Was it Google's fault, or my own?
Last Saturday, I mapped out a ride on El Olde Googley Machine. This is always a crapping shoot for me because, despite the presence of a scale in the bottom right corner of a Googley map, I always pick rides that are too long for the amount of time I have. Last weekend was no different. What I'd hope to be a nice big three-hour loop on my new Maveek Ksyrium SR's was instead a two hour, forty-five-minute, out-and-back. No problem, it was a beautiful day.
Well, one problem.
I headed southwest to the Albany roads. I had noted that I wanted to turn on Albany N. Or was it M? My writing was pretty unclear. Well, as it turns out, Albany M from County H ends in a sand alley. Way too mushy for road bike tires. So I turned back to H, figuring what I meant to write was "N," not, "M." Or maybe I had actually written "N" sloppily and it just sort of looked like an "M." Who knows. I made the right onto Albany N and was rewarded with an awesome climb up into some woodsey-type areas. Alas, by the time I made it to the top, I was an hour and a half from home. I had to turn back, leaving the rest of my planned route for another day.
Where is my sense of adventure, you ask? With 21-month old twins at home, when a man says he'll be gone for three hours, he'd better be gone three hours. Or less. Certainly not more. So, I turned back, heading northeast to Eau Claire, and since I was smart and had chosen the southwest route due to where the wind was coming from, I rode a tailwind all the way home. Hence the 15-minutes shorter return trip along the same route. That, and I also knew where I was going on the way in.
Oh, and it was all my fault, not knowing where I was going. Not the Googley's. Obviously.
The Googley never makes mistakes.
Never.
Ever.
(Originally Posted by me elsewhere on 4/18/12)
