That's One Fine Chicken Sammich!

4:15 Thursday afternoon I left W.O. for my attorney's house in Charleston, WV. At 5:00 it started snowing. By 5:30 I was moving at a top speed of 40 mph on the interstate, with the death grip on the xB's wheel. Many "oh shit, I can't see the road!" moments later, and a few skids and spins later I arrived at said attorneys house and gave it all I had to get the xB up the big ass hill and into his driveway without tipping over.

8 hours later my attorney and I are up, eating eggs and packing the xB to head to Georgia for Southern Cross II. The weather forecast sort of deteriorated for Dahlonega (which I believe is pronounced Dallllllllllonngeeeeeaieee, but I'm not real sure), and went from just witch tit cold to witch tit cold with a dose of snow. Great. Anyway, I had Brad (formerly known as my attorney) check e mails one last time JUST to make sure there were no last minute race up dates/cancellations before we left. There were none. Off we go... but first we need gas and cash.

Brad cashed up, I filled up and got some windshield washer fluid for the snowy drive, and we were off. 2 miles later my wiper line was apparently froze and none of the just bought fluid would come out. THUS I couldn't really see. So I stopped, tried to fix it- nothing. We continued on driving with about 10-20% visibility. Great.

An hour later we stop AGAIN to try to fix it. Nothing. Some dude in the parking lot suggests adding a little bit of alcohol to the fluid. Who are we to argue with a random trucker type dude giving out advice at gas stations. So we stopped at a Lowes to buy some sort of shit to put in it. Still nothing. Frig.

The best moment came as Brad and I are both hunched down, trying to see out the window, traveling at 70 mph, with snow, and salt blowing at us. We were approaching two tractor trailers at warp speed with some death metal song of Brad's blaring from the xB's hi-fi. Brad just casually says "This is how we're going to die."

Four hours and several hundred miles later, we entered the sunny, snowless North Carolina. A few miles later the washer fluid FINALLY comes and I can see!! Frig yeah!!! Now that we can relax a bit, Brad checks his voice mail messages. He says "the race is canceled." I of course think he's joking and he says again "NO, the f*cking race is cancelled, turn around!" I STILL don't believe him, so he hands me the phone and sure as shit, it was Eddie telling us the race is postponed do to snow at the venue and safety concerns. Great.

We're sort of in shock, and VERY much in f*cking North Carolina!! LOL! So we travel down the road a bit, stop at a Chick-fil-A, eat, get some gas and do ONE BIG GIANT U-TURN to head back to Charleston.

How far will YOU drive for a chicken sandwich??

So NOW what?? I'm feel like an old man from being in the car for 8 hours, but Brad suggests we go for a snowy night ride at Kanawha and then drink some beer. I am less than thrilled of the idea of riding... I just wanted to sleep. BUT I was pretty stiff and of course wanted to earn some beer calories. He promised it would be low key, so I caved.

Once home we kitted up and headed to the park. The now was deep, the trails which are known for being damn technical were even more so with several inches of snow on them. BUT they were forgiving to the body upon impact!

The ride was more of a hike for me. My brakes weren't really working in the snow, but it was damn fun and a hell of workout. It wasn't all that long, but t was damn nice to get out and do something after being in the car for 8 hours.

Then there was beer, pizza, Rock Band (God am I bad at it!!), and watching cycling movies until 3:30 a.m.. Even though we only rode for about 1:20, and the conditions were less than ideal, we somehow managed to turn the day into and endurance event of our own. It was a great time, and I thank Brad and K-Schmalz for their generosity and hospitality.

Disappointed to miss the event. I hope Eddie can get it rescheduled for folks. If rescheduled, I can't imagine that I will make a second attempt at it this winter. I think my travels (read finances) are done until spring. I would like to bitch, but we were just on the business end of Snow Miser totally destroying us (in a pants down, "are you using the whole fist??, over the barrel sort of way). Even if the roads to the venue would have been good I can't imagine the course roads at higher elevations would have been too safe for racers. Oh well, we tried to race, but succeeded at having a good time despite some bad luck.

Later.