Tri- ing Weekend

… So this was my weekend: Saturday I got up at 5:30 AM, left the house at about 6, got to the grocery store at about 6:20 and picked up some muffins, bananas and Gatorade for the time trial. Then I drove down to my Grandmas for breakfast. My family (dad’s side) goes on vacation every year about this time and they were leaving for Table Rock Lake this morning. I wanted to wish them a safe trip, since I would not be joining them for the first time in many years. I just feel like I’ve got too much going on here this year. So I had breakfast with them and then hurried out the door to get to New City a little early. I arrived about 7:40 and noticed 3 cars in the lot. Good, I thought, maybe more people will show up today. Only 3 people showed, though and one was my brother, Dru, who apparently is also not going on vacation. No matter, since I’m already there, but I wish more people would show up, since I had to get out of bed early and all. Started everyone at one minute intervals, since we had plenty of time. Listened to Neil Diamond while they were out on the course. After the TT, Dru and I headed to the shop to catch the end of the Tour, where they were riding their own TT. That was about 9:15. I don’t like getting to the shop early too often, because customers always show up and knock on the door before we open. As I was talking to the first guy that did this, another showed up, and I decided to go ahead and take out the used bikes, even though it was about 15 minutes before we officially had to open. I started taking the used bikes out the door, which pretty much block the entryway until I get them outside, but this guy had to force his way in anyway. He said something like “there’s not much room in this place” and before I could bite my tongue, I had already said “yeah, until I get these bikes out so we can open” oops…. I was a jerk again. In my defense, I had some of the lights in the shop still off, since we weren’t actually open yet. And I was still a little asleep from waking up so early. Work was busy all day, but only one triathlete dropped off a bike for same- day repairs. Turned out that they just got it out after storing it since- get this- last year’s tri. She said the chain came off last year, and jammed in the pedal. This is where the chain currently resided when I got it in the stand. Thankfully, all it needed was a front derailleur adjustment and a new bottom bracket to get it working again. I’m not really sure that not riding your bike for an entire year is good training for triathlon, but I’ve been wrong once or twice in my life.
Actually, I saw her on Sunday at the Triathlon. She was way behind after the swim and I never saw her again before I left. I had ridden out to the beach house on my city bike loaded down with about 40 pounds of stuff including; a boombox, a six bottles of 312, and a lawn chair. Unfortunately, I had no takers on the beer and couldn’t really bring myself to drink alone while I watched, so I rode back home later with all 6 bottles still in the cooler. Maybe 9 AM on a Sunday is not conducive to drinking, but I was a little bummed that I rode all the way out there with so much untouched alcohol. To cheer myself (and the volunteers and a few runners left on the course) up, I fired up the boombox, blaring Neil Diamond to everyone I passed on my way back home. I think I can even take credit for motivating at least one woman on the course who started singing along to “Sweet Caroline” as she was walking along and she started running again as I passed. Once I got home, I pretty much wasted the rest of the day, but it was good to have some down time after such a busy weekend.