Last week, we rode our scooters all five work days.

We are now three for three this week. The rain has been early enough in the afternoon to not affect our rides home.

Meanwhile, Bossman rode one of his other motorcycles today. He has several.

My ride home tonight was truly unpleasant. About four miles into the ride, it started to rain. I anticipated this, given the black sky and the weather forecast before I left work. But, since it was starting to rain, and I was going to be riding parallel to the black for many miles, I thought it might be prudent to alter my route so that I would be near various shopping plazas. That way, if the sky opened up, I could stop somewhere other than some stranger’s house and seek shelter. I wanted to turn onto Colonial Drive (Hwy 50) from Mills (Hwy 17-92), but the car in front of me did not comprehend the green or yellow turn signals. So, when it was safe to do so, I got back out of the turn lane and continued along Mills. I took the side street that the post office is on, figuring if nothing else, I could stop at the Narnes & Boble on Bumby, as the rain was stinging as it smacked me.

The road I selected is a brick road with speed humps and three stop signs. Obviously I could not get going very fast, not to mention it’s a residential street, so I wouldn’t go much above 30mph anyway. After the second stop sign, as I puttered along, most likely around 25mph, I suddenly realized I was going to die, and there was not a whole hell of a lot I could do about it. A pimp mobile suddenly rapidly backed out of a driveway without looking and at a ridiculously fast speed. There was absolutely no way I was going to avoid hitting this car. No way. I hurt my wrist, I braked so furiously. While braking, I also turned to the left, hoping against hope that I could somehow swing behind the pimp mobile without either hitting his side, or being backed into if I managed to eek past as he continued to be oblivious to my presence.

And then, he noticed me and slammed on his brakes, enabling me to just squeeze behind him.

Folks, I was terrified. There was absolutely no way I would have missed him had he not stopped. No way. The road was wet, my brakes were wet, and there was not enough road for me to stop or for me to navigate past him.

Scared.

Three additional vehicles tried to take me out on the remainder of my ride home. Three people who felt the need to cut off the scooter. In the rain.

A miserable, scary ride.

I came home and latched onto my husband. And had a martini.

According to this map, the storm should be right over me as I’m preparing to leave work on my scooter.

Husband just left, and it just started raining. He called and said he’s going to try to stay ahead of it.

With husband’s new work hours, we wanted to start scooting daily to work last week. Last Monday, we scooted, and it rained heavily all afternoon. It made the ride home wet. No, we didn’t ride in the rain; we rode in breaks in the weather. It rained every single day last week, so we drove the car.

Yesterday, we had to bring something large to hubby’s work, so we took the car. Good thing since it poured all afternoon.

Today, we scooted. Hubby gets off work by 330p. He had a gorgeous ride home. I get off at 430p. I had a gorgeous ride home. The ride to work at 7a is considerably easier due to less traffic, so these new hours work for us, I guess. But I do miss the company on my ride home.

That being said, I think some random man at a bus stop hit on me as I waited at a red light. Hey, a girl on a scooter is an attractive thing!

As I was preparing to leave work yesterday, there was a single small black cloud over my office. The rest of the sky was brilliant blue. Five minutes later, on the road, the sky looked like this directly over my head:

I rushed to meet up with hubby. As we raced home, the pretty blue was rapidly overcome by gray clouds.

About five miles from home, we encountered a very fine, misty drizzle for about a mile. But, we did beat the rain home. Thank goodness.

Even though the sky was an ominous shade of gray, I decided to believe my weather forecaster and scooter to work today. They say it will be the first dry day we’ve had in a week. I would hate to miss out on a glorious scooter day just because it was gray in the morning.

Got stuck behind a truck pulling a wood chipper. The bed of the truck was full of mulch. He took all the same back roads I took. The crap carried by the wind was unpleasant. I kept a very healthy distance and still got that crap stuck to my lip gloss. Blech.

Then there was the big giant SUV who felt 35mph actually meant 25mph on Mills. It’s pretty sad if my little scooter is passing you.

I love riding my scooter, even if it is lonely to ride alone (hubby is on his last day of vacation today).

Frustrated by the rainy weather all week, I have been unable to take my Metropolitan to work. Today, they are calling for only a 20% chance of rain. It was so pretty outside, I had to ride.

What a glorious morning for a ride! It was a lovely 67 degrees. I had on two jackets, but could have done with only one. No gloves required.

I took a different route to work, since I was traveling alone. I really dislike the traffic on Bumby, and without my husband along to navigated the lane change before me, saving me a spot in that lane, I didn’t want to go there. Instead, I took Briercliff/Mills the whole way. It was better for traffic, but worse, of course, for the bumps that are the bricked section of Mills.

I really could not have asked for a nicer ride, though.

Think happy thoughts that it won’t rain this afternoon on me.

We were both itching to ride our scooters today, having not been on them since we retrieved the Element on Wednesday. We had a lovely ride. We rode around Baldwin park; truly a beautiful community.

We rode around Lake Baldwin.

Baldwin Park now ends at my old back yard. This cemetery was what my bathroom window overlooked when I had my little studio apartment nine years ago. My roommate and I (when we took over a two bedroom apartment) used to walk our duck through the cemetery to the park.

It was a gorgeous day, a perfect day for a ride.

We stopped for a smoothie and walked around the town center at Baldwin Park. Saw someone I worked with back in 2000, who now owns a specialty shop in Baldwin Park (I’ve been meaning to drop in and say hello when I saw the store sign a year or two ago, as I remember that was the name of her dream shop).

Hubby saw a happy otter swimming in one of the ponds we passed, but I missed it.

Two miles from home, it started to rain. I didn’t mind getting wet, but I could not see with all the water on my lenses. And the rain hitting my face at 35mph was sometimes painful.

All in all, it was a really great ride and I’m so glad we went.

I told my husband we should get two more scooters so that when friends are over, they can join us for a lovely ride.

I wore jeans and a warm sweater.

I put track pants over the jeans.

I put a zipper fleece over the sweater.

I put a zipper wind breaker jacket over the fleece over the sweater.

Gloves were added to the ensemble.

I looked like the Stay-puff Marshmallow Man!

It was a long, cold, super cold ride.

It is forty-four degrees outside. I do not want to ride in that kind of cold. It’s a long, long thirteen miles when it’s cold.