Half the weekend was great

For the first weekend in a very long time, I didn't feel driven by an agenda.  Nothing to get ready for, nothing to recover from, nothing HAD to get done.  I woke up early on Saturday, and started washing bikes.  One bike, two bikes, three... time for the Fastest Bike in the World that hasn't been cleaned in months, maybe years?  Maybe the Fire Mjare, which I don't think has ever seen the hose?

For the first time in perhaps ever, all the single speeds (save for the garage bikes) were clean at once.

So much accomplished, family still sound asleep, I actually washed... the Honda Fit of Rage (and Ant Farm).

Organize the bike room, get out for a short ride at the Back Yard Trails (future site of the Faster Mustache Back Yard Experience in less than a month), and then home to relax.  I spent a good part of the remainder of a most beautiful September day in the hammock with The Pie while the dogs wandered about sniffing and peeing on everything that needed peed on.

And then there was a long night with a dog's health issues, and when it was time to get up, it was decided that we needed to put Chloe down.

The Boy found her wandering around the apartment complex over ten years ago after a huge (for Charlotte) snow storm.  No tag, strange injuries on her legs, and covered in snow balls.  We had her scanned... no chip.  We tried to find her owners... no luck.  She became ours and quickly became Maggie's best buddy.

She was a spectacular Frisbee dog by nature, leaping up to chomp with not even the least bit of worry as to the rolling heap she'd end up in when she finally touched down.  She loved to lay next to the tub whenever someone took a shower and would head back there before there was any solid indication that you were even going that way.  Then there was her picnic habit, her tendency to grab a mouthful of food and then take it into another room, spit it out, and eat it piece by piece.  For years, she was terrified of storm drains.  Unique is the word that comes to mind.

She has been a ticking time bomb for quite awhile.  Like most purebreds, she was facing a laundry list of "usual problems," one of which would probably be the cause of her demise.  In the end, it was the collapsing trachea that won the race.

So we were up as a family on Sunday, headed over to the vet when they opened, and said our goodbyes.  It was peaceful.

The rest of the day, we stayed busy to keep our minds off of Chloe.  Being that I had washed every single solitary bike I owned, I was left with some unusual tasks.  Sort through a giant blue bin in the bike room, discarding unwanted crap.  Organize my bibs/jerseys and thin the herd.  Spend way more time than one should trying to de-gunk a couple Stan's valves.  Vacuum my car and clean three years worth of gunk out of the cracks around the trunk.  In between it all, shitty crying jags.

We'll miss her.  The Pie and I had decided some time back that when our two personal dogs pass away, no more pets of our own.  Just fostering from here on out.  All that's left is Maggie now, last of the old guard.  Of all my friends who got dogs around the same time, she is the last one standing.  Four times in thirteen years, we've thought she was going down... bouts of pancreatitis, herniated disc, the weird strokey morning last September... vestibular disease.  Still alive.  Crooked, mostly blind, completely deaf, but still alive.

And just a bit lonely now.  Here's hoping her and Gordon make friends.

On a final note, when we loaded up Sunday morning for the trip to the vet, I turned the ignition key, and this song came on the radio.



So, there's that.

We won't.