Funny thing happened at the mailbox.

Boy this past week got away from me.  I was a little busy with some other work and the last real decent ride I enjoyed was last weekend.   Some locals and I did the annual

Forests and Foliage in the Fall ride in the Yankee Springs area.

It was a bit of a  chilly morning (below 40F) but cloudless and promising.

There were nine of us who braved the morning while I know a number stayed in because they are just plain sissies.  We were toasty and comfortable within a few miles and the air had that fresh autumn briskness that comes with the cool lack of humidity.  The route is initially hilly with a Cat 5 climb through thousands of acres of hardwood forests turning to shed their leaves for the winter.

After the halfway point, the route becomes really fast, with a series of rollers that lead predominantly downhill.   It's a beautiful and pleasant metric for a fall afternoon.  Next year I may schedule it later in the morning so the wimps can come out and play.

In other news I found a greeting card in my mailbox this week.  I don't get a greeting card from anybody but aging relatives at Christmas..  Hell, I only go to my mailbox once or twice a week to clean out the coupons and throw them away.  I wasn't sure what it was, 

but it came from Rivendell Bike Works.

They weren't even thanking me for my business, but more impressively for something I wrote.

Not here, but on a Bike Forum.   Apparently one of them noticed a comment I made on one of the flaming anti-Riv threads on the Bike Forums and they just wanted to thank me for defending them.

I guess that's customer appreciation of a different level, but I am always amused when Riv or Grant are mentioned on the Forums.  It attracts a vitriolic group of children who can't understand there is a different world than than that of the Spandex Hamster.  Thanks, Riv for noticing.