Life On A B-I7

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This morning we left Redmond, Oregon for Anacortes, Washington — the start of my tour. We decide that rather than slog up I-5 all the way to Anacortes, we would cut-over to Mukilteo, just North of Seattle, and catch the Washington State Ferry to Whidbey Island. We drove up-island and crossed the famous Deception Pass bridge. Built in 1935, it is a landmark in Washington. We parked and walked across the bridge (see photo below) and enjoyed the view from this remarkably preserved structure. Whidbey Island State Park is the most visited park in the state of Washington. It encompasses the bridge on both sides. Tomorrow we plan to enjoy the city of Anacortes and have dinner with friends and family before I begin the tour on Monday.

The view from the Deception Pass bridge on Whidbey Island.

You actually learn a lot more about a country than just the contours. I’m not going to criticize Hemingway for that description, he is correct, as far as he goes. I would add that there are opportunities along the way to learn a lot more…

For the next three months or so (if all goes according to plan) I’ll be posting a daily entry here describing my bicycle ride across the country. Each entry will contain a photo and a story about the day. If it’s not too bold to say, I hope to make Hemingway proud. I also would be gratified to have you join me on my adventure.

Wish me luck!

I’m heading into the Apple Store to get my cat an iPhone.

When I’m cycling across the country, I want to be able to call him and see how he’s doing. If he misses me as much as I’m going to miss him, it’s the least I can do…

Today I will meet all kinds of people:

People with addictions.
People overcome by lust.
People that lack gratitude.
People that are angry.
People that are greedy.
People enslaved to ambition
…and many others…

All of these people I will treat with kindness.

This Stoic “Mantra” can be used to condition ourselves to remain calm when facing an annoying situation. These have been adapted from the writings of Seneca. I think Seneca would approve the use of these in the form of a mantra.)

Psychologist today would call these techniques “cognitive distancing.” The Stoics understood these techniques long before modern science “acknowledged” them._ 

I think about what it would be like to not complete my upcoming tour. I shouldn’t be thinking like that, I haven’t even started yet. if I were ten years younger, these doubts wouldn’t even be entering my mind. Today is a different story. if I am successful, I will be happy of course. If I don’t succeed, it’s going to be a huge disappointment. I realize that someday I will attempt something epic and I won’t be successful. That is when facing myself will become the most important thing I can do. Naturally, I want to put that off for as long as I can. At least I have given some thought to what failure might look like and what may be required in response. Thinking ahead helps prevent emotions from taking control of us.

One of the most effective ways to reduce worry is to simply monitor your inner judgements and the emotions they give rise to. The Stoic philosopher Epictetus called this practice prosoche. Translated, that means mindfulness or attention. The more thought we give before judging, the more control we have over our emotions.

May we all enjoy happiness and the cause of happiness.
May we all be free from suffering and the cause of suffering.
May we all be free of expectations from others and rejection by others.
May we all rest in boundless equanimity.
Ahmen.

In my mind, this does not fall far from Christian belief — or any other worthwhile moral philosophy for that matter. If I am ever called upon to offer a pray for some reason (let’s hope not) I would like to pull this out of my back pocket.

Democracy thrives under good leadership. Democracy withers under bad leadership. Under the worst leadership, Democracy dies. Fear the Autocrat disguised as a savior.

It’s tough to put into words what yesterday’s ride means to me. I wish I was better with words. To start, it felt good. Turning the pedals is — work. It’s also joy, pure and simple. You are moving forward and you are doing it under your own power and no one else’s. That’s part of the experience. It’s all on you and no one else. Watching the road come up and then disappear under the front tire gives you such a feeling of progress, it’s satisfying. I look up to see beauty all around. The sort of beauty you don’t see when screaming through the terrain at fifty mile per hour. Beauty you are seeing. Cars passing by don’t disturb me, perhaps they should, but they don’t. I’m lost in the moment, or perhaps it’s more accurate to say, the moments. I listen. I hear the tires rolling on the tarmac. Another indication that I’m making progress. Then there is the existential. It just feels good. Good to be out there. There’s no place else I would want to be in that moment. It’s all part of the experience that will eventually bring me home and allow me to write this. While you are pedaling, there is no thought of what is to come later. You look up, you see a bend in the road in front of you and there is no indication what is beyond. That’s part of the mystery. Naturally, you can never be completely sure your body will allow you to get where you are planning to go. I find that now, more than ever, the thought of finishing the ride is not assured. The desire to finish has become another point of the exercise. We can’t be sure of anything, but when the goal is reached and you dismount, it’s a cause for celebration, a celebration of one that feels good.

I’m unsubscribing from (most) everything that comes into my email.

I’m tired of being told what to think.

If you have something worth saying, I’ll find it.

Taking a Step Back

It’s time to take a step back from Stoicism and temper it with a bit of Socratic wisdom.

Knowledge, which we are all seeking and what all philosophies have as their ultimate objective, is a journey…

Stoicism provides tremendous insight into how we should live our lives.

Socraticism is the attempt to define why we are living our lives.

Focus

It doesn’t hurt to occasionally remind myself of my daily goals…

Breathe… Repeat…

Occasionally I will sit on the patio in the morning and just soak up the early rays of sunlight. Tux is always right there with me. Keeping an eye on things, no doubt making sure nothing interferes with my (or his) reverie.

Everybody in Redmond, Oregon drives either a bad-ass pick-up truck or a bad-ass Jeep. I think Tacoma owners should go with little rubber dinosaurs. After all, dinosaurs eat duckies for lunch…

While I’m not at liberty to reveal the identities of these wonderful children, those of you that know me will know they are near and dear to my heart.

I played some competitive pickleball last night. It was a ladder competition. For those of you that don’t know what I’m talking about, that is where if you win you move up a court, if you loose, you move down a court. If there are 5 courts your goal is not to finish the night on court 5. My record for the night was 2-1-2-3-4-5-4-3. A mixed bag that showed some good play at the beginning and at the end of the night. (I was randomly assigned court two as my starting court.)

All of that is to just give you some context. I enjoyed the evening and my fellow players, almost all men certified at a higher level than I am) There was one exception. One fellow I was partnered with was clearly unhappy with my play because we lost and had to move down a court. Later in the evening I faced him as an opponent. I made some great shots early in the game and he said to me across the net, “Where was that game when we were partners?” I smiled and laughed. My partner at that time, who, by the way is a phycologist and therapist by profession, looked at me and said, “don’t let him talk to you that way.” I just smiled again. What made the contest ultimately satisfying was the end. My partner and I lost but as customary we all gathered at the net to tap paddles. I took my paddle and tapped my vocal opponent on the shoulder and told him, “I saved my worst game for the end so you could win.”

Do I feel bad for saying that, not really… I’m hoping my psychologist partner heard me…

Welcome to my 2026 Norther Tier bicycle journey!

My goal is to ride my bicycle (just how I like) from Anacortes, Washington to Bar Harbor, Maine. If I complete the journey that will be a grand total of 4,317 miles traveled in something like three plus months.

I have crossed the Unites States by bicycle twice in the past, once in 2019 following the Souther Tier bicycle route and again in 2024 following the TransAmerica bicycle route. My goal this time around is to complete the “trifecta” of trans-continental bicycle tours.

Each day I will be posting here a little bit about the day’s adventure. I would be delighted to have you look in from time-to-time to check up on my progress.

Entries will begin daily starting May 31st.

Thanks for joining me on this adventure!

Science and politics make strange bedfellows. Usually after sex (the co-mingling of one with the other in the news media) one or the two ends up on the couch in the living room…

by Fredrik Backman

I enjoyed this book a fair bit but I have mixed reactions to it. Backman can write, there’s no question about that, He has a very good translator too. This is my first Backman. He has been published a dozen or more times in too many languages to count. What I had difficulty with was his humor, satire, and irony. It’s not that he didn’t have any, it’s that he has too much. A better description would be that he chooses to use too much (at least for my taste). The story was a good one and the characters, although abnormal compared to most people I know, were still enjoyable.

I was telling a friend about this book and I said that Hemingway would have written the same story in half the number of pages and it would have been just as good. There’s no accounting for taste. That’s one of the things that makes reading fiction enjoyable — you never know quite what you are going to get.

All of that aside. I appreciate Backman’s ability to reach into a topic and pull out some essence of meaning. What he comes up with may or may not be to your liking, but he has the ability to be profound. One of my favorite passages between two of the characters:

That hit me in a big way. Close to home.

There is so much out there to read, and so little time. I don’t know if I will pick up another Backman any time soon, but I haven’t tossed him onto the scrap heap either.

I like the notion that prepositions are often little words. They are also always part of a phrase. (A prepositional phrase…)

Here are some prepositions:

in, with, at, around, of, between, by, down, beside, within, for among, beneath, after.

These are prepositional phrases:

in the box, with my friends, at school, you get the idea.

I won’t mention the fact that if a preposition does not have a noun or pronoun after it, it is generally not a preposition: it is being used as an adverb. Life is never simple is it?

While adjectives are used to describe nouns and pronouns, adverbs are used to describe verbs (get it?) It’s not quite that simple, sometimes they are used to also describe adjectives or other adverbs.

Here’s the crux. Adverbs tell whewre, when, how, or to what extent. Adverbs usually (but not always) end in -ly.

Here are some adverbs that end in -ly.

Quickly, extremely, really, lovely, lonely.

Here are some adverbs that do not end in -ly.

Now, then, soon, very, only, often and not.

Note: often an adverb can be placed in different parts of a sentence — your choice! Here is an example:

I go for a walk in the woods often.

I often go for a walk in the woods.

Danger! Don’t overuse adverbs. It will make your writing clumsy and boring. Not that mine isn’t already for a myriad of other reasons…