For years I rode the bus and tram to work. At that time in the morning and then again in the afternoon when everyone gets off work, the buses are packed with short tempered and often not exactly sweet-smelling masses. It's the perfect time of the day for pickpockets and you have to be very careful with your purse or billfold.

One day in 2008, on the occasion of a general transportation strike, I decided to try my luck and ride my bike there and back, a 1 hour ride right across town each way. That first day, when I got to work my face was the color of a ripe tomato. But here I am, 13 years later, and I never went back to using public transportation to get to work. Over the years, I experimented with various routes and now most of my way there I follow the course of the river, through riverside parks, trails and bike paths. I think the photos show quite clearly why I much prefer starting my day this way rather than on a crowded, smelly bus ... Not to mention that, nowadays, public transportation is also a hot bed that seems almost specifically designed to help the virus spread.

The blue flowers in the photos are common chicory flowers. Chicory is used widely in Italian cuisine and cultivated in most kitchen gardens. So much so, that it manages to escape and reseed itself just about anywhere. While it likes growing on open lawns, you can only see the flowers in the morning, because they close up tightly and become invisible when the sun hits them directly.

For Andy: may the road to recovery, even if challenging in itself, include little pleasant surprises that make the work less hard.