Last night I was feeling a bit stir crazy, so we declared a “date night” and went out.  I’ve been a bit down on the ‘Sider as of late, so we opted for the Flying Saucer downtown instead.  Fine choice as always!  We hung out down there for several hours, and enjoyed a fine dinner of soft pretzels.  (The only thing Donette will eat off their menu, with good reason.)  We didn’t play any darts on this visit though;  Weren’t feeling particularly athletic I guess.  After that, we headed back home to find our bi-weekly Netflix movie in the mailbox.  The name escapes me, but Donette was all about throwing it in the DVD player and watching it.  She got trumped by the baseball game though, which, while relatively excited, ended in disappointment as usual.

This morning I decided to test my meteorological skills once again.  With my highly trained eye, I was able to determine that the Brookside area was on the back edge of the rain;  It had most definitely already passed and was continuing south, leaving me with a clear dry path to ride my scooter downtown.  Once again, I was most definitely wrong;  Hopefully my clothes dry out by lunch time or so.

Hit and miss kind of weekend.  We started off strong on Friday with a little entertainment.  We met up with the Martins and our friend Lori down at Los Tules for a tasty dinner.  That place is pretty solid;  If it’s not on your regular rotation you might want to check it out.  We had a nice leisurely dinner and then headed down to Grinders for a show.  We got there in time to see the end of the BoDean’s set, and then Big Head Todd & The Monsters came on at 9:30.  I’m not sure how many times we’ve seen them but it’s always a good show.  Being outside on a fine evening was an added bonus;  Definitely premium “outdoor concert” weather.

Saturday was something of a bust, at least from my point of view.  Donette, meanwhile, met up with a bunch of friends and headed up to Waldo for the second annual Bacon Fest.  We went last year when it was downtown and had a great time, but I was skeptical it would be a success two years in a row.  For one thing, events in Waldo tend to get way too big.  The place is just a little too popular right now.  Another downer was that my favorite band, Bacon Shoe, would not be playing this year.  Speculation varied on why they didn’t come back.  I think they might have been a bit too…  “edgy,” perhaps.  Anyway, it sounds like I missed out on a good time.  Reports were that it was indeed very crowded, but they handled it OK.  There was a lot of cool swag this year too.  Oh well.  Still no Bacon Shoe.  In my own little pork tribute, I threw a few slabs of ribs on the smoker and sat around watching them cook all afternoon.

Sunday I joined Munkirs and Martin out by Longview College for the Summer Breeze bike ride.  I had high hopes for a nice cool afternoon like the ones we’ve been enjoying lately.  If you stepped outside yesterday, you probably know that was the first failure of the day.  Like all rides, it started off well enough though.  Failure #2 occurred at approximately the 20-mile mark, where we had the option of turning for the 45 mile route, or continuing on for the 70 mile route.  I confidently declared “I am doing the 70,” and rolled on.  I was immediately bombarded with a flurry of hostility, ranging from “This is a bad, bad, bad idea” to “I’m gonna punch you in the face.”  Hey, I clearly said “I am doing the 70.”  Since when did anybody ever follow any of my bad ideas?  We all forged on though, with me bombarded the entire time with reminders of my poor judgement.  By the 45 mile mark, I was inclined to agree with them.  By the sixty mile mark, I was backing them 100%.  They had a nice BBQ lunch set up at that point, and in retrospect maybe we should have hung out there for a while and recovered.  But, honestly, the thought of a greasy brisket sandwich slathered in BBQ sauce was not very appealing at the time.  I was fighting leg cramps, and absolutely debilitating back pain;  I just wanted to be done.  So we trudged on.  Failure #3 came at the 70 mile marker, when we found ourselves on the wrong side of Longview Lake.  If you click the 70-mile route map at the bottom of that website, you can see it is quite clearly 75 miles.  So, what’s five more miles when you’ve already ridden seventy?  QUITE A #$)* BIT! Twenty more minutes of misery, after I’d been staring fixedly at my odometer for the last hour expecting to be done.  I do hope they send out a comment form on this ride, I’ve got some for them.  I made it home and laid down for a while, and when I was confident I could quit yelping from the intermittent back spasms we headed over to our friend Lisa’s house for a Sunday night BBQ.  A few other couples joined us, and we sat around in the back yard enjoying a pot-luck kinda dinner.  Delicious food enjoyed outside on a nice evening?  Fun.  Seventy-five mile bike ride?  Not fun.

So, did I wake up this morning and think to myself, “Ahhhh, that wasn’t so bad, I’d do it again.”  No not really.  While I feel a lot better than I expected, I’m still a little beat up.  My main driver behind going for the 70-miler was to decide if I really wanted to try the MS-150 this year, and this morning that would be a resounding “NO.”  So maybe I could grind through day one, maybe even do the 100-mile route.  Would I want to get up and do it again the next day?  Absolutely not, I could think of no worse idea on earth.

Munkirs & I went on our weekly “Brookside Ride” last night.  Feeling a bit risky, we decided to take off with the faster group again.  It went… errrr…. OK.  I think we kept up fairly well, while I admit we were towards the rear of the group.  It was definitely a quicker pace than the group we usually ride with.  We hung with them for about ten miles, then they zigged and we zagged.  The fast group rides a slightly different route than the one we are used to, and we weren’t feeling that adventurous so we stuck to our known path.  One other guy took the turn with us too, making for an interesting last five miles.  Rider #3 was roughly the age of Munkirs and I put together.  That might be a slight exaggeration, but honestly not much.  I thought to myself, “No big deal, he looks pretty fit and he’s made it this far, and we ain’t in a hurry anyway.”  That guy flat rode us into the ground.  He was merciless.  If you slowed down to take a drink or shake your hands out, he was gone;  You’d spend the next five minutes standing, trying to catch back up.  It was evident he wasn’t even trying hard either.  Oh well, another lesson learned.  After the ride we slunk off to the Brooksider and had some cheeseburgers.  He was probably over at Hoopers gloating with his buddies.

Wow, the morning commute on the ol’ scooter is getting a little chilly!  About time to dig out the jacket I think.  Dare I hope that the heat wave is over?  (No, I dare not, I know better.)  I rather fancy it while it’s here though.  Last night I headed down to the Brooksider for the sole purpose of enjoying the nice cool evening.  And enjoy it I did;  Sat out on the deck for a solid three and half hours watching TV.  Donette, meanwhile, was at the big Arrowhead Stadium open house with her family, presumably enjoying the weather also.

Tonight is the weekly bicycle ride in Brookside;  Anybody want to go besides Munkirs and myself?  A finer evening for a ride there may never be.  Afterward, the group all heads to Charlie Hoopers for a little post-ride wind down too.  Well…  “the group” with the exception of Munkirs & I;  We go to the Brooksider for a hamburger.

Munkirs & I headed out to Leawood last night to try out a new bike ride.  I give it a thumbs up, I thought it was a pretty decent route and a nice size group too;  Probably about twenty riders.  Didn’t take any “rest stops” either like on our Thursday evening ride, which was a plus.  Seventeen miles, one hour, done.  Throw a few breaks in there and you’re looking at 1.5 hours, dangerously close to crossing my attention span.  I’d rather just get it done.  Not to mention, when we finished up it was around 7:30 and dangerously close to being dark.  Kind of makes me wonder if we’re going to be able to see the road when we finish up this Thursday night.  After the ride, the group gathered at Los Cabos restaurant for some good food, conversation, and general frivolity.  We skipped that part.