Keeping up with dudes

Holla!

I spent last weekend doing the following:

• Camping! In a tent! That I pitched! For two whole nights! With no potties for at least 100 yards!
• This is truly a fact worthy of five exclamation points, as you see, I was raised a Girl Scout, but Troop 1050 of Henry Elementary were hardly the Red Feathers of Culver City, ifyouknowwhatI'msayin.
• Keeping up with Hubs and his pals on a 110-mile bike ride, even though they all have much (MUCH) nicer bikes than I. Thank you, Body Pump, for the quads of steel. Even with relatively little training, this ride was ten bazillion times easier than our little trip to Winterset last year. 
• It seems having a little less chunk to haul around makes a heckuva difference! I'm guessing all that running helped my endurance, too.
• Also, this was not a race. But I want all you fine people to know that I passed many, many riders on nice bikes, with fancy, unflattering bike shorts and $100 helmets. It seems looking like a biker does not make one a biker. Who knew?
• RAGBRAI, which for those of you who are not familiar is:
• A bike ride across the state of Iowa, in which I rode the final two days from Cedar Rapids to Clinton on the river.
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• Street parties galore!

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• 20,000 riders deep.

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• A little of this. 

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• Adorable local om-pa bands! 

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• PIE. Lots and lots of pie. 

It was so fun! My cell phone broke right before we headed out, so I was free as a bird all weekend, which was delightful. We're already plotting our return for 2013. Hopefully with slick team t-shirts and custom koozies. 

Were any of my lovely readers on RAGBRAI? I actually met up with an old college friend who randomly found me on the street in Anamosa. I was shocked because I had sunglasses on, and I can never recognize people when they wear sunglasses, particularly when I haven't seen them in seven years. Can you?

Related: your favorite type of pie? Mine is berry. With ice cream.