The calm before the storm. That old expression, come to think of it, has a rather ominous ring to it. It conjures up visions of something waiting to pounce.

This morning I overslept, and didn\’t get to ride before I had to clock in to (remote) work. The sky then was only lightly covered by thin, high, white clouds; and the wind wasn\’t particularly strong. In fact, a breeze of 10 mph really isn\’t too bad.

By mid- to late morning, the sky was mostly clear. That surprised me. I expected that the clouds would constantly become thicker and thicker; and much darker. The calm before the storm, I thought again. By this time, however, the wind had strengthened to 18-20 mph. That\’s not so calm, as far as I\’m concerned.

At lunchtime, I hooked the hybrid into the trainer and pedaled for 25-30 minutes. I decided against going for a short ride outdoors, because I didn\’t want to lose time while I applied sunblock. The wind would have presented me with quite a struggle, anyway.

At 5 pm the clouds looked rather threatening, and it was beginning to drizzle. The arrival of the storm\’s outer bands, I thought. I re-checked the NHC site, and real tropical storm conditions are still a few hours away.

I believe they said that Marco weakened somewhat. That\’s good news for us all, but Tropical Storm Laura is the one we\’ve really got to watch now. To make it harder, there won\’t be time to clean up after Marco before Laura arrives!

Two tropical systems in the Gulf at one time is a rare event. I\’m sure that weather buffs are keeping a close watch — as is everybody else in hurricane-prone areas.