What's After Work?

  It is year nine of the Great Cycle Challenge and I am finishing up my training for that ride out on the Courtney Campbell Causeway. I look forward to this ride each year with both excitement and a little trepidation. I am trying to raise $2500 this year as well as ride 300 miles in the month of September, and we're not getting any younger.  I still have not gotten a new bike, this one has got me this for and I think it has another GCC ride in it. So keep a lookout  for my posts about the ride on Facebook, Twitter oops X, and my Great Cycle Challenge site.

Jan and I had a nice ride today. Out to the causeway and back. The weather was pleasant and the sky was clear.  We rode about 10 miles at a comfortable pace. I'm feeling good about my riding and may up my mileage next year to 400 for the Great Cycle Challenge 2023. 

 Of course these two day's joy is about riding my bike. Yesterday while riding in the morning I saw a mama duck and her ducklings out for a walk. The last one seems to have had enough. After the bike ride Jan and I went for a long car ride to Tallahassee. There we are visiting with Noah while Jessica and Jared take a little vacation from parenting.  After Jan dropped Noah off for school we went on a bike ride around Killearn Acres. It is a little hillier here than in Safety Harbor so it was more of a workout.

 Today I went out for an evening bike ride. It's always a little more peaceful just before sunset out on the causeway. All the jet skiers have gone home so the water is quiet. I stopped my ride for a moment to study the shadows cast by a row of palm trees across the trail when I turned to the bay. There I saw an osprey enjoying a little dinner. It looked like a little catfish. He seemed to accept me watching him for quite a while. It is amazing how much wildlife I see with all those cars whizzing past only a few feet away. 

  Just down the street from our home in Safety Harbor is a piece of public art. A mosaic dedicated to biking in our city. It was created several years ago during an art festival in downtown Safety Harbor. The fun thing is that Jan and I got to help place some of the pieces.  I liked that some of the tiles used are mirrors. You can see the reflection of them on the ground in front of the artwork. 

I was out today on the Courtney Campbell Causeway for a ride today and noticed something new. Just past the beach on the Clearwater side I found a big planting of mangroves down near the beach. There must have been a hundred little mangroves planted in neat rows.  Some of them had washed out of where they had been planted with the time. Next time I ride I'll bring a small shovel to replant them.

For the last 8 years I have been riding in the Great Cycle Challenge to raise money for children's cancer research. I started soon after my heart surgery.  I was already riding my bike for the exercise and I figured this was a way to help others while helping myself. This year I am trying to raise $1000 for cancer research and today with the very generous help of my friends I am halfway there.  It does make me happy to have such caring friends. 

 I was out on the causeway today and saw a guy fishing near the bridge. He had a set up in his bike to carry all his fishing stuff on the back. But looking offshore from him I saw some dolphins that were by all looks doing much better fishing than him. Lots of splashing and fin kicks. Dolphins are much harder to photograph than it would seem.

 I missed yesterday so today there will be two in one post.  4/1/22 You know I ride my bike a lot now that I'm retired and have the time to do it. Yesterday like most days out riding I noticed the little lizards standing guard along my route. Most of the time I notice them where the trail is paved with asphalt. Today was no exception. I'm not sure why that is but I counted over 30 lizards on this part of the trail while on the concrete parts I only saw 4. I guess there are more bugs on the darker surfaces.  Today 4/2/22 I was again out riding, this time with Jan. We stopped at Coopers Bayou Park and saw a Pileated Woodpecker flying through the trees. At first I only saw the white flash of his wings as he flew from branch to branch in the oak trees in the park. But then he landed in a branch near where we had stopped. It was quite pretty.  

  The first week of February Jan and I took a trip down to Everglades. Other than driving through the Everglades on Alligator Alley Jan an I have never visited the Everglades.  For this trip we rented a class "B"rv. We had been wanting to try one and this fit the bill.  This one is made by Winnebago. It is like driving a really big van. Inside there is room for two to sleep, shower and cook dinner. On top are several solar panels that keep the batteries charged. I was also surprised to find the mileage acceptable, 16 to 17 MPG.  We camped at the Everglades Flamingo which is the southernmost tip of the Florida peninsula. This is semi-primitive camping, no hot water in the showers. But other than that is is a very nice campground. the sites are very large and spread out. We never felt that the other camper were too close. At night the lighting at the campground is very subdued and we could see lots of stars. The first full day in the Everglades we had planned a boat t...

 With a year of Covid under our belts I've been thinking about what will define this era. I think it will be the masks we are wearing. These are a visual representation if the many things we are all going through.  I know that there are other things that could define this time; washing hands, social distancing, unemployment, fear and anger. but these are all things that can be connected with other times or events. Masks are focused on this time only. Masks are either a symbol of caring for others or submission to an authoritative government. Masks played a part in the downfall of some political aspirations while boosting others.  I have noticed masks being discarded most places I go nowadays. I got to thinking that a year ago seeing a mask was a rare event. Now most people I see out are wearing masks and they are loosing then everywhere. I have started photographing masks as I find them. The more I look the more I find. By the end of this I may have quite a collection of ...

This has been a fun week. I started off on Monday with a Zoom call to Mrs. Zacek's 4th grade class. It was great to talk to and see some of my students. I made them a Google slideshow of things that I have been doing after retiring. The kids had the most questions about my trip to Hawaii.  Even though September is over I'm still riding my bike and I'm getting Jan out on her bike also. We took a nice morning ride on Tuesday.  After the ride we sat down to check off a few more episodes of The West Wing. I guess we don't get enough politics on the news.  Thursday we went out to General RV in Dover. We are toying with the idea of getting an RV and hitting the road. Still have some decisions to make. New, used, trailer, drivable. So many choices. We have rented two RV's  to get an idea about how we would get along in the smaller space....So far so good😃 Today I started a bike scavenger hunt around Safety Harbor. I got about 14 of the 20 or so spots found and photograp...

  For the past 5 years I have ridden in June to raise money to  support of research to develop better treatments and find a cure for childhood cancer. This year because of Covid 19 it was moved to September. I began the month with the challenge of raising $500 and riding 250 miles. I'm still trying to ride 250 miles but because of my having very generous family and friends I have raised more than $1500. That is just  amazing. One of the other challenges I gave myself is to document each ride and share that with my friends, family and other Great Cycle Challenge riders. What follows is each of those posts that I placed on the GCC site. I started posting before September, kind of a prequel to the ride.

 September is a very exciting month for me. I will be participation again in the Great Cycle Challenge to help prevent childhood cancer. It is a bike ride and a fundraiser. This is the 6th year I have done this month long ride. I started after I had my heart surgery looking for ways to motivate my exercise and I just kept with it. In that time I have raised over $2000.00 and ridden over 1200 miles just in that one month. Usually the ride is in June but this year it was pushed back to September because of Covid 19.  Because of that extra time my friends have donated $860.00 to this cause. Maybe having a few extra months was a good thing. I'm going to try and post an update on my ride each day on either Facebook or on the Great Cycle Challenge webpage .  Below is a video that I created on my first ride that I started one minute into September. 

The summer time flag is flying at the Bliss household. It's a nice day today and not a cloud in the sky. I hope it stays that way till this afternoon so I can take a bike ride. We get to do something a little different today which is going to the Peach Truck .  Last year they came to Florida and the Tampa Bay area and Jan sent me over for a box. This is from a post on Facebook at the time and you can see it is a lot of peaches. Lats year we made several different kinds of peach jellies, jams and preserves.  Plus eat a lot of peaches when they get ripe, and they all get ripe at the same time.  

Between March 21 and May 4th the beach on the Courtney Campbell Causeway was closed to the public. During that time I photographed the beach each day I rode my bike out there. I noticed some subtle changes on the beach.  The tire tracks and foot prints started to fade and there was much less trash. I also noticed that the birds were appearing on the beach. Not just a few seagulls but whole flocks of seabirds.  High-tide lines of seaweed also could be seen and the water appeared less cloudy.  Overall the beach quickly returned to a more natural state.  I had hoped that when the beach was reopened that they would limit the number of vehicles on the beach to fewer that had been allowed before Covid 19, that does not appear to be the case but they are limiting to just the number of spaces. 42 and no more closing off the entrance to the beach when that number is reached.  I wish that a parking lot could be built to move parking off the beach and a launch...

May 11 A little more that 2 months in quarantine. The days are starting to run together and I only really know what day it is because my pill minder has the days of the week on it. That is unnerving.  Right now the days are plan breakfast and drink some coffee, watch the news and read the paper.  Then I make a choice putter around the house or go for a bike ride. I ride a little over 10 miles each day.  In the past 2 months most of my rides take me out onto the Courtney Campbell causeway. During that time the beach has been closed. It was interesting to see the changes on the beach with no one going out there. May  23 Still in quarantine doing the same thing over and over. My pill box still helps me remember what day it is.  Today I did a little yard work and then sat down to watch some cooking shows. So far I have traveled from Greece to Italy and now I'm on the border of Mexico and USA. I'm thinking a trip there when this is all over would be great. The f...

6 weeks into social distancing and Jan and I are starting to fall into a routine. If you want to call mostly waiting a routine. Jan walks several times a week with a friend, keeping their distance from each other and wearing masks. I ride my bike most every day with a mask also. Those are our two big outings from the house. Two weeks ago I started to do some yard work, trimming up the bamboo palms in the back yard. These things grow like weeds and drop palms fronds all year long. I don't really like them but they do provide a good screen between us and the neighbor behind us. Well I started cutting some of the smaller palm trees down and filling trash cans. I got two filled ready for trash day and then we got the news that Safety Harbor was no longer picking up yard waste on Thursday. Well that's a kicker. I got trash with no where to go. So I took part one can full of palms and cut them smaller and hid it in our big trash can hiding the leaves and such under several trash ba...

I don't know if it is the need for a change or just cabin fever. Yesterday I decided to cut it all off. Jan had suggested that I trim my hair and some of my beard. It had also been bothering me by tickling my ears. Interesting thing though I realized that my hair and beard muffled the sound of the wind when I ride my bike. Today It was kinda windy when I rode my bike but the sound was more intense than it had been previously. I'm not going to start growing my beard out again to block the sound but I may be buying some Cat-Ears AirStreamz to help block the wind noise. I had seen these things advertised before and thought they were a gimmick but now I'm not so sure. Last night after cutting my hair I had to put a knit cap on because my head got cold. That feeling has gone away.

We are starting to fall into a routine during our time of  social distancing. The one thing I try to do each day is to go on a bike ride. In the past I usually went out in the afternoon. It use to be after work and I don't mind the heat. But as of late the ride is getting really crowded. Everyone staying home from work or school and I guess by the afternoon they need to get out. I'm seeing lots of new bikes and walking shoes out there. It is good  that people are getting out for some fresh air and exercise. But they kinda crowd up the trail that I usually take. It is hard to keep my distance and pace when ya go three bikes side by side riding slow and talking. I ring my bell and begrudgingly they will move to single file so I can ride by. So today I got up early to ride in the morning. Not a fan, I would rather sleep in. But I went out at about 7:45, after the sun was up. It was nice. Not a lot of people and not much wind. Both good things. It is still strange riding out on...