Went somewhere. Did some things.

Maybe you member that The Pie and I were supposed to go on a most logistically complicated vacation to celebrate our 25th anniversary this past Spring... before the boomie booms fell and ruined everything. 

Not The Pie.  She's not ruined.  She's still fine after dealing with me as long as she's had to.

Anyways, she was going to run a half marathon, I was going to mountain bike all over the place, we were going to enjoy the "night life" (I'm fifty one, I don't really know what that means) in Hollywood, FL.  It seemed like only a couple hours after we booked all the hotels, we were canceling them.

So some time passed and "we the people" were told not to travel to visit family for Thanksgiving, so we decided to travel to not be with family.  I'd still get to ride, and she'd get to do a full marathon, her tenth one as a matter of fact.  No "night life," but I still couldn't figure out what that would be anyways.

We stayed the first night in a tiny town.  The Pie was going to wake up, drive thirty minutes, and run a marathon.  I was going to wake up (much later), ride seven miles to the Chuck Lennon Trails, get some time in the dirt, ride back to town, sit outside in the Florida sun at a brewery killing time and brain cells until The Pie came and picked me up.

We went to bed to the typical Florida forecast.  Slight chance of a little rain.

We woke up to rain.  Lots of rain... I mean she did first... and then I did hours later.

What to do, what to do.

I've only got what I planned to ride away from the hotel with.

Going down to get my double-fisted coffees in SIDIs.  I mean, I literally have nothing that wasn't part of a self-sufficient plan.

Single serve chamois butter going into a plastic wrapper from a single serve coffee I found in the garbage.

Well, fudge.  I got a vest, and a tiny hat, and a sleeveless T-shirt, and action jorts, and a sammich bag, and a pocket knife, and... a piss poor forecast for the rest of the day.  I don't wanna go trashing up the local trails, I can't sit in the sun and drink beer when there is no sun, and the hotel is kicking me out at 11:00AM.

I might as well ride in the pouring rain to go see The Pie at her marathon.  She was slightly worried about making the time cutoff.  Because since she signed up last minute, she was gonna get stuck in the last corral to go out on the course, and she only had three weeks to train up for marathon distance.  Mebbe I could find her and offer some support.  I know her.  She's not gonna quit just because they start pulling aid stations and course markings and finish lines and free beer.

I sat and scrolled my phone about on Google Maps trying to find a "bike friendly" route... since I only had a tiny blinky I hadn't intended to actually use for anything.  I pieced something together, and headed out.

Strip malls and gas stations to a run down neighborhood to this?

A road?  A path?  A trail?  Dunno.

I also found out pretty quick that even though my phone was in a waterproof case, for some reason, when it's mounted in a Super 8 Strap on my top tube for navigation purposes, it thinks the moist strap is the finger of a distracted two year old.  I kept loosing navigation.  Meh.

If my blue action jorts do this to my saddle in the rain, I wonder if they make my brown eye blue?

The rain went from pouring to drizzle, I got to the marathon, found The Pie's car, grabbed a beer, stuffed it in my fanny pack, and headed backwards on the course.  I found The Pie much closer to the finish than I'd anticipated... and she had a little friend. 

They'd been running together since mile thirteen.  The Pie was doing great, didn't need my gummy bears or beer, so I headed back to the finish...

And for my first time, I saw The Pie finish a marathon.  Her tenth.  In shit conditions.  Ignore that time, tho.  It's based on the first corral that went out for the day.  She did just fine.

Which was pretty cool.