Mitchell, South Dakota
Today Dad made a passing attempt to convince me that not all bike rides suck -- and with that effort, the ride started to suck. But I guess that is how it goes when biking through the middle of nowhere South Dakota, a ride can start sucking almost instantaneously. I started to feel a bit of nausea once we hit mile 60 of the ride, and then I started to feel dizzy shortly after. Brian speculated that it was the string cheese that I ate at the convenience mart only miles earlier, but I knew the truth... biking sucks. Even on a pleasant day like today, biking is just not fun.
Dad misses a lot of the truth when he reports on our rides for this blog. He tells about the rewarding aspects and glosses over the toil in such a way in an attempt to make people revere us for our "perseverance". What he doesn't tell you is that biking sucks. I wake up every morning and I think about the ride and how the wind will probably be in our face, or how it will be hot, or how humid it will be, or how we will have climb a mountain, or how much my rear end hurts (I literally have saddle sores, painful saddle sores), or how the day will be some combination of those sucky factors. Sure, I could look on the bright side of things: I could notice how the grass turned from short to long; I could appreciate the world famous Mitchell Corn Palace (which in fact is a glorified high school gymnasium); I could marvel at the cuteness of the prairie dog, or the power of the bison; or I could relish the fact that I can eat upwards of six double cheese burgers in a sitting. But no. I am a "glass is half empty" kind of guy right now.
I think that the major source of my bitterness stems from the fact that I feel as though I have had to compromise basically all of my summer for this ride. I could be at home smoking cigarettes, drinking beers, and playing pool with my friends. Or I could be in Toronto doing a similar type of thing but while taking classes in things like Geographic Information Systems (something I am bound to do poorly in again this fall). But in spite of the fact that I decided to compromise my time and my body, I don't think that I need to compromise the only thing that I have left -- my passively surly attitude, it is here to stay. So fooey to this ride. Fooey to South Dakota. Fooey to biking in general. I am not going to pretend to be elated to be doing this any more. The only reason that I have made it this far is because we are riding for a really good cause -- if it wasn't for that I would have thrown my bike off the first available cliff in Ontario, Oregon.
But I ain't no quitter. I am going to make it to the Atlantic Ocean or die trying.
Rock it,
Paul
Footnotes for July 15
Dad misses a lot of the truth when he reports on our rides for this blog. He tells about the rewarding aspects and glosses over the toil in such a way in an attempt to make people revere us for our "perseverance". What he doesn't tell you is that biking sucks. I wake up every morning and I think about the ride and how the wind will probably be in our face, or how it will be hot, or how humid it will be, or how we will have climb a mountain, or how much my rear end hurts (I literally have saddle sores, painful saddle sores), or how the day will be some combination of those sucky factors. Sure, I could look on the bright side of things: I could notice how the grass turned from short to long; I could appreciate the world famous Mitchell Corn Palace (which in fact is a glorified high school gymnasium); I could marvel at the cuteness of the prairie dog, or the power of the bison; or I could relish the fact that I can eat upwards of six double cheese burgers in a sitting. But no. I am a "glass is half empty" kind of guy right now.
I think that the major source of my bitterness stems from the fact that I feel as though I have had to compromise basically all of my summer for this ride. I could be at home smoking cigarettes, drinking beers, and playing pool with my friends. Or I could be in Toronto doing a similar type of thing but while taking classes in things like Geographic Information Systems (something I am bound to do poorly in again this fall). But in spite of the fact that I decided to compromise my time and my body, I don't think that I need to compromise the only thing that I have left -- my passively surly attitude, it is here to stay. So fooey to this ride. Fooey to South Dakota. Fooey to biking in general. I am not going to pretend to be elated to be doing this any more. The only reason that I have made it this far is because we are riding for a really good cause -- if it wasn't for that I would have thrown my bike off the first available cliff in Ontario, Oregon.
But I ain't no quitter. I am going to make it to the Atlantic Ocean or die trying.
Rock it,
Paul
Footnotes for July 15
- Tomorrows ride puts us over the 2,000 mile mark.
- I recently discovered that I am more attractive than a young John Ritter.
- Dads joke o' the day: "You better tighten up your helmet or your frontal lobe may get smashed if you fall... then you would be a... the remainder of this joke has been censored by the owner of this computer so as not to offend donors.
posted by Len Burman at 1:26 PM
2 Comments:
Hahaha, brilliant censorship mr editor. After a long entry about not censoring his feelings toward the ride, you do it for him. The irony sends pangs through our whole "apathetic" generation.
Hi, I was out blogging and found your site. It certainly got my attention and interest. I was looking for Rods information and even though this isn't a perfect match I enjoyed your site. Thanks for the read!
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