SEEING as how the roads might be unrideable for a while, I got out Sunday on the arctic piglet for about 140 miles. Took a blast down to Narragansett and had coffee with our friends Marty and Diana, then rode over to East Beach in Charlestown.
The ’49 truck about an hour ago…
In Charlestown I tried to pick up a GPS route through the woods going north, said to be mostly off-road. On the screen it looked as if I could intersect Plainfield Pike at some point then cut east for home before the route crossed the Connecticut line.
Something wasn’t working. GPS sent me too far west. I kept wondering when the dirt was going to start and before you know it I’m seeing signs for Norwich, Connecticut.
Here’s where I thought I was going…
I’m not handy with GPS, have always ridden without one. If you want to ride for distance off road, though, at least here in the east, it’s a necessity. I need to get on the learning curve.
It was a nice day, in any event. Temps were in the mid 40s, just brisk enough to sharpen the senses. I like to ride chilly, just on that little edge of discomfort that brings everything into focus. Didn’t bring any electrics with me. Did bring a vest and mitten liners and ended up needing both before I got home around daylight’s end.
Here’s the place for riding off road…
Robyn sent this pic from Montana a few days ago, Two Dot Butte as seen from the ranch that morning. I’ve ridden quite a lot of gravel in Wheatland County, all of it on the big bike, porky iron piggy laden for transcontinental pavement. She’s weightless at speed on a paved road; on gravel, she’s very heavy, and very unforgiving.
Not much else going on. All systems status quo. I’m reading Vonnegut for fun, Bellow for the language, Baudrillard to ward off senility.
I keep an eye out for movies worth catching on Criterion. Will close with this, a clip from a fun little watch from 1946 I saw the other night, though the title hardly makes it sound like fun: A Matter of Life and Death
It’s a sappy little love story, wonderfully acted by Kim Hunter (adorable at 3:38 with her breathless “I’m not frightened”) and one of my favorite actors of all time, David Niven. I read his memoir many years ago, The Moon’s a Balloon.
There’s a little motorcycle action in the yarn, too, the village doctor bombing around narrow, unpaved lanes on an Ariel Square Four like this one.
A hardtail liter bike, that must be a kick to ride on dirt.
The movie opens with Captain Peter Carter piloting a doomed Lancaster as he faces his final moments with well-bred aplomb. A hail fellow well met, he recites 17th-century poetry by Sir Walter Raleigh and Andrew Marvell; a poetry of mortality, his impending own.
Did you hear the ticking clock all the way through? And did you note when it stopped? It’s a clever bit of audio storytelling.
And now, with snow to shovel, I’m bailing out, bailing out of this post—no, no one can help, June, let me do this in my own way.
Tony DePaul, February 13, 2024, Cranston, Rhode Island, USA
