My Last Saturday in Philadelphia

So before I forget, congratulations to Tara for being the first successful responder to the Zoltar photo question. It was “Big”. Michael and Nancy also correctly identified the movie but Tara gets bragging rights. I don’t have any prizes to offer at this point but bragging rights are better than nothing, right?

Ok, on with the update.

If all goes according to plan, today will be my last Saturday in Philadelphia for a while. That’s a bit of an unpleasant thought but it was going to happen eventually. At least I still have one more full day here before I get back on the road.

My final Philadelphia weekend started with a trip back to Fairmount Bicycles. My bike was ready and waiting for me with new tires, a new chain, and a few other new items to get things back to being fully operational. Apparently the chain was in pretty rough shape! Kyler and Fairmount Bicycles were great – I was even able to swap the inner tubes I had (with the short valve stems) for tubes that would actually fit my wheels. There were definitely more repair items needed than I had anticipated when I first brought in the bike but after 6,000km I guess that was to be expected. On the upside, the ride from the bike shop back home (ie. Gage’s place) was very smooth.

From there my day turned to walking. To the Schuylkill River Dog Park to be specific. It was a beautiful sunny day (How could it not be? It’s Philadelphia.) so I took Tsunami (my friend’s Portuguese Water Dog) for a walk along the river to the dog park. For the record, this isn’t the first time I’ve been to the dog park on this visit but I think it’s the first time I’ve mentioned it. Anyway, the dog park is an interesting place for both people watching and dog watching. And a good place to meet people too – people at dog parks tend to be rather friendly. I’d met a few people on previous trips but there was more people/dog watching than meeting on this particular visit – but it was still fun. The weather was unseasonably warm (28 degrees) so Tsunami pretty much hid in the shade most of the time.

After returning from the park, the rest of my afternoon was spent plotting a course towards Florida. It was a moderately successful endeavour but I’m sure the route will change once I’m on the road. It always does.

My friends had dinner plans this evening so my evening was pretty quiet as I was charged with being the grown-up and stayed home with Gage & Jack’s two boys. It was a very low maintenance task as they’re almost old enough to be left on their own anyway. Keeping the dog out of the trash was the biggest challenge of the evening. Well, that and deciding what to watch.

My evening ended in a very relaxing manner. Sitting in front of the TV, sipping on a glass of whiskey while watching It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Yup, today was a good day.