Again With The Bad Luck?

It was a weekend of downs and ups.

I awoke early Saturday morning eager to drive to Dillard. I left the house with plenty of time to spare and made my way up 985, stopping for breakfast at a Waffle House along the way. As I was leaving Waffle House I looked at one of my tires and thought “Huh, that seems low, but if it were the Tire Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS) would let me know.”

Twenty miles later the TPMS came on.

Fortunately for me I was close to the one exit that has a gas station on it. It’s a BP, and if you’ve ever driven to Clayton (Nanthahala, Black Rock Mountain State Park, etc) you’ve no doubt noticed it. I pulled into the BP and swapped some paper money for quarters and proceeded to be baffled that not a single tire registered as being low on the gas station’s air pump. I put a few pounds of air in each tire, but the TPMS was still not satisfied.

DANGEN! There went my fun day.

I called the Mazda dealership and, confirming that they could look at it that day, turned around and drove the two hours to Morrow.

Fuck my luck.

I figured that since none of the tires “needed” additional air that something else must be wrong on a car that is not even eleven months old.

Unsurprisingly the Mazda dealer found nothing “wrong” and they asked if I had the tires rotated recently. “Yes, here, about two weeks ago.” I responded. They could say nothing more. Fortunately the trip to the dealership cost me no more than my time.

I drove the M6 from Morrow to Perimeter Mall to pick up the bicycle that I left on Friday.

The Good Part Of Saturday
If there was one good thing to come from the aborting of my day-trip to Dillard it was that I was guaranteed to be ITP for Saturday night’s show by The Polyphonic Spree at Terminal West. As predicted the show was an uplifting blast. There are few bands that can improve my mood as quickly as The Polyphonic Spree can. The band played the entirety of their first record “The Beginning Stages…” and then select other songs from their other releases.

For a good part of the show I stood next to a woman who would score highly on my Wife Project questionnaire (a nod to ITP-Readers Lisa’s and Randy’s suggestion of “The Rosie Project”, which I finished reading this weekend). Unfortunately for me, she was also standing next to the man of her dreams, who stood on the other side, her husband.

Paying For My Indiscretion
I failed to mention that my trip to Perimeter Mall also included a stop at the local Taco Mac for a few beers and some nachos in order to drown my sorrows. While I didn’t eat a proper dinner on Saturday I knew that I should pay for my caloric indiscretions of Saturday.

A little before 9:00am I suited up in my Gators kit and went out for a ride. I was hoping to get in fifty miles; I came close.

My ride started with me questioning why I didn’t at least bring my arm warmers with me. While it wasn’t cold, it was clammy enough to prove to be uncomfortable, at least for the first five miles or so.

Inside Stone Mountain park a woman rode alongside me asking if the Gators had a bye week; I answered in the affirmative. She went on to tell me that she was a Seminole, and I characteristically provided solace even though deep inside I was still thrilled to have see FSU lose to Georgia Tech on a soul-crushing blocked field goal that was returned for a touchdown on the game’s final play.

Yesterday’s ride was proving to be quite a struggle due to the nearly-constant headwind I encountered.

As I approached Virginia-Highland I was greeted with a “Go Gators”, to which I characteristically returned — as one does when you are a Gator. This raised my spirits slightly, but I still had an arduous task ahead of me.

More surprisingly when I turned onto Highland I was engulfed by a morning peloton. Since I had already covered thirty-five miles at that point and had no idea where their ride was headed I continued straight as their leaders turned right a few blocks later.

From Virginia-Highland my journey toward fifty miles took me onto Monroe, and then Piedmont, into The Prado, a quick shot on Peachtree before turning onto 14th, taking it all the way to Howell Mill, where I then worked my way onto Marietta, taking it all the way back past Georgia State before winding my way through Grant Park into East Atlanta.

I managed to cover forty-six miles. At that point I was tired and had been on the saddle long enough, so I called it quits.

Slumber Time
It should come as no surprise that I fell asleep watching the Falcons game.

Hunger Time
By 4:00pm I was getting rather hungry. With no food in the house that I wished to prepare I decided to eat out. This would also be my first real meal of Sunday, having eaten nothing more than a protein bar pre-ride and some pretzels with mustard as “lunch”.

I was undecided where to eat. Fox Bros BBQ was my first thought, but I didn’t want to deal with waiting for a table. I thought about eating in the hood, but then I read a tweet from the D.B.A. Barbecue guy. The tweet mentioned how he thought the Falcons were playing so poorly that they deserved to lose. Another person responded that his negativity was going to drive away business. I saw it that the DBA guy was just speaking the truth.

I ate dinner at D.B.A. Barbecue.

Of course I also have an appreciation for DBA because they are Gator supporters. In fact, I nearly bought a t-shirt while there yesterday. I regret not buying it, I may return tonight.

Hope your weekend involved no “downs”.

Cheers,
Paulie [eatl/ga]