The morning I caught him in the act.

My bike was stolen yesterday.

For the time being, no more crisp morning rides along Puget Sound as the rising sun slowly illuminates the Olympic Mountains. No more endorphin rushes after grinding up those steep West Seattle hills. And, at least temporarily, no more strutting around the house in my spandex for at least four hours after the ride, looking and feeling firm-ish.

It happened so anticlimactically. The spot my bike occupied was empty; my helmet lay on the ground. Our minds work in certain patterns when confronted with sudden loss—denial (I must have forgotten that I stored it safely in the bushes yesterday), anger (If I ever find that bastard, I'll water board him) and finally, fantasy (I'm going to spin a yarn about catching him in the act.). For all of you who've been robbed, broken into, burglarized or violated, this fantasy dramatization from a parallel universe is for you:

Tim awoke an hour earlier that morning, eager to get a jump start on his busy week. He had the ulterior motive of arriving at work to use the restroom before the new guy, whom his co-workers had already dubbed, "The Crop Duster," could christen it for the day.

Sensing an odd energy as he slowly opened the gate and walked into his backyard, Tim instantly spotted the door to the bike shed standing wide open. His mind hadn't yet grasped the implications of the image when a male figure burst out of the shed on Tim's bike, his legs wildly pumping the pedals with their adrenal advantage.

The figure burst out from the shadow of the pear tree as Tim's primitive monkey brain finally engaged to match the intruder's state of arousal. As the startled rider attempted to blow past him, Tim reflexively reached out and grabbed.  He was unsure of what his hand clutched, but Tim latched onto the sinewy flesh with the conviction of a newborn calf to the teat.

A subtle release of tension against Tim's grip followed an awkward tearing sound, and the thief instantly jerked backward, flying from the bicycle and sprawling on the concrete below Tim.

The ear was nearly severed.

Tim bent down. His hand still held the loose flesh, and his knee rested on the assailant's sternum. "If you move as much as an eyelid, I'll show you your ear," Tim commanded, in his best Dirty Harry whisper. "No simpler than popping a loose front tooth from a five-year-old's mouth.

"And no talking. I'm going to assume that you're experiencing a bit of shock, just as I did upon discovering your filthy self aboard my sweet, 24-speed coronary preventer. So any amount of exertion will only increase your blood pressure, accelerating the blood loss out of your ear hole."

Tim's wife had heard the commotion, dashed to the scene and call 9-1-1. A police cruiser and aid car arrived within minutes, while Tim's knee solidified its relationship with the criminal's chest. An emergency medical technician hurried to the sprawling man and took possession of the nearly detached ear . As she bent down, her foot slid slightly on the bloody asphalt and pulled the ear completely off. Fortunately for the felon, the paramedics succeeded in affixing a protective mesh screen over the ear chasm, thereby preventing additional wasps from entering through the open wound. The perpetrator was then stabilized, strapped down and transported to the trauma center.

"Well, what can I say? Nice work." Sergeant Lynn Johnsonville of the Seattle Police department surveyed the scene and glanced back at Tim. "We've been looking for this guy for months. Seems like every cop in the Southwest Precinct wanted a piece of this guy, and as it turns out, you got one."

The two nearly doubled over in laughter as the local news van pulled into the driveway.

It's morning in Seattle

Today, I'd like to briefly discuss a class of people, a group of which I am a member. I'll refer to us as the "people of the morning."

During the summer, I enjoy a vigorous bike ride every morning at six. It's a great time to take in the sights and smells of summer, without having to worry too much about getting clipped in the temple by a large truck's side view mirror.

It's also a good opportunity to observe the others who own the morning:

The old guys—actually this can be broken down even further.

We've got the elderly men who stick close to their homes' peripheries. They walk around, raising flags and washing driveways. In fact, one guy actually hoses down his driveway every single morning. Come on now...how dirty can a driveway get in one day? I suppose I could return around lunchtime to see if he spreads out Kraft Singles, baloney and Wonderbread on the pavement.

The other type of older dude goes for really, really long walks. Very often, I ride up behind and past one fellow on the local park trail, and without fail, I startle him enough to cause a him to spastically flinch and hop. Hopefully, he's lived a full life, because one of these days, he's going to flat line on me.

The dog walkers—It's difficult to classify these people into one homogeneous group, because Seattle has more dogs than children, and slightly less than farmers' markets. One common characteristic among them is their strict obedience to clean-up laws. They can produce that plastic bag out of nowhere. Fecal David Copperfields, these people.

The runners—Why do they still wear the same shorts we wore in the seventies? Yes, you people have great legs, but please don't think you're merely showing upper thigh...you are actually flashing lower crotch.

The creepers—Last but not least, there's that random guy, slinking around for no apparent reason. These sightings usually occur at the aforementioned local park. I'm thinking these guys are congressmen, since the senators have already claimed airport restrooms as their turf.

I suppose I should categorize myself as well, since I'm right out there riding among everyone, early each morning, clad in spandex and neon.

Nah.

It's not as easy as riding a bike

One of my favorite fringe benefits of having children is the unpredictability of an average day—especially if that day falls on the weekend.

My wife decided we should embark on a family outing on Sunday. The four of us have very few common denominators, but one of them is our ability to ride bicycles. Since we all possess varying skill levels, my role is that of the "just-call-me-Lance-because-that's-how-awesome-I-look-in-logo-covered-spandex" alpha bike dog. The rest of the family falls in somewhere within the amateur ranks.

Any type of day trip with children, regardless of their ages, requires extensive contingency planning. I knew we shouldn't have gotten rid of the diaper bag, because by the time we'd packed sandwiches, goldfish, protein bars, gallons of water, sunscreen and various other essentials, we nearly had to exclude one of the kids in order to haul all of the supplies.

We drove south from Seattle for about forty minutes, arriving at the Interurban bike trail, a long, flat, paved path, which bisects the Green River Valley of south King County, Washington. This area of western Washington is formerly lush farmland once populated by strawberries, lettuce, daffodils and pumpkins, but which is currently occupied by beautiful, boxy warehouses. Nothing screams nature's majesty like a row of concrete loading docks.

We parked at a trailhead in Auburn and unloaded four bikes. Zoe, my fourteen-year-old, was accompanied by her "bestie," Maddy. The girls surveyed our surroundings and Zoe glanced over at me, a concerned look betraying her teenage-induced glaziness.

"Dad, what if people think Maddy and I are from Auburn? That would be awkward."

Then I did something I do frequently—I asked her a question when I really should have ignored her. "What do you mean?"

"Well, they'll all be looking at us and think we'll be new kids at the school on Monday."

"First of all," I rebutted, "this may come as a surprise, but no one's looking at you." I wish Galileo were still around to debunk the teenage myth that the universe orbits around a teen's ever-so-slowly developing gray matter. "And secondly, your mom and I are both from here, so you're an honorary citizen of Auburn. Your paperwork would be all in order." That was an attempt at a joke.

Blank stare. "Well, at least my butt looks good in these shorts." She'd moved on long ago.

The two older girls hopped on their bikes and rode off ahead of Lauryn, Terri and me. Once the three of us were underway, we stopped roughly every hundred yards so Lauryn could re-hydrate. After about a mile, we'd gone through our entire water supply, and our condition seemed quite dire to my ten-year-old. "Dad, I'm so thirsty. It's like I'm in the desert and I haven't had a drink in days."

"Lauryn, you just finished your water ten seconds ago."

"I know, but that water just teased me."

Luckily, we didn't need a divining rod to detect some liquid refreshment about one hundred yards up the path at a teriyaki mini-mart. I rode ahead, proud that I was fulfilling my role as provider. While Lauryn sat and replenished her water stores, I squirreled around on my awesome mountain bike to kill some time. As I circled back, I turned a bit too sharply and went down—hard, on both wrists. I skinned both knees. It hurt a lot. It seems like when you're a kid, this happens all the time, and you recover in seconds, but when someone my age takes a spill, the injury lingers forever. I'm planning on this.

We eventually established a rhythm and rode about seven miles. When we returned to our vehicle, the teenagers were reclining in the truck bed, sunning themselves. "Maddy, we're going to be so tan at school tomorrow." Zoe glowed with delight about her newfound bronze potential. "Do you think people will think we went to California for the weekend?"

I love that girl. And so does everyone else in the universe.