Maiden Voyage
I got my bike yesterday afternoon as planned - thanks everyone for the advice on gear. This afternoon I went out for a quick ride just to work on getting things adjusted. I went on the gravel road right around the house, about 1 3/4 miles total, broken up into 1/4 - 1/2 mile segments as I adjusted the seat in small increments.
Wow, am I out of shape. I have been lifting weights pretty hard for the past year and thought that I'd have just a little more endurance than I did. But I guess that's just one more reason to hit the bike. My butt is a little sore, but not as bad as I thought it might be. I haven't ridden a bike since probably junior high.
I found out just how much "fun" fresh gravel can be. I never lost contact with the bike, but a hit a stretch of new gravel that hadn't been packed down by traffic yet and felt myself get jerked around a couple of times.
All in all, the whole afternoon was very encouraging that this is really going to help me lose the weight I need to lose. And best of all, I even got my wife talking about getting a bike for herself and a pull-behind trailer for the kids next spring so we can all ride together.
Hopefully there will be many more positive ride reports in the future.