Mile 3394.7 - Home again

Days 55 and 56 were spent at my parents' house. After spending much of the morning hanging out with my family, I wanted to take a ride. There are a number of bike paths that have been built in the 15 years since I lived there last. There is one that I frequently ride on that goes along side the nearby Lily Cache Creek that I used to play around. I wanted to see if there was some way to get from my parents' house to my mom's work using a route that my mom might actually be willing to ride on. The problem I found was that the individual segments of bike trail throughout the town didn't seem to connect to each other. At some point, my mom would have to cross Illinois Route 53, basically a 4-6 lane highway that runs through the east part of the village. While I had no problem taking a lane at the stop light, heading up a line of cars behind me, there is no way my mom would ever possibly cross like that. What Bolingbrook needs to do is build a bike/pedestrian overpass, but who knows if that is ever going to happen. Disappointed, I headed back home.

My mom asked where I wanted to go for dinner, and I wanted Gino's East. Their deep dish pizza is my favorite and there is nothing in New York that compares. Since my friend and training partner Lisa was in Chicago, we decided to meet at the Gino's in Wheaton, a block away from the train station. My parents and I went to see a movie then drove the little way to the Wheaton train station. During the movie, a thunderstorm had rolled through. In Wheaton, it knocked out power in a four block radius around the train station. Unfortunately, this meant the restaurant was not able to turn on their ovens. Also, there was a tornado warning in Oak Park, right where Lisa's train had come to a stop. In fact, all metra trains on that line had been brought to a stand still. After an hour and a half of waiting, the trains started moving again. Then the power came back on. By the time Lisa arrived, the restaurant was open. As it turned out, we were the first customers in and the last customers out that evening. The pizza was worth it.

Pretty much the rest of these two days were spent hanging out and eating with my family. Day 56, I didn't even really get on the bike, though I did spend a good hour cleaning and maintaining. I did, however, spend a decent amount of time in my favorite tree. There's a maple in my parents' front yard that is absolutely perfect for climbing. Five feet off the ground, the trunk breaks off into four large branches, leaving a perfect seat in the middle.

Not much else to report here, so I'll move on to the next day.

Days 55 & 56, Bolingbrook, IL
11.3 miles in 23:05 for 3394.7 miles in 276:20:21 and a high speed of 19.3 mph