“To P, or not to P. That is the question.”

On the one hand, I mean no disrespect to Will not only for mangling lines from Hamlet, but for taking them completely out of context to suit my shameless lowbrow purpose.

But in my defense, it was sort of an existential question that we were entertaining earlier in the week: whether to ride. Janis, MikeH, and I wanted to notch another monthly P-ride, and we were keeping a close eye on the weather.

In the balance: Mike’s P-9, Janis’ P-12, and my P-24.

The early week forecast was calling for rain. As the week progressed, the rain was out, but headwinds on the return, gusting at 22—25 mph, were in. As it turned out, this was a complete exaggeration, too, although we wouldn’t know it until after we’d committed.

We were smug in our initial game plan: let the wind blow us to the turnaround control at Sherry’s Bakery in Dunn, warm ourselves with coffee, while feasting on apple fritters (frittering away the time), and then somehow deal with the wind on the return.

We find inspiration from another misquotation from Will, this time from Macbeth, an exhortation to storm the bakery and gorge ourselves on pastries!

“Lay on, MacMike, and damn'd be him that first cries, "Hold, enough!"

We had a great December ride today. Congratulations to Janis today not only for eclipsing 6,000km for the year so far, but for notching her first P-12!

At least one other Tarheel rider, JohnO, has earned a P-12 this year!






MikeH, readying to storm the bakery! Janis (lead-in picture) ready to celebrate!

Let’s ride!