Stick or quit?

Nov distance: 254 km

Woodlands, 52 km. For seven rides in a row, I cycle the same route, with its 25 upslopes and 49 traffic lights. I'm not tired of it yet. Same road, same sights, perhaps what's different is the traffic conditions and the cyclists who pass me. A guy on a titanium frame and carbon chainstays overtakes me. I crank up my wattage and keep up, till I get tired ... tired of following behind. So I surge past and we part ways.

I stop by the same shop for lunch, though I don't eat the same thing as last week. The cook-boss tells me he's in business for 20 years, though the shop I eat at is less than a year old (his other branch is the first branch). He's done well enough to drive a BMW. He says it's a hard business, with long hours.

So how does he keep it up for two decades? He sure can stand the heat in the kitchen. As for me, two colleagues quit, one after 2-3 months. This is after she tells me her time frame was 2-3 years. The other tells me she'll stick around "for a very long time" and it turns out the time frame was weeks. What gives? I don't get it. Perhaps us old sticks in the mud, just stick around too long.

How I long to be back in Cambodia. To cycle far away from home, away from the things that eat me up, to be away where the road is long (photo).