Wednesday, July 15, 2009

N.I.T.E. Ride, Freedom Run, and other random stuff I want to ramble about.

The last few weeks have been rather eventful. Let's start with June 27th. Elvis convinced me that I had to do this awesome event that he participated in last year. It's call the Indy N.I.T.E. (Navigate Indy This Evening) Ride. The event begins at 11pm and and consists of a 20 mile bike around the greater downtown Indianapolis area. It begins at the Major Taylor Velodrome (which you can sort of make out in the background of the picture below) on Marion College campus.

Tons of bikes lined up and ready to go.

The Quitter! Ready to ride... and totally NOT a Quitter at the NITE! She was awesome!

More bikes ready to ride!

Elvis talks to Quitter's Hubby (I think he shall be called Shaun White - unless he already has a name and I have forgotten). This picture makes me laugh because Elvis looks pissed and Shaun White looks scared, but they were really just having a normal conversation.

Elvis pretending to be a bad ass.

Shaun White and The Quitter being cute before we took off.

Me and The Quitter (clearly we had LOTS of waiting time before we could start. I was bored so I took a lot of pics and now you get to look at them. Aren't you lucky?!?!)

Sadly, I wasn't really able to take pics during the ride. Too bad though. It was certainly eventful. About 3 miles in the road starts feeling REALLY ROUGH. I look over at Elvis and ask him if my tire looks ok. "Um, NO! It's completely flat!" GREAT!!!! Did I mention this was a 20 miles ride and we were only 3 miles in?!?!?! We pull off to the side and start walking to try to get to the next intersection where there will be cops/volunteers. The walk was probably somewhere between 1/2 mile to a mile. Also... I was wearing my spiffy new bike shoes... great for biking, but giant metal clips protruding from the bottom of your shoes don't exactly make walking a picnic.

Somewhere along the way The Quitter and Shaun White catch up with us. We all get to the next intersection and a volunteer radios for help for us. We send The Quitter and Shaun White on and Elvis and I wait..... and wait...... and wait.... and wait... OOOOO Headlights!!! Yes, headlights of the cop car that tails the group and tells all the other cops that they can stop directing traffic/marking the course and go home. And so we wait.... and wait.... FINALLY the mechanics show up and pretty uneventlfully get me back up and going. (BTW... YES I know I should have had a spare tube, CO2 and tools in my saddle bag. And YES next time The Reverand is in town I'm holding him hostage until he teaches me to change my tire. We will not repeat these events again).

With my tire fixed the mechanics take off and Elvis gets my tire back on my bike. We hop back on and are determined to catch up. We start flying down the road and manage to catch up to the mechanics. We plan on following them until we realize, they don't really totally know where they are going either. AWESOME!

This is the course.

We decide that since we're so far behind and have no one marking the course for us the best thing to do is just get to the break point and pick it up from there. We take off again and find a road that we both know will get us where we need to go. Even though that portion wasn't exactly a "sanctioned" part of the ride, Elvis and I had a BLAST. It was probably the 2nd best part of the whole ride. There was no one else around to maneuver through, traffic was almost non-existent... we just rode. There was nothing holding us back. So fun!

We get to the break and wait for the others to show up and then we were off again. The ride took us straight north on Meridian and then wound through Butler campus and then back down through the Art Museum where the path was lit by luminaria - beautiful! The next part was the best. I still don't really know how it happened, but suddenly I realize we're approaching this GIANT downward sloped curve. We start heading down and I begin to look around and realize... we're on AN OFFRAMP!!!! Freakin' SWEET! We make our way to the finish line and back to cars. Down some Gatorade and water. The Quitter and Shaun White make it back and we load up to head home. It was a great event. Can't wait for next year!

Here's a picture of my little tiny car (Yoko) loaded down with 3 bikes (we won't talk about the fact that the bike rack dented my car and I couldn't open my back hatch for two days).

June 28th I went to see New Kids on the Block with my best friend since first grade, Jonesy, and some of her other friends who were big fans back in the day. We had an amazing time, though sadly I don't have pictures. We were surrounded by a bunch of other 20-30 year old women, some with their daughters, who were just there to have a good time. This certainly wasn't the BEST concert I've ever been to, but it ranks really high on the most fun list. Rock on NKOTB!

July 1st was the Reverand's bday, most of which he spent in the lab... BOO! And the 3rd was Elvis' bday. We had a little family function and rolled the bridal shower for him and his fiancee and the bday celebrations all together. Fun was had by all and I totally dominated the guess that spice game. I know my spices baby!

Which brings us to the Fourth of July and the Carmel Freedom Run. This time it was just Simmonds and me because Will's foot had been bothering him again. Lucky for us, he graciously agreed to be our driver/photographer so that I could share the event with you now. Thanks Will!


I guess this is technically still the 3rd... none the less.. Tradition pre-race Tequila shot.

This is the best tradition ever!

Morning of the race. I love this picture! Simmonds is genuinely smiley and I don't think my smile could look more fake if I tried. Also, big thanks to Bange for sewing our spiffy bandanas... we were trying to be patriotic.

As the race starts I round the first corner and see my car sitting a parking lot with a window halfway down. I immediately start looking for Will (praying he's close by, because my purse is in the car). I spot him and start to wave as I'm running... he doesn't notice.. I wave bigger... nothing... finally I scream his name and looks over fumbles around and quickly snaps this picture. Nicely done!


And just behind me, he snaps a pic of Simmonds.

Bunch of crazy people running through the streets of Carmel on a Saturday morning.


On the home stretch!


If you look behind the wonderful woman who walked in front of Will just as he was snapping this picture, you can barely make out a light blue tank top... that would be me crossing the finish line. Thanks Lady!

Go Simmonds Go! You're so close!

Simmonds crosses the finish line. Wahoo!


Traditional banana shot. Super sexy - especially the sweat still glistening on my skin.

And us at the starting line.... at the end of the race.... Whatever!

After the race we went to Bub's Cafe for breakfast. Will made us sit outside and implied that we didn't smell too hot after running 4.5 miles so it would be rude to sit inside. The restaurant was hoppin' since Carmel was having freedom fest and Bub's is literally walking distance from the festivities. We had to wait for about 45 minutes for a table but it was worth it for the quote from Simmonds. There was no where to sit while we waited and clearly we were tired, so Simmonds and I sat in the parking lot, eventually Will caved and joined us. I was really tired and eventually threw my hoody on the ground and leaned over and laid down. Simmonds... "Don't do that you look homeless." HAHAHA! That's right, Carmel has to import their homeless from Noblesville. HAHA! AWESOME!

That night Will and I headed up to A-town to attend K-dog and The Doctor's traditional 4th party. Sadly, weather wasn't really cooperating, so no fireworks and a fraction of the crowd that usually comes. Oh well... more wine for me. :-) Eventually it was just me, K-dog, The Doctor and Will and we played Sing Star for a couple hours before calling it a night. Good times!

Ok... I think I've crammed enough events into this one post.

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