2020, Day 14: Commemorations

Happy birthday to Mom, today! Sixty-six never looked so good. One could imagine dad leaving the pre-life waiting room but pausing to hold the door for mom, first, as if it were meant to be.

In celebration of her years of experience, mom got to go do things that she wasn't very interested in. What a treat! First waiting for dad to bike, then waiting for dad to shower, then waiting for dad to explore a museum before getting to go out to the Senior Citizen of steakhouses, Texas Roadhouse. I hope she ate plenty of bloomin' onions out of spite.

Since the weekend lands politely between their birthdays, hopefully mom and dad will take some time Saturday or Sunday to celebrate properly and find some cake somewhere. I doubt dad brought his guitar on the trip, but maybe he serenaded her over a scoop of free vanilla ice cream after the steak dinner? Either way, hope it was a fabulous day, Mom!

While it seems almost a waste to go all the way to Canton and not go into the museum, I get it. Mom had eight children. She doesn't need a museum dedicated to dumb kids tackling each other, she was a referee for the bulk of her adulthood without even needing a striped shirt, whistle, and belt flag. She's earned the right to watch from the picnic table. Her Hall of Fame may not be perfectly curated, and it might not have a sprawling lawn with spray-painted logos and yardlines, but her HOFs pulled the weeds themselves, so we can probably call it even. Nowadays the team may be in a rebuilding stage, but the farm system has some promising prospects.

From Dad:

We got a later start today. We had to drive out 40 miles to start the ride at Wakeman. Another detour--more on that later. So we started out at 9:25. Cross wind again, slightly in my face, slowed me down somewhat in the early part of the ride. Later, blocked by trees and deep valleys it became less of a factor. Most of the day I had no shoulders to ride on, so traffic had to give a little space. After the first 20 miles, I started climbing, mostly long, gradual hills. The last 7 miles into Richfield, though, was a steep roller coaster, plus a detour that added a couple of miles and an extremely steep hill--I went to my lowest gear--and still had to rest halfway up. Finished up at 1:05, so 41.6 miles in 3:40.

After showering, we drove 40 miles to Canton and I visited the NFL Hall of Fame. Mom wasn’t interested, so she enjoyed the outside area around it. I spent two hours inside, and really enjoyed memories of football over the past many 55? years that I have been watching. Then we went to Texas Roadhouse for Linda’s birthday dinner, then back to the hotel.

With his latest arrival at Richfield, dad is now three square days (triangular days?) ahead of his original schedule, despite all the setbacks. Nice job, dad!