Today is one of those days when we have what the locals like to call “Chamber of Commerce weather.” The temperatures are comfortable, the humidity is down, the sun is shining … if you came to visit Jacksonville today, you’d want to stay. In fact, when I came to Jacksonville for the first time, for an APPX conference nine years ago this month, this was exactly how the weather was. It helped to make the ensuing job offer that much easier to accept, compared to facing the beginning of another long, cold, snowy winter in Syracuse.

So, how does one go about taking advantage of such a spectacular day? As kids, we’d be likely to spend the day outside, at least that portion that school didn’t occupy, and we’d play baseball or football or a made-up kids’ game, or maybe just hang out and listen to the radio (mostly AM in those days). As adults, it’s our privilege to remain shut inside an office all day, with windows that let the sunshine in but do not open, allowing daydreams but denying fresh air.

Not wanting to be defeated in that way, we biked to work today. As mentioned in earlier blogs, it’s about 5 miles from home to work, with sidewalks all the way. It’s a bit of exercise, it makes us feel good about getting a piece of this beautiful weather, and, of course, it saves gas. But I have to admit that the nice feelings about that last factor have been somewhat diminished with gas down more than a dollar since earlier this year. That shouldn’t matter, but it’s hard not to always have gas prices on the mind.

It would be a great day to shut down the office for the afternoon and take a company golf outing. Somehow, I don’t think that proposal would be approved. Or we could all go out on the water (”Picture yourself on a boat on a river …”). Small problem - no one here has a boat. What about just driving around with the windows down? Um, I arrived by bike, remember?

So, I guess we’ll just find some way to get some fresh air at lunch time, and try to savor the two-wheeled ride home this afternoon. And also take great joy in knowing that it is cloudy and in the 40’s in Syracuse today, and only getting worse there in the weeks to come.

This entry was posted on Friday, October 17th, 2008 at 9:39 am and is filed under Al. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.