I'm on some kind of a roll.

This is my third post from Colorado, which by its very existence is probably tearing a whole in the fabric of the internet or space-time or something, which is to say that I'm terribly about blogging on the regular. Yesterday was a relatively easy day and thus a welcome change from the ascent to Trail Ridge. At about 25 miles we reached Hot Sulphur Springs, and a couple hours, $12.50 each (group rate, natch) and up to 112 degrees of spring water later, we all felt a lot better despite the fact that we reeked like hardboiled eggs. I stopped off for lunch with Elizabeth and Kristen, our incredibly patient sweeps for the day, and about three miles into the second leg of the day deeply regretted devouring that catfish sandwich. We spent the night in Kremmling, camping on a high school's football field with over a thousand riders from the Bike Tour of Colorado. Being pretty much self-contained in our group of twenty-seven for the past month and change, I think everyone was a little shocked to be around so many other people all at once.

I just got word that the van is here, so I'm going to have to cut this short to go unload the trailer.

The 2.3-Mile High Club

I know it's unprecedented for me to publish two posts from the same state, but today was a banner day for CUS 2k7. In what may very well have been our most intense day of climbing to date, we ascended 5,000 feet from Estes Park to the peak of Trail Ridge Road, the highest continuous paved highway in the United States. It was an arduous process, but we finally reached the summit, atop a mountain at 12,183 feet above sea level. The second to arrive at lunch, I promptly put on every warm article of clothing I had, made an almond butter and banana sandwich, and dove into the van to curl up in the fetal position on the bench behind the driver's seat. Once I had warmed up, we went to the gift shop in search of hot chocolate, and then hit up the bathroom before leaving. Unfortunately, since I was wearing every warm article of clothing I have in addition to my bib spandex, I pretty much had to strip down at the front of the bathroom line. I emerged from the john wearing bike shorts that make me look like a Warsaw Pact greco-roman wrestler, and matching spandex arm warmers and leg warmers, much to the joy of the other Bike and Builders in line, who whipped out their cameras to capture my moment of embarrassment. I take their schadenfreude as a sign that we have truly bonded as a family.

We're not in Kansas anymore.

It's kind of a hackneyed title, but I'm really tired and I couldn't think of anything else. Today we left Kansas, made a brief detour down into Nebraska, and ended up in the high desert of Colorado. So much time has passed since my last entry that I won't even try to cover everything; instead I'll go over roughly the past week. My bike computer stopped working a few days ago and I couldn't figure out why, until I noticed today that the wire going around my brake cable was really loose. Upon closer examination, I found that the cable had snapped in two. At least now I know what's wrong with it (it's pretty much trashed) and also what that rubber-on-metal sound that plagued me up until a few days ago was.

We had heard from reading last year's CUS journal entries that St. Francis, KS has an awesome thrift store, but when we got there mid-afternoon yesterday, we found to our dismay that it was closed. It seems that St. Francis isn't its normal bustling metropolis self on Saturdays, since that's when everyone goes to the WalMart in Goodland. So we bummed around the main drag a little bit, Kristen and I grabbed a beer, and we went back to the church, where I promptly fell asleep on a nicely padded pew. I have never had quite so delightful a wake-up call as the one that came when Rosanna came to tell me that people were going to the thrift store because it was operated by the church, and they were opening it especially for us. We went and it was amazing, its amazingness only augmented by the fact that everything was half off, which made everything 100% amazing-er. I bought plaid shorts, rainbow suspenders and a pair of cowboy boots for $3. Three dollars. Anywhere else, the boots alone would have been at least $20. See, the American midwest totally lacks a hipster population, which keeps the price of vintage clothing nicely low. You could make a killing by driving through, buying up everything, and reselling it in some skinny-jeans-and-sideswept-bangs mecca like San Francisco or Philadelphia.

Oh yeah, we also had a day off in Manhattan, KS last week. Our karaoke experience didn't quite live up to the sheer awesomeness of Bloomington. There was this, er, mentally handicapped guy who wouldn't get off the stage and ran around high-fiving people and singing along to every song, which was mildly amusing until you realized you weren't in a film by David Lynch, at which point it just made you feel dirty. We did, however, find a pretty good coffee shop on our day off in which to talk and wait out the thundershower.

So... yeah. Today was long. Tomorrow will also be long. Then we start climbing... my legs already hurt just thinking about it.

Indiana is my new favorite state.

We've spent the past few days in Indiana, which has me bowled over by the sheer power of its awesomeness. Right now we're in Terre Haute, and we spent the last two days in Bloomington, since we had a day off there. Bloomington was picturesque and charming, with lots of ethnic restaurants and a killer Goodwill to distract us. Almost everyone who went walked away with a second-hand treasure, from mine and Bohr's matching Little 500 pink baseball tees to Kristen's $1.99 rollerskates, also known as the most impractical purchase EVER. She tried to convince everyone that they should go in with the group gear (as opposed to her duffel) because "they're for everyone," but I don't know what I can really do with a pair of women's size 5 1/2 rollerskates, besides watching Kristen faceplant into a previously owned couch, which we got to do even before she bought them.
Our first night in Bloomington, we finally achieved my long-time goal of finding a place for us to do karaoke. Katie and I opened with a crowd-pleasing "Love Shack," Bohr deflowered the stage with his bare-footed "Roadhouse Blues," and we nearly burned up the whole place with our ensemble "Bohemian Rhapsody." Literally--James "dropped" roughly 20 oz. of beer all over the sound equipment, which cut our performance rather short. Even so, we totally owned it. Other highlights: my token "Independent Woman Part 1" and Shibrina doing "Push It."
We spent yesterday morning being pretty tired from the previous late night, and then a big group went to go swimmin at the local quarry, notable for its otherworldly concrete slab formations and its apparent use as a shooting range for the owner(s) of a high-powered rifle.
So now we're in Terre Haute, and later on this afternoon I intend to check out the Eugene V. Debs house, of Royles Family Road Trip '96 fame. That's all for now.

Georgetown (Ohio, that is)

I finally got around to setting up a new blog so that my adoring public (that's you) can read all about my cross-country cycling adventure. Last night we went to see 28 Weeks Later, and I spent most of the movie with my hands clamped tightly over my ears. I had some stylistic problems with it, but overall I think it did a pretty good job of retaining the grittiness and pessimism of the original, although I think now the acoustic-guitar-0ver-montage-of-carnage-and-destruction thing is kind of played out. If they make another sequel (please, no) they should set everything to French house music, because 28 Months Later will clearly be set in Paris. Hopefully I didn't just ruin the end of the movie for everyone.
An hour and a half ago we rolled into Georgetown, OH, having left Portsmouth this morning. After lunch, my chain fell off right in front of a house with three very angry and very unleashed dogs. They didn't do much besides bark, so I got my chain back on with no trouble, but as we pedalled away I shouted, "I hope your dogs get shot in the head!" Then Adam pointed out that one of them only had three legs. Some people shouldn't be allowed to have pets.
Once we got into Georgetown, we checked out the local bikeshop, Mycle's Cycles, and were lavished upon with green apples and stories from the county's long history, from Indian massacres to runaway slaves. The Rankin House, a major stop along the Underground Railroad, is about 12 miles from here. One of the guys at the bike shop suggested that we bike there, but instead we walked across the street to the gas station and bought milkshakes, because drinking a milshake is just like visiting a national historic site. Take it from me--I'm a historian.
Tomorrow we depart for Cincinnati, and the day after that we have a build day (holla). Not that we don't all love cycling, but today was day seven of eight straight days in the saddle, and all of us could use the break. Furthermore, I'm personally looking forward to some big city excitement, including a) replacing the bite valve on my Camelbak b) buying a nice pair of sandals and c) paying way too much for trendy beer. Huzzah!

Highlights from the past few days:
-Elizabeth and I getting slapped on the ass my some guy passing us in a car
-the stupid woman in Blacksburg who gave me a two-block-long lecture on traffic signals through the passenger-side window of her MOVING car while I was riding my bike
-"I didn't know you could get an ulcer there."