This senior on a different kind of cruise

She has asthma and gets dehydrated easily. She has arthritis and thyroid problems. Her blood pressure runs high.

Of course, imperfect health goes with the landscape when you’re about eight months shy of turning 80.

But Ruth Thomas takes a philosophical view of her infirmities.

She could stay home and sit on the couch and watch TV and probably still feel rotten.

Or she could ignore the aches and pains and resume her cockeyed quest to pedal her bicycle to the smallest incorporated city in each and every state.

The Spokane woman opted for Plan B last week.

She pulled her trusty 21-speed bike out of a storage facility in Islip, N.Y., and gave the machine a tuneup. Then she continued what I have dubbed the Great-Grandma Gravity Grind.

Don’t doubt that Thomas will finish her offbeat tour of podunk USA.

She has already traveled 11,000 miles and checked 37 states off her master list since beginning her journey in 1998.

Thomas is now on a 1,000-mile route through the Northeast to add another seven states to her grand total. The final destination is the tiniest hamlet of Maine: Centreville (population 26).

“I’m getting there,” she told me during a telephone conversation. Thomas was holed up in a Bay Shore, N.Y., motel room waiting for a patch of heavy rains to pass. “I told my kids I’m gonna do this if it takes me till I’m 90.”

Next Friday marks the seventh anniversary of the day Thomas departed Spokane and became a literal “roll” model for aging America.

I had to practically twist the woman’s arm to get her to agree to that first interview.

Thomas has never sought publicity. That’s one of the aspects of this story that has always appealed to me. Nor has she ever tried to turn her cycling into a crusade for some cause. The single woman went so far as to sell her home to bankroll the ride.

“I’m doing this for me.”

That has always been her response when anyone asks why.

Talk about low-key. I only learned Thomas was back in the saddle when one of her friends tipped me off through an e-mail. “I guess I should have called you,” Thomas said when we finally made contact.

It was great to hear that youthful lilt back in Thomas’ voice. That spark was missing late last summer when some misfortune handed her an unplanned intermission.

Thomas overcame a bout of heat exhaustion. That, however, was a mere joy ride compared to a monster pothole she rammed into near Clifton, N.J.

The impact flipped Thomas off her bike like a rag doll. Banged up and barely able to move her right arm, Thomas checked her bike into a storage shed and bought a bus ticket for home.

Though down, she vowed to heal up and return to her adventure.

Her original idea was to make a solo bike ride across the country. But the more Thomas pored over maps, the more intrigued she became with odd little destinations that few travelers have ever heard of.

Ophir, for example. That flyspeck (population 23) near Salt Lake City is Utah’s smallest incorporated town.

Ophir will be one of the remaining targets Thomas must reach once she finishes up in the Northeast. Vernon, Calif., (population 93) is another.

But the sightseeing is really secondary. Meeting people and making new friends has always been the primary goal for this retired schoolteacher who taught 25 years in Kellogg.

Thomas is an ambassador for Spokane. These days we can use all the good will we can get.

Take her recent conversation with a New York City fire captain. She said she met the man while riding a train out of Manhattan. He was so impressed that he gave Thomas his NYFD ball cap.

A lot of people are content to ride out their old age from the safe vantage of a sofa.

Ruth Thomas is not one of them.

“I really feel good when I’m on this trip,” she said before saying goodbye. “I really do.”