Troubling Trends

Here in Pennsylvania, I have settled into a comfortable routine. I have been here for a month, after all, and my mother’s house and neighborhood were already familiar to me. Work for my employer has continued uninterrupted. In most respects, I am living here just as I live back in West Bend.

However, cycling feels different. On an average day I can give it only about 90 minutes. My overnight workshift ends at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time. That means my whole day is shifted one hour later: I’m going to bed an hour later in the morning, getting up an hour later in the afternoon, not getting on the bike until late in the afternoon, then cutting my rides off at about 90 minutes to ensure I can help Mom with dinner. I’m going to finish June 2023 with more miles, year-to-date, than I had at the end of June 2022, but that’s mostly because this April was so much more productive than last April. June 2023 is not going to be a statistically impressive month, and by the end of July it seems probable that I will be behind my 2022 pace. That’s up to me, of course. If I find the motivation to do longer rides on my days off, then I can stay ahead. I will remind myself of that at a later date; this week already appears to be compromised. The forecast for Thursday, my next day off, is 65° with rain. That’s a miserable excuse for a summer day in Philadelphia, and there’s a chance of rain every day after that until at least the middle of next week.

I did the 3,000th ride of my cycling career last Thursday. That’s cool, I guess, but my ride frequency hasn’t been great this month. I did only four rides during each of the last two weeks, just 6.5 hours each week, and barely more than 100 miles per week. At this time of year, my mileage and saddle time should be roughly double what I have been doing. I have lost more days to bad weather than I could have anticipated, and that’s going to get worse before it gets better.