cranksgiving ....

This afternoon I participated in KC Bike Fed's Cranksgiving. Which apparently has been going on all over the country for awhile. Google it. Anyway, I thought it would be a nice, easy short ride around the Brookside Market, the Chopper, etc to pick up some food for donation to somewhere ...

So I rode down to the starting point on Troost and picked up the manifest. Well ... I had never ever been in any of those stores, even the tiny Wild Oats on Main. And it just got better from there. All over the east and northeast of KC. 20-plus miles by the time I got home from the afterparty at Grinders.

I thought maybe a couple people I knew would be there, but they weren't. A nice guy named Keith, who reminded me of my cousin Mike, started chatting with me and then asked if I wanted to ride with him. I was happy for the offer, because even though I probably could have found most of the stores, especially by following the pack, it was nice to have someone sorta watching out for me.

I felt bad that I probably slowed him and his sweet Kona road bike down, since I was on the silver bullet, which weighed even more after a couple of stops for canned goods. But he wasn't worried about 'winning' and we ended up being the 11th and 12th finishers anyway. Once again, this is not a cycling town for babies. My legs were already nearly tapped from yesterday's 37 miles to Longview and chugging up these hills really made them scream.

It was an interesting selection of stores. I wasn't sure if some of those places would have enough stuff, but it seemed to be OK. We east to Van Brunt, then up through the northeast, along St John and Independence Ave. I sure was glad to empty my bag of cans and the nice, puffy bag of organic stuffing mix from Wild Oats.