Sunday was a busy day. We rode Saturday morning, then went to my youngest’s swim meet, then to my eldest’s university marching band practice. It was a spectacular day but I didn’t get much done – and there was much to be done.

We rode at 7:30 from a high school 15 miles from the house, and one of my favorite routes. It’s a departure from the slow, rarely traveled country roads we’re used to. We head south to the outer suburbs of Detroit.

We had a great, small-ish group. Chuck, Chucker, Matt, Mike, Diane & Jeff on a tandem and me. Mike wasn’t feeling well so he took his toy and went home… turned out he had a knot in his back that wouldn’t release.

Our route is pretty straightforward till we get far enough south that we’re getting to Kensington Metropark. Then we hit a straight shot 8% descent that, with a little effort, you can briefly break the 45-mph speed limit on. I hammer that sucker till I can’t pedal any faster. 50/11 at 45.4-mph. I pedaled so hard I passed the tandem and topped out at 46.5 with a smile stretched from ear to ear (I did not employ the super-tuck for this one).

Now, if you noticed, I hadn’t mentioned my wife yet, who always rides with us on the weekends… heck, normally we’re on the tandem. She’d fallen ill with sore throat (and you know why I first defaulted to “sore throat”) and was asleep when I left. She was in rough shape. She was also not showing any signs of being under the weather Saturday… when we’d been playing kissy-face all day, as married people do. This meant every time I lacked comfortability, cycling in 85 degree heat and abundant sunshine at high rates of speed, I’d think, “Oh, crap, this is it! I’m sick too and I’m x miles from home… this is gonna suck.” Only to feel better a few minutes later. I lost count how many times that happened.

We stopped for coffee and a snack (I had a fantastic cinnamon roll) which, in hindsight, was a little weird… coffee, when it’s just shy of 90 (30 C)? It was fantastic, though – the perfect “not so hot you have to wait 20 minutes to take a sip” drinking temperature. We rolled out for home after a nice, not too long, rest. I felt fantastic and fast all the way home. I relaxed. We ended up with 52 miles, 1,900 feet of up (a lot for what I’m used to – double normal), and an average speed of 18.2-mph, a perfect Sunday Funday.

I got home, showered up, ate some lunch and took a quick nap. And that left the chores. My youngest helped by cutting the grass – her first time on the tractor, so there was some teaching time involved. She was awesome. While she was on the tractor, I turned my attention to the camper. The front storage section started rotting out under the corners (where water gets kicked up from the truck). The corners were gone. It needed a new floor and I had to cover the two holes from below, plus rebuild the righthand side which had rotted out completely.

I started working on it at around 2pm and by 5:30 I was almost done. It took a lot to figure it out but I’ve got it solid, now. I’d be willing to bet it’s good for at least another decade – and if I ever have to revisit it, I know exactly how to put it back together. It turned out vastly better than I’d hoped it would – I’m enthusiastically surprised, really. I’ll finish it up this afternoon – we had a storm blow through that forced me to stow my gear and I was absolutely wiped out by the time I sat down to eat dinner. I wasn’t about to go back out and get dirty after supper. The last bit this evening should go quite fast as I know exactly what I’m doing.

I slept like a baby last night. Everything got done – or close enough to it that I’ll finish tonight.