When I said I liked rain, this isn't what I meant!

Always loved cold rain storms. Riding in them. Racing in them.
Vlaamse-wetter. Regen. Open the skies and bring it on!
Most of my best racing performances were in cold rain. Somehow the worse the weather, the better my chances became.

Well, the past few days have tested my affinity for intemperate deluges. Record flash floods here in southern New England dumped over a foot of water into my basement, ruining a substantial collection of vintage cycling posters and videos - and soaking some framed and signed retro jerseys that used to hang in my old shop, Velocite Bicycle Sport.

At 6am Tuesday, my wife rushed to rescue the Christmas and Easter decorations. I raced to save a KAS jersey signed by Sean Kelly.

Hey, a guy's gotta have his priorities.

While trying in vain to pump out the cellar the past two nights I rationalized that many others were much worse off. My sleep deprived mind wandered to remembering that Gino Bartali once lost a lot of his personal archives when the Arno flooded his home in Ponte a Ema in Florence in 1966.

Thinking of how much carefully preserved cycling history was lost in that flood makes my minor personal loss pale in significance.
It still stinks though.

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