All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy……

Initially I wasn’t sure if I was working or playing on today’s ride. The first twinge of “uggh, I have to go ride my bike” hit today. Though I knew better, I did not want that feeling to rise, certainly not in the first week of this thing. Wah, pout, pout, I have to go ride my bike in the sunshine by the beach instead of being in work with the other great industrial capitalists of our time. I should be on the floor throwing papers around, “Buy! Sell! Buy! Sell!” Light my cigar!

I bet you that pro cyclists don’t always want to ride their bike.  (John, why inject this nonsensical comparison?)  Yet, they do anyway because there is something to be gained for themselves or the team. May come as a surprise to you but I am not a pro cyclist nor do I ride for a team, yet I went out on my bike today when I psychologically did not want to. Why? Because I said I would. Sometimes you have to do the things you say you are going to do. 

I remember my football coach taunting players to quit the team because they showed they were suffering under the oppressive August heat. “Go ahead and quit!  Quit on football, then you quit on school, then you quit your job and finally you quit on your family! Just quit!” He was an extreme man. Wonder if any of those poor bastards who quit, who never should have been on a football team in the first place, but were coerced by vicariously expressive fathers to be on the team, actually quit on their families twenty years later. Unlikely. I think they just didn’t want to play football. (John, are you on the drugs right now?  Because you’re all over the place with this cycling/football quitter thing.)  

Look, sometimes you have to do the thing you don’t want to do. You know, like Nike says. Many times the thing you don’t want to do is exactly the thing you need to do. I am way happier for having gone riding today. No doubt. You know why? Because if I hadn’t gone for a ride today there is strong likelihood I would have quit on my family tonight. (John, that’s really weird to say. I hope they get it.)