Good Ride + Good Friends + Kristi = Great Weekend!

So Friday I was scheduled for a 45 minute swim. Figured I'd get it in after class in the morning. Unfortunately my classes had given me a headache. It didn't seem all that bad by the time I got to the pool at the rec center but after 15 minutes my head was pounding. The next 15 minutes was brutal and I felt dizzy and sick. Sooo, I cut the workout short and headed back home.

I slept for an hour or two and took some advil once home. The combination got rid of the headache. And it was then off to work the Coke booth at our local church festival (St. Al's). Kristi and I were only supposed to work from 4:30 to 7 but wound up staying until a little after 9. I had the pleasure of getting all the drinks from the truck to the booth and taking care of all the ice as well. Kristi was taking money along with my mom and some friends of my parents were helping out as well.

From the festival Kristi and I went to Zip Dip for some ice cream. I threatened to get a face cone but she said she'd never talk to me again if I did. So I got Jimmies (i.e. sprinkles) instead. When I ordered Jimmies she asked what the hell Jimmies were. I was in shock! Her sister used to work at an ice cream place and she didn't know what Jimmies were. Apparently I'm old school because everyone calls them sprinkles now. But, I will continue to call them Jimmies if for no other reason than to annoy Kristi.

When saturday rolled around I was supposed to lead a 50 mile ride out of Bicycles and More. But, nobody showed. Judi had said something about her and Sandi doing a 50 miler out route 8 at 9:30 or 10 so I gave her a call to see if I could meet up with them. As it turned out Sandi chickened out but Amanda decided to join instead. As I rolled into the lot Amanda was already there waiting and Judi came in a little while later. At this point I already had 20 miles in for the morning. Because I road from home to the shop and then downtown.

Rt.8 is an extremely boring ride down along the river. It's shrouded in trees on both sides and is mostly flat with some rolling hills. I don't think any one of us actually enjoy that ride. But it's always better with friends. And I hadn't ridden with Amanda since some time last October I guess. So the tally on the Rt.8 portion was 55miles at an 18.3 mph pace. And I was tired when we were done.

But, no rest for the weary because I had to get to Kristi's another 5 or so miles away. And of course in order to get there I have to climb from the river all the way up Gilbert to MLK. It's probably a 2 mile uphill stretch that was miserable by myself. Eventually I got there and we had to leave ASAP so we could go back to the festival to work again. Fortunately she drove us back to my house so I could get a shower and then we were off.

Again I wound up hauling the 50 lb bags of ice and all the pop from the truck to the booth. Not exactly what I wanted to be doing but oh well. Right at 7 it started raining, bad. And because our booth was at the bottom of the parking lot it flooded! And we got all wet. But, we got to leave at that point because our scheduled time was up and it wasn't that busy.

Sunday it was off to Kings Island with the FREE tickets I had gotten from working the festival. This was Kristi's birthday present since she'd been talking about wanting to go for some time. We started off at Top Gun and then Son of Beast. We didn't have to wait for either ride which was nice and we got seats at the front. Which are, of course, the only seats to have. From SOB we headed to the Drop Tower. Drop Tower is badass because you just dangle there 26 stories in the air before it throws you at the ground! And it was WAY outside Kristi's comfort zone. But she enjoyed it afterwards. We hit all the big rides including the 2 new ones Firehawk and Diamondback. We had front seats on all of them including The Beast! Which is possible the best ride EVER! The only downer on the day was that the backwards racer was replaced with another forward looking train and I was PISSED! It just wasn't the same.