Back on the bike + fur-baby story

After a long, hard day of sitting outside in the sun, I decided it was time to go for a bike ride. It's been a while since I've gone out on my own but I have to say it went reasonably well. I kept the route fairly easy, with only a couple minor hills to contend with. I covered 13.78 miles in 53:35, averaging out to about 15.4mph/25km/h.

My bike is running nice and smooth, thanks to the spring tune-up it got a few weeks ago, and it was nice to be back out on the roads. But, let me tell you - I am out of riding shape. At this time last year, my legs were in much better condition to handle hard hills and long rides.


Here's a NRR dog story that happened yesterday afternoon. Both Mika and Kona were outside playing while we were enjoying the sun. Their favourite pastime is "lip-biting", where they derive some enjoyment out of trying to bite each other's lips, cheeks, ears, etc. Dogs are weird, what can I say? Normally, they continue like this until they get tired, but sometimes it evolves into a bit of a scrap if one of them gets annoyed. Usually, I order them to break it up, they shake it off and they're back at it again without delay. 


Yesterday, however, when I separated the two of them, I noticed that Mika had some blood on her fur. It's happened a couple times that one or the other has drawn blood (after all, they do love playing very rough), so I wasn't immediately concerned but as it turned out, there was a lot of more than usual. It took me few seconds to realize that the blood was coming from her ear. We tried to get a look at it but Mika decided to shake and little tiny droplets of blood flew everywhere, completing covering Chris. I took her inside to clean it up, but once in the bathroom, Mika promptly shook again, turning our bathroom into a crime scene. In all this, Mika didn't seem to notice or care that her ear was bleeding; she wasn't whimpering or complaining - all she wanted to do was go back outside and play some more.

This morning, once everything cleared up a bit, we were able to get a good look at it. We think what happened is that Kona bit Mika's right ear and her tooth went through the skin, most likely by accident; Mika, not too thrilled by her new piercing, probably pulled away and her ear got ripped in the process. As a result, she has a small slice in her upper ear, about 1/2 inch long. We're keeping an eye on it, but it seems to be healing nicely and Mika doesn't seem bothered by it at all. I guess it makes her look tough.

Yeah, I'm tough.