Seriously. I'm all happy for you and your pursuit of the bronzing power of tanning, but could you fake it for a few days until your skin can catch up? My sunglasses don't ward against that kind of glare very well.

The newly-mowed grass, the fresh-cut lumber, and lilacs created a heavenly bouquet at Diversey, a small consolation to me after the city took away my trail. When I ride to work every morning I break it into chunks to keep myself from giving up before I get onto the bike. The warm-up to Belmont, the off-roading between Diversey and Fullerton, the water break at North Ave, the stoplight at Grand...you get the idea. But that off-road section was perfect. On the way to work, it was the first true test of my being awake. On the way home, it was a little reward for my 4 miles of relentless hell: weaving thru idiots on the lakefront. But now it's all inaccessible and I have to use the new path. Bah. It's all concrete where I wanted to weave thru trees and roots and mud. *So* much more fun.

~~~~~

I rode to work today, learning once again that the lakefront is a pain in the ass in the early morning. There's always a breeze off the lake for some meteorological reason (which I won't go into) and it's *always* against me. There's no 'easy' ride to/from work. It's always a struggle, and it gets progressively harder as you approach downtown. Until North Ave, it's dead, according to the trees. No flicker, no nothing--it's not true, but tell it to the inanimate objects. Then it starts feeling like an active breeze (and the leaves tremble), but that stretch from Oak Street to Olive Park has gale-force winds knocking me back and ripping my helmet off my head as I...oh, who am I kidding? It's wicked-windy and I hate hate hate it. The fact that the triathletes use it as their warmup before the 40 mile pleasure ride doesn't mean *I* enjoy it. There's nothing but you, the water, and the relentless traffic 15 feet from your head...and that damnable wind. It's evil. EVIL.

Since I'm on the subject, let me also issue a scathing reprimand to Mr Daley: Listen up, bigshot biker--make it easier for pedestrians to get from the lakefront to WACKER. I have to loop down to the Art Institute to backtrack up to Lake Street. That's almost an extra mile, and let me tell you--at 7:30a, that's a mile I'd rather spend *not* impaled on a bike seat, no matter how many soothing gel-seats are piled on there.