciatica, nor do they follow the aching thigh numbness of my slipped disc. Still, some sort of nerve compression in my lower back is a pretty good candidate for the cause.

So I looked up yoga videos for lower back pain. The three that I found all include positions in my routine. Most include extending the leg away from the body, either while doing a standing yoga position or a kneeling one. (Some of them involve reaching back and pulling the foot back toward the body.  Ain’t gonna happen.) The level of difficulty of these is easy to moderate, for me anyway. If I had full blown sciatica, they’d be impossible.

Another candidate for the pain in my calf is repercussions from my blood clot episode of two years ago. It turns out that some people who have had a blood clot called a deep vein thrombosis (DVT) in their leg have residual pain that can show up much later and last a life time. The pain is caused by the body reacting to the DVT by redirecting blood flow around the DVT. After the DVT is gone, the blood flow gets discombobulated and pain and swelling results. (When I had the DVT,  I had no pain or swelling. It was a sneaky little bastard.) Depending on how my visit to the orthopedist goes on Monday, I may make a follow up appointment with my hematologist.

Digression: one way to tell that you are old is by the number of medical specialists you see. My specialty list includes ophthalmology, neurology, hematology, pulmonology, endocrinology, orthopaedics, and physical therapy. If this goes on much longer, I’m going to need a psychiatrist. As long as my list does not involve a mortician, I’ll consider myself ahead of the game.

A third possibility is acute Christmas cookie intoxification. ACCI is a bitch. The only known cure is January.

I happen to have a vibrating massage gizmo that I acquired during one of my many episodes of back pain many years ago. It’s basically been useless until now but it turns out to be surprisingly effective in calming my calf muscle down. This device can target the muscle tightness much better than a foam roller, massage stick, or a lacrosse ball.

So for the next several days it’s biking, yoga, massage gizmo, Netflix, and pills.

Flossing ain’t getting it done

For the last couple of days I’ve rested my legs and done nerve flossing. Last night my left leg was killing me as I walked 1/2 mile from the WABA holiday party to the Metro station. It nearly seized up as I was crossing U Street, a chaotic traffic mess of a road. It ached at night and all day until I went in the basement and started riding:

I’ve been going at it for over an hour. No pain at all.

After 10+ weeks of physical therapy and three cortisone shots, other than when I’m riding, I’m in more pain than when I started. They say that doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is the definition of insanity

I’m cancelling my Monday PT appointment and going back to the orthopedist instead.

In the meantime, I’m discontinuing all flossing or stretching or leg strengthening exercises as long as my leg still aches.

On Sunday morning I’ll be doing the last event ride of the year, the Hains Point 100. It’s a flat ride in 3.3 mile laps. If you do 30, laps, good on you. I usually ride 7 to 10 laps, stopping to chat with friends and eat junk food. And Advil.

Flossing amid the winter gloom

So the weatherman cooperated with my new regime. Yesterday I didn’t ride at all. Not riding makes my brain restless so I started the day with 20 minutes of meditation. I haven’t done sitting meditation in a long time, because long slow rides make it superfluous. (Most meditation teachers would disagree but I doubt they’ve ridden a bike across Kansas. Then again, I did run into a Tibetan monk in a cowboy hat walking down the road in Missouri this summer so what do I know.)

Cold drizzle made outdoor riding unappealing, so I rode Big Nellie in the basement for the first time since last winter. Two hours on a bike indoors may sound boring but I multitasked with a Bill Bryson book, Neither Here Nor There. It’s his account of travelling solo through Europe.

After that I did a PT session. After reviewing several YouTube videos on nerve flossing, I decided to stop beating my left leg up with the foam roller. I did four or five flossing sessions (they only take a minute). So far, I am seeing no noticeable change. If this doesn’t work, I’m going back to my yoga-based routine from 2017 – 2018. In many ways it is quite similar to the PT I’ve been doing but costs nothing. I tried some balance moves today. The Flying Wallendas will not be calling me anytime soon. I also did a shoulder stand that I cut short to avoid taking out the router on the table next to me.

After that I watched Room on Netflix. A gloomy movie for a gloomy day. Lots of really good acting though.

Tomorrow, I hope to pick Little Nellie up from the bike shop. Then I’ll go to the WABA Holiday Party. I’ll be the guy with the pronounced limp on the left and the beer on the right.

 

Belle View Bike Shop Update

My local bike shop, Spokes Etc.’s Belle View location, is the only shop within six miles of my home. I use it mostly for repairs and purchases of bike stuff. It’s pretty darn good. A few weeks ago, fire broke out in the Belle View shopping center and a number of businesses had to close, including Spokes. I had thought that the bike shop had suffered only smoke damage but that turns out not to be the case. Along with burning off the roof, the fire warped a structural I beam. Once the shopping center’s owners get the place structurally sound and covered, the Spokes people can go about building out the store. Although the I beam should be installed soon, the rest of the structural work will take a few months.

Finding and Fixing

Way back in September, I participated in the 50 States Ride in DC. When I got home, I couldn’t find one of my two bike headlights. I thought I had tucked my Light and Motion Urban 500 light in one of the side pockets of The Mule’s saddle bag. It wasn’t there when I got home so I assumed that a passerby had walked off with it.

Yesterday, I took Little Nellie to the Spokes Etc. bike shop in Alexandria to get it’s front shifting fixed. When I described how the chain wouldn’t stay on either of the two bigger chain rings, the mechanic suggested that my shifter had loosened. Sure enough, the screw that holds the shifter’s lever in place had backed out. The mechanic tightened it back up, I shifted the gears, and walked out a happy dude.

Today, as I prepared to ride to Friday Coffee Club, I could not find the helmet mount for my Light and Motion Stella 500 light. Without it I would have to mount the light on my handlebars. The Mule’s handlebar bag would obstruct the headlight’s beam so I chose to ride Little Nellie which features a lower profile handlebar bag.

I rode about a half mile and realized that despite yesterday’s mechanical intervention, the front shifter still would not hold the chain on the big chain ring. For whatever mysterious reason, the shifter would hold the chain on the middle chain ring. I reasoned this was good enough and rode 15 miles to the coffee meet up.

It began to sprinkle on the way there. Temperatures were on the low 30s. Despite this I managed to enjoy the ride being careful not to tempt fate by trying to use the bogus font shifter. This meant I relied excessively on my rear gears. The shifter controlling those gears was very stiff. And the chain seemed to want to work only in four or five of the nine available gears.

After caffeine I rode home in a steady rain. When I got home, I began to prep the bike for the trip to the bike shop. I took off the pump and grabbed my valuables from the handlebar bag. When I went to retrieve the Stella’s battery pack from one of the pockets on the handlebar bag, I noticed something tucked next to it. It was my “stolen” Urban 500 light! Yay!

Later, at the bike shop, a couple of mechanics took a look at my bike. Basically, it needs new cables and cable housings, a new chain, and a new cassette. If all goes well, I’ll pick the bike up next week.

 

Lucky Number Seven

Today I had my seventh colonoscopy. I’m afraid to report that colonoscopies don’t get easier with age. My mother contracted colon cancer when she was around 70 years old.  She hated them. More specifically, she HATED drinking “the stuff”, the liquid you take to flush your digestive tract out. Back in those days (we’re talking about 1990 or so) you had to drink a gallon of rank tasting liquid. Then repeat the process 12 hours later. In between you shitted your brains out.

It’s much easier now. You only have to drink 48 ounces (you save 12 ounces! What a bargain) twelve hours apart. And the foul tasting stuff is only in the first 16 of the 48 ounces. A friend of mine told me about her colonoscopy prep. She took a pill. Even better she was awake for the procedure and watched it on TV.

When you get your colonoscopy, try to schedule it for early in the morning. The only slot my doctor had was 11:30 a.m. so I was pretty much up the Shits Creek without a paddle, so to speak.

For three days prior to the procedure you can’t eat anything that might get hung up in your inner tubes. Popcorn, peas, fruit with skin, nuts, etc. I had Indian food one night and Thanksgiving leftovers the another. The day before you can’t have any solid food, only clear liquids. I chowed down on tea, gatorade, and chicken broth. How do you handle a hungry maaaan?

At 4 p.m. I drank my first round of the stuff.  I fought off the urge to throw up. Then, after an hour, I heard the telltale gurgle in my gut and ran to the bathroom where I made like a Saturn 5 rocket engine for about an hour. It’s unbelievable how effective the stuff is. It must have Drano in it to work it’s way through your intestines so fast. The entire time the stuff was doing, well, its stuff, I was thinking of one scatological joke after another. I was just making the best of a totally helpless situation.

After an hour, the storm receded and was followed by occasional shit squalls until midnight. I fell asleep with my alarm set for 4 a.m. when round two would commence.

Let me tell you, as a breakfast drink, The Stuff is rather rude. I downed the brew and waited. Then the voiding process repeated. This time, thankfully, I had no more solids in me. (The doctor’s instructions say that if the prep doesn’t work, you’ll have to do it for two days. I’d rather die.) We renovated the bathroom next to the man cave this year and I am happy to report that the toilet and piping passed the ultimate test with flying colors. Mrs. Rootchopper had put a new bottle of Febreeze in the bathroom and it kept the paint from peeling off the walls.

By about 7:30 I was empty. I could tell just by looking in the mirror. My belly was flatter than it has been since riding 4,300 miles to Portland in 2018. Mrs. Rootchopper drove me to the hospital and, after a 20 minute uneventful check-in process, I was taken back to the pre-op area.

I weighed in at 203 with my clothes and shoes one. I was down about 8 pounds from my last weigh in a month ago. (Have I got a diet for you! Actually, don’t even go there. I tried a water diet my freshman year in college. It messed me up for three days. And could have killed me.)

I got in my gown and laid down on a comfy portable bed. A nurse took my vital signs. My blood pressure was normal. My pulse was 44. (“I ride a bicycle. A lot.”) The nurse covered me with a warm blanket. Having had only about 4 hours of continuous sleep, I was ready to take a snooze. And so I did. Zzzzz.

The doctor was backed up. Wait, let me rephrase that. He was behind schedule. So I got a nice hour or two nap in. Then I was wheeled to an operating room. There the anesthesia nurse gave me a stimulant to increase my heart rate.  A pulse of 44 leaves too little down side. Then she injected one of the tubes leading to my veins with an anesthetic and I woke up. In the recovery room.

I have no recollection of the procedure. For all I know they went out for lunch at Denny’s.

After a while my doctor came by with the preliminary results. (My brain: Please don’t be cancer. Please don’t be cancer.) He had pictures that look like a tunnel except for close ups of three polyps. One looked innocuous to him. The others looked worthy of a biopsy. Once that was done he removed them. Actually, he torched them. Seriously. Thankfully, the prep had eliminated the chance for a fatal blue dart.

My doctor, who has been doing colonoscopies on me for 24 years, thinks that the lab results will show that the polyps he biopsied are benign. He gave me the good news that if they are benign, I don’t need another colonoscopy for three years. (Most people who are free of polyps or tumors and have no family history are put on a five or ten year cycle. Thanks, Mom.)

I do hope that the prep is made easier by then. This was the hardest prep I’ve ever done. I attribute the difficulty to age. No wonder my mother hated it so. I can’t imagine being 70 years old and weighing all of 105 pounds and going through this over and over and over again. She was one tough customer. She also survived her colon cancer and lived another 20 years.

So there you have the whole story.

Many thanks to Mrs. Rootchopper for getting me to and from the hospital and waiting several hours longer than we had planned. And thanks to my doctor and the staff and nurses at Inova Mount Vernon Hospital for being so professional and good humored.

Nearly three years in a row

Two years ago I was stopped less than 90 miles shy of 10,000 bicycling miles for the year. Having to quit with a week to go because of a life threatening illness really sucked. Of course, living is worth 88 miles.

Last year, I blew the doors off with over 11,000 miles in the saddle. Revenge was sweet. I crossed the 10,000 mark around Thanksgiving. I rode in eight new states (Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Washington, and Oregon). And I crossed the continental divide for the first time.

Today, I crossed the 10,000 mile threshold again. Along the way, I picked off five new states (Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Utah, and Nevada). I rode over Monarch Pass, above 11,000 feet.

From Colorado to California, I climbed well over 150,000 feet. Somebody stop me before I do such a foolish thing ever again.

Now it’s time to get well and have some fun. Colonoscopies are fun, aren’t they?

PSA – Get your ass to a doctor

If you’ve been meaning to do one of those cleansings of your inner organs, do I have a treat for you.

This week I will be having my seventh colonoscopy. PARTAY! Colon cancer doesn’t much care if you think a colonoscopy is gross. To be honest, the cleansing routine the day before is not much fun, although, unlike a decade ago, you no longer have to drink two gallons of foul tasting fluid to get the job done. Fair warning: do this at home. (Don’t ask.)

My mother survived it. My friend Bob is undergoing chemo for it. My grad school roommate Chet died of it a year ago. Like you, they were/are all very nice people. Colon cancer didn’t much care.

So if you are 50 or older, or if you have a family history of colon cancer, get your ass to a doctor and get a colonoscopy. It’s not nearly as gross as having eye surgery while conscious. (Been there. Done that. I have stories.)