Two-wheeled adventure, and a new toy!

Yesterday I participated in a charity ride for Angel Flight NE.  There were four route options; I took the 40 mile route (which finished at 44.5 miles).  It took me a little over 4-1/2 hours (counting two rest stops) and the weather was fabulous!  I had such a good time!

I am quite a slow rider.  Right now I average just a hair over 10 mph, but I am slowly improving.  I am also getting better at standing up to pedal, up short hills anyway.

I am signed up for two more large group rides this fall.  The next one is the Seacoast Century on September 23 & 24.  I'm planning to do the "metric century" - somewhere between 62 & 65 miles, and I'll wait until it gets a little closer before I decide which day I'm riding.  The one after that is on October 1 - the Cranberry Harvest Century, and I'm planning to do the 50 mile ride.  I'm hoping to eventually (maybe next year!) work up to century rides.  My biggest issue with 100 mile rides is that most of them have a time limit, and I'm a little too slow to be certain I would meet the time cut-off at this point.

I did order a bike jersey to make my turtle-like speed clear to others around me.

It ships from China, so I hope that it a) arrives in time for my next ride, and b) fits, as I have no way to tell from here.  We'll find out!

I re-joined Weight Watchers a week and a half ago.  At my first weigh-in after joining I had lost 6.2 lbs.  I started a set of jars to keep track of this visually, based on some similar jars on a Facebook WW support group.

I picked up the blue stones and the jars at WalMart, and ordered the vinyl decals from an Etsy vendor.  So far, so good.  I went a little over my daily points yesterday (who knew Gatorade had so many points!)  I also found out that I'm not crazy about the Honey Stinger energy chews.  I do have some electrolyte "sport beans"; they have fewer points too.  I'll try those next time.  I did count all the points I ate yesterday, however, including the energy chews, the two burgers (on one bun) at the end, and the banana, watermelon, pickle, and 3 Hershey miniatures I had at the rest stops.

As for the new toy - a new spindle!  Spotted this on one of the Facebook spinning groups, and hustled to order one!  Very unique idea, and the spindle is beautiful!  I will be spin-testing it later today.