Outside of whining about my bad knees from time to time,
I steer clear of discussing personal health here.
This’ll be an exception:
So I took the little red rooster (my Royal Enfield) on a delightful ride Tuesday – 60 miles through foothills, redwoods and vineyards. Green hillsides dotted with poppies; deep forests smelling of moist, rich duff; dry roads perfect for a little sightseeing; fresh air.
Then about 2:00 AM on Wednesday, then again at 4:00, then again, in the awake-hours-morning a couple of times, I had another spate of those – for lack of a better term – arrythmias. Felt like a constricted something-er-other (or, at least there was some real pushing going on) and a little light-headedness or dizziness and, after three to five minutes of reclined rest, back to normal – until some next one comes along.
I’ll experience these being distributed through a few hours once every 10 to 12 weeks, then nothing. After each little event there are only shadows of the incident but, it’s always in the back of my thinking.
Speaking of that thinking, I got to thinking how unfortunate it would be should one of these occur while riding at sixty-five-plus miles per hour on US 101 or out on some back road with no cell service. So, today, I began thinking about marketing the bikes: Both that sweet little 411cc Enfield which I absolutely adore, and the more substantial and visceral 850cc Moto Guzzi traveling companion.
Before I got too deep into that hole, I decided to do a bit more research. Hell! The Church of the Open Road was built upon sharing motorcycle adventures, wasn’t it?
As it turns out, when it comes to things cardio, of the seven or eight do-s and don’t-s listed with a number of reputable sites like the Mayo Clinic and the Cleveland Clinic, and as elucidated by my Kaiser doc, I seem to be doing okay with all but two: eating enough fresh fruit and vegetables and keeping it to only one or two drinks. As much as I have declared I’m going to cut way down on the wine, whiskey and song – okay, maybe not the song – lately, I’ve been plowing through the better part of a whole bottle of cabernet or zin or some nice red blend every evening. EEE-Yikes!
Enough already!
Either that stops, I’ve decided, or I sell the bikes.
Big test on the horizon: Shortly, Candi will be out of the house playing bunco. (I wonder if Joe Friday or Bill Gannon will show up.) I have a small beef filet and baked potato – and some veges, dang it! – on tap for myself. A nice Cab is being eyeballed. Can I hold myself to one or two glasses?
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