in the middle day of our trip, one of our friends swapped his single bike for a tandem so that he could take along his twelve year old son. We teased the poor kid mercilessly, like grabbing his shirt so that we could get towed along by him and his dad.

At some point, after 40 miles and one mountain pass under our belts for the day, the we stopped for lunch and the boy asked his father, "dad, can I have a cookie."

"yup."

"can I have a soda, too?"

"yup."

"and an ice cream?"

"Oh yes ... do you get it now?"

"get what?"

"ride hard enough and you can eat anything you want afterwards."