So that's what I did today. Hoping for the break in rain that Conrad was talking about this morning on wgn to come through, I hit the lakefront trail around noon and headed south for about as long as I could handle.
I wasn't in a huge rush, but I did have an end point in mind and I wanted to see how long it would take to get there. The rain wasn't quite breaking when I hoped it would, but it wasn't terrible out. It was down to sprinkles by the time I was winding around the Shedd.
Considering I was out there to get my mind off things, it didn't really help that nearly all I could think about was "I'm getting my mind off the job search" for nearly the entire ride. Even in the rain, into the wind. Oh well. Considering I was biking by some of the places I'd like to find work at, and ending up at my number two choice right now, telling myself I was getting my mind off things was probably good enough. Long rides= good, poorly planned or not.
The sun did start to come out as I got to the south side, and after about 45 minutes it turned pretty nice out. For a while at least. There was some blue in the sky around the mid-2000's.
Eventually I got as far south as MSI at 5700 south. Thank god for the occasional street marking painted on the path too, b/c around the 3000's the blocks started to blend a little.
The cool thing about going that far south though is that when you're far enough out of the city, everyone out there has respect for everyone else out there with them. I got more smiles and nods from people running or biking in the other direction on this one ride than I've gotten all year just in the neighborhood. It put me in a better mood.
The south side beaches helped with that as well. After getting down there, I took a minute to sit down at the 57th St. beach house. This was a big change from taking the dog to Montrose earlier in the morning, where in between sprinkles we were walking through goose turds and running after seagulls. Or at least she was; she loves goose turds.Of course, turning around gave me a clearer picture of just how far south I was. Holy crap the city seemed far away, even back up in the 4000's. A fat man could get awfully skinny doing this 5 times a week. I was worried w/o a zoom this picture wouldn't look good, but it's a decent depiction of just how far south I was.
Eventually, I got back into more frequently traversed territory and the rest of the ride wrapped itself up pretty quickly. I was turning off lincoln and zooming down webster before I knew what happened. 
It was a good ride but it had its share of nostalgic moments too. One positive I'm taking from the job search is the chance to maybe work downtown again or better yet, even further south. I miss the long rides downtown but there are parts I don't miss, especially around Navy Pier. The squeeze over the river was never fun, and the rain pouring off of upper LSD/Wacker didn't help on the way out. At least it was empty on the way back.
Of course, when you've got a dog like mine, you never know what you're coming home to. Today, it was this. A minor hiccup--she barely bothered to raise her head off the couch in acknowledgement when I asked her about this. I can't say that I blame her. She had a hard morning what with all the goose turds. 
Current beer-scale: a mellow 6.1
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