Damn, my ass hurts.

so, please, be gentle….
^.^

Ah the many wonders of long bike rides – the wind
in your hair, the click of the gears, the buzz of a spinning
freewheel,

the resulting ass
pain…

Yeah, hard to believe I’d
forgotten about that. Didn’t take long for me to remember it, though.

I went for a serious ride into Tokyo
today. I don’t know what the distance was, but it was a good 3 – 3.5 hours of
riding, most of it very fast. The first 1.5 hours were spent heading into Tokyo,
getting lost and finding my way again. That all went great, as did the next half
hour I spent making my way to a friend’s place. We hung out for a bit doing
geeky stuff, then headed off to ride
together.

That’s when it hit
me.

If you’ve ever ridden a bike
for any (un)reasonable distance, you know exactly what I’m talking about. That
certain tenderness you get in a place you don’t really think about. Of course,
that changes when the discomfort makes it all you
can
think about.

We cruised about for a
bit, rode down to Yoyogi Park, hit the trail there, then spent a little time
resting and chatting before splitting up. Him to go study kanji, me to find my
way home.

Which turned out to
be much easier than getting into
town.

I hit Harajuku first, to
check the Nike Factory Store to see if they had any Ninja shoes. (They didn’t.)
A quick study of my map showed me I could take Meiji-dori almost all the way
home, so that’s what I did. One the way I passed through Shinjuku and Ikebukuro,
both places I know, so I knew I was heading the right way. A few further map
checks as I traveled kept me going where I wanted
to.

And like that, I was home! Total
time from Harajuku –
1
hour
. Time from Ikebukuro –
34
minutes
.

It
should be noted that it takes longer to travel between Ikebukuro and my
apartment if I take the bus/train than it took me to get home on my bike. Now, I
think there’s a bit more downhill on the way home than there, but it’s pretty
negligible since Tokyo in general is pretty flat, and any hills that exist are
of little consequence. And once I learn the routes better and get used to riding
again, I’ll be able to do it even
faster…

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m
tired and need to go lay down –
on my
stomach. ^.^