I know a sunburned, sore redhead that's got a date tomorrow!

God I'm a stud.

I din't get to updating the blog on the end of my trip, but now I'm back (sitting in front of my parent's computer, eating their food, enjoying their air conditioning).

so these were the tangable totals of the ride:
516.26 miles,
in 41 hours and 25 minutes,
with a max speed of 41.4 miles per hour (down a hill),
and an average speed of 12.4 mph.

How much did I spend? Too much. About $450 when you include the Greyhound down, the cab, the food, the bike fixes, the cost of the actual ride, and my ride home.

But I think it was worth it-I feel more superior than a vegan at the Republican National Convention. And that analogy makes sense 'cause you know a vegan would feel very self-rightous in that environment. I also feel more fit-right now they're sore, but my legs feel better overall. I also feel tan-even though I wore sunscreen all week I still got enough sun to turn me from slightly Minnesota pasty to a slightly golden brown (though I'm a little red too).

anyways, next year I'm going to take some more people along with me, if they'll go. I think my Dad is sick of the Oshgosh air show, so he could skip that and come along. Plus I'd like to get my sister plus a few friends to give it a shot. Who knows.

well, back to squirting out software tomorrow. oh well.

This morning I woke up in Charles City, at about 5:30 to discover my sleeping bad and pillow had been drenched with rain. Got on the road by 7:00 after a shower. Ate a pork chop for lunch, talked to a bunch of people, learned about recumbants, saw a guy that had the type of bike Chris Kosel has, but newer (He bought it used for $600! What a steal). Drank some Nestea(did you know it's manufactured in Iowa? It is!). Got into town by 5:30 and ate some spaghetti from the Knights of Columbus. Not bad food.

I broke a couple spokes today-luckily I was within blocks of a repair shop both times. Cost me $23 though-which adds up. Since I have so much trouble with the spokes in my rear tire I need to figure out how to do stuff with my rims myself-with the money I'd save I could buy some nice stuff, like better rims.

Anyways, I'm going to bed now. Only two more days and then I can become clean.

I saw my first instance of decorated Mardi Gras road kill. Just outside of Nora Springs. Brought a tear of joy to my eye :-).

Right now I'm in this little town named Fenton, pop about 350...about 22 miles into the day. This is the first town of the day, after our overnight.

This morning one of the coolest things so far happened...I was re-organizing my bags, and I noticed this chirping sound. As I dug, I found this little cricket. It was nice knowing that I may have had company all this time, all these miles.

They say tomorrow's wind is going to be from the east. We're going east. As my Dad would say, "Ride with your Nuts."

RAGBRAI, Day 2 (Cherokee to Emmetsburg, IA)

I'm just wiped.

The ride today ended up being about 85 miles, about 35 or 40 in a really severe northernly headwind. Including all the stops, it was about 13 hours of riding.

I woke up this morning and I was crusing, at about 14-15 mph, for the first fifty or so miles. The weather was good, not to warm, not raining, not really windy. I was kind of discouraged by my breakfast-I stood in line for about half an hour for 3 small pancakes, and 2 sausages. Five bucks. And a part of my life I'll never get back. Though the eats did improve-I found an "All the Watermellon You Can Eat" place, so I chowed down there for a while (like--an hour. This was into the headwind...I was tired, hungary, and though not unique to this event, horny). I also found a place serving gigantic brats for 3 bucks. Score.

Overall, the thing I'm enjoying the most are the stops. I've talked to different people whenever I've wanted to and I think I've learned. But I'm kind of lonely. Next year if I do this, I won't do it alone. And I'll have a really cool recumbant bike. They are way nicer on your ass (I'm sure mine is all brused up by now) and not so hard on your back (mine just kills).

RAGBRAI, Day 1 (Sioux Center to Cherokee):

I rode 57 miles today, about 40 before noon (when temps were running about 104 degrees). The last 17 were killers-I was so hot, I don't think I averaged more than 8 or 9 miles an hour. Before noon, I think my average was about 15 or 16 mph.
I wore one of my St John's t-shirts and shorts and I heard "Hey Johnny! Blah Blah Blah" all day. It was nice-I felt as though I kind of existed :-).

I ran into the Chickenman today. Who is the Chickenman, you might ask? He's this guy that wears a wrap (and *ONLY* a wrap, you can tell when he sits down) covered with chickens who owns a big huge keg on wheels-and every day he parks it somewhere along the route. Today I had this wheat beer (kind of like "Blue Moon", but not as sweet) and a darker ale. It was fun.

By the time I got to camp I was just about ready to pass out. I ended up eating some watermelon and had a can of pop, then I started to feel better. After I get done typing this I think I'm going to eat at an all you can eat spaghetti dinner at one of the churches.

I think one of my favorite teams from last year, Team Road Kill is now defunct. Last year, they "dressed up" the road kill in bead necklaces and stickers--this year, road kill went unaltered. Bummer. Though I did see "Big Earl's Girls" and Team Bad Boy(members of this team have tricked-out bikes...one person has a portable bar on their bike, and I think someone else has a toilet bowl).

Tonight it might rain and tomorrow it's pretty hilly so it's going to be a tough 68 miles tomorrow.

I'm outta here. Going to go get something all-you-can-eat. MMMMMM barf-et.


By

Just watched a show of fireflies. cool. g'night.

So I arrived at camp, today at about 6:00....about an hour and a half later than I thought. Thanks to the combined stupidity of of Greyhound (mostly their web site) and myself.

The short story is that the starting camp was at Sioux Center, and the ending destination of my ticket was Sioux City. They aren't the same city.

I think what happened is I typed in Sioux City as my ending destination but Greyhound's site is kind enough to select the city with the closest spelling if the destination city you typed isn't found. Try it yourself--enter minneapolis, mn and sioux center, ia as the starting and ending cities on www.greyhound.com .... then watch the magic!

If I remember, there was an error message but I guess I missed it. My fault.

Anyways, I got a cab for about $80 from Sioux City to Sioux Center and now all is well, just I'm now $80 poorer.

I also met a few people from the cities today-so I've got a ride home.

More updates (if possible) after tomorrow (or the next day, or the next day ......) which will refer to the actual ride.

I'm sweaty, tired, and dirty. And I'm getting up at 5:00 tomorrow to start riding.

Last night I went and hung out with the 'rents. I went to the bike shop to get a box for my bike (for my trip). I also went hunting for a new hockey/duffle bag, to hold my stuff. My old hockey bag, after years of abuse finally died after last year's trip and now I need a new one. By the time I got home, about 8:30, the only thing open was SportMart. What a crappy store. I kid you not-this place, despite acres of floorspace had virtually no hockey equipment. I guess they needed all the space for their shitty running shorts and crappy huffy bikes.

I was thinking of trying play-it-again sports or Letterman's ( old school hockey/sports store ). They'll have what I need.

Well, this is the last post before my trip. I'll update in route if I can but if not I'll keep a written journal which I'll then post afterwards. If I'm motivated.

if I can get on-line, I'll also check my email@ yahoo. username: mwkohout server: yahoo.com. My ass and I would appreciate any documented incidents of good wishes/love/promises for sex (but only from girls) or money .

Last night I invaded Meghan McInerny, Nancy Lyon, Linda Shull's girls night out......well, it was only kind of a girls night out because Dave Mehl was there too. And he's only kind of a girl.

It was the most fun I've had all week-this week at work has been really trying...I have some serious doubts about the project I'm working on and the work in the project isn't interesting. Yesterday I cut and pasted all day. Not that there's anything wrong with it, but it just wears on me.

This morning the caretakers informed me my shower is leaking. Hooray! I also got my new biking shoes. Hooray! Guess which hooray is sincere.

On Saturday at 7:30 am I leave for my bike trip. I hope I can update this site while I'm on it. Last year a couple places let us use their school's computers so I may be able to.

It's been almost a week since my last update. I've been filling my time with biking and work mostly.

Saturday I went on a 20 mile ride on my road bike with Chris Kosel from work-a good ride. The trail was all gravel, and my ass was pretty sore from it yesterday. Afterwards, I ended up hanging out with Joe, Zack, Matt--typical Weekend stuff. Cards, Coffeeshop, and the required amount of bitching and moaning about the week.

Sunday, I went for another ride in uptown and around the lakes(Harriet and Calhoun)-also spent way too much time in the music store checking out amp modellers. Then I worked most of the night, from about 6 pm on till about 3:30.

This morning I got up at 7. I'm kind of tired now.

for anyone who is interested, my email is mwkohout@yahoo.com--send all your customer inquiries there :-).

So last weekend I went up to my Aunt's cabin. Kinda interesting-I don't think I've ever spent so much time with my cousins all at once in so concentrated a time.

I got up there on thursday afternoon-everyone had beaten my sister Melissa, her friend Kelly, and me up there. So my Uncle Tommy and his 12 and 11 year old girls were there, my little brothers and parents were there(Ryan, 18 and Patrick, 15) along with Ryan's girlfriend( also 18). And my cousin Doug(35) and his wife Stephanie was there along with his parents(Maryann and Dean, 60). The cabins we were staying at were Doug's and MaryAnn and Dean's and were pretty nice.

The first night we watched all the fireworks going off all around the lake--some were pretty good. Not Aquatennial good, but pretty fair for fireworks purchased at grocery stores or Wal-Marts. We fired off a few of our own (Patrick, my pyromaniac brother naturally took charge of this), and my younger cousins ran around with sparklers.

Friday my Mother and my aunt Maryann went to the liquor store, much to the delight of my brother Ryan and his girlfriend who then enjoyed being liquored up for much of the weekend. We played Bochi(SP?) Ball, I went for a walk with my sister and her friend Kelly (who is an old friend from elementary school and is now a super-buff and super-cute hockey player). We ended the night with Doug proudly showing us his Digital Satellite Porn Channels. Kinda funny.

Saturday, I went for a bike ride much of the afternoon. I found one of the cemeteries and looked at it for a while. When I got back, I ate dinner then went with Kelly for a walk back to the cemetery. We didn't make out. Oh well.

Then, Kelly, Melissa, and I left for home. And we had to deal with the torential rain where (naturally) my sister's windshield wipers stopped working. It kinda sucked, but we got back by 1:00 am on Sunday.

good weekend up at my aunt's cabin. will enter in later today, but for now I'll give my little rant about street cred.

I don't got any. At least I don't have any that counts compared to people that work or hang out at Pizza Luce, Little T's, Terminal Bar, or people that live in Uptown, Downtown, Etc, or people that have funny colored hair, tattoos, or body/face piercings.

That's why I'm going to go shopping at the Gap to see if I can find anyone there that could sell it to me. Or I'm going to make nonstop passes at those who have some, in hopes that my association with them will pass some on to me.

Will it work? I don't know but I'm really interested in that second path--I want to be that guy in the sweater vest with his arm around a cool girl.

mmmmmmm, cool girls.

I felt so uncreative last night.

Every once in a while, when I sit down to work on stuff that I've written (either to edit or extend existing stuff or to write whole new stuff) I get into a funk and feel really bored with what I'm doing. Although I haven't felt this way since I moved into my new place, and I never really felt as bored as last night since I got my new Telecaster last December.

I think it might be environmental, because with those old people above me I don't really feel disconnected with the real world-the whole time I was concerned with my noise level...what I was playing felt forced.

Tomorrow morning I'm going up to my Aunt Maryann's cabin north of Lake Melax(sp?) so most likely this will be my last post until next Monday.

went to buffalo wild wings last night....then went over to where a few of my friends live(Zack and Joey)....ended up staying up until 3am.

I tried to get up to do my morning ride at five, but man, it was weird. Every once in a while I have these really intense dreams that just kind of follow you out of sleep-like the kind where for that brief second you really believe you parents are dead, you dogs are dead, that you're back in high school, plus some good ones like you reach across the bed, expecting someone else to be there.

Anyways, I ended up having this wierd dream that I was in the Army......except it was like the 'Full Metal Jacket' type-Army(although "Full Metal Jacket was about Marines, right? Well, we can't expect my dreams to be totally fact-checked) and I think I was dreaming that I was on leave.

I think it could have been triggered by me thinking that I spotted one of my old roommates from college last night-he was ROTC, and every morning at 5am he'd wake me up as he got ready for his morning runs. He really pissed me off, and when we graduated I laughed my ass of as they stationed him in Alabama, as an MP, when he thought all through college they'd station him in Germany and allow him to go directly to law school(so he could serve as a JAG).

Of course, I also laughed at how my sister shot him down, every time, when he tried to impress her with his silly Army shit. I swear to God, every time he saw her(or any girl for that matter) he'd take out his uniform and explain how he'd gotten his pseudo-medals he got for his training.

Although to make it perfectly clear I didn't think he was an asshole for these things, but he most certainly was(he tried to physically threaten me a number of times). And I viewed these things as nice little ways to get back.

wow, did this post not really have a point.....oh well, it's not like anyone reads them.

I've decided girls are absolutely nuts if they don't think I'm smart, ok looking, and kind of funny....but in a good way.

And I've also discovered that girls that complain and think their lives are boring are kind of a turn on for me.

So....I ended up spending the entire weekend at my parents. Kinda fun, don't have pesky neighbors that tell me to be quiet, get to eat for free(plus the grub is pretty good), and I don't have to wake up in an empty house.

When I got home last night, I found a letter from my condo manager in my mailbox-I guess the people above me have used some time in their last years to chew off the ear of that guy, about my music. It's a pain in the ass, and I don't understand these people's problems. The only ones complaining are the people above me, neither the people right next to my living room nor the people on the other side, to where my amps are aiming are complaining. In fact, I asked them if I was bothering them and they said they couldn't hear a thing. It blows me away that this one person could totally ruin this place for me. Then again, while some of the (old) people that live there are nice, many are nasty mean old people.

Anyways, wrote another song last night. So far, I figure I've got between 7 - 9 good tunes that I enjoy playing. Although I haven't quite gotten around to recording them yet....maybe soon though. Although I don't know if the final count of this batch will be 7-9, I've been toying with combining them(they all kinda float around in the key of C) ...sometimes it seems as if they are kind of simple and I'd like them to be a little more stimulating to play and listen. Now I've just got to find some vocals....shouldn't be that hard. I've got 6 years of poetry saved up(ends up being around 5 or 6 filled notebooks, a single poem to a page).

oh, it looks like after the death of John Entwistle The Who are still going on tour. So I'm still going to take the old man to see that. Should still be interesting. I hope they won't alter the tour taking it out of Minnesota.