It's a new month

June is upon us!

Lots of stuff going on for me: The house purchase is starting to look like it might actually happen! There are only a couple of pieces of the puzzle left to assemble (I hope), and most of what's left is out of my hands at the moment. I'm still shepherding as much as I can, and planning for the crunch time to come next week as best I can.

I'm up against a deadline or three, you see. Our closing is scheduled for Tuesday morning. I'll have Tuesday afternoon to change (and repair a couple of) the locks on the house, before we fly out to California Wednesday morning for RAAM. We'll spend Wednesday afternoon, Thursday, Friday and Saturday preparing for our race, which starts Saturday afternoon. Not to worry, I have an assortment of folks set up to do random drive-by inspections at both houses, to make sure nobody burns down either one while we are gone. All the good stuff is already boxed up, anyway, and one would have to go through a LOT of boxes to figure out where it is.

Nothing like a little stress in one's life.

Before I leave town, I have to prepare the lesson plan and working materials for the New Rider Clinic class to happen on the 21st, as I will fly home just in time to get home, change clothes, air up the bike tires and ride to the class. Maybe I'd better have a back-up plan in place for that, too, eh?

The commute was a bit different today, too. Jenn spoke with Bob (owner of Bluegrass Bicycle, and my boss) at the Mayor's Ride on Monday, and their discussion led Jenn to think Bob would find value in looking at our Burley trailer. Since I was riding the Raleigh to work today, anyway (the Ryan seat mesh broke last week, and I'm a bit concerned that it would break worse if I keep riding it before replacing the mesh), I pulled the trailer to work with me. As I was getting ready to go home, I found I had reason to visit my mom for a bit on my way home. Going to her house involves a roughly half-hour addition to my travel time (it's about a half-hour to her place from work, and about an hour home from her place), so I did that. I had removed the headlights from the Raleigh the other day, and had yet to reinstall them, so I needed to leave Mom's in time to get home with some light left.

Mom lives near Long Run Park. Best route home from her house is roughly Aiken Road to Old Henry Road, Avoca Road to Anchorage, then KY146 to Lyndon Lane to Westport Road. Not a bad ride at all, frankly.

Except that Avoca Road is closed to through traffic right now. I figured (rightly, as it turned out) that I could walk whatever section was truly closed, so I rode past the closure signs. Apparently, some of the embankment supporting one edge of the road (beside a railroad track that serves the quarry operations off Old Henry Road) failed--there is a stretch of pavement two or three feet wide and forty or fifty feet long that is six inches or more below road grade. I can see why they would not want motor vehicles to pass each other along there!

And, yes, I got home before dark!