Van of Constant Sorrow '19: Day Four

That was a cold night, mostly because I packed a summer sleeping bag.  It felt moist in the Adventure Wagon, but that doesn't make sense because opening any of the windows in the back requires breaking out the channel locks.  Watts gets outta bed first...

"awwwww... poopy."

In the mayhem that was catching up to the park ranger, finding an open site by shining a commuter light out the window, and backing the van into the spot, Watts had left the driver side window open.  All the way open.  With his backpack sitting in the seat.  His stuff is wet.  The place where his butt will sit on the drive to Bentonville is wet.  I walk away towards the bathroom so whatever anxiety I might have buried in me doesn't stir up any bad karma when it's time to see if the engine starts.

I can hear the rumble from my stall... and it's not mine own.

We're off and rolling, but not before stopping at the office to pay up... and somehow the site that was half the price of the previous site requires twice the amount of information gathering before we are released.

Onward to Bentonville.

The rain.  It's as if the cloud is staying directly over Watts's head part.  I keep checking the radar, assuring him that we will poke out the other side to some sort of sunshine.  Before we get to the Bentonville city limits, the sun finally makes an appearance as does half of Watts's smile.  The trails may be too wet to ride today, but at least we have sun.

We get an early check in for our hotel.  Shower and get moving towards the media meeting at the Walmart Museum.  It's all greenway to get there, but my navigation-challenged brain sees us getting there ten minutes late.  A man is holding open a door when we arrive.

"Head on up to the top floor, fellows."

So we do.

The room is mostly empty, emptier than you think it would be for being ten minutes late.  They must have been pretty efficient at distributing those press badges and ice cream sundaes.  We go up to a table where volunteers are standing on the other side.

"Make sure you sign the posters."

Watts and I share confused looks at each other and also to the people across the table.

I look down at the spread out collection of OZ Trails Off Road posters and ask, "All of them?"

The volunteers now give us a confused look back.

"Ummmm... we're... media?"

"Oh.  Don't sign the posters.  Ha ha."

Watts and I take seats at the back of the room and watch pro rides pour in, to include none other than Kate Courtney (and her mechanic, you know, the guy from the YouTubes).

 Just the World Cup Champion, you know?

 YouTube sensation and world class blip chip smuggler, Brad Copeland.

The room starts filling up, and as we see the chairs supply dwindling, we take a spot standing with our backs against the wall.  More pro riders enter, some make eye contact with us, some look away immediately, while others squint in an effort to figure out who these two ding dongs are.

Kaysee Armstrong comes in, says "hi" to us, and validates our strange existence.

Race promoter Scott Sadow finally takes the mic and looks at the back of the room, directly at us.

"I'm happy that Dicky could finally make it out to one of our Epic Rides events after all these years."

There's a collective silence indicating that no one knows what or who he's talking about.  A few heads turn on a pivot trying to gather a clue as I try to crawl inside my own asshole to hide from everything.

So it came to be that we sat through the entire pro meeting that was absolutely not where we were supposed to be but we were because some guy told us where to go and we listened.  After the meeting was over, we went up and talked to Todd, got things straightened out, and were free to go on our way.

From there...

Beer/hot wings/curry fries...

beer in the beer garden, fat tire crits, cold air, open flames where they shouldn't be, more beer... run into Watts's friends Gabbi and Thomas.  They suggest we hop in a van with them and head to The Holler.

From there, more beer, mebbe I snagged a tray of a stranger's leftover nachos, then still more beer. 

Eventually, we needed to ride home and my iPhone shuts down from cold sads so we navigate by feel and I think we're in bed around midnight with a 6:00 AM alarm set for race day.