10/6/2008 13:31

The Rain Having Slowed Almost To a Stop, Again

The rains started just as we arrived, having waited (I presume) in order to disrupt our visit maximally. From a dribbling start as we turned the wrong way onto State Street, the precipitation increased to rain proper while we ate breakfast. We chose not to eat outside on the Terrace. (We felt fortunate to find that breakfast is served until 1:00 p.m. This allowed us to avoid skipping breakfast, although we did end up skipping noon lunch instead.) After stopping to pick up a free copy of The Onion we went off to see the Temple of Democracy until it was time to separate for a few hours.

The rain having slowed almost to a stop, again, I determined to unload my bicycle and enjoy the city. I biked through the Milwaukee Road rail yards -- in actual reality the yards have been somewhat changed since the days of the Milwaukee Road -- and stopped to buy a bicycle map.

I was appreciative, by this time, that the map was printed on Tear and Water Resistant Paper, but the rain was not so annoying as to keep me from skirting the Brittingham Boathouse and revisiting my old neighborhood near the Yahara River.

The rain having slowed almost to a stop, again, I committed myself to a run eastward on Cottage Grove Road. Under one highway and over another, with a number of unaccustomed hills intervening, until the ghost of Blooming Grove passed behind me and the pleasant vistas of rural Wisconsin farm fields opened to either side.

Now, however, The Onion began to seem prophetic, rather than satiric. Its lead story was headed,

HURRICANE KATRINA RETURNS ... TO APOLOGIZE

We know that hurricanes on the Gulf coast can affect the weather and bring rain hundreds of miles away. Could The Onion somehow have been accurate? In actual reality that seems highly improbable, although an accidental juxtaposition of imagination and reality is not entirely beyond the limits of possibility.

There was no obvious place to stop and ponder the question, and so I continued eastward. When at last I attained the shelter of the Cottage Grove Post Office I resolved that I would read that story with great care and attention, as soon as it had dried out.